"Therefore" - When In Rome - Ps Josiah Olson / Recorded in Kelowna on February 23rd, 2025

Welcome and thanks for joining us for this episode of the See Free Church podcast. You're

about to listen into a message from one of our gatherings. To find out more about our

community, where we gather, both in person and online, and how to get involved, head

to seefreechurch.ca. Now, let's listen into a message from a recent service.

Hey, so before we dive in, Clayton said it, my name is Josiah, and along with my wife,

we're associate pastors of the church. We reside in Vernon, so we spend most of our

time in our Vernon location, which seems to be a little untrue because I've been with

you for the last three weeks, but sometimes we spend a lot of time in Vernon, and we've

been in the middle of a series right now on the book of Romans. How many of you know we're

in the middle of a series on the book of Romans? I hope you do, otherwise I'm doing a very

bad job as a preacher, but that's all right. We'll give me another chance today. But before

we dig in today, we are going to be digging into Romans chapter 12 and 13. Let's quickly

Romans 12 · chapter mention

remind ourselves of where the book of Romans has come from, because lo and behold, although

you heard me last week and you heard me the week before, you've probably forgotten most

things about Romans by today. You have not forgot your streak on Duolingo or what you're

having for breakfast every week, a hash brown with hot sauce. Weird. Anyways, so we'll continue.

Romans, it comes from Paul, a devoted Jewish follower who had converted to Christianity,

and then became an apostle. Apostle is not a word that we use very often in our culture,

if you go to Africa, you'll see apostle on every advertisement for revival. But we could

interpret it this way, an apostle is a church planter. Okay, so he wrote this letter to

the church in Rome around AD 57, and he was still in the city of Corinth doing ministry

there. Paul is writing in advance of a hopeful trip to Rome, the epicenter of modern society.

Paul is, this church in Rome would have predominantly met in homes, if not exclusively in homes.

So because of the cultural divide between Jewish believers and non-Jewish believers, there's

a good chance that one home had Jewish believers and one home had non-Jewish believers, a little

segregated. But Paul was writing this not to Jewish believers or non-Jewish believers,

he was writing to all of them. The book of Romans, the letter is written to the church

in Rome, it's broken into three sections, Dr. Vernon McGee labels them this way, chapters

one to eight is the theology of faith, chapters nine to 11, which is what we looked at last

week when I preach from Vernon, it's the dispensational section. So it's about Israel's past, present,

and future. And here we are in chapters 12 into the third section, and it's chapters

12 through 16, it's duty, justified by faith to duty. We're going to read on Romans 12

versus one to two in the message version that are thrown up on the screen, I'll read it

with you, I think if it makes it up on the screen, there we go. So here's what I want

you to do, God helping you take your everyday ordinary life, you're sleeping, you're eating,

you're going to work and you're walking around life and place it before God as an offering,

embracing what God does for you is the best thing you can do for him. Don't become so

well adjusted to your culture that you fit into it without even thinking. Instead, fix

your attention on God. You'll be changed from the inside out, readily recognize what he wants

from you and quickly respond to it. Unlike the culture around you always dragging you

down to its level of immaturity, God brings the best out of you, develops well formed

maturity in you. This is the intro to Romans 12, Romans 12, one to two, we've read it in

the message version. If you've been doing our midweeks, you would have just spent a

week on the different translations. The message version is less a version, more a summary.

It's sort of like Cliff Notes. It's sort of like putting into chat GBT and saying, what

does this mean? This is what it is. So the message is a really great place to start when

you're trying to read your Bible because it gives you a more easily understood idea of

what the Bible is saying. How many of you know the Bible is confusing? Wow, you're so

vocal. So we've got to do things sometimes to make the Bible less confusing because the

Bible is still necessary. Scripture says that the Bible is necessary to correct, rebuke,

encourage, and to teach. So we need Scripture even if it's hard. How many of you know hard

things doesn't mean it's a bad thing? How many of you had to do a hard thing this morning?

Stand up. How many of you had to do a hard thing? Make coffee before you had coffee.

