So I have a question for you. What is the difference between a theologian and a pastor? This is not a joke. The answer is hopefully there is no difference. There was one such man named Francis Schaeffer. He was a Presbyterian pastor from Pennsylvania who went to Switzerland as a missionary in the 50s. By the 60s, he and his wife Edith had developed a ministry that they called Labrie, and it reached young people from all over Europe, from America, and from other parts of the world. Visitors would come and stay in one of the chalets in the Swiss Alps to engage with the Schaeffers on theological topics. Soon his taped lectures began circulating. And then he began writing books and his popularity grew. And an article in Time Magazine about him in 1960 called him the missionary to the intellectuals. By the 1980s, he had become one of the most influential Christian thinkers of the late 20th century. He influenced people like Jerry Falwell, Tim LaHaye, Chuck Colson, and James Dobson. And he was a major force in the pro-life movement. But Schaeffer was not an ivory tower intellectual. His goal was not only to teach the truth of Christianity, but the practice of it as well. His concern was for the spiritual well-being of the people that he ministered to. He came from a strong Bible-believing tradition that valued truth. But he saw how truth without love could become harsh and judgmental. He said this, Biblical orthodoxy without compassion is surely the ugliest thing in the world. Schaeffer was not interested in theology that didn't result in changed lives. He said this, if Christianity is truth, it ought to touch on the whole of life. Christianity must never be reduced merely to an intellectual system. After all, if God is there, it isn't just an answer to an intellectual question. We're called upon to adore him, to be in relationship to him, and incidentally, to obey him. So the goal of Schaeffer's ministry was not merely to disseminate information, but to foster transformation. And transformation reminded me of this. My grandsons love the Transformers. They watch the TV shows and the movies and they have the toys. Have you seen them? There's one. Transformers are cartoon characters that change from one form to another. Each transformer begins as something like a tank, or a race car, or a jet, and they all change into robots. They're transformed from one form to another. And the Christian life is the process of changing from one kind of a person to another. In one sense, that transformation takes place the moment that we place our trust in Jesus. But in another sense, that transformation only begins there and will last a lifetime. It takes a whole life to complete that process of transformation. So last week, we concluded with the doctrinal part of Romans, with Paul's spontaneous outburst of praise, giving God the glory for the truth that he just finished revealing to us about the gospel. And today we begin the second part of this letter. This part shows us what to do with that knowledge. The division in the book of Romans represents two essential components of the Christian life. And they've been called orthodoxy and orthopraxy. Orthodoxy means right teaching. Orthopraxy means right practice or right actions or simply Christian living. And the rest of this letter is dedicated to Christian living. Today we're going to look at verses 1 and 2 of chapter 12. They're the introduction to this section. So please stand for the reading of God's word, his perfect and holy word. 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. 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. This is the living and powerful Word of God for you today. Let me be seated. There's a lot packed into these two little verses, so we're going to explore them bit by bit. Paul begins with an exhortation, a command, a plea, all wrapped into one word, appeal. I appeal to you, therefore, brothers. The New American Standard and the NIV translate this as urge. I urge you. The New English translation says exhort. And the New Living Translation says plead. But I like the King James. I learned this when I was a new Christian. I beseech you, therefore, brethren. I love that. It comes from the same root as one of the names given to the Holy Spirit, the counselor. In Greek, it's paraklete. It means strongly encourage. And Paul is speaking here as a human helper, as a human counselor, as a human encourager to people that he loves. There's genuine passion in this word, a concern for his readers. And what drives that passion? He's passionate because they are his brethren. They're his brethren because they all have the same father. This plea is only for those who have entered into God's family through faith in Christ. How do we know? Because you must have experienced the mercies of God for this plea to have any power. Look at the next part. It's because of the mercies of God that he pleads, that he begs that we come to him. This is what the therefore is there for. He's asking for a response to the doctrine that he's just given us in chapters 1 through 11. Paul has cataloged God's mercies in detail in those preceding chapters. They include His love for us, His grace that saves us, His kindness towards us, His forgiveness, our reconciliation with Him, our justification in Christ, our freedom in Christ, eternal life, and our coming resurrection and glorification, just to mention a few. So mercy