O Wretched Man That I Am

Key Passage: Romans 7:24–25

Romans VerseQuest Commentary
Essay 47: O Wretched Man That I Am
Text: Romans 7:24–25

Introduction

Romans 7:24–25 says, “O wretched man that I am! who shall deliver me from the body of this death? I thank God through Jesus Christ our Lord. So then with the mind I myself serve the law of God; but with the flesh the law of sin.” Paul has just walked the reader through one of the most honest descriptions of inward conflict ever written. He has confessed that in his flesh dwelleth no good thing. He has shown that to will is present with him, but how to perform that which is good he finds not. He has admitted that the good he would, he does not, and the evil he would not, that he does. He has identified sin dwelling in him, evil present with him, the inward man delighting in the law of God, and another law in his members warring against the law of his mind. Then, after tracing the battle down to its deepest agony, he cries, “O wretched man that I am!” That is not the cry of a lost man boasting in darkness. That is the cry of a saved man who has learned the rotten limitations of self.

This is the place every honest believer must come to if he is going to stop trusting fleshly confidence. Most Christians do not learn it from a sermon outline. They learn it in the battlefield, after vows break, resolutions crack, emotion fades, religious confidence collapses, and the flesh proves once again that it has no intention of becoming holy simply because it heard a good message on Sunday. The flesh is not improved by religious attention. It is not tamed by compliments. It is not sanctified by willpower. It is not transformed by law-keeping. It is not cured by being dragged to church and dressed in respectable clothes. The flesh remains flesh. Paul does not cry, “O confused man that I am,” or “O undertrained man that I am,” or “O man who needs a better program that I am.” He cries, “O wretched man that I am!” The man has stopped flattering himself, and that is often where deliverance begins to become clear.

Romans 7:24–25 also gives the answer. Paul does not say, “What shall deliver me?” He says, “Who shall deliver me?” That is one of the greatest turns in the chapter. The answer is not a method, a rule, a system, a ceremony, a discipline, a feeling, or a fleshly performance plan. The answer is a Person: “I thank God through Jesus Christ our Lord.” The Christian life cannot be lived by self delivering self from self. That is like asking a prisoner to unlock himself with a key swallowed by the jailer. Self cannot crucify self into victory by trusting self to manage self. The believer needs the living Christ. He needs the deliverance of God through Jesus Christ our Lord. Romans 7 ends with the confession that the mind serves the law of God, but the flesh serves the law of sin. Romans 8 will open the window and let the sunlight pour in: “There is therefore now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus.” But before the shout of Romans 8, there is the groan of Romans 7. Before the Spirit’s liberty is set forth, the flesh’s bankruptcy is exposed.

Chapter One: The Honest Cry of a Broken Man

“O wretched man that I am!” is not theatrical humility. It is not Paul posing for a religious portrait with a sad face and folded hands. It is the honest cry of a man who has seen the war inside him and knows that his own strength is not the deliverer. Wretchedness here is not the same thing as condemnation. Paul is not saying he is lost, damned, abandoned, or outside of Christ. He is describing the misery of a renewed man still carrying mortal flesh. He delights in the law of God after the inward man, yet sees another law in his members bringing him into captivity. That contradiction produces a groan no shallow religion can understand. A corpse does not complain about being dead. A living man groans when death clings to him.

This cry exposes the difference between spiritual honesty and religious cosmetics. The average religious performer wants to appear strong, balanced, victorious, polished, and stable enough to impress the pews. He speaks in spiritual slogans and keeps the real battle hidden behind a painted smile. Paul will not play that game. He shows the wound. He names the misery. He does not dress the flesh in a choir robe and call it progress. He says, “O wretched man that I am!” That kind of honesty is not weakness; it is light. A man who cannot admit his wretchedness in the flesh will keep trusting the very thing that keeps betraying him. You cannot seek deliverance while still admiring the prison.