Hard things aren't bad things. They're just hard things. And we have to find ways to make

hard things more simple so that we can participate in the necessity of life. I've titled my message,

and I encourage you to take notes. I've titled it one word, therefore. Why don't you close

your eyes? I'm going to pray. Jesus, thank you for being here. God, I pray in this room

right now with every head bowed and every eye closed, God, I pray that we would turn

our attentions off ourselves. God, just for a moment, just for 27 minutes, would we turn

our affections and our attentions onto you? Would we remove the things that we are worried

about and would we say, God, I give you the space to ask me to do something I've never

done before so I can go somewhere I've never been before. God, would there be people in

this room that meet Jesus for the first time in reality because they gave permission for

you to move? God, I thank you that you're a gentleman. I thank you that you wait for

our invitation, that you give space for our figuring it out and working it out. God, I

pray that you would invade this space right now with your presence, that we wouldn't miss

that Jesus was in the room. In your name we pray, amen. So let me summarize for a moment

the chapters we're going to look at today. So in Romans 12, there's four sections I'm

breaking this down to. So we're going through Romans 12 to 13. Romans 12, 1 to 2, which

is what I just read. The Bible that I have has like little headings. Anyone see that

in your Bible ever? It's these black headings telling you a summary of what it is. So it

says a living sacrifice. I didn't really like that title so I'll give you a different one.

It's the walking dead. Romans 12, 1 to 2 is the walking dead. You'll understand it as we

go a little further. Second section, Romans 12, 3 to 21, my Bible says marks of a true

Christian. I'm going to call it proof of purchase. Next section, Romans 13, 1 to 7. We're going

to go through these but just give you a summary here. It says submitting to authorities. Everyone

say amen? That was, you guys are just such submitted authoritarian people. It's wonderful.

I called it a little different. I'm calling it recognizing who's in charge. Last section,

Romans 13, 8 to 4, which gets us to the end of the chapter that we're going through today.

Titled in mine it says living with urgency of love and holiness. I wrote it this way,

love like there's no tomorrow. The walking dead, proof of purchase, recognizing who's

in charge and love like there's no tomorrow. We're going to turn back to that first verse

that we read but we're going to read it in the ESV here. They're going to put it on the

screen so I can follow along. It just means if they put it on the screen I know I'm reading

from the Bible. It's good. Romans 12, 1 to 3, it'll be 2 but in the ESV. I appeal to

you therefore, brothers, by the mercies of God to present your bodies as a living sacrifice.

Walking dead. Holy and acceptable to God which is your spiritual worship. Do not be conformed

to this world but be transformed by the renewal of your mind that by testing you may discern

what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect. So if you've been

taking the course that we've been doing in midweek you would have learned that it's sometimes

advantageous to read the Bible in multiple versions. You would have learned that there's

a reason there's multiple versions. Now there's not multiple versions because one guy read

it and said I don't like this so I'm going to write my own Bible. Just so you're clear.

It's not multiple versions because of preference. It's multiple versions because we're trying

to interpret something that is not our original language. I love this analogy. So there's

two threads that are taken when we interpret scripture. There's the thread of trying to

interpret it word for word or thought for thought and most of your Bible translation

sits somewhere along that. The message is very thought for thought where it's summarizing

the idea. The ESV which we just read is the opposite. It's word for word. That's why I've

given you these contrasting things. I like this analogy to sort of put it in context

for us. If you know a little bit of French, which I know un petit peu, a little bit of

French, there's a word in French called palm de terre. Palm de terre. Now palm de terre

by thought is potato. By word for word translation is apple of the earth. So some Bible translations

will have translated that apple of the earth and some will have translated it potato. You

following me? It's not actually in the Bible the potato, the apple of the earth, but you

get it. So that's why we have the breadth of this trying to give us an understanding

that hey we all know now that palm de terre is probably not exactly or sorry apple of

the earth isn't exactly what they're saying. But potato is probably what they're saying,

but we need the breadth of that. Today you've learned some French. Welcome to Canada. Bonjour.

