The Word of God before us this morning is taken from Romans chapter 12. Romans chapter 12. I was brought to consider this text while finishing up our men's Bible study on the Ten Commandments. Almost nine months of study brought us through the richness of that Word and Romans 12 was a very helpful reflection upon the completion of that study. I should say that most of us completed all of the lessons. Some said that they understood and rather well fulfilled most of the commandments, and so they didn't attend all the studies. They smiled when they said that. Well, we also had opportunity to look at this text at the Junior High Chapel this week. And so having looked at it a couple of times, I was inclined to bring it for you this morning as well. A beautiful text holding forth to us the full spectrum of what God intends for us as those who share in the gospel of Christ. Before we read it together, Let's pray and ask Him to bless it for us. Our Father, we thank You that You have called us to hear Your Word and pray that we would believe all that You reveal to us there. Dear Father, we are so often challenged by the ideas presented here, so often distracted from the truth. you would have us rest in and so often undermined with the reality of ongoing sin in our lives. And so we come before you asking that through this means of grace you would grant us strength and faith and the encouragement and resolution we need to live out this calling that you've given to us in Christ. Help us, dear Father, towards this end, we ask in Jesus' name. Amen. We'll begin reading with Romans 11, verse 33, and just read the first two verses of Romans 12. Hear the word of God. Oh, the depth and riches of the wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable His judgments and His paths beyond tracing out! Who has known the mind of the Lord? Or who has been His counselor? Who has ever given to God that God should repay Him? For from Him and through Him and to Him are all things. To Him alone be glory forever. Amen. Therefore, Paul continues in our text, I urge you, brothers, in view of God's mercy, to offer your bodies as living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to God. This is your spiritual act of worship. Do not be conformed any longer to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God's will is, his good, pleasing, and perfect will. So is the reading of God's word. May He bless it for us this morning. We have had the privilege and the encouragement of witnessing the baptism of Kyle. Wonderful presentation of the Gospel. A sign and seal of God's covenant. The promise of Christ for all who believe. A promise for today and hope. A living hope for the future. And in the best sense of the word, Kyle is now a marked man. Like all of us, as a baptized and believing congregation, all of us have been identified as the people of God. And with this understanding of baptism comes a whole new understanding of life. You see, while the world around us who do not know God as revealed in Jesus Christ, who do not believe the Gospel, life is really summed up with the idea of an American dream of life, liberty, and the pursuit of personal happiness. Set elsewhere to be the pursuit of personal wealth, personal health, and personal prosperity. While those things are not bad in and of themselves, God has called us to define our lives and to set our hopes and dreams upon something far more profound than the so-called American dream. He's called us to a radical commitment of living for Him, of living for God. Baptism reminds us of this, that we are no longer to be united with this world. We are no longer to be bound by sin and the corruption of this present age, but we have been united with Christ. And rather than follow the patterns of this world, we're called to follow the patterns of heaven, to follow Christ in the pursuit of righteousness on the pathway to heaven. Therefore, like Christ, our lives can be summarized as living for God. Romans 12 is in the Bible because it shows us what this life looks like. That's why it's there. In the preceding chapters, Paul brings forth one of the most beautiful summaries and presentations of God's sovereign grace at work through the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ and all that it means for His people. So great and profound that he concludes those first 11 chapters with the doxology, oh, the depth and the riches and the wisdom and knowledge of God and so forth. He comes to chapter 12 And there we find, along with the chapters that follow, a description of what life is like for those who live for God. I had so much fun studying this text that I thought maybe we would do a 12-week summer series walking through Romans 12 together. But that would have been a bit presumptuous, I think, upon the elders. And so we'll focus this morning on just verses 1 and 2, a summary of what we find following in the whole rest of Romans. Romans 1 and 2, a summary of the Christian life, a summary of what it means to live for God. And we see there three things. We see there the character of Christian living. We see the cause of Christian living and the culmination of Christian living. Maybe the most striking point of these verses is the description of Christian character. We might call it the main point of verses 1 and 2 where Paul addresses the church with an urgent, right? I urge you, brothers, he says, with an urgent and yet pastorally sensitive plea to the people of God. I urge you, brothers, in view of God's mercy. You see, He doesn't come with the fire and the smoke and the lightning that was brought forth at Mount Sinai. You see the contrast. He doesn't come with that kind of fear and trembling, but He comes with an urgent plea to the people of God, reminding them of the mercies of God and he proceeds to describe the character they're to have as the people of God. Notice how he describes that character as a sacrifice. Presents your bodies as a sacrifice, followed by three adjectives we'll get to in a moment, but a sacrifice. And verse 2 goes on to describe the idea of verse 1 saying, Do not be conformed to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. This