Romans chapter 12, verses 1 and 2 are the focus
of our attention these weeks as we come to this
practical section of the book of Romans. The
application of the doctrine we've been studying
in verses, or chapters rather, 1 through 11.
If I were to ask you this morning how many of
you would like to be debt -free, would you lift
your hands? Yes. Many of us would like that.
But in order for us to make that a commitment
and to keep it, we have to follow up by doing
some things. We would first have to stop charging,
and then we'd have to go to work and pay off
the debts we have. It's not enough just to make
a commitment. We have to follow up then so that
that commitment will mean something. In verse
1 of our text, we have seen that the commitment
that God... is urging of us indeed commanding
of us is that we present our bodies to him as
a living and holy sacrifice but if that commitment
is going to be kept if it's going to mean something
then we have to follow up with what verse 2 says
i urge you therefore 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. And do not be conformed to
this world, but be transformed by the renewing
of your mind, that you may prove what the will
of God is, that which is good and acceptable
and perfect. Essentially what he tells us is
this. If we are going to keep the commitment
of presenting our total beings to God as a sacrifice,
it means we must follow up with two responses.
One of them is negative. The second is positive.
The negative response is essentially, don't allow
the peer pressure of our unregenerate society,
to make you live the way it wants you to live.
That is inconsistent with what you are as a child
of God, an object of his mercy. In other words,
do not be conformed to the world, to this age.
We talked about that last week. Today we want
to move into the positive side and talk about
the second. of the responses that we should make
to the Lord. And that is, continue being transformed.
That is in the present tense. It is something
that is to be continuous. We are to ever be transformed.
Now if that's something that we're supposed to
do, then we need to ask some questions to get
to the understanding of it. First, what does
it mean? And then how is it done? And finally,
why? Why should I do it? First of all, what does
it mean to continually be transformed? W .H.
Griffith Thomas, a commentator and a Bible teacher
of another generation, reminds us in his writings
that this is not growth, but transformation.
He goes on to say, growth suggests progress,
but transformation indicates change. Our Lord
grew, but he never needed to be transformed because
there was nothing in his character that needed
to be altered. With the Christian, it is different.
He requires not only growth, but transformation.
To be transformed means to be changed. into another
form. If we were to take this Greek word and
put it into the English language letter for letter,
we would have the English word metamorphosis.
We're familiar with that word, especially with
regards to biology. A caterpillar, for example,
crawls into its cocoon. And after a period of
time, it burst out changed. It has gone through
a process of metamorphosis, so it becomes a butterfly,
though it was a caterpillar. The same change
is seen in a tadpole that eventually becomes
a frog. It is the same creature, but it has been
changed into another form. That is the idea in
this word here, that we are to be continually
changed. The word also is translated in the New
Testament as transfigured. Now when I say that
word, you probably immediately think of the Lord
Jesus Christ when he went up to the top of that
mountain along with Peter, James, and John. And
it says in Matthew and in Mark, That while they
were there, he was transfigured. The very same
word as Romans 12, 2. Matthew says that his face
shone. Mark includes his clothing, which he says
was as bright as light. When Luke records it,
he says it differently. He doesn't use this word,
but he says that he was made different. All of
them combined tell us of that time when Jesus
Christ's glory was manifested. He who was a man
of humility and in appearance the man of sorrows
who was acquainted with grief was on that occasion
transfigured. His deity was evidenced. which
had been veiled in flesh at the incarnation.
One of the eyewitnesses on that occasion, Peter,
writes a few years later in the second epistle
that bears his name, and he says, the Father
gave him glory. What happened on that day? Jesus
was changed. His countenance was changed. He
was made different. He was altered. He was transfigured.
He was transformed. So that what he was on the
inside, God, affected even the appearance of
his humanity, that which was outward. That is
the thrust, folks, behind this word here. The
apostle is saying to you and to me, that we are
to continually be changed outwardly so that what
we are on the inside is made apparent in the
way that we conduct ourselves. We're not talking
about pressure from the outside that coerces
us. We're talking about power from inside that
changes us. We're talking about a change in conduct,
a change in lifestyle, a transformation of aims
and standards and the manner in which one lives.
