A Living Sacrifice

Welcome to each one.

Glad you're here this morning with us.

Two clarifications I'd like to make about announcements is if you bring uh come out to worship night tonight, bring camping chairs with you.

Um so you have a chair for sure.

And the second thing, just slip my mind.

It might come back.

Turn with me to Romans chapter 12 this morning.

Romans 12 · chapter mention

Lord, I just pray that as we open your word this morning that you would make your truth known to us, make this a life-changing as we understand your word and walk in it.

May you uh give us understanding to our hearts, cause our ears to hear, and cause our feet to walk in your ways.

In Jesus' name, amen.

This morning's text is taken out of Romans chapter 12.

Romans 12 · chapter mention

We're in verses 1 and 2 today.

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 will be able to test and approve what God's will is, his good, pleasing, and perfect will.

Moving into chapter twelve here, we need to remember the foundation that Paul laid for us in the first eleven chapters.

We have been learning about the gospel of God, the power of sin on those under the law, and also how Jesus came to fulfill the law and justify us through faith by grace rather than the old way of the law.

Paul is very systematic in his method of theology here in the book of Romans.

Up until now, he has been expounding on the gospel and the fact that our righteousness comes by faith in Christ alone.

Now he begins to shift to exhorting us to godly living.

In these next chapters, we will be looking at some very, very practical ways to live out our lives post-salvation.

We have experienced the righteousness of Christ by faith.

Now the question remains for us: how do we live?

How do I act as one that professes Christ?

The word therefore in this chapter is referring to the last chapters that we have gone through, along with the doxology that he left us with in chapter 11, where it says, Oh, the depth of the riches of the wisdom and knowledge of God, how unsearchable his judgments and his past beyond tracing out.

Who has known the mind of the Lord, or who has been his counselor?

Who has ever given to God that God should repay them?

For from him and through him and for him are all things.

To him be the glory forever.

Amen.

Paul says, Therefore, I urge you, brothers and sisters, I come alongside of you, I exhort you, I encourage you.

The King James uses the word beseech.

Paul is arguing that offering our bodies as a living sacrifice should be our reaction, a response to the mercy that God gave us, to the mercy that we have received from God.

In chapter 11, last time we ended by talking a little bit about the mercy of God and how God extended his mercy to us as Gentiles.

Paul refers to us as wild olive branches grafted into the root, meaning Jesus Christ.

Do we truly understand the gravity of what it would be like to find ourselves without the mercy of God?

Grace is God giving us what we do not deserve.

It is us unmerited favor, kindness, and spiritual blessings.

On the other hand, mercy of God is withholding what we do deserve.

God's mercy.

His judgment and punishment for our sins.

It demonstrates his compassion, his patience and love, sparing us from the consequences of wrongdoing.

It may help us to view mercy as a subset of grace.

In Scripture, mercy is often equated with a deliverance from judgment, and grace is always the extending of a blessing to the unworthy.

But here in verse 1, Paul is telling us that understanding how great God's mercy is on us is key to coming to a place in our lives where we know that a living sacrifice is the only reasonable thing for us to do.

It's the only reasonable response to the mercy that God had on us, that He has shown us.

And unlike the Old Testament animal sacrifices, a living sacrifice is not about atoning for sin.

Because Jesus' sacrifice on the cross has already accomplished that for us.

Hebrews 9, verse 12 tells us he did not enter by means of the blood of goats and calves, but he entered the most holy place once for all by his own blood, thus obtaining eternal redemption.

Hebrews 9:12

So what Paul was saying here in light of a living sacrifice was that we should offer ourselves to God as a sacrifice.

Not as a sacrifice on the altar as a Mosaic law required, but as a living sacrifice consecrated to God, given to God.

The dictionary defines sacrifice as anything consecrated and offered to God.

This begs to question do I consecrate and offer myself to God?

You notice I didn't say, did you consecrate?

