While this is a glorious truth, believers still battle indwelling sin after conversion as part of their sanctification. As the Westminster Confession of Faith states, “This corruption of nature, during this life, does remain in those that are regenerated; and although it be, through Christ, pardoned and mortified, yet both itself and all the motions thereof are truly and properly sin” (6.5).
Romans 6–8 reveals the dynamics of sanctification. In 6:1–23, the Apostle explains that believers have experienced a radical breach with the power of sin through their union with Christ. In 7:13–25, he explains the ongoing battle with indwelling sin. And in 8:1–11, he charges believers to mortify remaining sin by the power of the Holy Spirit. At one and the same time, the Apostle teaches that believers are no longer totally depraved and that the “corruption of nature” remains within them.
When we consider the full-orbed teaching of Scripture about the believer’s relationship with his or her sin, we will have a right understanding of what we were, what we are, and what we one day will be. And we will be able to say with Newton: I am not what I ought to be. I am not what I wish to be. I am not what I hope to be. Yet, I can heartily join with the Apostle and acknowledge, “By the grace of God, I am what I am.”
This article about total depravity originally appeared here and is used by permission.
