Living Transformed Lives Part 1: A Look at Romans 12:1-2

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1 Living Transformed Lives Part 1: A Look at Romans 12:1-2 Therefore I urge you, brothers, because God has compassion on our pitiful condition, to present your bodies a living and holy sacrifice, acceptable to God, which is your reasonable service. Don t be outwardly conformed to this world, but be inwardly transformed by the renewing of your mind, so that you may test and approve what is the good and acceptable and perfect will of God. - Romans 12:1-2 Introduction Many young Christians are ill-equipped to live the Christian life. As I ve talked with people and reflected on my own life, I think that salvation by grace through faith has been hammered home without a corresponding sense of what we re supposed to do until we die. How do I live the Christian life? is a question many are wondering, but few are trying to answer. When I was originally preparing this message, my hope was to look at living transformed lives through understanding who we are as humans and how that relates to the Christian life. But as I prepared, I couldn t get past Romans 12:1-2 and the message turned into a meditation and analysis of these two verses. The Problem Jesus said, I came that they may have life, and have it abundantly. 1 Paul told the Corinthians, If anyone is in Christ, he is a new creature; the old things passed away; behold, new things have come. 2 He also said, We are the aroma of Christ to God among those who are being saved a fragrance from life to life. 3 The apostle John says, Whoever keeps God s Word, in him the love of God has truly been perfected. By this we know that we are in Him: whoever says, I abide in Him, ought to walk just as He walked. 4 How many of us would say that we have life abundantly? Are we new creatures? Would fellow Christians say that we are the sweet-scented aroma of Jesus, or would they suggest that we smell like something else? Are we walking as Jesus walked? I know that Jesus came that I may have life abundantly, but I m not sure if that s how I would describe my life. I know that the Bible says that I m a new creature, but there doesn t seem to be anything new about me. 1 John 10: Corinthians 5: Corinthians 2:15, John 2:5-6 1

2 know. I d like to think that I m the sweet aroma of Christ to those around me, but I don t I m trying to walk like Jesus walked, but I m not there - and I m not likely to ever get there. So what s the point? At one time or another, all of us have been discouraged and disappointed in our Christian walk. We don t pray, read the Bible, or love people the way we d like to. We see other Christians hearing from God and being led by Him, but we feel like He s either forgotten us or we aren t doing enough to have that kind of sensitivity. But James Houston reminds us, Our relationship with God does not depend on the good things we do, but on God s mercy. I want to live the transformed life that Jesus offers and of which the New Testament speaks, and I want to see the Christian community living that life too. Jesus said that the world will know that we are His disciples by our love for each other. We are not naturally the kind of people who can love each other. Being a follower of Jesus means being transformed into a new kind of person, bringing us now to Romans 12:1-2. Therefore I urge you, brothers, because God has compassion on our pitiful condition, to present your bodies a living and holy sacrifice, acceptable to God, which is your reasonable service. Don t be outwardly conformed to this world, but be inwardly transformed by the renewing of your mind, so that you may test and approve what is the good and acceptable and perfect will of God. (paraphrase) The Mercies of God Romans 12:1-2 urges us to be transformed by the renewing of our minds. Living a transformed life - walking just as Jesus walked - is to be the reality of our lives. We are to be living sacrifices - not conformed to the world, but transformed into new creatures. But, this transformation is not brought about by us, even though we are to be willing participants in it. Paul urges transformation based on God s mercy. Christian transformation is possible because the foundation of our transformation is the mercy of God. The term mercies (oiktirmos) means pity, compassion for the ills of others the ground upon which believers are to present their bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God, as their reasonable service (Vine s). If we ever lose sight of the fact that it is God s mercy - not our effort - that is the foundation of transformation, we will live in discouragement and disappointment. Rather than being marked by love, we ll be marked by bitterness and envy. Everything discussed from this point forward is rooted in the fact that God, who is love, has pity and compassion on us, and He is the one at work in us. 2

