Thinking Like a Christian
A
series of Scripture meditations on what the Bible teaches about the
Christian life.
by Pastor Pete Beck III
These meditations are copyrighted,
but feel free to download them for
personal use or to forward to friends.
plausible deniability
And I know that nothing good lives in me, that is, in my sinful nature. I want to do what is right, but I can’t. 19 I want to do what is good, but I don’t. I don’t want to do what is wrong, but I do it anyway. 20 But if I do what I don’t want to do, I am not really the one doing wrong; it is sin living in me that does it. Romans 7:18-20 (NLT)
One thing we have grown to hate is when politicians evasively dance around the truth, looking for some way to have plausible deniability of their culpability for something that has gone wrong. Perhaps the signature moment for this sort of thing took place during Clinton's grilling for his involvement in the Monica Lewinsky affair when he uttered these now infamous words as an explanation if his previous assertion that "there's nothing going on between us."
"It depends on what the meaning of the word 'is' is. If the--if he--if 'is' means is and never has been, that is not--that is one thing. If it means there is none, that was a completely true statement....Now, if someone had asked me on that day, are you having any kind of sexual relations with Ms. Lewinsky, that is, asked me a question in the present tense, I would have said no. And it would have been completely true."
In other words, Clinton's defense was that he cleverly sought to deceive his interrogators by hiding behind a verb tense. Clearly he did not give them the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. He was playing games and became a mockery as a result. When a politician hides behind plausible deniability in order to cover up his or her involvement in a matter, it is disgusting and cowardly. The same is true for us as Christians when it comes to admitting our guilt in matters of sin. When we are brought face to face with our sinful actions, words, thoughts, or omissions, we cannot hide behind cute legal maneuvers or excuses. God, who sees our hearts, is never fooled. He takes no pleasure in deception or denial. He loves an honest admission of guilt, which is known in some parts as repentance.
That being the case, why then did Paul write what is quoted in our opening Bible verse? On the surface, it appears he is playing theological games with us. Is he saying that he was not responsible for his sins? Was King Agrippa right when he declared that Paul's great learning had made him insane? Had Paul crossed the line and begun to live in a fantasy world of no longer believing he committed sin? Did not the apostle John write: If we claim we have no sin, we are only fooling ourselves and not living in the truth. 1 John 1:8 (NLT)? Worse yet, has the Bible contradicted itself?
Whenever we come to scriptures that are difficult to understand, it important to bring what we clearly know into the equation. We know from the body of Paul's writings that he was a stickler for repentance and that he held people accountable for their actions. That being the case, what does Paul's statement in Romans 7 mean? Does Paul advocate some sort of plausible deniability when it comes to sin? In a way, yes!
It is vital that we understand the nature of our salvation. When we are born again through faith in Christ and his finished work, our spirits are brought back to life. The spirit is the innermost part of our being. It is where God's Spirit and ours are united. God lives in us and we in Him. Our spirits are made righteous and perfect in God's eyes. If you have put your faith in Christ, in your spirit you are as righteous as you will ever be. On the other hand, when you were born again, your body remained the same. Its salvation is yet in the future when Jesus will raise us from dead and give us glorious new spiritual bodies. Another part of us that was not immediately saved or changed was our soul. The soul is comprised of the mind, will, and emotions - our personality. Although some things in our personality were immediately affected as a result of the new birth, our personalities basically remained the same. If we were prone to be moody, that still exists. If we had quick tempers, we still have that to deal with. God is working on us on a daily basis as part of his ongoing, daily salvation, changing us little by little so that we think, speak, and act like Jesus. So then, our salvation is past, present and future and affects our spirits, souls, and bodies. (If you want to read more about our amazing three-fold salvation and see some Bible verses to support it, click here.) What does this have to do with our topic? Everything!
Paul understood that as Christians we have a very important decision to make. We can either identify with the new creation spirit man or we can identify with our old sin nature. When we were born again, Christ did not obliterate our old sin nature; rather, he rendered it ineffective in its ability to rule our lives. (Romans 6:6) It's still there, resembling an old incorrigible outlaw. Give him an inch, and he will take a mile. Give him half a chance, and he will try to turn the tables on us and make a clean getaway in order to commit some new crimes. The sin nature cannot be reformed: it had to be put to death. Christ accomplished that on the cross for us, but since it has been allowed to remain with us in its now weakened form, we must daily do battle with it.
So I say, let the Holy Spirit guide your lives. Then you won’t be doing what your sinful nature craves. 17 The sinful nature wants to do evil, which is just the opposite of what the Spirit wants. And the Spirit gives us desires that are the opposite of what the sinful nature desires. These two forces are constantly fighting each other, so you are not free to carry out your good intentions. 18 But when you are directed by the Spirit, you are not under obligation to the law of Moses. 19 When you follow the desires of your sinful nature, the results are very clear: sexual immorality, impurity, lustful pleasures, 20 idolatry, sorcery, hostility, quarreling, jealousy, outbursts of anger, selfish ambition, dissension, division, 21 envy, drunkenness, wild parties, and other sins like these. Let me tell you again, as I have before, that anyone living that sort of life will not inherit the Kingdom of God. 22 But the Holy Spirit produces this kind of fruit in our lives: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, 23 gentleness, and self-control. There is no law against these things! 24 Those who belong to Christ Jesus have nailed the passions and desires of their sinful nature to his cross and crucified them there. 25 Since we are living by the Spirit, let us follow the Spirit’s leading in every part of our lives. Galatians 5:16-25 (NLT)
My personal take on why this situation exists goes back to Genesis. When God created man in his image, he formed the body out of the dust of the earth and breathed his Spirit into him. The result was that man became a living soul. (Genesis 2:7) The soul or personality results from the combination of spirit and body. We are fearfully and wonderfully made! In the new birth, our spirits are perfected, but our bodies are still affected by the curse upon sin. They are dying daily, waiting for God to complete his salvation at the resurrection. The soul of a believer, then, is the result of combining a perfect spirit with an imperfect body, producing a state of constant turmoil. Part of us wants to serve God completely and passionately, but part of us is still linked to the old creation and has desires that are pitted against God's will. No wonder we are such a mess!
