‘For indeed, I am not knowing or understanding what I am working out and producing. For what I am not intending and desiring, this I am doing, and what I am detesting and hating, this I am manufacturing and constructing. And if I am doing this, what I do not intend, I am agreeing and consenting in company with the law that is good and honourable. 17 Now at this present time, not like before, I [ego] am no longer fully working it out to completion, on the contrary, the self-forfeiture sitting and dwelling within me’, (Romans 7 v 15 - 17).
Paul continues to present himself as an illustration of his teaching. He is now talking in the present tense, having in the past been sold across the other side under the power of self-forfeiture and loss. He was carried across to divine condemnation, but divine law itself did not cause this, nor is divine law inherently bad. The cause of his selling across is the fact that he exists as a fleshly entity, and the result at this present time, as a Christian, is that he does not know or understand his behaviour. There is a fundamental contrariness and conflict within the very fabric of his being. There are certain behaviours and actions that he does not intend or desire to engage in, yet he finds that he nevertheless engages in these very behaviours. There are certain behaviours and actions that he hates and detests yet these are the very things that he sometimes finds himself constructing.
So how does this situation relate to good, clean, divine law? He tells us in the next two verses. ‘And if I am doing this, what I do not intend, I am agreeing and consenting in company with the law that is good and honourable. 17 Now at this present time, not like before, I [ego] am no longer fully working it out to completion, on the contrary, the self-forfeiture sitting and dwelling within me’, (verses 16, 17).
There are two important principles that emerge from out of this inner conflict and contrariness. He states the first in verse 16. He finds himself doing something – behaving, speaking, thinking – that he does not intend or desire, that he even hates and despises. So the first principle is this - IF he does not intend or desire such behaviour THEN this means that he agrees in company with the good and praiseworthy divine law. IF he does not intend or desire such behaviour, THEN he is not constructing this behaviour from out of considering divine law to be bad or dishonourable. He is not dismissing divine law, or opposing divine law.
The first principle in relation to divine law is this -
IF we are engaging in speech and behaviour that we do not intend or desire, or that we despise,
THEN we are in agreement in company with good, honourable and praiseworthy divine law
Let’s imagine that I impulsively and opportunistically steal something, even though I do not usually desire to steal, and usually consider stealing to be a transgression of divine law and therefore disapproved-of by God. In stealing I have acted contrary to myself and done something that I disapprove of, that in a more sober moment I did not intend. I am not only acting contrary to myself but also contrary to divine law, which I agree with - stealing is wrong. The first point that Paul is making is that because in my calm and sober moments I do not intend to steal, that I even despise stealing, then in this instance of my stealing, it does not mean that I therefore disagree with or oppose divine law. Rather my behaviour is inconsistent with my usual intentions and with the divine law that I agree with.
