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.
You must be born again
61-1231M §65
Now, what kind of a nature have you got then, Brother Branham? His nature. If I had my father's nature, then I'd do the things my father did. But now that I'm born again, it depends on who my father was. If you're just born in a church, you got a church father, and you can call him "father" if you want to. You call him anything you want to, because he's your father. But if your Father is God, and you're born in the family of God, you seek those things that pertain to God. That's right. Then you are God's child. You...
You must be born again
61-1231M §32
And although the creed that they recite, I do not believe that we could criticize it. Some of them are pure and holy, some of them are real scriptural, but the scripture is not applied in the right place. And, even applying the scripture, I believe that the new birth is something beyond that. Even though how well you might mean it, I believe something ... that the new birth is far beyond your good intentions and your thoughts, minds. It's beyond that.
You must be born again
61-1231M §105
...now---manifesting." Tell them all about this, "Tonight you're a sinner, tomorrow you're manifested sons of God." Nonsense! Where do you get that in the Word? Babies are not born men. They're born babies and grow to men.
Ye must be born again
58-0619B §54
...it don't make any difference whether they think that we should have this television program, or this, that or the other. Let us keep our eyes on the Master. Remember to be born again is to have that extreme love and know that we've passed from death unto life. We have the abundance of life, and the abundant life is that overflowing something that God puts into the human being.
You must be born again
61-1231M §74
I'm looking at a little woman right now that come to me not long ago with a vision or a dream she had, and I got the interpretation. Still, it's kind of hard to go tell that little Pentecostal preacher's wife that she didn't have the Holy Ghost; but she didn't. But then she received it. Yes. It's different, see. Yeah. It ain't speaking in tongues, it ain't dancing in the Spirit. There's none of those things you can lay it onto. It's a death and a birth, a changed nature, a changed disposition. The old things are de...