For I do not do the good I want, but I do the evil I do not want.
Paul wrestles deeply with sin in today’s first reading. He says, “For I do not do the good I want, but I do the evil I do not want.” [Read Rom 7:18-25]
So many of us live in that tension. We struggle with sins we can’t seem to overcome and get discouraged because we think that if grace were really working, the struggle would be gone.
But Paul gives us a kind of litmus test for whether or not we’re on the right track. The key question is this: Do you want to be free from it?
Whatever keeps troubling you, whatever thing you wish you could change, if there were a switch you could flip to be rid of it forever, would you flip it?
I can think of times in my life when I wouldn’t have. I made a conscious decision to keep certain sins because they gave me comfort. That’s completely different from the desire to be free.
The desire to be free and to do the good you want is THE sign that you’re on the right road. It is not your will. Paul says, “Now if I do what I do not want, it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells in me.” The devil tries to discourage us precisely there, when we’re fighting.
We often want God to take things away from us instantly, but that would actually work against our growth. The building of a life of grace and virtue happens in the struggle. The relationship with God deepens there.
Yes, He can and will deliver us, but only at the perfect time. This is the work that must be done in the soul. The detachment from created things and ability to cling to Him alone is only obtained in the struggle.
So why does God let us keep struggling? Because that’s where we are sanctified. Maybe you’ll wrestle with it your whole life. But that’s part of what it means to embrace the Cross: to say, “God, even if I fight this every day for the rest of my life, I’ll do it and keep clinging to You.”
That’s where our freedom begins. That’s how we embrace our cross, grow in virtue, detach from this world, and grow in intimacy with our loving Father.
Realizing this is when we can start to give thanks for the struggle. When we see that it’s the very thing God is using to draw us closer to Himself.