Do we consecrate and offer ourselves to God as a living sacrifice?

As I think about that, you know, if we offer ourselves a living sacrifice, you can't just lay part of yourself on the altar, can you?

Sometimes we might try.

I think of the story, you know, where mom told Johnny to sit down and he didn't want to sit down.

And he said, I might sit down, but in my inside I'm standing up.

You know, sometimes that's us on the altar, isn't it?

We try to lay ourselves down, but we really fight against that.

Lay down ourselves.

We are called to lay down our bodies, our minds, our fleshly desires, our agendas, and align ourselves to that which is holy and pleasing to God.

That is what God's call is on our lives.

To those of us who have saving faith in the finished work of Christ, the only acceptable worship is to offer ourselves completely to the Lord under God's control.

The believer's yet unredeemed body can and must be yielded to him as an instrument of righteousness.

In light of the sacrifice of Jesus for us, this is only reasonable for us to do.

Romans 6, 12 and 13 tell us, Therefore do not let sin reign in your mortal body, so that you may obey its evil desires.

Do not offer any part of yourself to sin as an instrument of wickedness, but rather offer yourselves to God as those who have been bought from death to life, and offer every part of yourself to him as an instrument of righteousness.

Also in Romans 8, 12 and 13 it tells us, Therefore, brothers and sisters, we have an obligation, but it is not to the flesh to live according to it, for if you live according to the flesh, you will die.

But if by the Spirit you put to death the misdeeds of the body, you will live.

Question I have for us this morning: Do we want to honor the sacrifice that Jesus gave us?

Do you want to offer true and proper worship to the one that is worthy today?

The answer then is go and live your life in a way that is holy and pleasing to God.

It's interesting, we are in a culture of worship being centered around song, music, bands, gatherings of people, lifting up praise to God.

This has its place, and I'm not against that.

After all, you look at Revelations, we better get used to it.

That's what's happening there.

But could it be more than anything that God is looking for a people that will walk in holiness, rejecting the norms of this world?

And we see that in this verse today.

A people set apart, a people that are consecrated to serving God and walking in holiness.

To do this, we need to reject the expectations of this world.

Verse 2 says, do not conform to the pattern of this world.

As we live our lives and rub shoulders with the mindset of the world.

Notice I didn't say the people of the world, I said the mindset of the world.

Oftentimes we think of the world as a certain group of people.

The world is a mindset.

As we live and rub shoulders with the mindset of the world, we need to be intentional about the direction of our thinking, the direction of our living, the direction of our actions.

Not conforming to the pattern of the world affects every single aspect of our life.

Oftentimes when we think of nonconformity, and that word might be a trigger for you, when you think about nonconformity, we think of clothing or other obvious visible things that we see.

Nonconformity does affect these things, but it goes so much deeper than that.

So much deeper.

And we all know that if we don't deal with the heart, the outside will never be right.

The mistake is often, all too often, in focusing on the need to not conform to the world and forgetting the second part of nonconformity.

Can anybody tell me what the second part of nonconformity is looking at this verse?

There you go.

Thank you.

But be transformed by the renewing of your mind.

What is the key to not conforming to the pattern of the world?

It is to be transformed by the renewing of your mind.

This is where I get excited to think about because when Jesus transforms our mind, he transforms our heart, everything changes, does it not?

Does it not?

That's right, it does.

Everything changes.

Not just some things.

Everything changes when Christ transforms us and transforms our mind.

We no longer do things for selfish motives.

We look out for ways to serve as the hands and feet of Jesus.

We no longer desire to fulfill the lust of the flesh because we have a desire to live in a manner of holiness that pleases our Father.

It's a transformation.

This is what happens when we allow our minds to be transformed.

There are so many stories that we could tell of the journey of transformation in the lives of those that became a living sacrifice, as this verse teaches us.

First one I thought about was Chuck Coulson going from Watergate to prison ministry.