So this is why we look at different versions because there's a different perspective taken

on it. They're all trying to translate the Bible authentically. There's just different

ideas of how to translate it authentically. They're all saying that the Bible is in the

inerrant, the rightful word of God. We're just translating to help us understand it. Pastor

Dave says this, I think I said it last week as well, is the best version of the Bible

for you to read is the one that you'll read. So if the one that you're trying to read isn't

working, then choose a version that you can read, because they're authoritative enough

in their translation that we can get what God's trying to say out of it. Okay, sound good?

So I've titled this message Therefore, and I don't know if you'll remember, a couple

weeks ago when I was here, I used the idea about therefore. And when I was in Bible college,

I had a professor say to me, he said, "Whenever you see therefore in the Bible, you must discover

what it is." There for exactly. Ah, proud of you. There for. So here we find ourselves

in Romans 12 with Paul saying therefore, what does that mean? In theosaurus, or thesaurus,

thesaurus, it's a dinosaur, thesaurus.com, gives the list of synonyms for the word therefore.

It says accordingly. So then thus consequently, hence thence and so ergo for for this reason

for as much as in consequence in that event, in as much as on account of on the ground

since there from there upon to that and whence wherefore. Therefore doesn't tell us a whole

lot, does it? It tells us that there's something preceding this that I must know to understand

what is taking place after it. Too often in scripture, we like to read pastor therefore.

We have 11 chapters that Paul has said, this is what it means. God's sacrificing himself

for you. This is what it means to obtain righteousness with Christ. Therefore, this is now how we

act. And how many of you know if you get the action before the understanding of why you're

going to misalign some things, you're going to have a very dead Christianity, not just

a dead individual, but a dead Christianity. It's what we sometimes call dead works. You'll

do the right things without meeting Jesus. We believe in our church that today you can

meet Jesus, which is why we worship not to sing songs. But we actually think there's

life that is coming into the space. Not to read words that were written 2000 years ago,

but we believe there's life coming to the words of the Bible. It's so sad to relegate

the relationship with Jesus just to a religious practice. And let me tell you, if that's all

you've ever had, God has more for you than that. He is far more than doing the right

things, because doing the right things never really got you anywhere anyways, did it? No.

So therefore tells us that everything preceding that, this chapter that we're in, now tells

us how to live. I remember a guy I asked to feedback one of my messages about a decade

ago from a different city. He gave me this thought, and it's funny I have it written

on my template that I always write on my notes, and I asked myself this question when I'm preparing

a message, after I've written everything, the question is, "so what?" Great. Paul wrote

Romans, "so what?" And today I want to encourage you to ask the same question today as we dig

into the message. So what, or now what? Not here's the information that I have, because

information will not change your life, but revelation will. Something being revealed

that transforms it. When someone comes up here and encourages you to give, having encouragement

to give is not going to change your life. Giving changes your life. Knowing that church

is a good place to be doesn't change your life. Being in church, and being involved,

and being in relationship, that changes your life. Knowing the Bible's God word doesn't

change your life. Reading God's, you get the idea here, right? So here I'm encouraging

you to say, okay, now what? Or so what? And if there's no answer to that then I've done

a poor job delivering God's word to you this morning. But I believe that today there is

something for you. That there is a so what? There is a now what because of this. Make

sense? Can we agree upon that? Okay. Mitchell says yes. So I go with Mitchell. John P. Pohlhiel

in his book, Paul and his letters, which is a theological understanding of Paul's letters,

because Paul wrote a lot of the New Testament, not all of it as he would have learned this

week, but a good amount. He says this, Christ presented himself as a sacrifice for us. Understand?

