Tuesday, April 5: Josh Hosler

Wretched man that I am! Who will rescue me from this body of death? - Romans 7:13-25

I remember hearing this passage in church when I was a kid. My best friend Trav and I sat in the front row and giggled throughout, much to the annoyance of my parents. At home, we got out a Bible and read it again. We challenged each other to read it five times fast. We couldn’t make head nor tails of it, but we knew it sounded hilarious. We wanted to shout, “Wretched man that I am! Who will save me from this convoluted sentence structure?”

The passage continued to elicit giggles from me well into high school. One night at summer camp, each of the campers was asked to share a passage of scripture that was meaningful to us. I thought I’d lighten the mood a bit, so I read this passage and received, to my delight, many more chuckles from my fellow campers. But Father Phil, the head of the camp, smiled knowingly: “You may think it’s funny now, but once you understand it, you won’t find it funny at all.”

When we’ve lived long enough, we do understand it. No matter how hard we try, we can’t “be good.” We continue to do things wrong. We continue to mess up—not only by accident, but even willfully—all the time. We justify our actions one way or another, and then we feel awful when we suffer the consequences. Are we sorrier for the action, or for the consequences?

Yet the most important line in the passage is this one: “Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord!” We have nothing to fear, because Jesus knows our hearts and understands our struggles. Each time we fall down, we can get back up again, not with groveling, but with dignity … because we are God’s beloved children.

—Josh Hosler