When we sin, therefore, it is because we have submitted to the sin nature instead of having lived out of our spirits in harmony with God's Spirit. Since we are responsible for what our souls (personalities - mind, will, and emotions) do, we must own up to our sin and repent. However, on an entirely different level, when we sin, we are not acting in accord with our deepest, true nature, the "real me," - the spirit. That is why Paul made the bold statement in our opening verse. The "I" he is talking about is the inner or spirit man, the real me that loves God and would never choose sin. So like Clinton did, we must split hairs about what is meant by a little word in order to have plausible deniability. But in this case, God approves of this maneuver because it is based in truth.
It is important that we choose to identify with the new nature, our spirit man, or else we may grow despondent and lose hope. How many times have you heard Christians say, "I wonder if I am really saved?" They become confused because they just fell into sin for the umpteenth million time it seems, and they have listened to human logic and the voice of the accuser of the brethren which tells them they have not really changed at all and never will. Right! The flesh or sin nature will never change. Give up on that hope and you will immediately be better off! Instead, place your hope in the coming sovereignty of the spirit man. One day he will rule supreme at the resurrection of the dead! At that point, we will have been delivered from the penalty of sin (justification), the power of sin (transformation), and the very presence of sin (glorification). In the meantime, our lives here on earth are opportunities for us to learn to walk by faith in the power of God's Spirit, who alone enables us to triumph over the downward tug of sin.
So now there is no condemnation for those who belong to Christ Jesus. 2 And because you belong to him, the power of the life-giving Spirit has freed you from the power of sin that leads to death. 3 The law of Moses was unable to save us because of the weakness of our sinful nature. So God did what the law could not do. He sent his own Son in a body like the bodies we sinners have. And in that body God declared an end to sin’s control over us by giving his Son as a sacrifice for our sins. 4 He did this so that the just requirement of the law would be fully satisfied for us, who no longer follow our sinful nature but instead follow the Spirit. 5 Those who are dominated by the sinful nature think about sinful things, but those who are controlled by the Holy Spirit think about things that please the Spirit. 6 So letting your sinful nature control your mind leads to death. But letting the Spirit control your mind leads to life and peace. 7 For the sinful nature is always hostile to God. It never did obey God’s laws, and it never will. 8 That’s why those who are still under the control of their sinful nature can never please God. 9 But you are not controlled by your sinful nature. You are controlled by the Spirit if you have the Spirit of God living in you. (And remember that those who do not have the Spirit of Christ living in them do not belong to him at all.) 10 And Christ lives within you, so even though your body will die because of sin, the Spirit gives you life because you have been made right with God. 11 The Spirit of God, who raised Jesus from the dead, lives in you. And just as God raised Christ Jesus from the dead, he will give life to your mortal bodies by this same Spirit living within you. 12 Therefore, dear brothers and sisters, you have no obligation to do what your sinful nature urges you to do. 13 For if you live by its dictates, you will die. But if through the power of the Spirit you put to death the deeds of your sinful nature, you will live. 14 For all who are led by the Spirit of God are children of God. 15 So you have not received a spirit that makes you fearful slaves. Instead, you received God’s Spirit when he adopted you as his own children. Now we call him, “Abba, Father.” 16 For his Spirit joins with our spirit to affirm that we are God’s children. 17 And since we are his children, we are his heirs. In fact, together with Christ we are heirs of God’s glory. But if we are to share his glory, we must also share his suffering. Romans 8:1-17 (NLT)
I quoted a big portion of Romans above so you can get a feel for the great news of the gospel. We are both responsible and not responsible for our actions. We have an obligation to repent and own up to our sins, while at the same time we have plausible deniability. We have been delivered from condemnation, but not from conviction. We have been delivered from the fires of judgment in hell but not from the fire of God's chastening and discipline in our lives. We have been set free from our bondage to the old sin nature and told to rightly identify with the new creation part of us. All of this is in agreement with some words the apostle John wrote:
We know that everyone fathered by God does not sin, but God protects the one he has fathered, and the evil one cannot touch him. 1 John 5:18 (NET1)
So the apostle who wrote that if we say we do not have sin, we are liars, also wrote that born again Christians do not sin. This is a great mystery which agrees with what Paul wrote in Romans Chapter Seven. Now all that remains is for you to stop identifying with your sin nature and believe the glorious good news that God no longer condemns you, nor does he regard that the true you is the one who is sinning. Even though you are required to own up to your sin (confession) and turn from it (repentance), you are not to believe your sin defines you. The real you loves God and would never do such a thing. That is why you feel so "torn up" when you sin. Don't let your sin lead you down a road to hopeless despair. Instead, keep reminding yourself that the real you loves God perfectly and does not want to sin. Get behind me, sin nature! I want to follow Jesus!
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