Present Yourself to God
Notes
Transcript
Introduction
Introduction
Pastoral Reminder: Head Heart Hands, Equipping the Saints for the Work of the Ministry
16 All Scripture is inspired by God and is profitable for teaching, for rebuking, for correcting, for training in righteousness, 17 so that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work.
Turn your bibles to Chapter 12 of the book of Romans. Let us read our passage this morning.
1 Therefore, brothers and sisters, in view of the mercies of God, I urge you to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and pleasing to God; this is your true worship.
2 Do not be conformed to this age, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, so that you may discern what is the good, pleasing, and perfect will of God.
For eleven chapters Paul has spoken of the mercies of God. We were all condemned sinners and lost. Enemies of God, the ungodly living contrary to God, in all ways unrighteous, earning the wages of sin death.
But God saves. His plan of redemption will never fail or be turned to the side. His promises will never be taken back. His love is demonstrated as he saves men and women to be his children. Uniting them to his son so that nothing can separate us from Himself. He has made the dead come alive. He has justified the guilty. Removed the condemnation that is deserved and given us the Spirit to lead us in the paths of righteousness.
The mercies of God has been his focus up to this point in the letter. It has shown the character of God and his hand on mankind. It is very light on direct commands and instructions.
Consider yourself dead to sin, but alive to God 6:11
Do not let sin reign in your mortal body 6:12
Do not offer your members to sin 6:13
Offer yourself to God 6:13
Offer your members as slaves to righteousness 6:19
Do not boast and do not be arrogant
Other than this simple and general list there isn’t much concrete to do or work on. We have not really been given much direction on how are we to respond to what God has done. God has saved our souls but what now. How am I to live?
Paul says based on everything God has done. I urge you. I exhort and implore you. I beseech you and call you to respond. Paul comes alongside the believers and with all authority as an apostle and all love and care as fellow saint, he urges them to respond to God because he has given us everything.
3 Blessed is the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavens in Christ.
You have heard the truth now you must act.
True Worship
True Worship
1 Therefore, brothers and sisters, in view of the mercies of God, I urge you to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and pleasing to God; this is your true worship.
He points them forward to the proper response of a person who has recieved these mercies. The action is to present your bodies to God.
To present or to offer your complete self to him. Only a person who has the Holy Spirit and has been redeemed can do this. For the heart of flesh and the mind of flesh is hostile to God. But the one who has been changed by God is called to present themselves and all of themselves to God.
Many Christians today look to God and the church as the person and place who is supposed to give them what they want. For years people would talk about church shopping. I am looking for just the right place, with the right people. They must have this program, sing this way, be this big, and the list goes on and on. But that idea of looking to God as just a provider of our wants and the church as an extension of that, is contrary to what Paul is saying here.
He urges them, that in light of all that God has done for you. Understand that there is nothing that measures up to the saving graces of God. In view of all of this, look to him, come before him, and present your body to God.
19 Don’t you know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you have from God? You are not your own, 20 for you were bought at a price. So glorify God with your body.
Paul is speaking of the heart of the grateful. It means to yield your own life to his. Not to seek to gain from God as the motivation but to come before him and say Lord here I am use me. Using the imagery of the temple worship we are to give ourselves over to him as a sacrifice. As an offering. Instead of lams, bulls, doves, and many of the other offerings, we are to bring our own person before him as the sacrifice.
He gives three qualifiers to describe how we are to be this sacrifice.
The first is that it is a living sacrifice. This is not the one and done Christian. This isn’t the person who professes Christ as Lord and then never lives for the Lord. They don’t make a deal with Jesus and then never do any thing about it. If I went to a job interview and had a great interview. Everything went great and I was given the job. I have a new title. I have a new wage. What would happen if I never showed up to work my first day, or the second day, or the third day. What would the employer do.
A living sacrifice is just that, it is alive, it is one that is moving, pursuing, growing, and producing fruit. It is active and alive not dead and empty.
Secondly, the sacrifice is not only living and active but this sacrifice is one that is holy. In other words it is clean and undefiled.
Though we know we are forgiven of our sin and that Christ has justified us and washed us clean, we still sin and we can repent of that sin receive forgiveness and be holy.
9 If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. 10 If we say we have not sinned, we make him a liar, and his word is not in us. 1 My little children, I am writing these things to you so that you may not sin. But if anyone does sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous.
God says be holy as I am holy. Is that possible? Well not in the perfect sense but it should be one of our greatest desires. That we present ourselves holy and pure before the Lord. We do not believe the lie that since God saved me in my sin that he is ok if I say there. Same job interview and same new position. But this time I do show up but I have not showered. I am in my pajamas. I have last nights pizza sauce on my chin from dinner. My clothes smell because I have not washed them in a week. What would the employer do?
