Collide - 2, Be Transformed

COLLIDE – Week 2

Be Transformed

Romans 12:1-2

Series Slide

Good morning and welcome to worship on this beautiful Summer day. God is so Good, is He not? Scripture reminds us that God’s mercies are new every day. One way that God’s mercies are new is in the fact that next week, you will get to hear Shaefer preach here in the Sanctuary. I am so thankful that we have an amazing young man serving God here as our Associate Pastor. God is doing a great work in and through Shaefer. This week, Renee and I will be taking a few days to get out of town together, just the two of us. I’ll be back for the weekend and preaching in Common Ground, then heading out again helping take one of the Scout Units in the area on a trip. I’ll be back for the weekend, but had already scheduled to have Dr. Vicki Vaughn here to preach on the 23rd, so I will be able to go and preach at one of the New Global Methodist Church Plants as they work to get established and formed. God is moving in a powerful way through this new denomination, and we are so blessed to be a part of this new thing.

But, enough about all that, we are in week 2 of our sermon series, COLLIDE. We are looking at how it is that we continue in the faith, how we grow, in a culture and a time when our faith and the culture around us seem to be at odds. Last week we looked at the biblical principle of standing firm, of having a firm foundation. The culture around us, the world around us offers us tempting and tantalizing things…. Attractive things…. Seductive things to grasp and hold onto, but in the end those things, those principles, become shifting sand that destroys the life we built upon them.

How do we differentiate the worlds values from those of Christ? How do we live for the Kingdom of God and not the kingdom of humanity?

By being people of the Word of God.

By being a people of prayer, and

By being led by the Holy Spirit.

If you do those three things, if you live based on those three principles, you will experience the abundant life that God has promised through Jesus Christ.

Sermon Slide

Now, today, we are going to look at how it is that we continue in that life. That’s what we are going to look at today. We are going to be in Romans 12 today as we talk about being transformed for Christ, so flip on over to Romans 12.

And as you flip over there, let me ask you, who remembers the Power Rangers? These normal everyday people who are able to morph, they were able to transform into these superheroes with special skills and abilities.

Like the Transformers. I had a friend back in middle school that was into the whole transformer toys thing, long before there were movies about them. I never could get into them, but I see the attraction. Transformers and Power Rangers both were normal, ordinary items… people, cars, trucks… but, when they morphed, when they transformed, they become so much more. The transformation led them to be extraordinary. (Think about that word… extra – ordinary. More than ordinary… more than normal.)

I think that is what God desires for you and me… that through Christ, we can become more than we once were, that we can become extraordinary. That’s what Paul was talking about here in Romans 12. Turn with me to verses 1-2

Romans 12:1-2

<Prayer>

We are going to keep this sermon simple today. There is a subtraction, an addition, and an outcome. That will be my three points today.

First, the subtraction.

Say No to the Ways of This World

Paul invites us… urges us… encourages us to say no to the patterns of this world. His exact words is verse 2 were, “Do not copy the behavior and customs of this world.” Another translation I read said, “Do not conform to the patterns of this world.” In other words, subtract the patterns and customs of this world from our life.

We are surrounded by patterns. We live our life by a certain rhythm. Some of us wake up at the exact same time every morning, have our cup of coffee, feed the pets, grab our Bible, and spend time with God reflecting and praying, have an exhilarating work out, take a shower, and head out for the day. That is a healthy rhythm, I wish I could say it was my rhythm. Some of us have a different rhythm, like a nightly rhythm… we get home from the long day of work or volunteering, or whatever we do during the day, then we cook supper, we eat (often in front of the TV if we don’t go out to eat), clean up from dinner, turn the TV on and watch The Bachelor, or Bachelorette, or some other reality show, maybe watch some sports, something as we sit and veg on the couch… then we get a drink… eat a snack… like an entire bag of chips… fall asleep on the couch, wake up at 2:00 and stumble to bed. That is not a healthy pattern. It’s not my pattern either, but it isn’t far from it some nights.

The simple truth is, we all have unhealthy patterns in various times of our lives. It may only be one area… you may have one little sin that keeps creeping back into your life… but then that one sin affects other areas and soon your entire cycle or rhythm of life is all cattywampus. I know when I do eat too much too late, then stay up too long watching something on TV that will never change or improve my life… I end up going to bed too late, getting too little sleep, waking up too late to have a quiet time and work out… now because of my gluttony and slothfulness at night, I have negatively affected my next morning, that impacts my days physical and spiritual health.

Who remembers Nancy Reagan’s anti-drug campaign?

“Just say no!”

That’s right. That phrase can work in every unhealthy area of our life! When we see that sin creeping in… when we see that unhealthy habit beginning to reemerge… when we see our spiritual rhythm beginning to be overtaken by other rhythms, just say no!

In your life right now, I bet there is something you need to say NO to. I bet, if you are like me, you have areas of your life where you are conforming to the patterns of this world, you are copying the customs of this world. If that’s the case, just say no! Subtract it!

We will mirror something with our lives, we will mirror the patterns and customs of this world, or we will mirror the patterns and customs of the Kingdom of God.

Choose the latter, that is the beginning of your life of transformation, of morphing into the superhero God has called you to be!

One thing I learned a long time ago, often we say NO, to the wrong things to make room to say YES to the correct things, and that is our second point today… the addition.

Say Yes to the Ways of God.

