Sunday 09:16:12

This Changes Everything – Inside and Out The Gospel is a powerful message. God is a powerful Father. Jesus is a powerful Savior. The Spirit is a powerful Sanctifier. Yet there is a struggle in this life to be what I want to be, what I am called to be. I am not what I ought to be, I am not what I want to be, I am not what I hope to be in another world; but still I am not what I once used to be, and by the grace of God I am what I am. - John Newton Romans 12:1-13 v. 1 – There is a all-encompassing transformation in the life of the believer. “Therefore,” because of what Jesus has done and the grace and love he has shown me, I offer my whole self to him. Even my body is no longer mine, it is his. I see myself as belonging to him, like I am living a life of sacrifice to the one who sacrificed himself for me. v. 2 – There is an internal transformation of our minds. How is your mind transformed? Christians can be really good about managing the externals. We change our behavior, but God calls us to something much deeper. Change your mind about that, not just your behavior. Changing your behavior rarely lasts, and causes you to look down on others. You must be in His word. Read, meditate, journal about his word. Pray, ask him to change your mind. Ask him to give you his thoughts about what you’re struggling with. This transformation helps us know God’s will. Want to know God’s will? Allow him to change your mind. If you want to know his will, you have to know how He thinks, what He values. You have to think, “What would God think about this?” 1 Corinthians 6:18-20 – God must change how we view sex. v. 3 - There is an external transformation of our relationships. – from making relationships about us to making them about Christ in service to each other. v. 3 – It begins with humility, recognizing that this really isn’t about us. Even our relationships are really not about us. Our relationships are about the Great King that redeemed the whole body of us. We all the time battle with this, trying to make things about us; trying to make relationships about feeling important or significant. No, it begins with imitating Jesus’ humility: “this is not about me, but about the Father.” vv. 4-5 – We are in a body, not living on our own. We belong not just to God, but to a body of God’s people. The Christian life cannot be lived independently. We are meant to live in close relationships with each other. vv. 6-8 – God gives us gifts to help build up the body. We are commanded to faithfully use our gifts to help the body function. We are God’s representatives to the people around us. vv. 9-13 – The body of Christ looks like this: love, devotion, honoring, zealous, joyful, hopeful, patient, faithful, generous. God is doing his work of change in us. We need to see ourselves within the framework of what He’s doing. We need to offer ourselves to Him and His great plan of redemption. We need to a change of our minds to his view in holiness and purity. We need to see our relationships as opportunities to love him by serving others.