The third quality is that the sacrifice it pleasing to the Lord. We like to tell God what is acceptable but this is the heart of the sacrifice. That there is a desire that it be pleasing to the Lord. Which means that you know what the Lord wants of you and what he desires and then you make every effort to bring that to him. To receive the praise of well done Good and Faithful servant like Paul instead of you wicked servant.
6 “A son honors his father, and a servant his master. If then I am a father, where is my honor? And if I am a master, where is my fear? says the Lord of hosts to you, O priests, who despise my name. But you say, ‘How have we despised your name?’ 7 By offering polluted food upon my altar. But you say, ‘How have we polluted you?’ By saying that the Lord’s table may be despised. 8 When you offer blind animals in sacrifice, is that not evil? And when you offer those that are lame or sick, is that not evil? Present that to your governor; will he accept you or show you favor? says the Lord of hosts. 9 And now entreat the favor of God, that he may be gracious to us. With such a gift from your hand, will he show favor to any of you? says the Lord of hosts. 10 Oh that there were one among you who would shut the doors, that you might not kindle fire on my altar in vain! I have no pleasure in you, says the Lord of hosts, and I will not accept an offering from your hand.
The priests in the temple were to bring the best to God but instead they were using the sacrifices to get rid of the animals that no one wanted. They were not even good enough to pay taxes with but they were being given to God. The offering was to be pleasing to God. It was to be what he requested.
Same new job and I show up on the first day on time and ready to go. I am clean and have properly prepared for the work environment. But what if I decided that I was going to do things my way. That I know how this is to be done. I don’t need to be taught I got this all under control. And I go out start changing things, making a mess, causing disruption and chaos. Money is lost people get hurt. But I want to do what I want instead of doing what is pleasing to the boss.
What would be the result? None of us would expect the boss to not fire me on the very first day. So why do we think that God deserves less than our employers? Why do we come before him dead or not at all? Why do we think that we can stay soiled and dirty when we come to the holy one? Why do we think we know better than God? Our employers rules we follow to receive a check but the commands of God are optional when we are receiving eternal live?
1 Therefore I, the prisoner in the Lord, urge you to walk worthy of the calling you have received, 2 with all humility and gentleness, with patience, bearing with one another in love, 3 making every effort to keep the unity of the Spirit through the bond of peace.
Paul urges them to present their bodies to God as a living sacrifice that is Holy and pleasing to God. For this is your true worship. Or your divine service.
The way in which we are to live out our divine service is to be a living, holy, and pleasing sacrifice to the Lord. This is something that Paul says you must do. He says this is your true worship. He is still using the imagery of the worship in the temple to help them see this new life. Instead of bringing the offerings to the temple to be offered to God as worship. He says present yourself as the offering for this is your true worship. And he has given us everything to do this so all are without excuse.
3 His divine power has given us everything required for life and godliness through the knowledge of him who called us by his own glory and goodness.
Other translations will say your reasonable service or your spiritual worship. Peter will use another image of the temple to point to the same idea.
4 As you come to him, a living stone—rejected by people but chosen and honored by God—5 you yourselves, as living stones, a spiritual house, are being built to be a holy priesthood to offer spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ.
As living stones, we are to come to him to be used to be built into the spiritual house of God and into a holy priesthood. And what do the priests do? they offer sacrifices that are pleasing and acceptable to God. And in both cases it is ourselves that are put on the alter.
This idea of a willful giving of ourselves is part of the life of a Christian. To walk worthy of the calling, to make every effort to supplement our faith, to offer our bodies to God as tools of righteousness. There is an active will in our lives as we follow Jesus. For there are two paths that will result.
Be Transformed
Be Transformed
2 Do not be conformed to this age, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, ...
This age is described as an evil age. One filled with corruption and darkness.
15 Do not love the world or the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him. 16 For all that is in the world—the desires of the flesh and the desires of the eyes and pride of life—is not from the Father but is from the world. 17 And the world is passing away along with its desires, but whoever does the will of God abides forever.
Those that present there bodies to God will not be conformed to this age. We naturally conform to the world and this age. Look around and you will see that this is true. When we live for ourselves we pursue the desires of the flesh, the eyes, and anything that we can boast about in our pride. Conformed like clay being molded and remolded by the different teachings of false teachers and those that do not believe in God.
But those that are being led by the Spirit and doing the will of God and being obedient to what he desires will not be molded to the image of the world but to the image of Christ by the renewing of the mind.
