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A Living & Holy Sacrifice
Romans 12:1-2
In the oldest records that can be found of the various nations of the earth,
sacrifice is always found to have been part of their religious services. From
the time of Adam our ancestors not only felt the need to obtain pardon for sins,
but to express their gratitude to the supreme being or beings who they regarded
as the givers and the benefactors of their life. "But it is only when we come to
the religion of Israel that we find the idea of sacrifice having any influence
upon the life. The other nations offered sacrifices, but there was no turning
away from evil. ... [In fact,] in the case of many heathen countries, their acts
of religious worship became, and have become, associated with immoral and
degrading practices. The religion of Israel, however, taught the necessity of
personal holiness" (C.H. Irwin, The Pulpit Commentary, vol. 18, Romans, p. 368).
The Jews were constantly warned that without personal holiness their sacred
assemblies and sacrifices would be unacceptable. In Amos 5:21-24, for example,
God said: I hate, I despise your feast days, and I do not savor your sacred
assemblies. Though you offer Me burnt offerings and your grain offerings, I will
not accept them, nor will I regard your fattened peace offerings. Take away from
Me the noise of your songs, for I will not hear the melody of your stringed
instruments. But let justice run down like water, and righteousness like a
mighty stream (cf. Isa 1:10-17; Amos 5:21-24)
There has never been a time when God has been pleased with the sacrifice of
individuals who are not determined to live holy lives. He would rather that they
not even attempt to worship Him rather than to worship without personal
righteousness - justice, mercy and a humble walk with God. But Israel did not
listen to these warnings and by the time that we come to the NT the religion of
most people had become a religion of ritual and routine.
Matt 23:23-28 "Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you pay tithe
of mint and anise and cummin, and have neglected the weightier matters of the
law: justice and mercy and faith. These you ought to have done, without leaving
the others undone. Blind guides, who strain out a gnat and swallow a camel! Woe
to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you cleanse the outside of the
cup and dish, but inside they are full of extortion and self-indulgence. Blind
Pharisee, first cleanse the inside of the cup and dish, that the outside of them
may be clean also. Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you are
like whitewashed tombs which indeed appear beautiful outwardly, but inside are
full of dead men's bones and all uncleanness. Even so you also outwardly appear
righteous to men, but inside you are full of hypocrisy and lawlessness.
True religion demands much more than that we be formally correct in our
congregational worship. It demands that we, as individuals, serve God all the
time in both body and mind. This is what Paul teaches in Romans 12:1-2.
I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that you present your
bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God, which is your reasonable
service. And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the
renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and
perfect will of God.
Christians are called upon to be holy in both body and mind; and Paul seeks to
motive them "through the mercies of God." The Gk. word translated "mercies" (oiktirmos)
means "pity, compassion for the ills of others." (W.E. Vine, vol. 3, p. 60)
Lenski says that it is "the tender feeling of pity for those in distress."
(Interpretation of I and II Corinthians, p.815) Up to this point "Paul had been
showing ... that they were dependent wholly on God's mercy and not on their
legal righteousness; and because God has shown this mercy, 'Therefore' they
should 'present their bodies' [to Him as] 'living sacrifices.'" (I.B. Grubbs,
Commentary on Romans, p. 147) In Paul's day the Greeks believed that the spirit,
not the body was what mattered. To them "the body was only a shackle and a
prison-house; the body was something to be despised and even to be ashamed of."
They did not believe that they would be held responsible for what they did in
the flesh. There are many today who also believe something like this. They teach
that Christians will not be held responsible before God for what they do in the
body. These people "use their members sinfully" and then "attempt to excuse
themselves ... by alleging that they have a good heart. But we see from this
passage that God requires the service of the body as well as that of the mind."
(Robert Haldane, An Exposition of Romans, p. 554)
Christians need to understand that our bodies belong to God just as much as our
souls do (1 Cor 6:19-20). What we do in our bodies is important! Paul warns us
against believing otherwise when he wrote: Rom 6:12-13, 16 ... do not let sin
reign in your mortal body, that you should obey it in its lusts. And do not
present your members as instruments of unrighteousness to sin, but present
yourselves to God as being alive from the dead, and your members as instruments
of righteousness to God. ... Do you not know that to whom you present yourselves
slaves to obey, you are that one's slaves whom you obey, whether of sin leading
to death, or of obedience leading to righteousness?
