October 24

What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me from this body of death? — Rom 7:24 BSB

If the Holy Spirit has placed that sorrowful cry in your soul, “O wretched man that I am!” then what follows is inevitable: “Who shall deliver me from the body of this death?” Where will you look for deliverance? From what direction will it come? Will you look to the law? Certainly not! The law curses and condemns you because you continually break it. Will you turn to friends? They may sympathize with you, but they cannot remove the body of sin and death—it is too deeply intertwined. Will you turn to ministers of truth? You may find approval in their words, but more is needed to free you from the grasp of sin and death. Will you turn to the Scriptures? They hold the remedy, but you need that remedy to be applied personally to your soul.

So, “Who shall deliver me?” Where can you find refuge? To whom can you turn? From what direction can deliverance come? See the bewilderment! View the perplexity of a struggling soul—looking here, looking there, turning to the right, turning to the left. Yet deliverance can come from only one direction. When the Apostle reached this point—when he was sinking low, looking everywhere for deliverance—God blessed his soul with a view of His precious Son. The Holy Spirit worked in his heart, raising up living faith so that he could see Jesus. And through this faith, the blood and love of the Lamb were communicated to his conscience.