Christ died. The proper and logical response to the divine act of grace, Christ didn't

die because I did something good. Christ died because he was good. In fact, everything I've

tried to do good is not sufficient for his death. So the only logical response to this

divine act of grace is to sacrifice ourselves in sacred service to our Lord. The truth is

this, conceited people are incapable of empathy toward others. We need to learn how to be

the walking dead. Dead to self, alive in Christ. And I promise you if that's offensive then

you're probably not the walking dead yet. Anytime scripture hurts me, it shows me where

I haven't actually submitted myself to God. It doesn't show me where scripture is being

mean. It shows me where scripture is pointing on something that I'm still trying to be my

own Lord of. You ever watch one of those house flipping shows? They walk into like a disaster

of a house. Holes in the walls, questionable smell, you know, maybe it's what your house

currently looks like, I don't know. And they say, this place has potential. I remember

our house in Revelstoke, we learned after looking at houses for a while that I saw potential

where my wife didn't so I had to look first and then she would trust my potential. I remember

walking into her house and she's like, yeah I'll live here. Get rid of that, that, that,

that. Which we did and it was great. But this is kind of what Jesus does to us. He walks

into the mess of our lives, hands us the keys and says, it's time to renovate. He sees potential.

It doesn't matter what it looks like, he sees potential. It doesn't matter where you've

come from, doesn't matter where you're at right now, God walks into your life and says,

let's renovate. There's potential here. Whether today's your first day or you grew up in this

church, let's walk in, there's potential. There's still things that scripture shows

you, you are not submitted to God about because we're human, working it out. Romans 12 to

3 is sort of Paul's blueprint for this transformation. He spent 11 chapters laying out the gospel

and now he hits us with therefore. In other words, since Jesus did all this, here's what

happens next. So the first point, the walking dead. Paul starts with an appeal, with I appeal

to you therefore brothers by the mercies of God to present your bodies as a living sacrifice,

holy and acceptable to God which is your spiritual worship. Back in the day, sacrifices were dead.

Make sense? There was not a practice in Jewish faith to sacrifice living things. They sacrificed

dead things. So Paul flips the script when he says this and he says, well actually I

want a living sacrifice. You want your life to be a living sacrifice. It's not just about

tweaking our behaviour, it's actually about surrendering everything. How many of you can

say today that you have surrendered everything to Jesus? None of you. Now some of us can

say we want to surrender everything to Jesus, some of us are working at surrendering everything

to Jesus, but none of us have fully surrendered, which is why God walks into our life and says,

it's time to renovate. It doesn't matter where we're at. Understanding? So surrendering

is this really interesting thing. So we focus here on the therefore and I think there's so

many times in my life that I have to ask myself, have I really got to the therefore? Have I

really submitted, because of what God's done, have I really submitted myself to him? And

again it's those moments where you read a scripture and you're like, well I don't really

like that or I don't agree with that. Well when you say to God, I don't agree with what

you said, what you're saying is, I'm in charge, you're not. It's not how we like to say it.

As a Canadian culture we like to tone down any negative thing we say. We're like, oh well

it could have been better. We give very light feedback in our society. We don't tell people,

you're a bad singer, please don't do that again. We say, well, you know what, you just

have a different tone than the rest of us. So maybe today I'm going to give you a few

options of tangible applications, things you can do. The so what? The now what? Maybe today

what you could decide to do over the next week is you could say, and pray, God I give

you my mind, my heart, my body, let my life be an act of worship. Maybe you write it down,

maybe you text a friend and tell them, hey this week I would like to do this every day.

How many of you know if you text a friend you're more likely to do something than if you leave

here and don't text a friend? I just gave that example to someone this morning about,

for me the thing that really shifted my irregular practice of reading the Bible to reading the

Bible was doing a Bible reading plan with others. They never even called me and said,

why haven't you read your Bible? They were not judgmental like I would be. But I knew

they were there, and that encouraged me. You know I said it last week, we're all only one

tool away from the breakthrough in our lives. One moment away from the breakthrough in it.

Whatever you feel like is hard in your Christian walk, you're only one moment away. You're

one prayer at the end of service with someone away, you're one idea away, you're one action

away, you're one thing away. I remember praying a few months ago about a financial concern,

and I realized God said, you know like every once in a while we have financial concerns,

right? Whether it's a hundred dollars that you're in debt or a hundred thousand dollars

you're in debt or whatever. And I realized when I was praying, I was like God I would

like you to show up in this way. And I thought about like, oh it's going to be thirty different

things that have to happen for this to work out, and then God said like, I could do it

with just one person dropping off one thing. And we always think that it has to be thirty

things, but God can do a miraculous thing in a miraculous moment. So we have to be careful

not to relegate God to a certain box of things. And we all do it, we all put God in a box.

