Revering the Word
Romans 12 Have you offered you?
Good morning, everyone. We are in Romans chapter 12 and it's a very significant beginning, an entire chapter as well, but the first couple verses are not only significant to the book, but they've been very significant to my life as well. In the end of Romans 11, Paul has essentially completed his presentation of the Gospel, and one of the Paulmark verses of Romans 11 in my view is verse 32 of chapter 11, where it says, "For God has shut up or caught up in the net all in disobedience so that He may show mercy to all." And hallelujah, although we were all sinners and though all of us fell short of the glory of God, through Jesus Christ dying for us on that cross, all who believe in Him have been given God's mercy. But trust in Jesus, hallelujah, you've been given His grace, His mercy, His forgiveness, and the promise of eternal life. And the other thing that He's given us, which has been talked about significantly throughout this book, is His righteousness. We have been considered or reckoned righteous before God, and one day we can be presented or will be presented before God seen in right standing or righteous because we've been forgiven by the Lord. And Paul, now in completing the Gospel in those 11 chapters, gives a big therefore. And, you know, when he says therefore, it's, you know, what is it there for? He's saying, hey, this is what I've all said. Now therefore your response to this, our proper response to the mercy of God, the fact that we've been forgiven and ushered into the promise of eternal life. He says in verse 1 of chapter 12, therefore I urge you, I urge you. And what a strong word that is. I urge you. I imagine if Paul were in front of us pleading his case to us, brothers, I urge you. And in fact, that's what he says next. Therefore, I urge you, brothers, brethren, by the mercy of God as a result of the fact that you've now received mercy, brothers, sisters, I urge this of you because of the mercy you've been given. Present your bodies a living and holy sacrifice. Now many years ago, I was in fact, it's very interesting. I happen to be riding along in the car right now as well with my bride. And I'll never forget, we were in the car. And I mean, this goes back to the mid 2000s, like 2005 or something. I don't know. It's a long time ago. And I was actually reading the Bible and I read this passage Romans 12 1 and something just was illustrated to me in a profound way. And, you know, it's shaped me. It's shaped my preaching. And as a result of what I feel like was delivered to me or awakened in me or what I was able to see, I ended up writing a book called altered based on this passage. And it says, therefore, I urge you, Paul is saying, because of the mercy of God, to present your bodies a living and holy sacrifice. Let me just finish the verse, acceptable to God, which is your spiritual service of worship. And when it says, your spiritual service, as though it's a priestly term, an Old Testament priestly term, where an Old Testament priest would bring a sacrifice to atone for our sin. And that was the priestly duty of worshiping God to bring that sacrifice. It was their spiritual duty to bring that offering. But now as a result of Jesus being the once and final offering, and we can no longer bring an offering. It won't do us any good if we were to bring a lamb to offer our sin because God brought the final one, right? So as a result, he's saying, I urge you by the mercy of God to present you living and holy. And what God is after, this is so deep, is that he wants us to present ourselves to him as an offering. Just as that lamb was offered to forgive, Jesus offered himself. Now we are being urged to offer ourselves alive. You know, you used to have to bring a lamb and sacrifice that you'd offer a dead lamb, but it would be a blameless one. It'd be a perfect one. You couldn't bring a spotted lamb. Well, now we are the one who in a sense has become the unspotted one, the unblemished one, because not because we've been perfect, but because we've been perfectly forgiven, and now we can stand before God, holy because of the forgiveness, but we're supposed to present ourselves to God alive, a living sacrifice. See, he doesn't want us dead, dead to our old ways, yes, dead to the sin in our lives, yes, but actually he wants us to present ourselves alive to say, you know what? I'm here, God. I want to live for you now. I'm a living sacrifice. I'm a living breathing sacrifice. I want to present my body, my skills, the gifts that you've given me, and present them before you and say, God, they're here for your service, hallelujah, because you gave your all dead, and then you rose from the dead, hallelujah. Now you're asking of us in response to the great mercy you've given us to present ourselves alive being made holy by you, and that is our priestly duty. And now we're a kingdom of priests, and the priestly duty today is not to bring an animal sacrifice, but really the priestly duty today for each one of us as is kingdom of priests is to say, Lord, I present myself to you. No, you know, for me, that meant offering my life to serve him as a pastor, and I've been in ministry now for 20 years. But that's not necessarily what it means for you, vocationally, to be a pastor. Now, I believe every one of us is a minister unto God. Every one of us is called to ministry. That doesn't mean that we're all going to be paid, you know, call to paid vocational ministry as a career. But every one of us as a believer in Jesus is a kingdom priest here to serve God's kingdom. And this is something I do believe he wants for every one of us, as he wants us to offer our bodies a living sacrifice, holy and pleasing to him, and say, God, how do you want to use me? And this is what my book altered is about. The book altered really is about convincing people of the reality that you can trust the Bible to teach you that Jesus was the Lamb of God. And there is great evidence to believe in the Bible. The book illustrates that it's to help people believe. But then once we do believe in his book and his gospel and the mercy that we've been forgiven, then the book inspires and challenges each one of us to offer ourselves and say, Hey, you know what, God, what does that mean for me to offer myself? You know, as an example, you know, riding in the car with my beautiful bride right now. And, you know, when I when I got called to be a pastor of a church, she also got offered to be a job as a schoolteacher, which was significant