NOTES for Rom 7:18-25
In this passage the apostle Paul speaks about himself with more than frankness, revealing to the reader the full depth of his weakness. "Wretched man that I am!" he says of himself, but when we read these words, we cannot help applying them to ourselves and to all humanity. This "wretchedness," in the saint's view, lies in the monstrous discord between what the divine nature in a person wants and what his bodily nature does.
Very often we understand that we are doing something bad, even know where it can lead, and still continue. Our nature is so deeply saturated with sin that we are unable to change it. This is not simply some flaw we can get rid of, not a problem we can handle. Only the Lord can help us in this, the One who works miracles, changing our nature and truly divinizing it.