I first learned this lesson from reading a book by Neil Anderson on spiritual warfare. There is not a single time that God's people are called "sinners" in the Bible. In the Bible "sinners" are always those on the outside of the Kingdom.
When I say "I am not a sinner," I'm not saying I don't ever sin. I'm saying that's not who I am.
Paul says something very interesting toward the end of Romans 7 that I have pondered for a very long time. In Romans 7, Paul talks about his inability to do the good he wants to do. That's not the part I had trouble with. However, what Paul says below seemed like some sort of denial; it didn't feel right. Yet there it was in the Bible, and Paul says it twice! Here are the passages (I underlined the part I was having trouble with):
And if I do what I do not want to do, I agree that the law is good. As it is, it is no longer I myself who do it, but it is sin living in me. (Ro 7:16–17)
For what I do is not the good I want to do; no, the evil I do not want to do—this I keep on doing. Now if I do what I do not want to do, it is no longer I who do it, but it is sin living in me that does it. (Romans 7:19–20)Now, what is this? Doesn't that look like a cop-out? It sounds like, "Hey, I did it, but it wasn't me doing it." Huh? How does that even make sense?!
Unpacking Romans 7:7-25
Before I tell you how I see that passage now, let's do a little study first and compare this with the following chapter.In the Greek language (unlike English) it is usually not necessary to say "I" (Greek ego - ἐγώ). Like Spanish, one can assume that I'm talking about my by the conjugation of the verb. For instance in Spanish I can say "Voy a la casa," meaning "I'm going home." You'd know I meant I was going because of the verb form I used. If I said "Vamos a la casa," you'd know I meant "Let's go home." I don't need to say "Yo voy a la casa," which would sound a bit like "I, I'm going home." I'd only add the "Yo" ("I"), if I wanted to emphasize who was the one going home.
Sorry for the Spanish lesson, but here's the point: in this regard Greek is the same. Unlike English, we can know that Paul is talking about himself by the verb conjugation he uses. The really interesting thing is that in Romans 7:7-15, Paul uses the pronoun for "I" twenty-three (23) times (counting in Greek, not English). He does not use it at all in Romans 8--not once.
Isn't that interesting? What does that mean?
Romans 7:7-25 is Paul talking about his inability to do what he knows is right. Romans 8:1-17 is about how to live rightly before God. What is present in Romans 8, that seems to take the place of "I" (ἐγώ) is flesh (Greek: sarx, σάρξ).* When Paul does this we learn something about what he means by "flesh" namely it's me - but more specifically it's me without the Spirit (cf., Rom 7:18). It's us, trying to do it on our own, without God's help.
What we find in Romans 8 is that with the Spirit's help we can set our minds on what the Spirit desires (Rom 8:5), that we can live in the realm of the Spirit (Rom 8:9), that by the Spirit we can put to death the misdeeds of the body (Rom 8:13). In other words, in ourselves we have no hope to live a godly life, but empowered by the Spirit we can and should expect to! If Romans 7 seems like moral failure, Romans 8 offers moral victory! But it's a victory that is won by the Spirit living in us, and by being led by Him--that is by following His lead.
Who or What is Doing the Sinning?
Now let's get back to the strange statement of Paul in Romans 7:17, 20: it is no longer I who do it, but it is sin living in me that does it.What is Paul talking about here? Paul is talking about his inner conflict and his inability to understand himself in this. He does what he hates, and what he wants to do, he can't. He resolves the dilemma by stating that it's not him, but something living in him causing the problem. He even names that thing living in him as "sin."
We get the idea that Paul thinks about the sin living in him as not really him. The problem isn't him, the problem is not who he is; he isn't the problem. Something else is the problem. It's in him but it isn't him.
My theological and spiritual upbringing did not equip me to understand what Paul was actually saying here. I picked up that I was sinful by nature--even as a believer, and that's why I sinned. That is to say, when I sinned I was just being my true self. I was assured that I would still be forgiven, but I felt doomed to live a sinful life, until I died or the Lord returned. I was a sinner, but I was still under grace. I must admit, I did not feel much incentive for self-improvement! Why try, when failure is guaranteed! When I got myself more edumacated, I equated the endeavor with the myth of Sisyphus, condemned by the Greek gods to push a boulder up a hill, but whenever the boulder got near the top, it would roll back to the bottom: an act of eternal frustration.
The teaching of Neil Anderson I referenced above began to change my understanding of who we really are in Christ, and eventually how to understand Paul's statements above. The New Testament always speaks of believers as "saints" - that is "holy ones." It never qualifies this, to let us think that we are to understand this in some potential sense. Most of the Epistles begin "To the saints in..."
We are supposed to believe the Bible, right? So if they Bible always talks about believers as holy ones (saints), and if we are believers, what are we? Holy ones, of course. And who are the "sinners?" Those outside the Kingdom; those who are not (yet) believers. We are no longer identified as sinners, because "sinner" is no longer our identity.
In Christ we are a new creation; the old has gone, the new has come (2Cor 5:17). In our new selves, we are not what we were.
When sin shows up, what happens is that there's something going on that is out of sync with our new identity. It's not the real us; it's not the real me. That's not who I really am. That is exactly what Paul is saying. When we sin, we are acting outside our true character, we are behaving in a way inconsistent with our true identity. In fact, it's not even us doing it--not the real us.
The "sin living in us" is more like a parasite living in our intestine. It's foreign. It doesn't belong. It shouldn't be there. While parasites can't make us sin, they can make us physically ill. In the same way sin living in us, even though it isn't a part of us, can make us spiritually ill. The problem isn't us, it's something that doesn't belong, staying in residence after it's been evicted.
When God gave the land of Canaan to the Israelites as they crossed the Jordan, led by Joshua, the land was theirs, but they still had to "take possession" of it. They still had battles to fight. The peoples who lived their, still lived there, but they weren't Israelites, so they didn't belong. God, through Joshua, and subsequent leaders, removed them incrementally. Similarly, there's stuff in me that doesn't belong. God is removing it incrementally. But the important thing to know for this blog entry is that it doesn't belong, it's not supposed to be there, and I'm under no obligation to live with it (Rom 8:12-13).
This isn't the same as some of what's come out of the holiness movement. I'm not saying we can get a second blessing to keep us from ever sinning again. I'm not saying we don't sometimes sin. I am saying that, if I sin, that doesn't make me a "sinner" any more than putting bread in a toaster makes me a cook.
I am not a sinner. That's not who I am. I'm a saint--a holy one. God says so.
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*The NIV84 wrongly (IMHO) puts "sinful nature" here; the NIV2011 rightly reverts to "flesh."
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