Once you are able to locate the worldly patterns you have been following, the space is then created for God’s transforming work to take place. Jesus desires that we live a life that is constantly seeking to grow. So, add the ways of God.

Renee has done a great job with her plants, it’s kinda become her thing. Part of her rhythm is going out and watering her plants… and they grow because of it. But if she wants to keep her plants growing, she has to keep pouring water over them… she can’t pour sweet tea, or Dr. Pepper, or wine, or anything else over them. It has to be water. The purest liquid on earth.

We need the same. We need to have the living water pour over our lives, our heart and soul and mind.

In our passage, Paul is focused on what and how we think. In his culture, the idea was that how we think leads to what we do. Our thought process is important when it comes to growth potential in the kingdom of God. Oftentimes the temptation to follow worldly patterns and values begins with a thought.

But the same is true for the patterns Christ wants in our lives. Spending time reading and studying the word of God will give us the right type of thought processes, and help us respond well when we are confronted with worldly things. We can’t simply “water” our minds and hearts every once in a while. It must be a healthy routine and rhythm we enter into. The Bible talks about this concept. Turn with me to Psalm 1:1-2;

“Blessed is the one

who does not walk in step with the wicked

or stand in the way that sinners take

or sit in the company of mockers,

but whose delight is in the law of the Lord,

and who meditates on his law day and night.”

David is a walking, talking example of the importance of meditating on God’s Word, day and night. God desires that we not just have the Word near us, but actually in us. In our minds, in our hearts, and through our lives. That is how our minds are renewed, that is how we are transformed… not by our work, but by God’s work in us… and God works best in us when we spend time in His Word, when we spend time in communion with God, when we spend time meditating and praying to God.

This allows God to come and do a transforming work. This transformation begins in your mind. Paul closes out Romans 12:2 with an outcome once we take these steps toward transformation. He says, “Then you will learn to know God’s will for you, which is good and pleasing and perfect.”

That moves us into our final point of the day, the outcome:

Discern your Purpose

That’s a fancy way of saying to know God’s will for you. Paul wrote this some 2000 years ago, yet it is still what you and I and those around us need to hear now. God loves you and has a wonderful plan for your life. Your life has purpose!

The younger generation is on a quest for purpose. Maybe it’s always been this way, but it certainly seems more pronounced today than in the past. They are asking the same questions we asked, “Why am I hear?”

“What do I do with my life?”

“I must be more than an accidental lump of flesh that lives for a little while and then dies.”

I believe it was Tolstoy that compared life to the fermentation process… we are born, we ferment, and deteriorate. There has to be more to this life than that!

Maybe you’ve looked for purpose in relationships – friends, family, partners…

Maybe you’ve looked for purpose in work, or a job.

Maybe you’ve looked for purpose in your hobbies, or your volunteerism, or something else you do with your time.

Maybe you’ve tried to make your family – your spouse, your kids, your parents your purpose.

Maybe you’ve tried to make your social life – on media or the real things – your purpose.

And you keep coming up empty. Proverbs tells us, “There is a way that seems right to a man, but in the end it leads to destruction.

These things that seem right, these ways of the world, are not the way to our purpose.

There is nothing that this world can offer you or me that will make us complete and whole.

Jesus, The Christ, is the only one who can give us meaning and purpose in this life!

God created you in an amazing and wonderful way. Scripture reminds us that “You are fearfully and wonderfully made.” You have giftings and abilities and passions that God put in your innermost being. It is when we align our lives with Christ that those giftings, abilities, and passions come together in a way that impacts not only God’s Kingdom in Heaven… but also brings a little of God’s heaven to earth.

So, what are we going to do? We are going to say no to the ways of this world, we are going to say yes to the way of God, and in the process we will discover God’s will for our lives.

Said another way,

Romans 12:2

Amen?

I want to wrap this up with one other point. I don’t know if you notice, but I skipped completely over verse 1.

Romans 12:1

This is the secret to the abundant life that Jesus is offering. This is where our culture and our faith collide. The world tells us to say and believe,

“I am the most important thing around.”

“I am an army of one.”

“Climb to the top any way you can, and don’t worry about who you step on to get there.”

But Scripture tells us to worship God with all that you have and all that you are. We have nothing. You realize that. That house you live in… here today, and it can be gone tomorrow… That car you cherish… the same. Relationship, fleeting. Your money? Just ask the government how much is yours… and ask the Funeral Director how much you can take with you when you die.

The only thing you have and the only thing you can offer God is yourself.

Give your bodies as living sacrifices to God.

At the time of Paul writing this, they had regular examples of sacrifices… once a sacrifice is given, it’s gone… But Paul is saying, make this your living act of worship. Give God your life, over and over again… not to gain anything, but because of all that God has already done for you.

Culture, the world around us, says the most important thing is what is happening right now. Forget about the past, ignore about the future… right now is what matters.

God says, look at the past – I love you… I love you so much I became flesh and lived with you… I showed you how to love one another… Then I showed you how important you are by dying for you, so that you can live for me.

God says don’t forget the past – dwell in the richness of the resurrection, of what God did for you in the past.

And those things you have done in the past – give them to God and let God redeem your past.

Don’t ignore the future – your eternity depends on what you do… your future matters.

You matter.

That is why we give ourselves to God, to be transformed… to become extra-ordinary.

That is who God created you to be.