Therefore I urge you, brethren, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies a living and holy sacrifice, acceptable to God, [which is] your spiritual service of worship.
Message: Living Sacrifices in Worship
Time: Paul route to Rome, the city has never visited, from the Greek city of Corinth in AD 57. The rights to a church that he believes needed to hear basic Gospel doctrine. The city was a hotbed of sexual immorality and idolatry.
What the Lord is Saying:
One of the interesting subjects of the Bible is tying together the idea of sacrifices in the Old Testament to Jesus our eternal and permanent sacrifice in the New Testament. The idea has been mentioned before that the Old Testament in looking to Christ and now we are looking back. Yet, sacrifices were present and a part of worship, going to the temple, and atoning for sins. My brother recently in his Bible Study Fellowship lesson summarized the covenants for me. He said:
- The Abrahamic Covenant was unilateral and unconditional meaning God is going to bless no matter what.
- Genesis 12:2-3 “I will make you into a great nation, and I will bless you; I will make your name great, and you will be a blessing. I will bless those who bless you, and whoever curses you I will curse; and all peoples on earth will be blessed through you.”
- The Moses covenant is bilateral and conditional says, You do this and God will do that.
- Deuteronomy 4:1 - "Now, Israel, hear the decrees and laws I am about to teach you. Follow them so that you may live and may go in and take possession of the land the Lord, the God of your ancestors, is giving you."
- The Davidic Covenant is unilateral and unconditional which means God is going to bless no matter what.
- 2 Samuel 7:12,16 -- "When your days are over and you rest with your ancestors, I will raise up your offspring to succeed you, your own flesh and blood, and I will establish his kingdom. Your house and your kingdom will endure forever before me; your throne will be established forever."
- The New Covenant is unilateral and unconditional which means God is going to bless no matter what.
- Jeremiah 31:31-34 -- “Behold, days are coming,” declares the Lord, “when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah, not like the covenant which I made with their fathers in the day I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt, My covenant which they broke, although I was a husband to them,” declares the Lord. “But this is the covenant which I will make with the house of Israel after those days,” declares the Lord, “I will put My law within them and on their heart I will write it; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people. They will not teach again, each man his neighbor and each man his brother, saying, ‘Know the Lord,’ for they will all know Me, from the least of them to the greatest of them,” declares the Lord, “for I will forgive their iniquity, and their sin I will remember no more.”
- What these covenants show:
- God desires to bring blessing.
- People can't perfectly keep covenants.
- God always keeps covenants.
- Messiah Jesus fulfills covenants.
Though we do know sacrifices ceased under the New Covenant, there still is a little bit of mystery as to why the story was set up like it was - starting with Old Covenant sacrifices leading up to New Testament Jesus as the permanent sacrifice, once for all. It is a little hard for me to put together, the raising of animals, the killing of animals. It is probably harder to recognize today given the way we have been trained to treat animals and many of us still eat meat today and so sacrificing animals for our pallet continues today.
But that idea also makes today's passage even more meaningful. In an animal sacrifice, the life of the animal is taken and removed and given completely to God. In the verse today it is mentioned - "to present your bodies a living and holy sacrifice." This seems to take on the same idea as Galatians 5:24 -- "Those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires." We remain living but we put to death our flesh, our bodies. The principle seems clear. The application seems a little difficult. Maybe I get caught up in how to do this completely. It is a surrender of myself and a surrender of to God to trust in what He provides. "All to Jesus I surrender" is the hymn.
Leviticus 1:3 reminds me that the offering offered was without defect -- "If his offering is a burnt offering from the herd, he shall offer it, a male without defect; he shall offer it at the doorway of the tent of meeting, that he may be accepted before the Lord."
Here is a great quote from St. Chrysostom (347-407) --
“How is the body to become a sacrifice? Let thine eye look upon no evil thing, and it hath become a sacrifice; let thy tongue speak nothing filthy, and it hath become an offering; let thy hand do no lawless deed, and it hath become a whole burnt offering. But this is not enough, we must do good works also; let the hand do alms, the mouth bless them that despitefully use us, and the ear find leisure evermore for the hearing of Scripture. For sacrifice can be made only of that which is clean; sacrifice is a first fruit of other actions. Let us, then, from our hands, and feet, and mouth, and all our other members, yield a first fruit unto God”
I love that quote because it puts the sacrifice to action. It changes our course and means that I make sure at all times my words and deeds glorify God.
Summary: A living sacrifice in worship is to give God all of me, to give him my best and this means I turn from doing those things that don't honor him in any way.Promise: We must seek Him half-heartedly. Instead we are to give Him the very best of ourselves, not to atone for our sin or to merit our forgiveness but to thank Him for saving us, for giving us a purpose, and for calling us into service.
Prayer: O God, I want to surrender to you today and give you all of me. Lord, make me clean to start so that as I go forward the slate is clean and I can be brand new in glorifying You and doing Your will.
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