should be our motivation to present ourselves to God as living sacrifices. But what motivates you to obey the Lord? There's only two possibilities, either fear or love. It's true that God disciplines those whom he loves, and fear of that might keep us from sin at times. But how much better is it to serve him out of love in response to that mercy? And that's what Paul is urging us to do here. But urging us to do what? Look at the next phrase. to present your bodies as a living sacrifice. We're to present ourselves, to give ourselves, to offer ourselves up. It reminds me of what he said back in chapter six in verse 13. Do not present your members to sin as instruments of unrighteousness, but present yourselves to God as those who have been brought from death to life, and your members to God as instruments of righteousness. This is the language of Old Testament sacrifices, when there were numerous offerings required for the worship of God. But in the New Testament, the requirement is much simpler. There's only one sacrifice required, but that sacrifice is everything we are. When he says your bodies, he means all of you. You can't divorce your spirit from your body. You can't serve God with your mind and then fail to serve him with your body. You can't be like the Hindu mystics that just sit around and meditate all their lives. Serving God means action. It means living out your faith every day in the world. Like the Apostle James says in James 2.14, what good is it, my brothers, if someone says he has faith but does not have works? Can that faith save him? And he goes on to say in verse 18, show me your faith apart from your works, and I will show you my faith by my works. So simply put, true faith produces good works. And you and I are living sacrifices. In the Old Testament, sacrifices died. And in a way, you and I have died, yet we live. Galatians 2.20 says, I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh, and here he means the body, I live by faith in the Son of God who loved me and gave himself for me. And this offering of ourselves is not once and for all. Like a preacher I once heard said, the problem with a living sacrifice is that it keeps crawling off the altar. So we have to continually put ourselves back on the altar. We should begin every morning by presenting ourselves to God. And God only accepts certain kinds of sacrifice. It's a sacrifice that is holy and acceptable to God. The body that we present to him must be exclusively dedicated to him. That's what holy means, to be set apart from everything else. Paul told the Corinthian believers who were hanging on to all kinds of sexual sin, he said, the body is not for immorality, but for the Lord. The Old Testament sacrifices, they had to be without spot, without blemish. God did not accept inferior sacrifices. Listen to what God said to the Jews in Malachi 1, starting in verse 6. A son honors his father, and a servant his master. If I, then, am a father, where is my honor? And if I am a master, where is my fear? says the Lord of hosts to you, O priests, who despise my name. But you say, How have we despised your name? by offering polluted food upon my altar. But you say, how have we polluted you? By saying that the Lord's table may be despised. When you offer blind animals in sacrifice, is that not evil? When you offer those that are lame or sick, is that not evil? Present that to your governor. Will he accept you or show you favor, says the Lord of hosts? Now entreat the favor of God that he may be gracious to us. With such a gift from your hand, will he show any favor to you?" says the Lord of hosts. God doesn't accept our lame sacrifices, our leftovers. God does not want us to just go through the motions. He wants us to come to him with sincere devotion. And if we think we can continue to willfully sin on the one hand and then serve him on the other hand, then we're deceiving ourselves. Only holy sacrifices will do. Only clean vessels can carry acceptable offerings. Listen to Paul's words to Timothy in 2 Timothy 2, beginning in verse 20. Now in a great house, there are not only vessels of gold and silver, but also of wood and clay, some for honorable use, some for dishonorable. Therefore, if anyone cleanses himself from what is dishonorable, he will be a vessel for honorable use, set apart as holy, useful to the master of the house, ready for every good work. So flee youthful passions and pursue righteousness, faith, love, and peace, along with those who call on the Lord from a pure heart. Now it's possible to do right things on the outside, but to have them exposed as worthless in the end. Like the Pharisees, who Jesus called whitewashed tombs, but they concealed dead man's bones. There will be many who will stand before the Lord in the final judgment and say, Lord, Lord, did we not do many good works in your name? And what's he going to say to them? Depart from me. I never knew you. You workers of iniquity. But true believers can also perform worthless deeds. At the Bema seat, the judgment that's just for believers, the true worth of our works will finally be revealed. The gold and silver and precious stones of holy and acceptable sacrifices will remain. But the wood, hay, and stubble of hypocrisy will be exposed and will be burned up. Our focus shouldn't be on individual deeds that we do, but on the act of presenting ourselves, our whole body, soul, and spirit to Him for