Romans 7:15–25

¹⁵I don’t understand what I do. I don’t do what I want to do. Instead, I do what I hate to do. ¹⁶I do what I don’t want to do. So I agree that the law is good. ¹⁷As it is, I am no longer the one who does these things. It is sin living in me that does them.

¹⁸I know there is nothing good in my sinful nature. I want to do what is good, but I can’t. ¹⁹I don’t do the good things I want to do. I keep on doing the evil things I don’t want to do. ²⁰I do what I don’t want to do. But I am not really the one who is doing it. It is sin living in me.

²¹Here is the law I find working in me. When I want to do good, evil is right there with me. ²²Deep inside me I find joy in God’s law. ²³But I see another law working in the parts of my body. It fights against the law of my mind. It makes me a prisoner of the law of sin. That law controls the parts of my body.

²⁴What a terrible failure I am! Who will save me from this sin that brings death to my body? ²⁵I give thanks to God. He will do it through Jesus Christ our Lord.

So in my mind I am a slave to God’s law. But in my sinful nature I am a slave to the law of sin.