All of this to reflect that new man that you
are as one united with Jesus Christ. Really what
we're talking about... in this idea of transformation,
is the life of Jesus Christ himself being evidenced
and reflected in you. The beauty of his character
being seen, his gentleness, his humility, his
patience, and self -control, and love, and joy.
and all the other aspects of the fruit of the
Spirit, for that is the life of Jesus Christ.
It means having the beauty of His character reflected
in your words, in your attitudes, and in your
actions. By the way, how is that process of transformation
taking place in your life? How much of what you
say and the way you think and the way you conduct
yourself really reflects Jesus himself? To some
degree, all of us fail in this. Some of us, perhaps,
tragically. And that is why the apostle says
to us in such strong language, Stop! being conformed
to this age but continually ever be transformed
so that Jesus Christ is seen through you I remember
the words of a small boy to his mother regarding
the pastor of his church when he said to his
mother He reminds me of Jesus. No greater compliment
could have been paid to that man. And my friend,
no greater compliment can be paid to you or to
me by someone else than to have them say, you
remind me of Jesus. For when Jesus is seen in
us, this work of transformation is taking place.
That's what it means. But how is it done? He
explains to us right in the verse. Continually
be transformed by the renewing of your mind.
That is how it is done. By the renewing of your
mind. The word renew means to renovate. It's
talking here about the restoration of your mental
capacities. The transformation is done by new
thought patterns being laid down in your life.
By God's renovating of your attitudes and the
ideals that you have. By God purifying your imaginations.
By God healing your memory. By God changing the
way that you think. Understand and judge. That's
what the renewing of the mind refers to, but
it's more. I think it has to do as well with
emotions. The restoration of one's emotions.
There are some people, when they are saved, who
are in such a state that their emotions are all
messed up. Some so much so that they laugh when
they should cry and they cry when they should
laugh. The part of the renewal work that we're
talking about is the fixing of the emotions.
There are some people who are so hardened when
they are saved, they do not have the capacity
to cry about anything. Yet the Spirit of God
is able to soften the heart to restore the emotions.
I believe it includes an invigorated will. A
will that is able to say to certain things, no,
I will no longer do this. There's a man who is
attending our church who has been saved a matter
of a few months and has had for years the habit
of smoking. And ever since he got saved, He felt
convicted about that. He knew it was wrong, but
he went ahead and did it. But there came a time
a few weeks ago when he realized if he kept doing
that, he was sinning against God. And he numbered
his cigarettes that he had in the last pack.
Five, four, three, two, one. And when he got
down to the one, he finished that one. He said,
that's it. And he stopped. Just like that. He
didn't go out and buy any pills. He didn't go
get hypnotized. He stopped. Now, not everyone
has it quite that easy, but I can tell you this,
that as God works in this renewing, renovating
process, He invigorates the will so that once
again we can say no or yes. Dr. Thayer says regarding
this word, renew, that it means to grow up afresh,
like spring foliage. I like that, especially
at this time of year when we're moving into the
fall and everything's dying. I like to think
of the freshness of spring, the newness of life.
That's pictured here. What is your mind like?
There are some people whose minds are like a
field. that has gone to weeds. It's overgrown
with brush and wild growth. It needs to be weeded,
pruned, cleaned out. There are some people's
minds which are like a fetid swamp, smelling
of putrid waste and impurity and death. It needs
to be drained, renewed. There are some people
who have a mind which is like a garden. Well
kept, cultivated, lush with freshness and with
the fragrance of sweetness and beauty about it.
What is your mind like today? What is your mind
like? I can't look into your mind and see it.
But you know what it's like, and God knows what
it's like. Is it being renewed? Well, you say,
yes, I'm a Christian, and I want to emphasize
something. What we're talking about here is not
the reformation of an unsaved person. We're not
talking about a person who's unsaved turning
over a new leaf and trying harder to clean up
his act. A person who does not know Jesus Christ
cannot enter into what we're talking about here.