We put him in the permissibility of our lives box. Here's what you have permission to work

in in my life. And every once in a while we realize that we've put him in a box and we

break the box and put him in a larger box. Or a different box. God you can't have this

part but I'll let you have this part now. We all have to constantly break the box we put

God in to see that he has the potential to do things that we can't fathom. God can break

through in a moment what's been taking you ten years. And God might build something over

ten years that he could do in a moment. I know it was far more encouraging the first

time wasn't it. Romans 12 3-21 which I've labeled proof of purchase. It's the idea that

actually in this setting God has said, "I have died for you, therefore I have given

my life, therefore I'm asking you to give your life." Jesus isn't actually asking us

to do something he isn't willing to do. He's an excellent leader that way. He's not asking

you to participate in a way he wasn't willing to participate. He's saying, "Would you lay

down your life as I laid down my life? Would you participate as I participated? For the

better of others even though I had every reason not to would you participate?" Which also

sort of means for every reason I have not to lay down my life for God he still chose

to do it even though he had every reason not to. Being God is a pretty good reason not

to die. So Paul starts, or sorry Paul keeps it real and he lists how transformation shows

up in our relationships. They'll put some scriptures behind me as I go. First is humility

in Romans 12 verse 3, it says for by the grace given to me I say to everyone among you not

Romans 12:3

to think of himself more highly than he ought to think, but to think with sober judgment.

What is humility? Death to self. Not to think too highly of yourself. It is a death to self.

Romans 12 verse 6, having gifts that differ according to the grace given to us let us

Romans 12:6

use them. Serving. What is serving? Death to self. My 4 year old has this practice lately,

he doesn't do it with me but he does it with my wife, he's potty trained but he screams,

"Mom, I gotta go pee. Okay, you need to come." And my wife isn't home all the day and I heard

her ask yesterday to the older two children, she's like, "Does he require anyone else to

go to the bathroom with him?" I said, "Nope." "So when I'm away, does he just not go to the

bathroom?" "No, he goes by himself." But every time my wife goes to the bathroom with him

who knows how to pee in the bathroom by himself, she is serving him. She's dying to herself.

She's choosing to give up a part of her life that she doesn't want to for someone else.

This is a death to self. Whether it's humility that God is poking at, hey, actually you think

a little too highly of yourself which is why no one can teach you, which is why you're

hitting the same problems over and over again because you're too arrogant to admit you don't

know what's going on. Maybe that's what God's hitting. Maybe He's saying, "Hey, you only

have time for yourself and when someone asks you to participate in something you're always

looking for how am I getting paid or where's the gift or the benefit from it," where actually

you need to learn to sacrifice yourself on behalf of someone else. Maybe that's what God

is saying, "Are you dead yet?" Because I died to serve you. I died to be humble. Then he

goes on, "Let love be genuine. Uphor what is evil. Hold fast to what is good." Romans 12,

Romans 12:9

verse 9. What is that? It is death. It's a self. To love is to put someone else ahead

of yourself. To do for someone something that they need over doing for yourself something

that you need. The times that I show the least love to my family is when I'm trying to show

the most love to myself. It's not actually what happens because we know when we try to

show the most love to ourself we actually tend to do the most damage to ourself versus

the other way around but we articulate it as I'm doing this for myself. Love gives up.

It's this funny thing you may remember Jesus' disciples, he asked them how many times do

we have to forgive someone and he says seven times seventy you forgive them. What he's

really saying is he's like you forgive them because you're dead. You forgive them because

nothing can hurt you or nothing can hold on to you as hurt when you've chosen to prefer

others over yourself. Forgiveness is a constant dying to myself. Every time yesterday I had

to I had to apologize for something. It's like a daily practice in my marriage that

I'm apologizing to my wife. I don't know why she doesn't do nearly as many wrong things

as I do but I'll bring that up with God later. But I'm apologizing. It's a death to myself.