3 Our Bodies = Living Sacrifices Interestingly, Paul s exhortation begins with our bodies: present your bodies a living and holy sacrifice. For this message, I originally wanted to deal with the question, What is a human being? Understanding who and what we are is critical in understanding so many other issues - including how to live the Christian life. A human being is a person comprised of a unity of body (physical) and spirit/soul (spiritual) who is created in the image of God. 5 Being a unity of body and spirit means that we can t expect to worship and serve God in our spirits or minds without also doing so with our bodies. A living sacrifice submits on the altar and allows God to do His will in our lives. Can we submit our entire selves - thoughts, plans, actions, attitudes, and words - to the Lord? Our Reasonable Service Most Bible translations translate the end of verse one as present your bodies a living and holy sacrifice, acceptable to God, which is your spiritual service of worship (this example from the NASB) and contain a footnote noting that spiritual also means rational. The Greek term is logikos (reasonable). Here is how Vine s defines the term and explains its context in Romans 12:1: the reasoning faculty, reasonable, rational The sacrifice is to be intelligent, in contrast to those offered by ritual and compulsion; the presentation is to be in accordance with the spiritual intelligence of those new creatures in Christ and are mindful of the mercies of God. Being a living sacrifice is a deliberate lifestyle requiring intentional action - what Romans 12:1 calls service. The word service (latreia) literally means hired service and comes from the word serve (latreuo) meaning to work for hire (Vine s). When we read about our spiritual service of worship, few us think about it in terms of being hired hands. This term is used in two other verses, which help shed some light on this concept. Hebrews 9:1 says, Now even the first covenant had regulations of divine service and the earthly sanctuary (NASB/KJV). In Romans 9:4, Paul uses the same word in a list of things entrusted to Israel: [to the Israelites] belongs the adoption as sons, and the glory and the covenants and the giving of the Law and the temple service and the promises God alone knows how He is to be properly worshipped and served. Therefore, Israel was given detailed instructions about appropriate sacrifices and the construction of the tabernacle and its furniture. Numbers chapters 3-4 outlines the services of the Levitical priests with different families having charge of specific aspects of the tabernacle and its liturgy. Because of His holiness, God could only be approached in the way He prescribed. 5 see Genesis 1:26-27 and 2:7; Matthew 26:41; and Romans 7:

4 Although the laws and liturgy of the Mosaic Law may sound legalistic and rigid, the amazing thing is that God made a way for sinful humans to fellowship with a holy God. Perhaps this is why David says that the blessed man delights in God s Law and constantly meditates on it. It would also explain his meditations and prayers relating to God s Law in Psalm 119. The Law of God reveals a holy God desiring to be in restored relationship with sinful, undeserving, ungrateful people. Of course, we are no longer under Law because of Christ s sacrifice, and we are able to now serve God appropriately because Jesus sacrifice did something that no sacrifice could do under the old covenant. The writer of Hebrews says, how much more will the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered Himself without blemish to God, cleanse your conscience from dead works to serve the living God? (Hebrews 9:14). Jesus sacrifice frees us to serve God with a clear conscience. Because of God s great mercy on us, being living sacrifices is our reasonable service to God. Not Conformed to this World Therefore, Paul encourages us to not be conformed to the world or age in which we live. The word conformed (suschematizo) means to fashion or shape one thing like another and has more especial reference to that which is transitory, changeable, unstable could not be used of inward transformation (Vine s). Let s not just do what the world is doing. Unless we re diligent, we ll take on the mindset, attitudes, and actions of the culture and people around us. Consider this passage in 1 Peter 1:13-15: Therefore prepare your minds for action; discipline yourselves; set all your hope on the grace that Jesus Christ will bring you when he is revealed. Like obedient children, do not be conformed to the desires that you formerly had in ignorance. Instead, as he who called you is holy, be holy yourselves in all your conduct; for it is written, You shall be holy, for I am holy. Christopher Hall says, Peter is well aware that ideas have legs. Skewed thinking inevitably leads to a skewed life. Learning to think well as Christians, though, will not come easily, particularly as Christ s Church lives within a foreign, toxic environment. Peter warns that without disciplined thinking and its accompanying life, the surrounding world will quickly shape Christ s community into a foreign mold. How can this be avoided? Both Paul and Peter confirm that not outwardly conforming to the world requires a transformation beginning with the mind. 4

