or power, _of sin_, ver. 23, dragging me as it were at my conqueror’s chariot-wheels, into the very thing which my soul abhors. _O wretched man that I am, who shall deliver me from the body of this death!_ ver. 24. Who shall deliver me from this helpless, dying life: from this bondage of sin and misery! Till this is done, I _myself_ (or rather, _that I_, αὐτὸς ἐγὼ, _that man_ I am now personating) _with the mind_, or inward man, _serve the law of God_; my mind, my conscience is on God’s side: _but with the flesh_; with my body, _the law of sin_, ver. 25, being hurried away by a force I cannot resist. 11. How lively a portraiture is this of one _under the law_! One who feels the burthen he cannot shake off; who pants after liberty, power and love, but is in fear and bondage still! Until the time that God answers the wretched man, crying out, _Who shall deliver me_, from this bondage of sin, from this body of death? _The grace of God, through Jesus Christ thy Lord._ III. 1. Then it is, that this miserable bondage ends, and he is no more _under the law, but under grace_. This state we are, Thirdly, to consider, the state of one who has found _grace_ or favour, in the sight of God, even the Father, and who has the _grace_, or power of the Holy Ghost, reigning in his heart: who has received, in the language of the apostle, _the Spirit of adoption, whereby_ he now _cries, Abba, Father_! 2. _He cried unto the Lord in his trouble, and_ God _delivers him out of his distress_. His eyes are opened in quite another manner than before, even to see a loving, gracious God. While he is calling, _I beseech thee shew me thy glory_, he hears a voice in his inmost soul, _I will make all my goodness pass before thee, and I will proclaim the name of the Lord: I will be gracious to whom I will be gracious, and I will shew mercy to whom I will shew mercy_. And it is not long before _the Lord descends in the cloud, and proclaims the name of the Lord_. Then he sees, (but not with eyes of flesh and blood) _The Lord, the Lord God: merciful and gracious, long-suffering, and abundant in goodness and truth: keeping mercy for thousands, and forgiving iniquities and transgression and sin_.