The cry is also personal. Paul does not say, “O wretched world,” though the world is wretched. He does not say, “O wretched Pharisees,” though he knew that system well. He does not say, “O wretched pagans,” though Rome was full of them. He says, “O wretched man that I am.” The sword has turned inward. The doctrine is no longer safely aimed at someone else. Many people love preaching that exposes the other crowd. They enjoy sermons against liberals, Catholics, cults, atheists, politicians, compromisers, and obvious reprobates, but Romans 7 drags the believer into the examination room and says, “Now look at your flesh.” The man who always applies conviction outward has not yet learned the deepest lesson of this chapter.

Chapter Two: Self Cannot Deliver Self From Self

Paul’s cry proves that self cannot deliver self from self. The flesh cannot rescue the believer from the flesh. Adam cannot cure Adam. The old nature cannot manufacture victory over the old nature by promising to behave. That is the comedy of fleshly religion: the problem appoints itself as the solution, prints a plan, holds a meeting, and then acts shocked when the same corruption shows up for work the next morning. The flesh can make resolutions, sign pledge cards, attend conferences, memorize rules, grit teeth, shed tears, and still remain flesh. Fleshly confidence is a rooster crowing on a manure pile and calling it sunrise.

This does not mean the believer is passive. Romans 6 commanded reckoning and yielding. Romans 8 will command walking after the Spirit. The Christian is responsible to obey, mortify, yield, pray, watch, resist, and walk in truth. But he must never mistake responsibility for self-sufficiency. A man can be responsible to walk while still needing life and strength from God. The problem in Romans 7 is not that Paul does not know what is right. He knows. It is not that he does not desire what is right. He does. It is that knowing and desiring, when placed upon the flesh as the source of performance, cannot produce deliverance. The will is present, but the power is not found in self.

This is why so many believers live in cycles of failure. They sin, feel grief, make a vow, try harder, fail again, and then either despair or lower the standard. Some become hypocrites and hide the cycle. Some become legalists and condemn everyone else to distract from the war inside. Some become careless and claim grace means the battle does not matter. But the honest believer eventually sees the issue: “Who shall deliver me?” Not “How can I deliver myself?” Not “What rule will finally make my flesh spiritual?” Not “What ritual will make Adam stop being Adam?” The question must become “Who?” because deliverance is found in Christ, not in self-management.

Chapter Three: The Body of This Death

Paul asks, “who shall deliver me from the body of this death?” He does not ask deliverance merely from a bad habit, a difficult circumstance, a social pressure, or a lack of religious knowledge. He speaks of “the body of this death.” The believer is redeemed, justified, reconciled, indwelt, and alive unto God, but he still carries a mortal body affected by sin and death. Romans 8:23 will speak of believers waiting for “the redemption of our body.” Until that day, the saved man lives in a body where sin seeks occasion, where members can become instruments, where another law wars, and where mortality still groans. Salvation has already delivered the soul from condemnation; final glorification will deliver the body from death’s presence.

The phrase is heavy because the body is where the battle is often felt. The eyes, tongue, hands, feet, appetites, nerves, memories, impulses, and physical weaknesses all become fields of conflict. The body is not evil in itself; God made the body, and the believer’s body is the temple of the Holy Ghost. But the present mortal body is unglorified, and sin works in the members. That is why Paul has already said, “Let not sin therefore reign in your mortal body.” The body is not to be worshipped, trusted, indulged, neglected, or surrendered to sin. It is to be yielded unto God. But even when yielded, it remains mortal until Christ changes it.

There is no full deliverance from “the body of this death” by law-keeping. The law can say what the body should and should not do, but it cannot glorify the body. The law can command purity, but it cannot remove lust from the flesh. The law can condemn sinful acts, but it cannot raise a dead body from the grave. The believer needs more than commandments; he needs resurrection power and final redemption. Philippians 3:21 says the Lord Jesus Christ “shall change our vile body, that it may be fashioned like unto his glorious body.” That is the end of this groan. The believer is not waiting for the flesh to improve. He is waiting for the Saviour to change the body.

