Reasonable Service
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Radical? (The Normal Christian Life)
Radical? (The Normal Christian Life)
What comes to mind when you think of the word Radical?
For me its...
Going against the grain, doing something that is overtly different.
I usually think of something anti the norm.
Going above and beyond what most do
Defintion:
radical - departing markedly from the usual or customary; extreme or drastic.
So by definition Christianity itself is a radical way of life.
Over the next several weeks we are going to look at radical Christianity, or simply put the normal Christian life?
This kind of a double negative in and of itself.
Living the life of a Christian is in and of itself radical by nature. It is departing from the usual or customary, it is drastically different from the life of a non Christian.
But what is radical Christianity?
What is the normal Christian life?
Is there a difference?
What is A Christian Anyway?
What is A Christian Anyway?
Simply put, radical Christianity is not following Jesus. I would even say radical Christianity is not Christianity at all.
Let’s look at for clarity
Let’s look at for clarity
25 Then departed Barnabas to Tarsus, for to seek Saul:
26 and when he had found him, he brought him unto Antioch. And it came to pass, that a whole year they assembled themselves with the church, and taught much people, and the disciples were called Christians first in Antioch.
Acts 11:
The term Christian is used to describe the disciples.
Disciple of Jesus is a synonym for Christian.
So if you are not a disciple of Jesus then you cannot call yourself a Christian.
So if a Christian is a disciple, then...
Let’s look at Jesus’ words on the mark of His disciples
31 Then said Jesus to those Jews which believed on him, If ye continue in my word, then are ye my disciples indeed;
John 8
A disciples is not someone who believes the Word of God, but someone that continues in the Word.
Meaning they are a living out the truths of the Words of Jesus continually or daily.
So a Christian can be defined as someone who continues daily in the Word of God.
Someone who is daily growing and striving to be more like Jesus.
So we could say it this way. Radical Christianity isn’t really Christianity.
By definition radical means departing drastically from the usual or customary.
So if you are departing from the teachings of Jesus, aka the Word of God, then you are by definition a radical Christin, aka not a Christian.
Make sense?
The Normal Christian Life
The Normal Christian Life
So we are going to look at the Normal Christian Life.
This is what it looks like to call yourself a Christian.
Despite what you may think becing a Christian is much more than believing something.
1 I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that ye present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service.
2 And be not conformed to this world: but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind, that ye may prove what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect, will of God.
Reasonable Service
Reasonable Service
1 I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that ye present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service.
Paul tells us to present our bodies as a living sacrifice.
Paul tells us to present our bodies as a living sacrifice.
What is a sacrifice?
By definition a sacrifice is surrender of something for the sake of something else.
So in this case a sacrifice is surrendering yourself to God.
We are to present our selves wholly to God
We are to sacrifice ourselves “holy, acceptable unto God”
Holy
The is to be set apart and consecrated unto God.
To be blameless before God.
Acceptable
This is to live a life in accordance to the Word of God.
Fortunately for us we are made holy and acceptable unto God by the blood and sacrifice of Jesus.
19 Having therefore, brethren, boldness to enter into the holiest by the blood of Jesus,
20 by a new and living way, which he hath consecrated for us, through the vail, that is to say, his flesh;
Hebrews 10:19-22
He gave his life for us, therefore, we give our lives for Him.
13 Watch ye, stand fast in the faith, quit you like men, be strong.
The death burial and resurrection is a picture of what He wants to do in your life.
13 Meats for the belly, and the belly for meats: but God shall destroy both it and them. Now the body is not for fornication, but for the Lord; and the Lord for the body.
20 For ye are bought with a price: therefore glorify God in your body, and in your spirit, which are God’s.
4 Therefore we are buried with him by baptism into death: that like as Christ was raised up from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life.
So just like Jesus sacrificially gave His life for us, we sacrificially give our lives to God.
25 whom God hath set forth to be a propitiation through faith in his blood, to declare his righteousness for the remission of sins that are past, through the forbearance of God;
5 But if our unrighteousness commend the righteousness of God, what shall we say? Is God unrighteous who taketh vengeance? (I speak as a man)
This is described as being a reasonable service.
This is nothing radical, it is simply ordinary.
How would you describe reasonable?
reasonable = Being within the bounds of common sense
What would you think if someone told you your grades are reasonable?
logical
Paul is saying it would make logical or common sense for a Christian to offer his or her life to God as a sacrifice.
This is the normal Christian life.
But this in not an easy place to get to. This goes totally contrary to what we naturally desire, we want our will, not his.
So… how do we get to a pl
How We Get There
How We Get There
If you are anything like me you may be asking, that sounds all well and good Mason, but how to I get to a place where I have a desire to offer my life to God?
2 And be not conformed to this world: but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind, that ye may prove what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect, will of God.
Romans
You allow the Word of God to transform your mind.
Run from the World
Run from the World
Don’t be conformed to the world.
14 as obedient children, not fashioning yourselves according to the former lusts in your ignorance:
You have to put off the old nature
15 Love not the world, neither the things that are in the world. If any man love the world, the love of the Father is not in him.
Run from the world
Don’
15 Love not the world, neither the things that are in the world. If any man love the world, the love of the Father is not in him.
Here is what we are to be conformed to...
We are to be conformed to the image of Jesus.
29 For whom he did foreknow, he also did predestinate to be conformed to the image of his Son, that he might be the firstborn amongst many brethren.
Romans
14 But put ye on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make not provision for the flesh, to fulfil the lusts thereof.
Notice the order here.
You put on the Lord Jesus which will give you the ability to deny the flesh.
You cannot deny the flesh in your own power, it is in His power that we have the ability to deny self.
14 But put ye on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make not provision for the flesh, to fulfil the lusts thereof.
How are we conformed into the image of Jesus?
Run to the Word
Run to the Word
By running to the Word of God.
2 And be not conformed to this world: but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind, that ye may prove what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect, will of God.
Romans 12:
We are conformed to the image of Jesus by allowing God’s Word to transform and renew our mind.
If you come to God’s Word in faith, He will renew your mind.
I have seen this played out in my life
As I follow Jesus, I am changed, as I walk with Him daily my mind is made new through the washing of the water of the Word of God.
2 Every branch in me that beareth not fruit he taketh away: and every branch that beareth fruit, he purgeth it, that it may bring forth more fruit.
3 Now ye are clean through the word which I have spoken unto you.
Conclusion
We do not want to be a radical Christians. We want to be normal Christians.
As a result of this you will be radically different that those around you.
Tonight we learned that a reasonable thing for a Christian to do is...
Present themselves to God as a living sacrifice
By daily fleeing from the world and running to the Word
This is the normal Christian life.