because for many, many, many years we didn't have very much money. I had a very small church for a long time. And my wife, you know, helped our family by working as a schoolteacher and helping our family with insurance benefits and, you know, supporting me in the ministry. And, you know, also she seeks to be a light where she is, where she ministers. So the point is, is that our calling is the same. What I mean by that is we've all been called by God to serve his kingdom. Every one of us, we're all a kingdom priest. He wants every one of us to present ourselves to him alive. Here I am, God. Here I am, God. How do you want to use me? Hallelujah. As Isaiah said, Here I am. And others, Moses said the same thing. Here I am. He wants all of us to say, Here I am to him. God, how do you want to use me? But how he's going to use this is going to be different. So for my wife that's been supporting me and helping to earn an income from our family too and serving him through teaching. And for me, it's been pastoral. But how does God want to use you and, you know, have you offered yourself to him? Have you, have you said, God, I want to hear from you and I want to know how you want to use me? I'm here to present myself alive to you. And, you know, maybe some of you are, remember my dad had a, someone, you know, witness to him, a guy by the name of Ed Edwards and gave my dad a book called Half Time. And the book was about, you know, a lot of people, men, women, maybe the first half of their life are working for a career and stuff like that. And sometimes too focused on that without offering our lives to God earlier. But there's no better time than the present. You know, and that book Half Time is about kind of recognizing the first half of your life, but now how does God want to use the second half of your life? You know, I love golf and I love to go for hiking through the woods, but God has more for each one of us than just entertaining ourselves on a golf course. Now, if you do have something you enjoy in life, there may be a way you can use what you enjoy to reach others and to encourage others in the faith. And, and you know what? Do that. Use what you enjoy where you connect with people and seek to point people to him and encourage them towards Jesus. But we have to realize that we're here for God. Remember how verse chapter 11 ended for from him and through him and to him are all things. He is our reason for being and as a result of him being our reason for being, it says, therefore I urge you brothers. I urge you by the mercy of God because you receive God's mercy. Present your bodies. Present yourselves in living in holy sacrifice. He doesn't want you dead. He wants you alive. And he's already made you holy acceptable to God. You've already been made acceptable to God. Hallelujah. And to offer yourself to God is your priestly duty. It is your spiritual service of worship. Hallelujah. And once you do that, once you offer yourself and say, God, I want to be used by you. Wait for him. He will help you. He will help you to see how he wants to use you. And you might not hear today. But just keep offering yourself. Keep looking for how God wants to use you. And then it says this. And while you're doing that, do not be conformed to this world. Don't start looking like the world. Don't be so in this world that you become like the world and be conformed to this world. But be transformed by the renewing of your mind. And the fact that you're listening to this podcast already tells me that you're doing something right. And this is one of the ways that you transform yourself by the renewing of your mind. That you continue to place your thoughts upon God and His Word. And as a result, you're renewing your mind. It's something that we should be doing daily, renewing our mind and him. And that way you may prove what the will of God is. That which is good and acceptable and perfect. Hallelujah. And you'll be more adept to hearing and seeing and following the will of God when you are daily transforming being transformed by the renewing of your mind. As you spend time with God, He will continue to shape you. You will be His clay. He will have you on the potter's wheel if you will allow Him to. And He'll continue to mold you to make you more like Him. And use you for His glory. Hallelujah. Just keep putting yourself on that wheel every day. Get on that wheel. Get on that potter's wheel. Get in the Word of God like you're doing Hallelujah. And allow God to shape and mold you and make you more like Him. Hallelujah. What a great passage. I tell you what if you haven't yet read the book altered, I strongly encourage you to read that. It will go into this in more depth. And I encourage you to get one in the hands of your friends and family. Because not only will it convince them that they can trust the gospel and trust the Bible. It will also get them thinking about how God wants them to offer their lives to be used for God's kingdom. That's what the book is about Hallelujah. And then we'll go a little bit more speedily now through the rest of the chapter which gets down to practically living out our faith. And it says through the grace given to me, I say to everyone among you I have to think more highly of himself than he ought to think. But to think as to have sound judgment as God has allotted to each a measure of faith. Humm humility. For just as we have many members in one body and all the members do not have the same function, so we who are many are one body in Christ individually members one of another. Since we have gifts that differ according to the grace given to us each of us is to exercise them accordingly. If prophecy and according to the proportion of his faith. If service in a serving or he who teaches in his teaching or he who exhorts in his exhortation and he who gives with liberality meaning give generously and he who leads with diligence and he who shows mercy with cheerfulness. And that's exactly what I've been saying. Do you see how when we offer ourselves a life to God as a sacrifice to God that it can be different for each one of us. He just gave a bunch of different gifts there. It could be serving. It could be teaching. It could be giving. It could be so many different things that we can do for God's kingdom. He wants to use each one of us and he created us as a body of Christ meaning one body but many parts were all different and you know you're better at things than I am and God has things for you to do that he may not call me to do but