use. Our attitude has to precede our actions. This is the only acceptable sacrifice under the new covenant. And it's only right that we do this. It's not something for super spiritual saints. It is the definition of worship for everyone who knows God. As Paul tells us that our worship here is spiritual. Look at that next verse or part of the verse. It is our spiritual worship. Now, worship isn't just singing. It's all kinds of things. It's our giving. That's an act of worship. Our service is an act of worship. In fact, worship should be everything that we do. It says in Colossians 3.17, And whatever you do in word or deed, do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him. So it says here that it is spiritual worship. Other translations, they have the word reasonable. So which is it? Is it spiritual? Is it reasonable? Well, it comes from the Greek word logikos. What's that sound like? It's where we get our word logical. It's the same root as logos, which means word or rationality. And Jesus is called the logos, the word. He is the outward expression of God to us. So while all our worship should be spiritual, I think Paul's focusing on the reasonableness of our service to God here. We're not dumb animals going blindly to the slaughter. We are called to love God with all of our heart, soul, strength, and mind. In light of all that God has done for us, it logically follows that we should give ourselves wholly to him. It's the only sane thing to do. It's just like the prodigal son who woke up from his rebellious, delusional fantasy of so-called freedom. We come to our senses, and we return to serve the Heavenly Father because of the mercy that He's shown us. Okay, that's verse 1. Now we're going to try to get through verse 2 before our time's up this morning. you might feel a little overwhelmed at the expectations presented by this verse. You might be asking, how is that even possible? So verse two is going to point us to the way that we can accomplish this wholesale giving of ourselves to God. It begins with a renunciation and it is completed with a resignation. So Romans 12 to first part, do not be conformed to this world. The renunciation is to reject the influences of the world. The Greek word for world here is also translated as age. The world is that system that's controlled by the God of this age, Satan. You and I, we don't belong to this age. We belong to the age to come. The Greek word for conformed here means an outward expression that does not reflect what is within. In other words, we are supposed to renounce the world and don't let it shape us into something that we're not. I really like the Phillips translation of this verse. It says, don't let the world around you squeeze you into its mold. If you let the world squeeze you into its mold, it's not going to be comfortable. It's like trying to wear clothes that are too small for you. But the good news is you don't have to let the world do that. You remember what the Bible says about Lot when he lived in Sodom? Peter tells us in 2 Peter 2, beginning in verse 7, he, God, rescued righteous Lot, greatly distressed by the sensual conduct of the wicked. For as that righteous man lived among them day after day, he was tormenting his righteous soul over their lawless deeds that he saw and heard. but a lot was delivered and the Lord wants to deliver us too. So the next verse, Peter says, and the Lord knows how to rescue the godly from trials and to keep the unrighteous under punishment until the day of judgment. So what are we actually? Well, if you're one of the brethren that Paul is addressing here, then you're an adopted son or daughter of the king. You are God's workmanship, his masterpiece. You're an heir of the kingdom. You're a member of the body of Christ. You're a friend of God. You're an ambassador for Christ, and you're a new creation. The world hates all those things and it does its best to get us to forget them and to go back to our old way of life from before we knew Christ. That's called yielding to the flesh instead of walking in the Spirit. Do you want to be free from the world's pressure? then remember, like it says in 1 Corinthians 2.6, that the wisdom of this age and the rulers of this age are going to perish. This age will end, and we will enter into the age to come. Remember the fate of the world and its coming judgment. That should motivate us to long for deliverance. It should motivate us to reach out to those who are perishing. But we can only do that if we are free from the world's influence. He knows how to rescue you, and He will if you let Him. How does He do that? Well, I'm glad you asked. After you have renounced the world's influence, you must resign yourself to God's influence. This resignation is trusting yourself to God's leading. Look at the next phrase. But be transformed by the renewal of your mind. Here we come to the key word. of our study today, transform. To be transformed is a very different thing than to be conformed. It's the difference between being indoctrinated by rote memorization and being trained to think for yourself. One makes you into something you're not. The other reveals you to be who you actually are. One makes you a robot. The other makes you more and more the unique individual that God has created you to be. And transformed here is the same word used of Jesus when he was on the Mount of Transfiguration with Peter and John, and they