The previous post in this series can be found here:https://memoirandremains.wordpress.com/2014/01/27/oswald-chamers-the-psychology-of-redemption-2/

Chambers rejects the contention that “flesh” or the body is the seat of corruption:

The first man is of the earth, earthy. (1 Corinthians 15:47)

This is man’s glory, not his shame, because it is in a creature made of the earth that God is going to manifest His glory. We are apt to think that being made of the earth is our humiliation, but it is the very point that is made much of in God’s word. In the Middle Ages it was taught that sin resided in the actual fleshly body, and that therefore the body was a clog and a hindrance. The Bible says that the body is the temple of the Holy Ghost, not a thing to be despised. Sin is not in having a body and a nature that needs to be sacrificed; sin is in refusing to sacrifice them at the call of God. Sin is a disposition which rules the body, and regeneration means not only that we need not obey the disposition of sin, but that we can be absolutely delivered from it (Romans 6:6).

This is no insignificant point. If one holds that the corruption or the continued corruption of the human being after conversion rests in the physical body (as do some now, and as has been common in the history of the world), one will look to subdue the physical body by mere regime, and then eventually to escape the body.

Yet, if, as Chambers has it, the trouble is in one’s disposition, the solution will require outside help. In the form where one merely has an unruly set of bones and muscles, there is still an “I” (thinking, willing) who is right and can thus correctly determine in opposition to my body. Yet, if the fault lies in my thinking and willing — if it lies in my heart — the trouble is significantly more serious. There is no autonomous “I” who can correctly chart a course.