²³ but I see another law at work in me, waging war^(A) against the law of my mind and making me a prisoner of the law of sin^(B) at work within me.

¹⁷ For the flesh desires what is contrary to the Spirit, and the Spirit what is contrary to the flesh.^(A) They are in conflict with each other, so that you are not to do whatever^[a] you want.^(B)

Submit Yourselves to God

4 What causes fights and quarrels^(A) among you? Don’t they come from your desires that battle^(B) within you?

² because through Christ Jesus^(A) the law of the Spirit who gives life^(B) has set you^[a] free^(C) from the law of sin^(D) and death.

¹⁹ I am using an example from everyday life^(A) because of your human limitations. Just as you used to offer yourselves as slaves to impurity and to ever-increasing wickedness, so now offer yourselves as slaves to righteousness^(B) leading to holiness.

²⁵ Thanks be to God, who delivers me through Jesus Christ our Lord!^(A)

So then, I myself in my mind am a slave to God’s law,^(B) but in my sinful nature^[a] a slave to the law of sin.^(C)

Living Godly Lives in a Pagan Society

¹¹ Dear friends,^(A) I urge you, as foreigners and exiles,^(B) to abstain from sinful desires,^(C) which wage war against your soul.^(D)

God Disciplines His Children

⁴ In your struggle against sin, you have not yet resisted to the point of shedding your blood.^(A)

²⁵ Opponents must be gently instructed, in the hope that God will grant them repentance leading them to a knowledge of the truth,^{(A) 26} and that they will come to their senses and escape from the trap of the devil,^(B) who has taken them captive to do his will.