I figured it would be fitting to do a break down of what is said in Romans 12. To start lets go over Romans 12:1-2
1 I appeal to you therefore, brothers, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship. 2 Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect.
As we know, this is a letter written from Paul to the church in Rome. The church of Rome is believed to be actually five different household churches rather then one big church in Rome. Well enough with the background lets get to this breakdown. I absolutely LOVE this first verse. This verse just screams deep into my soul. "by the mercies of God, present you bodies as a living sacrifice, which is your spiritual worship" To me this is saying, "God gave you this life. Don't take it without giving anything in return." Webster dictionary defines sacrifice as the destruction or surrender of something for the sake of something else. A living sacrifice, what am I to give up? What am I to do? Anything really, giving almost any amount of time allotted for yourself to Gods work instead of for you. What can you do? Get involved at your church. Go out with the outreach ministries. My personal goal is to make myself nothing by giving my everything to the Lord. That is my spiritual worship. I give glory to God by giving back to him what he has given me!
"Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind." God has given us a new life and a new outlook on this world. Don't go along with it and just conform to everyone else in society. Use your new view on the world to stay along where God longs for us to be. Now this last part of verse 2 is where i was left blank for a while. Being as i am using my phone for the bible I was able to read a bunch of different translations on this verse and while I usually go with the ESV bible. The NLT does the best job, in my opinion, of making it understandable. "Then you will learn to know God's will for you, which is good and pleasing and perfect." I really like the way that this is said here, because it is telling us that when we align ourselves with God and allow God to transform us into a new person by changing the way we think, we will then be able to determine what Gods will is for us.
I seem to run into this problem a lot. I have a decision to make, and I want God to lead me to the right decision, but I am not fully getting in line with God. Sometimes we have to go out of our way and take extra steps when we are trying to hear from God. Personally the number one problem I have seen when people are trying to stay along God's will is a lack of asking God. When faced with a big decision go to God, spend extra time in prayer. The best way to get an answer is to ask the question
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