Vol. IX — No. 4 January 28, 1968
Romans 12:1-5
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. 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. For I say, through the grace given unto me, to every man that is among you, not to think of himself more highly than he ought to think; but to think soberly, according as God hath dealt to every man the measure of faith. For as we have many members in one body, and all members have not the same office: So we, being many, are one body in Christ, and every one members one of another.
In Christ Jesus, the Light of the world who would have us let our light shine, Fellow Redeemed:
The Light of the world has come and is shining upon a world of lost sinners milling around in the darkness they have created for themselves. That is the Epiphany message. Each gospel selection presents a ray of that Light: as Savior also of the Gentile world, as the Child who became aware that His business on earth was to be about His Father’s business, as the Creator who has power over the elements of His creation, as the Holy One before whom sickness must flee, as the Lord of nature, as the One who achieves His will through His word and finally as the Lord of Glory.
The epistle selections present The Light in its reflected glory, as it is to enlighten men and make them lights. On one occasion our Lord proclaimed the Epiphany message in this way: “I am the light of the world.” He pointed to Himself as the Light. Then He continued by pointing to the effect that He would have upon others: “He that followeth me shall not walk in darkness, but shall have the light of life.” John 8: l2. When He who is the Light comes, He dispels darkness in human lives. Yea He converts men of darkness into lights. Did not the Light say, “Ye are the light of the world!” Did not the Light shining into this world exhort, “Let your light so shine before men.” Matt. 5:14 and l6. This is the theme of the Epiphany epistle selections: how men of darkness are to shine as lights in this darkened world.
Chapter twelve of Paul’s epistle to the Romans furnishes three of the Epiphany epistle selections. we shall consider these selections today and the next two Sundays. We do so in the hope that we may learn how better to shine as lights in this particular area where the Lord has placed us. The first five verses of this chapter, our text for this morning, begin with the general and work towards the specific. The text reveals to us—
“I beseech—I beg, I implore, I urge, I exhort—you therefore, brethren…that ye present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service.” The killing of animals and offering them to the Lord as sacrifices was a thins of the past. Each child of God is to offer himself—his arms, his legs, his youth or age, his mental powers, his natural and acquired skills, his gifts and talents, his earning power and accumulated wealth—daily to the Lord as a living sacrifice. “Take my life and let it be Consecrated, Lord, to Thee,” is to be the melody with which we begin each day. This is precisely the service that Paul calls reasonable, for it is to be a conscious effort of the mind and will. It is acceptable to God, for He who has ransomed us from the powers of darkness wants us to serve Him without fear, in holiness and righteousness, all the days of our life. It is a holy sacrifice, for it separates us from the mass of mankind that is dedicated to self-service or the service of the lusts of the flesh whatever form they take.
St. Paul develops and explains this New Testament form of sacrificing—this daily presenting of our bodies as living sacrifices to Him. He explains first that such sacrificing is—
“I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that ye present your bodies a living sacrifice.” Notice the motivating power for this sacrificing of ourselves. Paul doesn’t command, “Do this or the almighty God will make you do it.” He doesn’t bribe: “If you do this, God will look with favor upon you and reward you.” He doesn’t appeal to one’s honor or self-respect or moral decency: “You certainly want to be a good, decent citizen. So do this!” Paul uses none of these motivations that are so commonly used among men. And this is precisely what distinguishes the living sacrifice of Paul from civic righteousness and the morality urged by men here on earth. Paul uses the “mercies of God” as the motivating power.
What does he mean? All that precedes in his letter to the Romans is a systematic introduction to this exhortation to present your bodies as living sacrifices to the Lord. Paul began by showing the universality of sin. Every single person on earth is convicted and damned. Then Paul showed the universality of God’s grace—how God sent His Son to redeem and justify mankind. That action on the part of God is “the mercies of God.”
Apply these things to yourself. You and I were conceived and born in sin, under the wrath of God. Left to ourselves we could but live our lives as slaves of sin in some form and doomed to damnation. But the mercies of the Lord have flowed our way. God sent His Son for us. Christ died for us and arose for us. The Holy Spirit has worked faith in our hearts so that we have tasted and experienced Christ. These mercies are the spiritual force, the motivating power, to get us day by day to present our bodies as living sacrifices to the Lord.
But just how is this achieved? It is—
“Be not conformed to this world: but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind, that ye may prove—or test—what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect, will of God.” If we have the same goals in life as the world, if we conduct ourselves as the world, then we are of the world—even though we may deceive ourselves into thinking that we are Christians and even though we may belong to a Christian church. No one can be conformed to the world and at the same time be a child of God. St. Paul exhorts, “Be not conformed to the world!” St. John puts it in these words, “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.” I John 2:15.
