Why Do I Still Struggle After Being Born Again?
1) Direct Answer
You still struggle because the new life is in you, but your body and human spirit have not been redeemed yet. The Holy Spirit in your inner man wars against the flesh. That conflict is a sign of life, not a sign that you were not born again. God allows the fight to train you, prove you, and make you an overcomer.
2) Scriptural Explanation
- The Bible says, “The flesh lusteth against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh” (Galatians 5:17). That’s the battle you feel.
- Paul said he delighted in God’s law “after the inward man,” yet felt another law in his members (Romans 7:22-25). Then he declares, “There is therefore now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus” (Romans 8:1-2).
- We “groan within ourselves, waiting for…the redemption of our body” (Romans 8:23). The soul is reborn now; the body’s redemption is future.
- Those sealed “with that Holy Spirit of promise” are “sealed unto the day of redemption” (Ephesians 1:13; 4:30). God keeps what He births.
- “Whosoever is born of God doth not commit sin; for His seed remaineth in him” (1 John 3:9). The Seed in the soul cannot deny the Word. When a believer stumbles, he is grieved and confesses (1 John 1:9), and has “an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous” (1 John 2:1).
- God chastens sons (Hebrews 12:6-8). Correction is proof of sonship, not rejection.
- “Resist the devil, and he will flee from you” (James 4:7). “God…will…make a way to escape” for every temptation (1 Corinthians 10:13).
- Put on the whole armor of God and use the Sword of the Spirit, the Word (Ephesians 6:10-18).
3) Simple Clarifying Logic
- New birth changes your nature. You love the Word and hate sin. The struggle remains because you’re still in the same body with old habits pressing from the outside. The Seed inside cannot disbelieve the Word, but the flesh must be crucified daily. Feed the inner man with the Word and prayer, and starve the flesh by refusing its avenues (eyes, ears, thoughts, companions, places).
- Condemnation is the enemy’s voice; conviction is the Spirit drawing you to confess and walk on. If you can sin without grief, that’s danger; but if it pains you and drives you to Christ, that’s life.
4) Short Reinforcing Counsel
- Stay in the Word daily; speak it back to temptation.
- Pray and watch; avoid the doorways of the old life.
- Confess quickly; don’t hide. The Blood answers the accuser.
- Fellowship with the faithful; put on the armor.
- Remember: the battle means you’re alive. God started the work, and He will finish it.
Ask a Follow-up Question
What did the Laodicean Church Age (our age) Angel (- messenger) Say about this?
Ranked passages from the local William Branham sermon and Church Age Book database. Relevance is relative, not a statement of doctrinal certainty.
To whom shall we go?
60-0604 §43
Nicodemus asked the question, "How can I be born again? I'm an old man, enter into my mother's womb the second time?" He said, "Except a man be born again he cannot see the kingdom of God." Now that translation there is really understand. Understand the kingdom of God. The kingdom of God is within you, so you couldn't actually see it unless you see it operating. But the only way you will ever be able to understand it, you've got to be born again. To be born again, you've been filled with God's Spirit, then you're i...
Questions and Answers (God being misunderstood)
61-0723E §82
And nobody knowed nothing about it. It was a strange thing that the King of the Jews was born and people hundreds of miles away knowed about it; and right here in the city where He was born, and the place He was born, amongst the people He was born to, and they knowed nothing about it. They misunderstood the Magi. They said, "There's no such a thing as the king of the Jews. We got a king up here, Herod." He was misunderstood in His birth when He was born. And Mary was to be mother before she was married to Joseph....
You must be born again
61-1231M §44
First, we reckon ourselves sinners and worthy of condemnation. And we are all born in sin and shaped in iniquity, there's not a sound parcel of us. Our minds are bad, our soul is corruptible, our constant thinking is evil, every imaginary thought of a man's mind is evil---a sinner. And also that our body is weak, our spirit is no good, and we're just full of corruption. And how could one corruptible thing bring another good thing out of a corruptible? Let me say this, that in Job, fourteenth chapter, he said, "Seei...
Stand Still
57-0518 §22
And then when the children of Israel stood still, God spoke from the heavens, and the Red Sea stood still. It stood on the side line. And it heaped its great walls up like mountains, standing at attention. When Jehovah spoke, the Red Sea stood still. God commands to stand still. And Israel passed over through the Red Sea as if it was on dry land. And the waters of the mighty, raging sea stood still. Not long after that, some forty years, after the people would not receive Caleb and Joshua's message, God said, "They...
Ye must be born again
58-0619B §13
...at settles it." His life proves that he isn't, then he isn't saved. And the legalist says, "I've got to do this, and I must do this, and I must do that." Then if you're not born again you're still not saved, so there you are, see. It's in between, in the middle of the road, is where we've got to stay.