EE – What is human nature?
DMP – What we call “human nature”, the apostle Paul often calls ‘the flesh’ (for example Romans 8:8–17). It is the way we think and act when we ignore God. It is our selfish, greedy, proud way of life—the way Adam and Eve chose when they defied God and took the forbidden fruit (Genesis 3:6). John summarises it neatly in 1 John 2:16. Jesus has his own version in Matthew 15:19. Note that the human heart has a bias to evil, not to good. To please God we have to try to conquer our natural feelings, and follow the example of Christ. Paul likens it to changing a coat: ‘You have heard about him and were taught in him, as the truth is in Jesus, to put off your old self, which belongs to your former manner of life and is corrupt through deceitful desires, and to be renewed in the spirit of your minds, and to put on the new self, created after the likeness of God in true righteousness and holiness’ (Ephesians 4:22–24).
EE – Is total victory over sin really possible in this world for believers in Christ?
DMP – We can only have victory over sin through our faith in Jesus’ death and resurrection. As Paul says in 1 Corinthians 15:57, it is God who gives us the victory through Jesus. Our own efforts to be righteous will always fail. Even the great apostle Paul, a better person than any of us, found himself constantly breaking the law of God: ‘Wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death? Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord!’ (Romans 7:24–25). Only Jesus could set him free from his sins.