It's saying okay I was wrong and instead of trying to dig deeper to prove some point that

doesn't produce anything I want. Anyone do that? Anyone like do something wrong and then

you dig deeper although it's going the opposite direction of where you're wanting to go and

you just keep digging. It's like what are you trying to accomplish here? Romans 12 14

this is bless those who persecute bless and do not curse them blessing enemies. What is

that? Okay what is that? Death to self. What do you mean? Bless my enemies? Are you dead

yet? Are you the walking dead? A living sacrifice. Therefore because of what God's done I then

can give up of myself. Therefore I can bless my enemies. Therefore I can love. Therefore

I can serve. Therefore I can have humility because I know what price someone paid for

me. Romans 12 21 it says do not be overcome by evil but overcome evil with good. Overcoming

evil with good what is that? It's death to self. I'm trying to drive a really unfortunate

point really home to you. Jesus gave everything for you. Amazing. Therefore he's asking you

to give everything for others. Too many times our North American comforts keep us from entering

into the greatness of what God has for us. We're too familiar, we're too used to what

is given to us to understand it. You know I love the reality that even as a pastor like

as a pastor I may do this in the sense of work but it doesn't make me a professional

Christian. Like you know I don't know about you but have you ever been cut off in traffic

and suddenly felt a little less Christian? Me too. Paul says transformation means reacting

differently not just in traffic but in life. My wife she's tuned in so I can say so many

things about her, it's wonderful. No she often says to me when I get mad in traffic about

something, she's like you do realize if you were that person you would be mad at you for

what you're doing. Yeah but I'm not right now. So maybe today the tangible now what

the so what out of this message is writing down the name of someone you struggle to love

and praying for them daily this week and if possible doing one thing to bless them, bless

those who curse you. It's really nice as an idea, really unfortunate as a reality hey,

you're like wait but I know who that person is. Romans 13, 1-7, this is a message to all

Christian. 1-7 this is what was called submitted to authorities which I like to call recognizing

who is in charge and I'll try and go quickly through here this is where I wanted to sit

most of the time but not there. Anyways Paul throws in a curve ball he says respect authority.

Let every person be subject to the governing authorities for there's no authority except

from God and those that exist have been instituted by God. Romans 13 verse 1. Now this doesn't

Romans 13:1

mean blind obedience. If government commits sin we obey God first. This is what Acts 5

Acts 5:29

verse 29 tells us but in general Christians should be the best citizens. Yes you're allowed

to be quiet for a moment, paying taxes, respecting leaders, obeying laws. When we forget therefore

we stop living out of the revelation of who God is and what he's done and begin to live

out of our broken humanity. So then maybe the question in this is less actually about governing

authority but rather is God your governing authority? It's rare that I don't hear a sentence

from someone who rejects governing authority that doesn't sound something like this. I

don't do it because it's a stupid law. The speed limit should be a hundred and kilometers

an hour here. The taxes are criminal. Maybe the greater question is are we dead? Are we

living out of the therefore. If we don't get the therefore the rest is dead works, activity

without love. Paul is not speaking about blind obedience but he is speaking about living

a life that is actually submitted to Christ. I wonder if so much of having difficulty submitting

to governing authorities just means you're not really submitted to God. I've learned

in my life that if there's no denial, if there's nothing that I'm denying in my life then there's

a lack of submission in my life too. A life with Christ includes a life of denial. Now

hear this not as a sound bite but hear it in the context. We're talking about the therefore.

We've spent eleven chapters talking about the therefore and now we're getting into the

this is what we're doing. It's the challenge when we go through a topic like this of the

book of Romans is if you take this message you've missed everything in context to everything

else that's in there. Yes Paul is saying this is what we do because of what God has done.

Not this is what we do in spite of but because of this, because of the overflow of that therefore

this is what I do. We obey God before we ever obey authorities or any other thing but so

often how we obey those demonstrate how we really submit to God. As a living sacrifice

I am not dead but I am dead to myself. Symbolized earlier in Romans in the picture of the metaphor

of death that is exemplified by our water baptism. Death to the old man alive to the new in Christ.