Chapter Four: The Question Is Who, Not What

“Who shall deliver me?” is the question that turns the whole passage toward the answer. Paul does not ask, “What shall deliver me?” because the answer is not a thing. It is not law, ceremony, tradition, discipline, philosophy, education, psychology, ritual, emotion, or religious enthusiasm. Those things may have limited usefulness in their proper earthly places, but none of them can deliver a man from the body of this death. A commandment can point at the chain. A program can teach a man how often he has worn it. A ceremony can decorate it. A counselor can discuss how it feels. Only Christ can deliver.

The difference between “what” and “who” is the difference between dead religion and living Christianity. Dead religion hands a man a method and tells him to climb. Christianity points to a Saviour and says He came down. Dead religion offers steps, systems, sacraments, seasons, vows, rules, and human effort. Christianity gives Jesus Christ our Lord, crucified, buried, risen, seated, interceding, and coming again. Paul has already tried the religious ladder. As Saul of Tarsus he had zeal, law, circumcision, tribe, tradition, and Pharisee credentials stacked high enough to impress any synagogue committee. Then the commandment came, sin revived, and he died. Religion gave him a résumé; Christ gave him life.

This question also humbles the believer. The Christian life is not a monument to the believer’s spiritual toughness. It is a testimony to the sufficiency of Christ. The believer who has learned Romans 7 does not strut into Romans 8 congratulating himself. He crawls out of self-confidence and says, “I thank God through Jesus Christ our Lord.” The answer is not found by looking deeper into self, but by looking away from self to the Lord. Self-examination has its place, but it is a terrible saviour. Stare at the flesh long enough and you will either despair or become delusional. Look to Christ and you will find the only Deliverer strong enough to answer the wretched man’s cry.

Chapter Five: I Thank God

Paul answers his own question: “I thank God through Jesus Christ our Lord.” The first words of the answer are not “I try harder.” They are “I thank God.” Deliverance begins with God, not man. Thanksgiving replaces despair because the answer lies outside the failing flesh. Paul does not thank himself for discovering a better system. He does not thank Moses. He does not thank the law, though the law is holy, just, and good. He thanks God. That is where all true deliverance must end: the glory going to God because the power came from God. Human flesh loves systems where it can claim a little credit. Grace shuts that mouth.

“I thank God” means the cry of wretchedness is not the final sound. Romans 7 is not hopeless. It is honest. Honesty about the flesh prepares the soul to rejoice in God’s answer. A man who has never seen his wretchedness will treat Christ like a religious accessory. A man who has seen it knows Christ is his only deliverer. The deeper the discovery of fleshly failure, the sweeter the thanksgiving for divine deliverance. Grace shines brightest when the flesh has finally stopped pretending it owns a flashlight. When self-confidence dies, thanksgiving breathes cleaner air.

This thanksgiving also shows that the Christian life is not meant to remain a miserable loop of defeat. Some use Romans 7 as though Paul built a house there and invited every believer to live permanently in the cellar. But the passage moves toward thanksgiving and then into Romans 8. The groan is real, but it is not the destination. The struggle is real, but it is not the Saviour. The flesh is real, but it is not lord. The believer thanks God because deliverance is available through Christ. The Christian who understands Romans 7 does not make peace with failure. He learns why self fails and then looks to the One who does not.

Chapter Six: Through Jesus Christ Our Lord

The answer is “through Jesus Christ our Lord.” Every word matters. Deliverance is through Jesus, the Saviour who died for sins. It is through Christ, the anointed One raised from the dead. It is through our Lord, the One with authority over the believer’s life. The Christian does not find deliverance through religious self-improvement but through union with the crucified and risen Lord. Romans 6 already said the believer is dead with Christ and alive unto God through Jesus Christ our Lord. Romans 7 now brings the struggling man back to the same Person. The answer to sin’s penalty, sin’s dominion, and sin’s inward conflict is never less than Christ.