If you've never trusted Jesus Christ, your need
today is to repent of your sin and to invite
him into your life as your Lord and Savior. And
once he's there, he brings in the power for this
kind of renovation that we're talking about.
How does it take place? How does this renewing
take place in your mind, Christian? I think we
find an answer to that by looking at the only
other place in the New Testament where this noun
is used. It's in Titus, the third chapter. Would
you turn there with me? I believe here we gain
some insight as to how our minds are renewed.
We're going to begin reading in verse 3. For
we also once were foolish ourselves, disobedient,
deceived, enslaved to various lusts and pleasures,
spending our life in malice and envy, hateful,
hating one another. That's what we were like
once, before salvation. But, and here there's
a pivot, there's a new train of thought. This
is after salvation. When the kindness of God
our Savior and His love for mankind appeared,
He saved us. Not on the basis of deeds which
we have done in righteousness. Of course, there
weren't any. But according to His mercy, by the
washing of regeneration and renewing of or by
the Holy Spirit. There are two things mentioned
there regarding salvation. He talks about the
washing of regeneration. That's the cleansing
that the new life brings. But then he immediately
ties with that what he calls the renewing of
the Holy Spirit. I believe that includes more
than the idea that the Holy Spirit causes that
new life to take place, which is true. He brings
new life, but there's more there than that. At
the moment that we are saved, the Holy Spirit
begins to renew us. It is a work that takes place
all the way through this life. I believe that
because of where this verb is used in the New
Testament. Two other places where it's used.
You need not look them up. But one place in 2
Corinthians it says, Our inner man is being renewed
day by day. A very closely related word. It's
the verb form of the same word that we're looking
at, renewing. And he says, our inner man, day
by day, is being renewed. And then it's used
once more in Colossians 3 .10 where it says,
put on the new self who is being renewed to a
true knowledge according to the image of the
one who created him. And so I believe putting
these passages together we see that the renewing
of the mind is the work of the Holy Spirit. You
cannot renew your mind, and I cannot renew my
mind. Like salvation, this is the work of God.
But, I hasten to add, we must cooperate with
the Holy Spirit if this work is to be done by
Him. What are we to do? What is our part then
so that the Holy Spirit can renew our minds?
I think the answer is found in a very significant
passage in 2 Corinthians chapter 3. I want you
to turn there with me. 2 Corinthians chapter
3 verse 18. And here you're going to see again
the same word transform or transfigured. But
we all with unveiled face beholding as in a mirror
the glory of the Lord are being transformed into
the same image from glory to glory just as from
the Lord the Spirit. Now what is the Lord saying
to us in this verse? He is saying that as you
and I are in communion with Jesus Christ, beholding
Him as in a mirror, in the Word, that the Holy
Spirit transfigures us. He changes us on the
inside. He renews our minds so that we go from
one level of glory to another, to another, to
another. A tadpole doesn't become a frog overnight.
A caterpillar doesn't become a butterfly in an
instant. There is a process to go through. There
are stages of metamorphosis. And so it is with
you and me. As you and I commune with Jesus Christ
in his word, and I emphasize in his word, The
Holy Spirit is free on the inside to change us
into that image of Christ that we see. How do
I know what Jesus is like? How do I know what
He thinks? How do I know what He would do? I
see it in the Word of God. And as I see Him in
the Word, I see the image of Him there. The Holy
Spirit changes me on the inside so that more
and more gradually from glory to glory. I become
like the one with whom I am communing. That's
a little mystical, isn't it? But I emphasize
that this communion is in the Word. It is the
written Word which reveals to us the living Word.
My commitment needs to be to this book. Not as
an end in itself, but as a means to come to know
the living God. I believe there are five levels
of commitment to this book. And every person
here today is on one of these levels. Level one
is listening. It's passive. It's what you do
when you come to church or sit in Sunday school
or small church. It's what you do when you sit
down and put a tape in the cassette machine.
It's what you do when you turn on the radio.
