The Marks of True Christianity

Scripture

Romans 12:9–18 KJV 1900

Let love be without dissimulation. Abhor that which is evil; cleave to that which is good. Be kindly affectioned one to another with brotherly love; in honour preferring one another; Not slothful in business; fervent in spirit; serving the Lord; Rejoicing in hope; patient in tribulation; continuing instant in prayer; Distributing to the necessity of saints; given to hospitality. Bless them which persecute you: bless, and curse not. Rejoice with them that do rejoice, and weep with them that weep. Be of the same mind one toward another. Mind not high things, but condescend to men of low estate. Be not wise in your own conceits. Recompense to no man evil for evil. Provide things honest in the sight of all men. If it be possible, as much as lieth in you, live peaceably with all men.

If there is one thing I have found to be crucial to my Christian walk, it is the constant surrender of my will. When doubt is creeping into my faith - I surrender. When I am afraid, I surrender. When I want Scripture to say something other than what it says, I surrender. When I don’t surrender I get lost in sin and confusion.

Paul always likes to conclude his words on doctrine with lists of duties. In the Christian life, doctrine and behaviour always go together. When it comes right down to it, the first two verses of Romans 12 are perhaps the most crucial verses in the New Testament for living the Christian life. This is the essence of relational theology. The sacrificing of our lives to the one who sacrificed his for us. We are to be:

A Living Sacrifice (vv 1-2)

The other part of this attitude is to let our minds be transformed so that we are more concerned with heaven and the salvation of others than with our worldly desires – to develop the mind of Christ. When we do this by being in His word and prayer regularly, we begin to discern what His will is. You will never get much discernment about what God wants if you just pray or think about Him, you must look at what he says throughout his entire Word and conform your mind to that.

This judgment of ourselves is supposed to be according to the measure of faith God has assigned us. Everyone has different levels of faith, and we are to be realistic about our own faith. Maybe our faith isn’t strong enough yet to surrender to this extent. But that should be our greatest desire to achieve, to build a faith at that level, not to use lack of faith as an excuse.

Marks of Christianity

These are a little different from the gifts. The gifts are given, but these are the fruit of being a Christian, and they are spoken in the form of verbs or commands that should be natural desires if we have truly come to a surrendering belief in Christ. … First we have:

A. Inner Marks

B. Outer Marks

Inner Marks

a. Genuine Love (v. 9a, 10)

b. Zealous fervent in service (v. 11)

c. Hopeful (v. 12a)

d. Patient in tribulation (v. 12b)

e. Constant in prayer (v. 12c)

Outer Marks

a. Be generous and show hospitality (v. 13)

b. Bless and love your enemies (vv 14, 19-20)

A. Inner Marks

a. Genuine Love (v. 9a, 10). Let love be genuine, love one another with brotherly affection. This has nothing to do with falling in love, it has to do with working at love until it is genuine, and even trying to outdo each other in showing honour to one another. Harboring unforgiveness and holding grudges, being unfriendly, are the polar opposite of this, and therefore is sin.

b. Zealous fervent in service (v. 11). This is not referring directly to serving others, but to serving God which of course will naturally lead you to serve others. This goes back to being zealous about our acceptable worship mentioned earlier.

c. Hopeful (v. 12a). Rejoice in hope. What a wonderful hope we have (We must see that after Revelation), rejoice in it so much that people ask you why you have such incredible hope as the world crumbles.

d. Patient in tribulation (v. 12b). Revelation spoke about this one a lot. True believers are patient in tribulation, we are overcomers because our Saviour overcame even the grave. We are told to even rejoice in tribulation, because it shows our faith is getting stronger.

e. Constant in prayer (v. 12c). How many of us pray for even an hour in a day? We are to be constant in it. In other words always having an awareness of God and talking to him, and listening to him, in all situations. … Then there are also:

B. Outer Marks

a. Be generous and show hospitality (v. 13). Contribute to the church and the saints who are serving God, and feed them, welcome them into your homes. Share what you have.

b. Bless and love your enemies (vv 14, 19-20). Do not curse your enemies. Do not spread negative remarks about them. Love them, even those who do you harm. Say good things about them, pray for them.

As Jesus says, give to them even what they don’t ask for, feed them, give them what they need, and part of the result will be to lead them to repent. You are a Christian (Christ-like), so your job is to heal them, save them, even if it means your own discomfort or even death.

Be there for others in good times and bad (v. 15). Weep with them in bad times, rejoice with them in good. Don’t be jealous of another’s good fortune, and don’t abandon them when they are suffering.

Live in harmony and peace with others (vv 16a, 18). This is huge because it is the main sign that we are Christians according to Jesus. “So far as it depends on you live peaceably with all”. Have you done everything you possibly can to reconcile that broken relationship, or are you waiting for the other person to make the first move? …And right along with this it’s necessary to:

Be humble (v. 16b). You are no better than the lowest person on earth in God’s eyes. The only way you can pull any of this off is with a very humble spirit. Something we will explore more next week. God came to earth in a human body and made himself equal with us for heaven’s sake. Nothing you can ever do will show that extent of humility.

Closing

God wants us to be nothing without him, dead to ourselves and alive to him. The root of most anger and sin in relationships is pride, and God detests pride. You think someone owes you an apology? Go sit at their feet and beg them for forgiveness for your own unforgiveness.

Be forgiving and never vengeful (vv 14, 17-19). God says vengeance is mine, what does that mean if you try to take it away from Him. It means you are taking part in the greatest sin, playing God. Until you are on the cross with nails through your hands being spit on and ridiculed, you have no business being unforgiving to anyone. Even then Christ forgave them.

Christian should be able to empathize with others, both believers and unbelievers. Paul commanded, Rejoice with those who rejoice, mourn with those who mourn. Related to this is the next command, Live in harmony with one another.

Do not be proud (lit., “not thinking highly” of yourself;) and be willing to associate with people of low position.

Now that we have seen some of what a Christian is, what God expects of us, what he wants to do in and through us, you may be very uncomfortable sitting here each week as we look at how we are going to let God change our character so that we can do these things and be the people he wants us to be.

I am asking for your commitment today, to come with me, to help me and anyone else who is willing, to become the people, the church, that Jesus intended us to be when we gave him our lives. Did you know that’s what you did when you became a Christian?

Today we have looked at the practical behavior's that we are to manifest as believers. For the next several weeks we are going to look at the inner characteristics of Christ-likeness from the beatitudes. These character traits will make the behavior's more likely.