System Failure

Using the example of a computer virus, writer Will Timmins writes on Romans 7: “Like a computer virus, sin has entered inside the system (‘living in me,’ vv. 17, 20), where it has impaired all operations (my bodily ‘members,’ v. 23) from functioning according to their original design (carrying out God’s good law, vv. 16, 18, 19, 21). This radical, systemic impairment results in an inability to accomplish the good (vv. 15, 18, 19). It means we have a radical moral disability. We’re incapacitated (vv. 18, 23). The pure, holy goodness of the law is beyond our reach. Because he is fleshly, the good Paul wants to do he does not do” (Will Timmins, “What’s Really Going on in Romans 7,” The Gospel Coalition, July 2, 2018).