he needs you to you know take your part and your role in God's kingdom and it's beautiful when the body of Christ each functioning in their area of skill and giftedness is being used for the glory of God it's a beautiful thing hallelujah. Now all of us no matter what our calling is no matter what our gifts may be and how we may serve God this is going to be true of all of us. Let love be without hypocrisy. Abor what is evil cling to what is good and you know that will preach by the way Abor what is evil you know today we celebrate what's evil and it's really sad God has things he calls good and God has things he calls evil and we're supposed to call what's good good and what's evil evil and we can't water that down or otherwise the world gets watered down and that's the truth. Verse 10 be devoted to one another and brotherly love and may we love one another be devoted to one another especially in the family and house of God give preference to one another in honor that's such an important thing we're supposed to honor one another and another way of translating giving preference to one another in honor is to lead the way in showing honor and man I tell you what that will provide for healthy relationships when we lead the way in showing honor to one another not lagging behind in diligence we should be diligent in all that we do fervor in spirit serving the Lord see he wants us all to serve him rejoice in and hope persevering and tribulation devoted to prayer contributing to the needs of the saints practicing hospitality I want to you know I want to just encourage you and challenge you for a moment there is more to serving God than showing up at church there is more to serving God and getting engaged than even your private devotions and your private devotions are so important and I want to encourage that and what you're doing here is wonderful in that regard but God is wanting as a result of the fact that we are growing in him to serve him and if sometimes I think what happens is is people you know it kind of reminds me of like I have some a daughter who's married now and has a full-time job and sometimes we kind of give her a hard time because she'll say she's busy and you know she is busy she's working full-time for the first time in her life but she doesn't have kids yet right and we try to explain to her that you know you think you're busy now just wait until you have children and now you're trying to juggle all this well sometimes people feel like they're busy and they don't have time to serve God and maybe you haven't put it into your schedule to serve God and as a result adding something to your schedule right now to serve at church weekly to do something to serve seems like oh my goodness how would I do that and it's kind of unfortunate that that's the case I want to say it humbly I you know I don't want to come to down hard on anyone but what I'm trying to say is it always should have been in our schedule to serve God that should have always been something that we were doing and it shouldn't be that that's something extra that now we have to do it's something that because God is important our lives should be revolved around the fact that you know what I go to church I do my devotions and I serve God and I'm going to fit my life around those things because he is you know as we read in inverse 36 of 11 from him and through him and to him are all things because he is worthy of it all we should always have in our lives service to God it should just be a priority for us hallelujah moving on verse 14 bless those who persecute you bless and do not curse wow just like Jesus did memories he was up on the cross and he said father forgive them for they do not know what they do rejoice with those who rejoice and weep with those who weep be of the same mind toward one another and it's great when Christians walk in unity brothers and sisters of faith walk in unity do not be haughty in mind he's brought that up before in this chapter about humility but associate with the lowly do not be wise in your own estimation humility again see how important that is as a Christian never pay back evil for evil to anyone respect what is right in the sight of all men and we should be seeking to do what's right in God's eyes first and that's most important but if in honor of others we can do what's right in front of all men that's good to where we have to make an exception to that is where the people around us want to celebrate evil we can't respect that we have to honor God first if possible so far as it depends on you be at peace with all men and we should seek to build unity in peace but again we can't do it at the forsake of doctrinal air or untruth so we do want to seek peace and pursue it but we have to also stand in truth speak the truth in love never take your own revenge beloved but leave room for the wrath of God see the wrath of God is coming forward is written vengeance is mine I will repay says the Lord and here we've talked about like in chapter 11 the kindness and severity of God and we're seeing how we're supposed to act with love and kindness but yet there is going to be vengeance and wrath for those who have not accepted Jesus Christ as our Lord and Savior and that's why we want to get the word out but if your enemy is hungry feed them and if he is thirsty give him a drink for in doing so you will keep burning coals on his head and what a wonderful thing that is that's an old testament passage but even when people are out to persecute us or harm us do good do good anyways do not be overcome by evil but overcome evil with good that's an interesting thing you know that God is asking us to stand firm in him to stand firm in truth but also to be very kind and loving and we need to practice as believers not only standing for what's good and right and true and holy before God but doing so with an abundance amount of love and sometimes our truth can come across hateful and we got to make sure we're not making that easy to occur meaning don't water down the truth stand with the truth but accompany the truth with great abundance of love and it more readily will be heard and I think that's a message for me and a message for all of us so we need that we need an abundance of both truth and love hallelujah so God bless you all I hope that this chapter inspired and encouraged you oh I urge you brothers by the mercies of God to present yourselves a living sacrifice holy and pleasing to God this is our kingdom priestly duty now God bless you all [click] [BLANK_AUDIO]