It's listening. Level two is reading. That's
when I open my own Bible and I begin to read
the words. It's active. I go from passive to
active, from stage one to stage two here. I begin
to read the Word. Level number three is when
I study it. It is the level of studying. When
I compare Scripture with Scripture, I get my
concordance out, I trace the Word. I take my
topical Bible, I trace that thought through the
Word. It is a studying of the Word of God. Level
number four is memorizing. Often we have the
idea that only children in Awana or in Sunday
school memorize Scripture, don't we? And yet
the hiding away of God's Word is vital for all
of us. Memorizing Scripture. And then we come
to level five. And I believe that it is only
when we get to this level, level five, that the
Holy Spirit is really free to renew our minds
and transform us. Only when you and I get to
level five is he really free to renew our thought
patterns, to lay down new tracks for us to walk
in in our thinking. Only when we get to level
five does he begin to purify and cleanse the
imaginations and get them under control. Only
when we get to level five does he begin to plug
in our emotions the way they ought to be. Now
he may do a little bit on the previous levels,
but it's level five that really gets the work
done. And level five is meditating. You say,
I thought that was the Oriental religions that
meditated. Well, they have a form of meditation,
and their idea is basically, in many cases, to
empty the mind of everything except a single
word or a phrase, and just to meditate on that.
I'm not talking about emptying your mind. I'm
talking about filling it up. Meditation is to
the spirit what digestion is to the body. That's
how to understand it. In the process of digestion,
my body takes food that I have eaten and breaks
it down, takes out the nourishment, the minerals,
the vitamins, etc. so that my body can go on
and be strengthened. That's what digestion is
all about. A person becomes very ill if his body,
for some reason, loses the ability to digest
the food. It is no less important spiritually,
dear people, that we allow the Word of God, which
we have heard, and read, and studied, and memorized
to then be digested into our spirits. How do
we do it? Well, it begins with reading it, and
interpreting it, and applying it to our lives.
But those are the mechanics. Observation, interpretation,
application. Those are the three big words. But
as I say, those are only the mechanics. For after
we have done that, Then throughout the process
of the day, we need to bring that word up again
in our lives and talk to the Lord about it and
think about it and let him give us new insights,
new applications, a new understanding. That's
meditation. The idea is also compared to rumination.
There are certain animals that ruminate, right?
They eat their food. and then at a convenient
point during the day, they bring it up again
and chew it all over again. That's why cows have
a couple of stomachs. Sheep have a couple of
stomachs because they swallow it initially as
they are foraging, and then they sit down someplace
and they chew it again and put it in the second
stomach, and that's how the food is digested.
As you and I forage in the reading and the studying
of God's Word, we are, as it were, putting it
into the first stomach. And sometime during the
day, indeed many times perhaps during the day,
we can bring something back to our minds that
we have studied, that we have read, and we can
say, Lord, how does this apply to me? What is
the meaning here? How should I understand this?
and we begin to commune with Him, and as we commune
with Him in the Word, we meditate, then that
Word is used by the Holy Spirit to renew our
minds and effect a transformation in us. That's
how it's done. How's it doing in your life? Which
level of commitment do you have to the Word of
God? Now you say, why is that so important after
all? Because of how he finishes the verse. He
says, continually be transformed by the renewing
of your mind that, here's the reason now, that
you may prove what the will of God is, that which
is good, acceptable, and perfect. Here's the
point, I think. Throughout the day, Every day,
you and I are confronted with a variety of circumstances.
Sometimes they are minor, sometimes they are
humongous. And we say, Lord, what am I supposed
to do with this? Why has this come into my life?
What is your purpose here? How should I react
to this? And you and I will only have the answer.
