The Relation of Sin and the Body

The Relation between Sin and the Body

A Christian enters a decidedly hazardous period of his life upon coming to know the truth of co-death and experiencing something of freedom from sin. If at this juncture he receives good instruction and permits the Holy Spirit to apply the cross to himself in a deeper way, he eventually will reach spiritual maturity. But if the believer is content to view his experience of victorious life over sin as the apogee of attainment and forbids the cross to contravene his soul life then he will abide in the soulical realm and mistake his soulical experience for a spiritual one. In spite of the fact his old man was dealt with, the believer’s soul life remains untouched by the cross. The will, mind and emotion will therefore continue to function without any check; and the result: his experience is confined to the realm of the soul.

What we need to know is how far such deliverance from sin actually has affected our being—what it has touched but also what it has not yet touched which should be. More especially must we understand that sin has a very particular relationship to our body. Unlike many philosophers we do not consider the body intrinsically evil, but we do confess that the body is the province of sin’s domination. In Romans 6.6 we find the Holy Spirit describing our body as “the body of sin,” for it is nothing but that before we experience the treatment of the cross and yield our members to God as instruments of righteousness. Sin had seized our body and forced it into servitude. It became sin’s fortress, instrument and garrison. Wherefore no designation is more fitting than that of “the body of sin.”

A careful reading of Romans 6 through 8, which tell of deliverance from sin, will uncover not only what is the relation of the body to sin but also what is God’s perfect salvation in releasing our body completely from serving sin into serving Him.

In Romans 6 the Apostle sets forth these statements:

“the sinful body might be destroyed” (v.6)
“let not sin therefore reign in your mortal bodies, to make you obey their passions” (v.12)
“do not yield your members to sin as instruments of wickedness” (v.13)

“yield . . . your members to God as instruments of righteousness” (v.13)

In Romans 7 God uses Paul to speak of the body in the following terms:
“at work in our members” (v.5)
“I see in my members another law” (v.23)
“making me captive to the law of sin which dwells in my members” (v.23)
“who will deliver me from this body of death?” (v.24)

In Romans 8 the pronouncements of the Holy Spirit through Paul are very plain:

“your bodies are dead because of sin” (v.10)
“will give life to your mortal bodies also through his Spirit which dwells in you” (v.11)
“if by the Spirit you put to death the deeds of the body you will live” (v.13)
“the redemption of our bodies” (v.23)

From these passages we can begin to discern God’s particular concern towards our body. God is aware that the body is sin’s special sphere of operation. Man has become a slave to sin because his body is sin’s puppet. But the moment his body is disemployed from sin the person ceases to be its slave. A man thus freed from sin actually experiences the liberation of his body from its power and influence.

The purpose in crucifying the old man is to release the body from the dominion of sin. With the old man, sin’s partner, crucified and the new man taking its place, sin’s power over the body is broken, because without the cooperation of the old man sin cannot directly use the body.

It must be emphasized that to be delivered from the power of sin merely means to have our body liberated. (Of course our perfect redemption which also includes the deliverance from the presence of sin lies in the future). Not yet dealt with is the life of the soul upon which we lean. If we consider victory over sin as life on the highest plateau then we are most foolish. We are accepting the “annulling” or “withering” of the body as life supreme but ignoring the fact that over and above the body of sin stands the natural soul which requires as much dealing as does the body. A believer’s spiritual odyssey is bound to be shallow if he only knows the body unemployed (wonderful as that may be) but fails to experience the soul life denied.

Mention was made earlier of the active self or soul engaged in the work of God. The body may be “withered” but the soul remains quite active. It may express itself in many different ways yet it invariably centers upon self. Believers who live in the soul incline towards either will or mind or emotion. They may even shift in their inclinations. But though outward appearances may differ, the inward clinging to the soul characterizes them all. Those who are disposed towards volition will walk according to their own delight and refuse the will of God. Those whose propensity is towards mind will order their way according to their own wisdom and neglect to receive with quietness the guidance of the Holy Spirit in their intuition. While those whose natural disposition is emotional will seek for pleasures in their feelings. Whatever one’s bent, each will view his tendency as life supreme. No matter the direction of the inclination, one thing is common to all such people: all live in themselves: all live in what they naturally possessed before believing the Lord—whether talent, ability, eloquence, cleverness, attractiveness, zealousness, or whatever. In principle, soul life is natural strength; in manifestation, its expression is either by stubborn unyielding or by self-conceit or by pleasure-seeking. If therefore a believer lives by his soul he will draw naturally upon his reservoir of strengths and will exhibit a particular strength in one or more of these ways. Unless the believer offers his soul life to death, he shall cultivate that life, incur the displeasure of God, and miss the fruit of the Holy Spirit.