Present your body, therefore, as a living and holy sacrifice. Take all the tasks
that you have to do every day - the ordinary work at the office, the factory,
the home, the school; take the tasks that you perform in your marriage
relationship and the parent-child relationship; and offer all of it as worship
to God. (William Barclay, The Letter to the Romans, p. 168) Nothing that you do
should be done outside the framework of serving the Lord.
Many Christians find this incredible, but this is what Paul calls our "spiritual
service of worship." We must never limit our service to God to only those things
that we may do as a congregation on Sundays and Wednesdays. But it must include
all that we do, "in word or deed" (Col. 3:17).
True religion involves the whole of one's life - as a parent (Eph. 6:4), as a
son (Eph 6:1-3), as a husband (Eph 5:25, 28, 33), as a citizen and taxpayer (Rom
13:1-7), as a neighbour (Matt. 22:39). True religion involves how you conduct
yourself at your place of work (Eph. 6:5-8) and how you may treat your employees
(Eph 6:9). Christians, in every sphere of your life you are called upon to
glorify God: 1) in washing and mending cloths and in cooking meals for your
family or in working as a lumberjack; 2) as a student or in working for the
telephone company; 3) as an employee for the city or as a secretary in an
office. In every situation your spiritual service of worship requires that you
present your body (what you do in your body) to God as a living and holy
sacrifice, acceptable to Him.
Worship is not restricted to what we do at the meeting house two times a week.
It is as wide as the Christian's life. This passage in Romans teaches this and
so does Heb. 13:15-16.
Therefore by Him let us continually offer the sacrifice of praise to God, that
is, the fruit of our lips, giving thanks to His name. But do not forget to do
good and to share, for with such sacrifices God is well pleased.
Our worship to God in this place will be unacceptable if our service to Him at
other times is unholy. For it was He who said: "I cannot endure iniquity and the
sacred meeting." Has He changed His mind in this matter?
To insure that they understood how they were to offer their bodies as living and
holy sacrifices, Paul went on to say: Rom 12:2 And do not be conformed to this
world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what
is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God.
Christians are not to allow the world to squeeze them into its own mould. For
the world holds to ideas and practices which, for the most part, are not simply
inconsistent with the doctrine of Christ, but which are also hostile to it;. and
the world actively encourages us to embrace these ideas and way of life. We must
resist! But how? It is possible only through the renewing of our minds.
According to the scriptures, as a man "thinks in his heart, so is he" (Prov.
23:7). According to the scriptures there are two mindsets: One governed by the
flesh and the other by the Holy Spirit.
Rom 8:5-8 For those who live according to the flesh set their minds on the
things of the flesh, but those who live according to the Spirit, the things of
the Spirit. For to be carnally minded is death, but to be spiritually minded is
life and peace. Because the carnal mind is enmity against God; for it is not
subject to the law of God, nor indeed can be. So then, those who are in the
flesh cannot please God.
The mind set on the flesh is that mind which is determined to be governed by the
demands of the flesh. To be spiritually minded is to be determined to be
governed by the Holy Spirit. In the past, all of us were governed by the demands
of the flesh. What we thought, what we said, what we did was determined by what
the flesh wanted. As a result, we lived like everyone else in the world (cf. Eph
2:2-3). However, we must change the way that we think in order that we can
change the way that we live. We do this by dwelling upon what is true ... noble,
... just, ... pure, ... lovely, ... [and] of good report" (Phil. 4:8); we do
this be dwelling up those things taught in the word of God. God's word really
does have the ability to change the way that we think and therefore, live (cf.
Psa 119:9-16, 97-104).
Brethren, friends, how we live has a profound effect upon whether or not God
will accept the worship that we perform with the congregation on the first day
of the week. We must learn to serve God on every day of the week; to present our
bodies to him as "a living and holy sacrifice." Otherwise, the worship that we
perform in the congregation will be for nothing. Let's not be fooled about this!
By Kieran Murphy
From Expository Files 4.4; April 1997
