A Living Sacrifice - Romans 12

12 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.

Why should we offer our bodies as a living sacrifice?  “In view of God’s mercy” it is reasonable and it is our “true and proper worship”. 

What is God’s mercy?  “Smite me, Almighty Smiter” said Bruce in the movie Almighty Bruce.  Isn’t mercy God not smiting us all to ashes for the evil within us?  God’s mercy is God’s power under control.  Certainly, we have all disobeyed the Words and call of God upon our hearts at some time.  We knew what was right and what was not and we did what we wanted, not what we knew was right.  Therefore, we all deserve to die and be separated from God.  Yet, He chose not to let that be our fate, but to provide another option to reunite us with Him.  That is God’s mercy.  It is God’s grace being imparted upon you and I for no other reason than God extended His mighty love towards us, undeserving sinners.  We didn’t earn it, but it was given to us.  We were guilty, but had the sentence removed.

Our bodies are a free gift of God.  We indwelt them when we were born.  It is all we have when we are born and we will give it up when we die.  Paul is reasoning that in light of the enormity of God’s mercy, which spared our souls, we should consider that offering our bodies as a sacrifice a reasonable thing.  In fact, he says it is more than just an any act, it is an act of worship.

What are our bodies?  Well, it is your physical body, that its actions would be those that honor God.  It is every way that we are able to express ourselves: your mind, your affections, your will.  But it is more than that, it is following God in this physical world.  We have many choices every day.  We can tithe or not tithe; we can curse or not curse; we can be kind or not be kind; we can hate or not hate; we can serve someone else or not serve; we can put others first or ourselves first; etc.  If we set our hearts to follow God, because He is God, even if we do not understand everything or why and have to overcome our own ideas of what we should do, it is a living sacrifice.  And this is an act of worship to God as a means of praise and acknowledgment that He is God and we are not.

 ² 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.

As we discussed with living sacrifice, a part of it is not conforming to the pattern of this world.  The only way to do that is to be in God’s Word and in communion with Him.  Assuming you sleep eight hours each night as you ought and spend another two hours eating and commuting, that leaves 14 hours of activity.  Let’s take away eight for work.  That leaves six hours of activity.  How many of those six hours are receiving input from the world and how many are receiving input from God?  It is difficult to not be conformed to the pattern of this world if all we see, hear, and study is this world. 

Kenneth S. Wuest  writes in the book, Romans in the Greek New Testament, an interpretation of this verse that says: “And stop assuming an outward expression that does not come from within you and is not representative of what you are in your inner being, but is patterned after this age; but change your outward expression to one that comes from within and is representative of your inner being, by the renewing of your mind, resulting in your putting to the test what is the will of God, the good and well-pleasing, and complete will, and having found that it meets specifications, placing your approval upon it.”

The word “transformed” indicates that our thoughts and wisdoms will be changed into something other than what we know.  Our mind will become renewed; it will have new life.  Once this happens, we will be able to know God’s will.  Paul says that we will be able to test and approve God’s will.  This indicates to me that Paul went through some times where maybe he wasn’t sure, or he had taught many people who didn’t know how to know what God’s will was.  Without the renewing of the mind to know God, you can’t know what God’s will is, and His will is good, pleasing, and perfect.