Therefore, I urge you, brothers and sisters, in view of God’s mercy, to offer your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and pleasing to God—this is your true and proper worship. Do not conform 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.
Romans 12:1-2
The mind is the scariest battlefield in the world. We never know what fight is going on in a persons mind, what lies are playing in their thoughts, on a given day.
A TV show once said that “9 out of 10 lies occur 6 inches from the bathroom mirror”. I’m not sure we can trust statistics from a sitcom, but there is truth there. Our minds often try to condemn us even though God is greater than our thoughts (1st John 3:21).
Lies that go unchecked in the mind are responsible for every awful act in history, as well as our own self-destructive actions.
Our minds need to be renewed.
Sometimes medicine can help clear out many lies from our minds, but our main source of renewal comes from God.
Along with a renewed mind from God, our body has to follow our mind with a sacrifice of its own.
Paul says that as we view God’s mercy (with our mind) we need to ‘offer [our] bodies as living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to God – this is [our] true and proper worship.’
Some of us don’t offer our bodies as a living sacrifice to God because our minds don’t fully grasp God’s mercy for us through Jesus. And when we don’t fully grasp God’s mercy for us, there is no anchor or reference point for our thoughts. Some thoughts get bigger or smaller depending on the mood we are in. Therefore, without the proper reference point, we entertain lies that lead our body to rebel against the Holy Spirits work in and around us.
However, most of us think that if we only knew God’s will for our lives we would be able to listen and obey. That is a lie that is covering up an unconscious, deeper concern in our minds. Our deeper concern is that God won’t come through for us when we obey what He has already revealed to us. We want an assurance that His will for us has a good outcome before we jump into it. But Paul says that the living sacrifice of our bodies and the renewal of our mind is how we know his ‘good, pleasing and perfect will.’
We can’t know his ‘good, pleasing and perfect will’ without our bodies being offered to God as a result of the God-inspired renewal of our minds.
How has your mind tried to lie to you? How can spending more time with God renew our minds? How can we offer up our bodies as living sacrifices?
Prayer:
Lord, thank you for your mercy! We pray that our hearts and minds would constantly view your mercies so that we can offer our bodies and minds to you, and be transformed in our true worship of you. Help us to walk confidently in your promises. In Jesus name, Amen.
REDEEM THE TIME 