It's likely that the moments that we that are difficult and offensive in our walk with

Jesus are spotlights on the area that we've lacked surrender. Maybe this week it's taking

one step toward being a better citizen. To pray for a leader to pay a bill on time or

actually read the rules before clicking I agree. Something I read in preparation said

it's always a sign that we haven't understood this if we spend more time complaining about

a leader than we do praying for them. Complaining is about us. Praying for them is putting it

on God. It demonstrates who I am submitted to. Myself or him. Him being God. Romans 13

8-14 Paul wraps up with urgency he says the night is far gone the day is at hand. Translation

time is short live like it. Put on the Lord Jesus Christ and make no provision for the

flesh to gratify its desires. It's like if you've had a person show up unexpected a guest

and you're planning on cleaning your house in five minutes. Paul says live every day

like Jesus is about to walk through the door. Don't wait till tomorrow to be submitted to

Christ. Don't wait till tomorrow to live submitted to him. It's not just a message it's a way

of life. Maybe your action is setting a daily reminder live today like Jesus is coming back.

Well let's go back into Romans 12 verses 1-2 this is going to be in the NIV version. The

Romans 12:1–2

NIV version is in between. It's in between thought translation and direct word for word

translation. Again the same verses that we read in the message the same verses that we

read in the ESV. Therefore I urge you brothers and sisters in view of God's mercy to offer

your bodies as a living sacrifice. Holy and pleasing to God. This is your true and proper

worship. Do not conform to the pattern of this world but be transformed by the renewing

of your mind. Then you'll be able to test and approve what God's will is his good, pleasing

and perfect will. Romans 12-3 lays out the therefore of the gospel. Because of Jesus

we surrender everything. We love radically, we respect authority even when it's hard and

we live like time is short. Could you pull out your phone again.

You already texted someone this morning right? And he said thank you for being here. Here's

what I'd like you to do is I'd like you to text them again. But here's what we're going

to do is we're going to text them and say this is what I'm going to do. This is my so

what? This is my now what? Maybe it's renewing your mind. It's that idea of reminding yourself

what God has done. Maybe it's loving someone difficult. It's choosing someone that you're

going to pray for every day this week and trying to find a place to bless them. Maybe

it's praying for your leaders whether those are governing leaders or it's Pastor Kim and

Pastor Dave. Or maybe it's living with urgency that reminder that am I living like God is

coming back today? Jesus is here today. We're going to give a minute with your phone. Text

the person. Don't change the person and just say hey this is what I'm going to do this

week. Guaranteed it's uncomfortable for at least 75-90% of you. You can't change the

how you look. It's much easier to hear than to do. As you're doing that I want to read

the message version. The very first thing I started with and then we'll close in prayer.

at the end of this message. So here's what I want you to do. God helping you. Take your

every day ordinary life. Sleeping, eating, going to work and walking around life. Place

it before God as an offering. Embracing what God does for you is the best thing you can

do for him. Don't become so well adjusted to your culture that you fit into it without

even thinking. Instead, fix your attention on God. You'll be changed from the inside

out. Readily recognize what he wants from you and quickly respond to it. I'm going to

pray. God I thank you that you are present, living, active. God I thank you that you do

not desire for us to stay as we are. God I thank you that when you walk into the rooms

of our house with holes in the walls and broken windows, you don't look and say that's good

enough. You say you're good enough. Nothing is too great for you. God I pray that in the

simplest and smallest of things God that we would choose to take an action. I love the

reality of our lives that it's never about the big actions we take irregularly. It's

the little actions that we take regularly that transform us. So God I pray that we would

be a people in this room that do one little thing today. Nothing beyond our reach. Nothing

beyond our capacity. But we would trust that in a little thing, you would show up. God

bless the people in this room. Bless them with your presence. What you died to give us. Would

we not be rejecting it? In Jesus' name. Amen. Thanks for tuning in today. Each week we gather

in cities across our region and online to explore the truth of freedom available to

all in the message of Jesus Christ. To find a gathering near you or to find out more,

head to c3church.ca.

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