Law of sin
Day 561, Monday, Feb. 23
Romans 7:7-25
This is one of the most raw and painful passages in all of Paul’s writings, as he speaks of being torn between the law of God and the law of sin. “Once I was alive apart from the law; but when the commandment came, sin sprang to life and I died.”
In the law being spelled out, we lost our innocence, and it became clear that we were sinful. It becomes clear that we are falling short. In a sentence most of us can relate to at one time or another, Paul said, “For what I want to do I do not do, but what I hate, I do.”
You can almost hear Paul wailing when he said, “What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me from this body that is subject to death?”
Fortunately, though, that desparate question has an answer: “Thanks be to God, who delivers me through Jesus Christ our Lord!”
To Paul, sin is not an inconvenience that keeps us from living our best life. It is a prison that condemns us to a painful death—a prison from which Jesus provides the only release.

-Rev. Mark Fleming

Monday meditation

Psalms 83:1-18
O God, do not remain silent; do not turn a deaf ear, do not stand aloof, O God. See how your enemies growl, how your foes rear their heads. With cunning they conspire against your people; they plot against those you cherish. “Come,” they say, “let us destroy them as a nation, so that Israel’s name is remembered no more.”
With one mind they plot together; they form an alliance against you—the tents of Edom and the Ishmaelites, of Moab and the Hagrites, Byblos, Ammon and Amalek, Philistia, with the people of Tyre. Even Assyria has joined them to reinforce Lot’s descendants.
Do to them as you did to Midian, as you did to Sisera and Jabin at the river Kishon, who perished at Endor and became like dung on the ground. Make their nobles like Oreb and Zeeb, all their princes like Zebah and Zalmunna, who said, “Let us take possession of the pasturelands of God.”
Make them like tumbleweed, my God, like chaff before the wind. As fire consumes the forest or a flame sets the mountains ablaze, so pursue them with your tempest and terrify them with your storm. Cover their faces with shame, Lord, so that they will seek your name.
May they ever be ashamed and dismayed; may they perish in disgrace. Let them know that you, whose name is the Lord—that you alone are the Most High over all the earth.

Prayer focus
Free us, God, from the sin that imprisons us.