11 And he gave the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, the shepherds and teachers, 12 to equip the saints for the work of ministry, for building up the body of Christ, 13 until we all attain to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to mature manhood, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ, 14 so that we may no longer be children, tossed to and fro by the waves and carried about by every wind of doctrine, by human cunning, by craftiness in deceitful schemes. 15 Rather, speaking the truth in love, we are to grow up in every way into him who is the head, into Christ, 16 from whom the whole body, joined and held together by every joint with which it is equipped, when each part is working properly, makes the body grow so that it builds itself up in love. 17 Now this I say and testify in the Lord, that you must no longer walk as the Gentiles do, in the futility of their minds. 18 They are darkened in their understanding, alienated from the life of God because of the ignorance that is in them, due to their hardness of heart. 19 They have become callous and have given themselves up to sensuality, greedy to practice every kind of impurity. 20 But that is not the way you learned Christ!— 21 assuming that you have heard about him and were taught in him, as the truth is in Jesus, 22 to put off your old self, which belongs to your former manner of life and is corrupt through deceitful desires, 23 and to be renewed in the spirit of your minds, 24 and to put on the new self, created after the likeness of God in true righteousness and holiness.
Seeking God’s will is found in the pages of his word. It is by this that we know what is pleasing to him. It is by this we know what is holy. And it is by this that our minds are transformed. We can be conformed to the world. Being reworked to look like the culture around us. Or being made new, putting of the old and putting on the new. Putting on the likeness of Christ.
14 As obedient children, do not be conformed to the passions of your former ignorance, 15 but as he who called you is holy, you also be holy in all your conduct, 16 since it is written, “You shall be holy, for I am holy.”
We know this is not possible without the work of the Spirit in our lives but we must want to do it. It must be more than good intentions and empty promises. We must want to be what God wants us to be and we must do it. When he says be do not be conformed to your former passions and ignorance but instead be holy as God is holy.
Be like Jesus and you will be holy. Know who Jesus is and imitate him. See how he lives in a pleasing way to God “This is my son in whom I am well pleased.” I do the will of the one who sent me. I willingly laid down my life. as the atoning sacrifice to cancel the certificate of debt, to pay the ransom, and to purchase for himself a people for his own possession.
4 But when the goodness and loving kindness of God our Savior appeared, 5 he saved us, not because of works done by us in righteousness, but according to his own mercy, by the washing of regeneration and renewal of the Holy Spirit, 6 whom he poured out on us richly through Jesus Christ our Savior, 7 so that being justified by his grace we might become heirs according to the hope of eternal life.
The result of the one who does these thing is that he may discern the will of God.
Gain Understanding
Gain Understanding
… so that you may discern what is the good, pleasing, and perfect will of God.
What is the purpose of being obedient to God and presenting our bodies as living sacrifices? To be pleasing and Holy and being transformed by the renewal of our minds.
It is so that we may discern the will of God. The question that many of us have had at one time or another. What is the point of God’s commands?
I find it revealing that we want this process to be in reverse. We want God to reveal his plans and why and then we will do it.
Paul tells us that the process is to obey what you know. Do what you know to be true. Do this for the Lord and you will be transformed and then you will understand.
Obedience leads to understanding why and understand lead to understanding God.
I have coached boys soccer for close to 14 years from 5 year 14 year olds. And I have seen a glimpse of this over the last decade. The first thing is that a player that will not obey brings very little value to the team no matter their skills. One year I had two boys join my team and they were awesome. I was finally going to have a good year. We did not win very much when I coached Kayson. Every game that year went exactly the same. Both boys would score in the first couple of minutes of the game and then we would lose never scoring again. The other team would team up on them and they would never pass to anyone else and would even take the ball away from their own team mates to try and score.
But when you have players that their response is yes coach something happens. They cannot see the big picture that is in my head. They are not bringing together all of the strengths and weaknesses. Many times they don’t comprehend why I ask them to do certain things but over time there comes a moment in each kid that I can see the light bulb come on and their comes understanding. They start to think differently as they see the results of their obedience play out in each game.
But what comes last is, over time, as they follow direction, see the results, they start to understand me and my heart. They start to trust and know what I want. They start to up and ask what can I do coach to fix this. What can I do to be a bigger impact. Put me in coach where it makes the most sense for the team.
When we obey God we usually cannot see what the outcome will be. We serve because we are presenting ourselves to his direction. We obey because we have professed him as Lord and king. But as we live our our lives as a living sacrifice we start to see the fruit that we never have tasted before. The sweetness of the work of the Lord in our relationships, in our Love and Joy. We see things change in our hearts in ways we never imagined. And as that happens we come to know deeply the will of God.
We come to see that his will is good. It is morally acceptable. It is without evil. It is what is best for us.
We come to see that his will is acceptable. That it is pleasing and that it is perfect and without blemish. These mirror the three qualities of the sacrifice that we are to give that is living, holy and pleasing to God.
9 What you have learned and received and heard and seen in me—practice these things, and the God of peace will be with you.
We are urged to do what God has commanded and and what we will find is that his ways are good and are a blessing.
17 If you know these things, blessed are you if you do them.
Conclusion
Conclusion
What would it look like?
Be where you can be used?
Let us pray.
Let us pray.
Prayer
Blessing/Benediction
3 Proclaim the Lord’s greatness with me; let us exalt his name together.