You know, a high-profile person, incarcerated, gave his life to Christ and founded prison ministry.

I mean, the Lord used him in miraculous ways in his ministry.

Another one we have is Corey Tenboom and her story of forgiveness in her life.

You know, her family was in the concentration camp during World War II.

Her father and sister were killed there.

And yet she forgives, gives her life to reconciliation and forgiveness.

And if you haven't read the story of her meeting her former guard from that prison, look it up and read that.

It's challenging and very interesting to read.

But her testimony is a powerful example of faith, healing, deep wounds in someone's life.

We're all familiar with John Newton, slave trader to hymn writer, as he was saved on that ship crossing the ocean.

And eventually he was a writer of Amazing Grace, which is a hymn that we all enjoy so well.

His life illustrates God's ability to turn a life of sin into a life of service.

Current-day testimony would be one of Charlie Kirk, a life dedicated to bringing Jesus to the modern day college campuses.

And he gave his all for Christ.

He gave his life for the cause of Christ and freedom.

We all have personal testimonies.

From discontent to purpose, from brokenness to healing.

God has taken me from being a lost, angry young man with no hope to someone who serves with a call and a purpose in my life.

God wants to transform you as well.

If he has not already.

How does this transformation of our mind take place?

This transformation is a call for the unbeliever to repent of his sin and embrace Christ by faith.

The Greek word translated repentance carries a notion of a change of mind.

Our thinking must be changed, transformed from old, ungodly ways to godly ways of thinking.

What we know in our minds to be true forms a conviction in our hearts.

And that conviction in our hearts translates into action in our life.

So to simplify it, we could say, read and study the Word of God.

First of all, we need to know what truth is.

Secondly, we need to act in obedience to what we know to be truth.

You know, knowledge without obedience hardens a heart.

This brings us to the final point here in this passage that I don't want to miss.

When we reject and refuse to conform to the pattern of the world and are transformed by the renewing of our minds, we will be able to discern God's good, pleasing, and perfect will.

You know, you often hear the question asked, how can I know God's will for my life?

Isn't that the big question?

The answer is simple.

Read.

Study.

Study God's word.

Know what is truth.

And then walk in obedience.

Walk in obedience.

Do not hesitate.

Do not look around to see what your peers are doing.

Know the truth and walk in obedience.

It's that simple.

Then you will be able to test and approve what God's will is.

Not only his will, but his good, pleasing, and perfect will.

Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind.

Then you will be able to test and approve what God's will is, his good, pleasing, and perfect will.

I would encourage you to put these scriptures, these two verses to memory and hide them away in your heart.

And remember these verses.

Remember the challenge.

Do not be conformed to the world, but let Christ transform you.

How?

Through his word, through his truth.

Walk in obedience to what he asks of you.

Don't be sidetracked with what's happening around you.

But walk with a vision, with your eyes on Jesus and what he calls for you in your life.

You will find his good, pleasing, and perfect will.

God bless you as you go from here.

May his peace be upon you.

May his grace be real in your lives as you walk with him this week.

Could we all stand for a closing prayer?

Thank you, Lord, for bringing us a challenge this morning to not be conformed, but to be transformed.

And Lord, I pray that you would do that in our hearts and lives today.

Lord, if there's someone here this morning that needs your transformation, Lord, I just pray that you would waken their heart to see their need of you and their need of transformation.

Lord, I just pray that you would do that for each and every person here.

That we could walk in your ways.

We could learn of your truth.

We could walk in holiness before you.

Lord, I just thank you for what you've done in our lives.

Thank you for your mercy today.

Where would we be without your mercy?

And we are grateful today for your grace and your mercy that is very, very real.

And we have all experienced it in our lives.

Lord, I pray you would just go before us as we go from here.

May your peace go with us.

May we be ambassadors of yours, reaching those that need to hear the good news of the gospel.

It's in Jesus' name we pray.

Amen.