Jesus Christ delivers in more than one sense. He has delivered the believer from condemnation by His blood. He delivers from sin’s dominion as the believer reckons and yields under grace. He delivers in daily experience as the believer walks in the Spirit and depends upon Him. He will finally deliver from the body of this death when He changes the believer’s body at the resurrection or rapture. Deliverance is past, present, and future in its application, but Christ is the Deliverer in every stage. The believer does not graduate from needing Christ. The more mature he becomes, the more deeply he knows he needs Him.

This crushes religious willpower as the foundation of Christian living. Willpower may choose, but it cannot supply resurrection life. Law-keeping may define conduct, but it cannot produce the Spirit’s power. Fleshly confidence may look impressive for a season, but it will crack under real pressure. Jesus Christ our Lord is not merely the One who saves the sinner at conversion; He is the One through whom the believer lives. Galatians 2:20 says, “nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me.” The Christian life is not Paul doing his best for Jesus. It is Christ living in Paul as Paul walks by faith. Anything less becomes Romans 7 frustration with religious wallpaper.

Chapter Seven: The Mind and the Flesh

Paul concludes, “So then with the mind I myself serve the law of God; but with the flesh the law of sin.” This closing statement summarizes the conflict. The renewed mind agrees with God’s law. It consents that the law is good. It delights in the law of God after the inward man. But the flesh serves the law of sin. That is the division the believer must understand. The mind, renewed by truth, points toward God. The flesh, unchanged in its nature, still operates under sin’s principle. The Christian must not confuse the two, and he must not trust the wrong one.

“With the mind I myself serve the law of God” shows the reality of inward renewal. Paul’s true inward consent is toward God. He is not a rebel at peace with sin. He is a man whose mind recognizes and serves God’s truth. This is why doctrine matters. The mind must be renewed by Scripture. Romans 12:2 will say, “be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind.” A believer who neglects the word weakens the very faculty that ought to serve God’s truth. The mind must be furnished with Bible doctrine, rightly divided truth, and the knowledge of Christ. A blank mind is not spirituality. It is an unlocked door.

“But with the flesh the law of sin” is the final warning before Romans 8. The flesh has not changed teams. Do not trust it. Do not feed it. Do not excuse it. Do not ask it for spiritual power. Do not be surprised when it serves sin’s law. The flesh may learn hymns, memorize verses, attend church, condemn other people’s sins, and sound religious, but it remains flesh. The believer must walk after the Spirit, not after the flesh. Romans 7 ends by leaving the two principles clearly distinguished. The mind serves God’s law; the flesh serves sin’s law. Romans 8 will show the way of no condemnation and life in the Spirit.

Conclusion

Romans 7:24–25 gives the cry and the answer. The cry is “O wretched man that I am! who shall deliver me from the body of this death?” That cry comes from a man who has learned that self cannot deliver self from self. He has discovered that the flesh contains no good thing, that desire alone cannot perform righteousness, that the inward man may delight in God while the members still war, and that the body remains a place of conflict until final redemption. This is not the cry of unbelief. It is the groan of a believer who has stopped lying about the flesh.

The answer is “I thank God through Jesus Christ our Lord.” Deliverance is not through fleshly confidence, religious willpower, law-keeping, ritual, or emotional effort. It is through Christ. He delivers from condemnation by His blood, from dominion by union with His death and resurrection, from daily defeat through the Spirit’s power, and finally from the body of this death by glorification. The believer does not need a better Adam. He needs the risen Christ. He does not need to polish the flesh. He needs to walk in the Spirit. He does not need to return to law as a power source. He needs to live by dependence on Jesus Christ our Lord.

So Romans 7 closes with the conflict still identified: the mind serves the law of God, but the flesh serves the law of sin. That distinction keeps the believer honest until Romans 8 opens the door to the Spirit-filled answer. Do not trust the flesh. Do not despair because the flesh is present. Do not mistake inward conflict for divine abandonment. Do not make Romans 7 an excuse for sin, and do not pretend Romans 7 is not in the Bible. Let it do its work. Let it slay confidence in self. Let it expose the body of this death. Then look where Paul looks: “I thank God through Jesus Christ our Lord.” The wretched man’s cry is answered by the worthy Saviour.