saw him revealed in his glory. They got a glimpse of his divinity when his face shone like the sun and his garments became white as light. That's what's happening to us. Our redeemed nature is revealed more and more in our daily living as we're transformed. And this happens through the renewal of our minds. And that happens when we are bathing our minds in the Word of God. This is the process of sanctification through the washing of the water of the Word. This is something that Jesus does in us if we are resigned to let him. The battleground is the mind. This is what Paul calls in another place, taking captive every thought and making it obedient to Christ. So what are you feeding your mind? Are you feeding it worldly wisdom or are you feeding it godly wisdom? The more we're transformed by his word, the more we can present our bodies in a way that is acceptable to the Lord. So look at the last part of this first. that by testing you may discern what is the will of God and what is good and acceptable and perfect." So this brings us back to the beginning of the passage, the idea of the reasonableness of our sacrifice. What is good and acceptable can be tested by our minds. When you're filled with godly wisdom, you will be able to reasonably choose the godly course of your life. You'll be able to test everything by godly wisdom. This is the process of transformation. A transformed mind, which produces a transformed will, which produces a transformed life. The Schaeffer's work at L'Abri was and continues to be a ministry of transformation. It grew from one small chalet to several, then to other L'Abris around the world. There's two in the United States. L'abri is the French word for shelter. Each l'abri was a home, a shelter where people can participate in the family life of a community. I told you how influential Schaeffer was among Christian leaders through his books. But this was all born out of the milieu of this community that he and his wife created. Literally thousands of young people went there and lived and were transformed through their time at Labrie. And that transformation came through both orthodoxy and orthopraxy. Right teaching and right practice. Schaefer summed up those two things as true truth and true spirituality. Guests were not left on their own to simply study and to listen to lectures. Each one was expected to participate in the life of the community by engaging with others personally and by sharing in the nitty gritty of daily chores. And the Schaffers modeled this. Francis said it this way, if you're gonna love people, you have to let them dirty your clean linens. That's practical, isn't it? And the Schaffers wanted to show that Christianity was not dehumanizing, but makes us what we should be, whole people in true community with one another. This community life will never be perfect. In fact, he said, if it's perfection or nothing, it will always be nothing in this life. But there can be real and substantial healing, or we could say transformation. Transformation in our innermost being, transformation in our relationships with one another, transformation in our environment, and transformation in the wider world. Like Labrie, each local church community should be a model that shows the world what it means to follow Christ, something that Pastor Ray Steadman called body life. This is only possible when we serve and have fellowship with one another. That is our reasonable and spiritual worship. That is how we present our bodies to Him. We can only do that if we're together with one another. So next week we're going to look at some of the ways that we are called to serve Christ through our gifts, the spiritual gifts that He has given us. But the other key aspect of body life is fellowship. Some of that takes place here on Sunday mornings, and I'm often hesitant to start the services because of the fellowship that I'm witnessing. But Sunday mornings aren't enough. They're not enough to fulfill His command for us to love one another. We do a good bit of it in the adult Bible study before services, as well as our men's meeting on Tuesdays or our Wednesday night small group. But I would like for us to go even deeper. I would like for us to get to know each other outside of church. So we're going to begin organizing some fellowship dinners in which we will take turns hosting one another in our homes. I'm going to call it the supper club. And you may choose to provide a complete meal for your gathering or have a potluck or just order pizza. That's not really what matters. Growing deeper in your relationships is what matters. That's the goal. So there's a sign up sheet in the foyer and we will kind of put together, you know, four or five people and we'll let you know. So I hope you're gonna see this as an opportunity to present yourselves as living sacrifices and experience the transformation that can come from it. So let's pray. Thank you, Father, for the power of the gospel to change our lives. Lord, we praise you that your Son died on the cross in our place that we might be raised to new life. And Lord, that that life is abundant. So Father, we pray that you would just show us ways that we might display your glory through living the lives that you've called us to, that we might give ourselves to you wholly, that you might use us to bring light into this world. So we give you all the praise and all the glory in Christ's name. Amen.