But this outer non-conformity is the product of an inner transformation. Paul exhorts, “Be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind.” We are to have a new attitude, a new scale of values, a new outlook on life, an outlook that has an eternal dimension. Perhaps an example will help put the point across. I have always had extreme difficulty in getting across to people the difference between good works in the sight of God and good works in the sight of man. The opinion of the man on the street, the man of this world, and also the opinion of many a Christian is that if a work is good in the sight and judgment of man, it cannot but be good and acceptable to God. So it is that when one points out the anti-Christian principles of many semi-religious organizations which have become a part of so many people’s lives, people counter with the argument, “But they do so much good.” Certainly—from the viewpoint of man. But what is good from man’s point of view is not necessarily good from God’s point of view. why? Because man looks only at the deed while God always looks beyond the deed to the doer. God looks at the heart of the doer. If the person has been overwhelmed by the mercies of God and so lives in Christ, then whether that person eats or drinks or whatever he does, he does it all to the glory of his God. But if the person has rejected or compromised the mercies of God in Christ, no matter what he does that is considered good by man, he is still unacceptable to God, for without faith in Christ it is impossible to please God. It takes a transformed mind a transformed way of thinking, an entirely unworldly set of values, to understand this. But just such an inner transformation is necessary and at the same time makes possible the offering of oneself as a living sacrifice unto the Lord. The person whose mind has been transformed so that he sees and evaluates things as does his Lord is then to prove or test all things. He is continually applying divine principles to human principles and situations in life to determine what is the will of God in a specific case or circumstance. We could explore this matter and give examples at length, but time does not permit. We hasten on to observe that offering ourselves as living sacrifices involves also— Paul continues, “For I say, through the grace given unto me, to every man that is among you, not to think of himself more highly than he ought to think; but to think soberly, according as God hath dealt to every man the measure of faith.” Paul warns against two extremes, spiritual pride and false humility. Satan used spiritual pride to deceive Eve in the garden. He still uses it. On more than one occasion I have confronted gainsayers with clear Scripture passages, Sometimes they stop and change the subject. Sometimes they thrash about seeking some kind of a counter argument. Sometimes they honestly say, “I just don’t believe that.” Sometimes they use the old evasion, “Well that is just your opinion.” Whenever anyone is confronted by a clear passage of Scripture on any point under discussion and refuses to yield to it, he reveals himself as a slave of spiritual pride. He thinks more highly of his own prejudices and opinions than he does of the Word of the Lord. The other extreme is false humility. Let me give you a rather delicate personal example. Since I have been your pastor we have had to deal with doctrines and practices that were out of line with Holy Scripture. I have been accused of thinking that I know it all and nobody else knows anything. In brief I have been accused of spiritual pride by some who have been unable to show that any teaching proclaimed or practice advocated is out of line with Scripture. Now if I were to yield and say that the opinion of someone, who has no Scripture to back his position and whose position is out of line with clear Scripture—if I were to say that his position is as good as mine, that would be false humility. Once again, time does not permit us even to begin to examine all the facets of this exhortation to examine and judge oneself soberly. Paul passes on to show how our sacrificing of ourselves may be implemented. It may be— Paul loves to use the analogy of the human body when describing the functions of the members of the Church. He writes, “For as we have many members in one body, and all members have not the same office: So we, being many are one body in Christ, and every one members of another.” In chapter twelve St. Paul shows us how we are to let our lights shine and thus reflect the glory of The Light as members of the Body of Christ. In chapter thirteen he continues by showing how we are to do that as citizens of our country. In chapters fourteen and fifteen he shows how the strong child of God is to let his light shine over against the weak brother. But here in our text Paul begins showing how we are to present our bodies as living sacrifices as members of the Body of Christ. The human body has many members: arms, legs, eyes, ears, internal organs. The legs make it possible for us to move from place to place; the arms and hands make it possible for us to grasp things and perform tasks. The eye sees; the ear hears. The heart pumps the blood; the stomach digests the food. Each part of the body has its purpose and function. We need all parts. So it is in the Church. He are all members, but we don’t all have the same gifts and abilities and so cannot all perform the same functions. Each one is to function for the interest and benefit of all. In so doing each one offers himself as a living sacrifice to his God. Amen. Ministry by Mail is a weekly publication of the Church of the Lutheran Confession. Subscription and staff information may be found online at www.clclutheran.org/ministrybymail. All scripture quotations, unless otherwise indicated, are taken from the King James Version.III. Imposing upon oneself sober self-evaluation.
IV. Implemented in part as members of the Body of Christ.