is the character of Christian living. It is sacrificial, it is godly, and it is comprehensive. When we read it, the words for many of us have become so familiar that the radical nature presented here is almost lost upon us. When he comes to us and he says, present your bodies as a sacrifice, what does that mean? It sounds an awful lot like human sacrifice to me. Maybe some of you who watched the PBS series that my family watched, a little disturbing but yet amazing history about the ancient Aztecs and the Incas and other religions who practiced human sacrifice. Well, that's not where Paul is going with the text because he calls it a living sacrifice. He's not going along the lines of a human sacrifice that destroys the body, and neither is he following the practice of Old Testament sacrifice, which likewise set upon an altar something to be given to God which was killed and destroyed. When Paul calls us to a sacrifice holy and acceptable to God, he has in mind a living sacrifice, a presentation of our bodies such that our whole existence is redefined for God. We're redefined from being a self-centered, selfish pursuit of hedonism to people who have sacrificed our will, Sacrificed our priorities. Sacrificed the reason for our existence to God. Living, holy, and acceptable to God. Christian character is sacrificial. It's also godly. If our lives are to be holy, then we no doubt must be godly. Verse 2 says that we must not conform to the pattern of this world, but as those who have been joined with Christ, we are to be transformed. Transformed into Christ-likeness. Transformed into a holy and acceptable people. Rather than follow the patterns of this world, we follow the patterns and practices of Christ, a sacrificial, godly life of service. Ephesians 5 verse 2 demonstrates this same point when it says that we are to walk in love as Christ loved us and gave Himself up for us, a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God. You see, Paul in our text develops the same picture, calling us to sacrifice, to holiness. To be transformed in our mind. And then in verse 3, he talks about humility. Humbling ourselves before God and one another. And in verses 4 through 8, service to the church. Verse 9, a love and compassion. Verse 12, joy, patience, and perseverance in prayer. Christian character is sacrificial, it's godly, and our text reminds us that it's comprehensive. We have been sadly confused too often that the Christian life is purely a public life or a life of action and deed while neglecting the reality of private service to God and the thought life that we have as believers. The whole of our existence is to be a sacrifice holy and acceptable to God. Christian character is comprehensive. Paul gets at that when he says that our bodies are to be sacrificed. Verse 2 explaining transforming of the mind. Our physical bodies, our mind, our thought life. All of who we are as creatures before God are to be redefined into this service to God so that in thought, word, and deed, in private and in public, we exist to live for God. One of the first songs I remember learning, many of you probably do as well, was living for Jesus. A life that is true, striving to please Him in all that I do. But for some reason it didn't work out very well. For myself, for my classmates as we grew, That life of Christ, that comprehensive character of sacrifice and godliness didn't seem to be pervasive in all that we did. I read an article this week by a Covenant College professor, formerly a high school teacher of 17 years, and he says, quote, After graduation, I was dismayed to see so many of our graduates pursue the traditions of alcohol and sexual promiscuity. A reformed high school pursuing the traditions of alcohol abuse and sexuality. Likewise, a pastor and board member of Westminster Seminary lamented in a recent sermon that studies he was familiar with show that sexual promiscuity is greater among evangelical believers than general society? Is that living for Jesus? Is that the character that Romans 12 holds out for us? A sacrificial, godly character that is holy and acceptable to our Father? And see, those are the public things. But just as destructive and sinful are the more private things as we gather around us friends into a group that is inclusive of everyone who meets my needs and my desires and exclusive of everyone I don't care about. Of everyone who doesn't make me feel better. of everyone who can't give me something to make me stronger. An inner private life, a thought pattern that follows the disciplines of this world and brings a devastating effect upon our neighbors and those we're called to love because we care more about ourselves and our happiness than those around us. You see, these things, they mature when we're in college. We just refine them a little bit into more socially acceptable patterns. We graduate, we get married, and then we fall under another statistic where Christian divorce rates is almost equal to that of non-Christians. Is that living for Jesus? A sacrificial, godly character, holy and acceptable to God. While preparing for this morning, dear friends, my prayer has been that each of us would evaluate ourselves in light of this law of God. Paul comes to us with a pastorally sensitive plea and He brings to us the command of God that we are to be of this character. And my prayer is that we would examine ourselves. Are we at school existing to serve God by loving those around us? Are we pursuing our college studies in such a way that first and foremost of our concerns is the will of God for our lives? Are we living in our homes and are we so interacting with our spouse that we're glad to be sacrificial in our love for them? my prayer has been that we would examine ourselves in light of the law of God and that each of us would respond like the disciples responded to Jesus in Matthew 19. There too, Jesus brings to His own people, to His friends, to His disciples, the will of God for their lives, in that case relating to marriage, do you remember? And what do the disciples do? They say, who then can be saved? Who can live such a sacrificial, godly life of service? What does Jesus do