5 Transformed by the Renewing of Our Minds Being transformed (metamorphoo) means to change into another form. Vine s explains, the obligation being to undergo a complete change which, under the power of God, will find expression in character and conduct; morphe [from transformed] lays stress on the inward change, schema [from conformed] lays stress on the outward. Paul doesn t urge us to conform to Christianity. Any outward change comes from inward transformation - specifically a renewal ( the adjustment of the moral and spiritual vision and thinking to the mind of God, which is designed to have a transforming effect upon the life ) of our minds ( the seat of reflective consciousness, comprising the faculties of perception and understanding, and those of feeling, judging and determining counsels, purpose ). Jesus completely changes the way we think, the kinds of things we think about, how we see people, how we see events, how we understand the world He changes everything. Filled now with His spirit, Paul says: For to us God revealed them through the Spirit; for the Spirit searches all things, even the depths of God. For who among men knows the thoughts of a man except the spirit of the man which is in him? Even so the thoughts of God no one knows but the Spirit of God. Now we have received, not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, so that we may know the things freely given to us by God For WHO HAS KNOWN THE MIND OF THE LORD, THAT HE WILL INSTRUCT HIIM? But we have the mind of Christ. (1 Corinthians 2:10-12, 16) We have the mind of Christ, therefore we can no longer be conformed by the world. Thomas Torrance says, Either you think from out of a mind centered in God through union with the mind of the Lord Jesus, or you think from out of a mind centered in yourself, alienated from God and inwardly hostile to the truth incarnate in the Lord Jesus, that is, in a way that is finally governed by the unregenerate and unbaptized reason. Having a renewed mind means constantly abiding in Christ, as Jesus spoke about in John 15. As disciples or apprentices of Jesus, we are with Him learning to be like Him. 6 And being like Him can be natural to us because He has sent us His Spirit, and our minds have been redeemed in such a way that we are able to think and discern based on the truth, rather than based in our own twisted, corrupt reasoning and thinking. We now have the mind of Christ. We are new creatures because we are transformed from the inside by a renewal of our minds. Therefore, Peter says, prepare your minds for action; discipline yourselves; set all your hope on the grace that Jesus Christ will bring you when he is revealed. This is the topic of Part 2, but let s remember that transformation is completely by the 6 This definition comes from Dallas Willard 5

6 grace of God - a grace that is not opposed to effort, but opposed to earning. Earning is an attitude that opposes God s grace by insisting that we can do it, therefore we deserve (fill in the blank). We can t transform ourselves, but God s grace - His action in our lives to do what we cannot do on our own 7 - can accomplish transformation in us. The Mark of Transformation and an Encouragement What does a transformed life look like? The transformed life is marked by love. Simple as that. Jesus said in John 13:35, By this all men will know that you are My disciples, if you have love for one another. We can t live a life of love apart from God s grace and work in our lives. We can have all the right theology and everything else, but we if don t love, we have nothing. Don t be discouraged in the Christian life by thinking that you should be further along than you are or because you re not where you want to be. This is a long journey and some things are learned in time through a variety of experiences, including unpleasant and painful circumstances. But it s God who is at work in you, 8 and I am confident of this very thing, that He who began a good work in you will perfect it until the day of Christ. 9 Faithful is He who calls you, and He also will bring it to pass Also from Willard 8 Philippians 2:13 9 Philippians 1: Thessalonians 5:24 6