There was once a poor country vicar who was livid when he confronted his wife with the receipt for a £250 dress she had bought. "How could you do this!" he exclaimed.
"I don’t know," she wailed, "I was standing in the store looking at the dress. Then I found myself trying it on. It was like the Devil was whispering to me, "Gee, you look great in that dress. You should buy it."
"Well," the pastor persisted, "You know how to deal with the Devil! Just tell him, "Get behind me, Satan!"
"I did," replied his wife, "but then he said "It looks great from back here, too."

I'm sure you've all done something you later regretted and wondered why it was that even though you knew it was the not the best idea at the time, you went ahead and did it anyway.

I'd like to explore that idea a little more today with the help of that classic device, the angel on one side and the devil on the other. And a willing victim in the middle.

Angel gives child two sweets:

Devil: Mmmm. What has it got in its pocketsies, eh? What's it got? A Sweetie. TWO sweeties, very nice.

Angel: Two sweets. One to eat and one to give to (your sister).

Devil: No! The precious! Mustn't give it away. Mustn't let go of the precious. It's all yours, must eat it all up!

Angel: Sharing is good and kind.

Devil: And sweeties is good and tasty.

Angel: Just think how happy you'll make her if you share.

Devil: But she'll never know.

Angel: You'll know, and you'll feel bad about it.

Devil: You'll feel full in your belly that's what you'll feel.

Make your choice! Eat it or share it!

After sweets eaten.

Angel (places paper and pen on altar): Come on now XXXXX its time to do your home work.

Devil: Come on XXXXX its time to play on the playstation.

Angel: It will only take a few minutes

Devil: Then there's no harm in waiting a bit and doing it later, you've plenty of time.

Angel: But you're doing so well in school at the moment, your teacher is so pleased with you.

Devil: You don't want to look like a teachers pet do you?

Angel: You've got a test tomorrow.

Devil: And you've got a high score to beat on Call of Duty.

Make your choice – play on the computer or do boring homework.

Ladies and gentleman, here we have a young (man) who will go far in life.

Let's have a round of applause.

If you find that you struggle to do what you know to be right, or find yourself doing what you know to be wrong, you are in surprisingly good company – St Paul, author of 1/2 the new testament and possibly the most committed Christian in history, willing to suffer and die for his faith, even he says The good that I want to do I don't do, and the things I don't want to do I find myself doing.

Now it tends to be assumed that in order to live life the right way, all we need is to know what to do and then we will do it.

Self help books and magazines are everywhere– offering you quick tips in how to improve. Show examples,

We buy into the idea time and again – this little tip, this new bit of information, this secret, that's what I need.

But it is not knowledge that guarantees change. And neither, more worryingly, is it just a case of motivation.

We can be fully aware of what we should be doing, and fully convinced of its rightness, and yet Sometimes it just seems that we are physically incapable. The head says vegetables, the hand reaches for the hobnobs. The head says save the planet and walk to church, the hand reaches for the car keys. I was going to include the teacher thinking I could go into school, but there's Wimbledon on the the TV....school, or Wimbledon – I know, let's go on strike, pass the remote control (but I didn't want to alienate the audience).

St Paul chooses to reflect our inner struggles with ourselves as being a battle not between an angel on one shoulder and a devil on the other, but between our spirits and our bodies. He is suggesting that it is a battle with our very selves, as if it were our very flesh, our physical substance that was the problem. Maybe we can relate to this. We want our bodies to do something but they just wont behave and do as they are told. Our bodies are not always under our control. For me, dancing is the classic example. In my mind I can be Fred Astaire (for those of you of that generation) or Aston from JLS for younger members. I might imagine I can throw some shapes. But the reality is... a little different.

The spirit is willing. The body doesn't have a clue. Its not a matter of knowledge, I took dance classes for 18 months. You might as well have given lessons to a halibut. It doesn't matter how clear I am in my head, the flesh isn't going to do it.

But Paul extends the idea to the whole of life saying “I delight in the law of God in my inmost self, but I see in my body another law at war with the law of my mind, making me captive to the law of sin that dwells in my body.

Today, with all our understanding of the way our minds and our bodies, our psychology and our genes and our experiences interact to produce our behaviour, we can still feel the value of Paul's point, though we might express it in different terms.

What does it mean for us? There is much that we could say, but I don't intend on having a whole ethics seminar and a nature/nurture/free will debate in this context. For now just simply this.

I think we often seem to judge people, including ourselves, as if they go around freely choosing their actions. If someone does something we don't like, we assume that they could easily have chosen to do otherwise. If they fail to do something we would have liked, its easy to assume that they could simply have just done it. And yet we know from our own experience that life isn't as simple and uncomplicated as that.

This is not to say that we should make easy excuses. It wasn't me what done it your honour, it was my body, or my brain or my genes or whatever. Ok then we'll lock your body up and let your spirit go free, how does that sound. Never the less, the Christian idea of sin questions the belief that people neatly choose to do right and simply choose to do wrong.

The good that I want to do I do not, and that which I do not want to do is what I do. It is easy to beat up on yourself or other people. Why do I keep doing that. Why does he or she always react like that and so on.

But Paul goes on to say in Chapter 8 of Romans, God does not expect us to be perfect, and does not condemn us when we fail, as long as we focus our desires on his way. As long as we are willing to keep up the inner battle and not surrender.

He knows that each of us is a work in progress. That is why we can come to his table and receive his body and his blood, signs of his forgiveness and reminders that it is the body, as well as the mind, that needs to be offered as a sacrifice to God. It is both the spirit and the flesh that need to be transformed and like Paul we can only look beyond this life for that transformation to be complete.

Jesus says “Come to me those who are weary and heavy laden and I will give you rest. My burden is easy and my yoke is light.” So let us come to his table, and lay down our burdens. Amen.