As we have renewed minds. Because only then will
we have the mind of Christ so that we can see
what God is doing in our lives. There is a very
significant verse in Psalm 103 that I think illustrates
this. I want you to look at it just as we come
to a close. Psalm 103. We often quote the first
few verses, but down in verse 7, it says, He
made known his ways to Moses, his acts to the
sons of Israel. Two words are used there, and
I recognize that this is Hebrew poetry, it's
parallelism, but there are two different words
used. He says he made known his ways to Moses,
his acts to the children of Israel. The Hebrew
word for acts here means exploits. It is a severe
word. It means harsh deeds. What it's saying
is that the Israelites, all of them, saw the
exploits of God. They saw the deeds of God. They
saw what he did in Egypt. They saw what he did
in delivering them from bondage. They all saw
the acts. But Moses, understood God's ways and
that's something else. For the word ways is related
to the verb for treading or walking. In other
words, Moses saw beyond the event to see where
God was going. Why? Because he was walking with
God. Your need and my need is to see beyond the
circumstances, people. To what God is doing.
To look beyond the event of the day and to see
what direction God is moving in and keep moving
with Him in that direction. How is it that we
can test the will of God and prove it as good,
acceptable, and perfect? It is by looking at
the events that come to us with a renewed mind.
With His mind. And as we do that, we will see
that whatever happens, happens for our benefit.
We will accept whatever God brings into our lives
as part of his gracious dealing with us. Is that
the way you look at it now? I don't know what
you're faced with today. I don't know what you're
struggling with in your home, in your family,
at work, or in your dorm room, or in your school.
I don't know what it may be. But are you looking
at that, whatever it is, with a renewed mind?
If you do, then you will see the way of the Lord
as well as the act of the Lord. I want to encourage
you to accept what God is bringing into your
life. And to stop your complaining and your whining
about it, perhaps. And to say, Lord, I thank
you, and whatever it is that you are trying to
say to me, I want to know it and I yield to it.
Will you do that today? Let's back up one point.
What's your commitment to the Word? Are you studying
it? You say, sure, I'm a student in Bible college.
Wonderful. But I'm talking about a different
kind of study. I'm talking about a personal Bible
study. Are you memorizing the Word? Are you meditating
in the Word? Are you willing to kick up your
commitment to the Word to the next level? Are
you being conformed by the peers around you?
Are you being squeezed into the mold of this
age? Then you need to recognize it and repent
of it and say, Lord, I want to stop this, and
I ask that you will begin that transforming work
in me. I yield to you, renew my mind, and here
is my commitment to your word so that you can
do that work of changing me. into the image of
Jesus Christ. Will you become in your conduct
what you are on the inside? If you're going to
be a living sacrifice, you're going to have to
do that. Otherwise, the commitment of being a
living sacrifice is a sham. It is a shell. It's
meaningless. If you are saying to God, I present
myself as a living sacrifice, then stop being
conformed to this age and continually ever be
transformed by the renewing of your mind. Heavenly
Father, I pray that you will cause your word
to strike us right where it needs to so that
it can accomplish in us the will of God. Father,
there are some of us today who need to make some
commitments. Perhaps we haven't liked to face
them. Perhaps we have only superficially made
them in the past. But today, Lord, I believe
you're laying in our hearts some definite, deep
commitments. And I pray whatever that commitment
may be in each life, that you'll have your way
in my life. in the life of every person listening
to me right now. With our heads bowed and our
eyes closed, I wonder how many of you would say,
Pastor, by the uplifted hand, I am confessing
before God, I am committing to him that I am
going to deepen my commitment to his word so
that my mind can be renewed. My commitment has
not been where it should be, but I am deepening
my commitment today. By the uplifted hand, I
am indicating that. Will you put your hand up
right now? Oh, praise God, many. Thank you. How
many of you would say by the uplifted hand, I
have only seen the deeds, the circumstances of
my situation. I have not seen the Lord working
in them. But today I am willing to say. God,
have your way. The circumstances are tough, but
you're willing to say, Lord, show me what you're
up to. I yield to you in advance. If you have
that surrendered spirit, that yieldedness, would
you lift your hand? Praise the Lord. Yes. Father,
I thank you for these commitments. And I pray
that if there are some here who are so troubled
or burdened that they need prayer with someone
else, or if you're leading someone today to trust
the Lord Jesus, or if one of your children here
needs to come in a rededication of life, having
been away from the Lord, that you'll give courage
to make those commitments public. In Jesus' name,
amen.