in response? Does he rebuke them? Oh, he says, with God all things are possible. With God, all things are possible, and that is exactly why Paul gives us chapters 1 through 11, so that he could develop for us the cause of Christian living before he calls us to Christian living, so that we would see how it is that God makes all things possible for his people, So that we could see where this life comes from. And he points us to those chapters in verse 1 when he says, Therefore, brothers, in view of the mercies of God. And he shows us there the cause of Christian living. That Christian living can be and must be a reality because God gives that life. God inspires that life. And God empowers that life. All things are possible with God. And He does it. You know where that comes from? You know where that gift of life comes from? the inspiration to pursue it, and the power to be sustained in it. Paul tells us right at the beginning in Romans 1 verse 16, he says that the Gospel is the power of God for salvation to all who believe. God gives that life, He inspires that life, and He empowers that life through the proclamation of the Gospel, which is exactly why we need to be meeting together, worshiping together, hearing the gospel of God together, so that we can have what is necessary to be a sacrificial, godly people dedicated to the service of God and one another. The gospel is the power of God for salvation. Unless we think that we heard it, we were converted, Assured of forgiveness. And now we move on to other things as we continue to read Romans. We come to Romans 8 and we find that no, the necessity of the Gospel continues for the believer. For God not only brings it to us at the start of our Christian life, He indwells us by His Spirit to sustain us in His Christian life. Reminding us again that there is therefore no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus and those who are in Christ Jesus are moved by the Spirit to say, Abba, Father, not my will, but Your will be done. And then Romans 9-11 reminds us that it's all a work of sovereign grace. He doesn't merely make something possible for His people. He promises to make it certain for other people. Friends, the cause of Christian living is found in God. Though we often limit the Gospel to conversion and the forgiveness of sins, Romans 12 teaches us that God empowers the Gospel to extend beyond the start of Christian living all the way through its completion and culmination. When the sign and seal of baptism are fully realized and the sin we fight against is finally left behind and the hope of righteousness and eternal blessing and joy is once and for all ours as this cursed body is left behind at the return of Christ. Romans 12 teaches us that. It teaches us that the Gospel brings us justification with the therefore, looking back. And it builds on that, pointing us forward to the necessity of sanctification as those who are to be living sacrifices, and progressively so. He says in verse 2, Then you will be able to test and approve what God's will is. It's part of our experience. It's part of our maturing in faith and life. Experiencing how good the will of God is for us as His people. How good, how satisfying, how fulfilling living within the will of God can be. How loving, even the most unlovable of those we go to school with. how pursuing a life that is defined by the will of God such that we might even make less profit in business, how loving our spouse with such sacrificial care and sensitivity that we might even forego what we were hoping for that evening. That, living in the will of God, can be good, pleasing, satisfying. And he says in Romans 12 that that progress and sanctification is part of our experience as those who believe and are empowered by the gospel of Jesus Christ until we come to that great day when we share in His glory and the consummation of all things. In what seems like a different life, Catherine and I spent about eight years in youth and college ministry. I remember one of our friends from Michigan. We got to know her first in ninth grade. By the way, if you were at the junior high chapel, this is a different friend that I talked about. A different friend from Michigan. We started working with her and being with her in ninth grade. We sang Living for Jesus together. We prayed. We studied the word together. We went on service projects together, and she graduated. Probably one of the more mature of our group. We found out a year later she was living in New York City. She had left her family. She had left her church. She wasn't married, was nursing her newborn, and despairing of life. There are many of us here today tempted to pursue the same life, perceived liberty and happiness. Dear friends, the Christian life is not an easy life. The wicked often seem to prosper. Evildoers seem to grow. The Word of God reminds us that the best of this life is passing away. The Word of God reminds us that there is a good and pleasing and satisfying plan of God for your life. Signed and signified in baptism, embraced and enjoyed through growing faith. He gives the Gospel to empower you and sustain you in it. Do not neglect the means of grace. Do not pursue that so-called American dream at the exclusion of God's plan because at the end that dream is a rejection of God. A dream is a rejection of God in all the hope that He has promised for you in Jesus Christ. young and old and like. Let us hear Romans verses 1 and 2. And by the grace and mercy of God, be the kind of people who are sacrificial in service to God and one another. And then may His will be done. Amen. Our Father in heaven, we thank you that your word comes to us and meets us at the moment and place of our need. May the Holy Spirit apply these things unto our heart and grant us repentance and faith so that we can be those who progress in proving and approving Your will. That we would be those who know because we have tasted and seen how good You are. Forgive us, dear Father, for how often we fall short and grant us greater strength for greater faithfulness. For your name's sake we pray and for the good of the people you've called us to serve. In Jesus' name, amen.