Still Growing?

 Greetings to you all in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ,

     Romans 7:17-22 says, “ Now then it is no more I that do it, but sin that dwelleth in me.  For I know that in me (that is, in my flesh,) dwelleth no good thing: for to will is present with me; but how to perform that which is good I find not.  For the good that I would I do not: but the evil which I would not, that I do.  Now if I do that I would not, it is no more I that do it, but sin that dwelleth in me.   I find then a law, that, when I would do good, evil is present with me.  For I delight in the law of God after the inward man:”

     There are some things in my life that seem to come naturally. That is, I don’t have to be taught how to do them.  Such is the case of those things that are more prone to come as a result of the flesh rather than the Spirit.  I was never taught how to procrastinate or how to lose my temper, or how to be impatient.  I was never taught how to be selfish or filled with pride.  These are all things that come after the flesh, nor do I have to seek for an excuse to do them.  They are just there all the time.

     The Apostle Paul mentions such a life in the above passage.  He wanted to do that which was good, but ending up not doing it and the evil things that he didn’t want to do, that’s what he ended up doing.  It would be easy to just give up and say, “Well, I’m going to do the wrong thing anyway so I might as well just keep on doing it.”  To have that type of philosophy would be against sanctification or your daily spiritual growth.  There probably are those times when we “slip up” and do that which we were not planning to do and then have to confess it before God.  There have been times when I have made a remark to someone and later think, “I should not have said that “ and then find myself looking for the person in order to apologize.  Not long ago, I used my credit card to get a bottle of soda from the machine and it gave me three bottles instead of one.  I gathered up the bottles and took them to my room and put  two of them in the refrigerator.  The bottles were $1.50 each in the machine and had to look for a staff person to give the $3.00 to in order for the soda company to receive their just amount.  I would have been easy to say, “Well, it’s high priced anyway.  Their loss, my gain.”  I have been yelled at, criticized and rebuked for many things in my life and no doubt deserved most  of it.  My Fat her’s proverbs were always good for me to follow, such as, “But your mind in gear before you put your mouth in motion.”  If Paul had the same problem, then we are in good company , or so we may think.  Paul was growing also and he was still living in the body of flesh as he points out.  So are we but that doesn’t negate our attempting to grow from day to day.  You may not recognize the growth right away but in a couple of years, it may be more visible in  your life.  Praise God for His patience toward us.