An Existential Dilemma

Thesis: Common for enslaved people, after being freed, to go back to their slave mentatlity. In the same way, those who have been liberated by Christ go back to their sinful habits and bondage to sin.

THE BELIEVERS DILEMMA

• New creature in Christ (2 Corinthians 5:17)
• Partakers of divine nature (2 Peter 3:4)
• Still ive in body of flesh (Romans 8)
• Believer lives in two worlds

I. AN ILLUSTRATION (v. 1-6)

• The bond of marriage (dissolved only by death)
• Jesus broke law yoke and married us
• Anulled our relationship to law
• Obedience now motivated by love

II. AN EXPLANATION (v. 7-14)

• Problem is not law - which is good, problem
  is operator of law - sinful people
• Sinful flesh manifests the law:
  love = joy in other's achievements
  sin = coveting (envying) their success