Transformed Living: Embracing Christ’s Teachings in Romans 12

Dick Lucas focuses on the practical implications of living a Christian life based on Paul’s teachings. He emphasizes the transformation that comes from renewing the mind, urging believers to live sacrificially, humbly, and in genuine love. Lucas highlights the importance of using one’s spiritual gifts to serve the body of Christ and stresses the call to live in harmony, peace, and service to others, reflecting Christ’s love and grace.

The following unedited transcript is provided by Beluga AI.

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Well, welcome again, dear brethren and sisters. It’s very good to have you, and that you’ve still managed to keep on the marathon is a very great encouragement to me. And we come now to Romans 12 and 13, and then next week, of course, 14, 15, and 16, and some kind of an attempt to summarize the whole letter and see what it’s really all about. Today we come to Lecture 1, Chapter 12; Lecture 2 after coffee, Chapter 13; plus, if time, a short conclusion on apostolic ethics, the ethics of Paul.

I want to commend the three pieces of paper in your hand. It includes two very valuable summaries written by members of the study group who are helping to keep me and all of us on the rails, and I think they’re worth tucking away and reading on the train going back this afternoon. One is the digest, as usual, and the other looks at some of the statements and claims of modern scholarship with regard to Romans. There’s also an article by Michael Griffiths that you may have seen on what we mean by worship.

I want to say that I’m very grateful to the study group, but like all authors in prefaces, I alone am responsible for what comes out on Thursday. I think it’s only fair to them to say that. Now we come to the final major section of Romans, obviously, in Ephesians 4, the beginning of Ephesians 4, which is a rather parallel place in that letter.

John Stott writes this, he says, “Now we come from exposition to exhortation, from what God has done to what we must be and do, from doctrine to duty, and from mind-stretching theology to its down-to-earth, concrete implications in everyday living.” That last phrase, but coming now in Romans 12 from mind-stretching theology—and it’s certainly been that—to its down-to-earth, concrete implications in everyday living. Now, there are a number of fine commentators who warn us that we ought not to look for a clear-cut pattern. They say there are too many exceptions, so the rule can’t be proved.

And they warn us not to look for a steady progress in application from one area of life to another. So the New Bible Commentary writes, Paul’s admonitions are given spontaneously, without any attempt at logical presentation, yet many characteristically group themselves together. I can’t think of anything more unlike the Apostle than that, can you? It doesn’t seem to me that he allows this material to go wandering all over the place, and of its own energy, characteristically group itself together. And if he ever said anything spontaneously without an attempt at logical presentation, then I’m a Dutchman.

So, respectfully but firmly, I must disagree. It seems to me that Paul is always a very well-organized writer, and not least when it comes to the final practical exhortations in his letters. If just for a moment you flip over to Colossians 3 and 4, that is a very, very good example of how in the second half of a letter he orders his material in short, powerful, little phrases, little chunks of material, which is unmistakably in patterns and shows of progress, and which is kind of potted for memory learning.

¹ If then you have been raised with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. ² Set your minds on things that are above, not on things that are on earth. ³ For you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God. ⁴ When Christ who is your life appears, then you also will appear with him in glory. (Colossians 3:1-4, ESV)

And so in Colossians 3, we start with our relationship to Christ, then to the local church, then wives and husbands, then slaves and masters, and then Colossians 4:2 to the Christian as he looks out into the world. And nothing could be plainer that there is a pattern there. There’s a pattern that’s quite very much intended, intended for people to take down, to memorize, to learn, so that they have a picture of what it means to be a Christian out in the pagan world.

And I think we should look for a pattern and a progress like that in Romans. Incidentally, these patterns of ethical exhortation, these patterns of application, are wonderful material for a short series of sermons. And I do recommend them. We’re often being asked, aren’t we, for application? Well, it’s a great thing to preach through apostolic applications. And you’ll get them at the end of Paul’s letters. So I personally am going to look for a pattern. And I’m going to look for a progress. But I want to be scrupulously honest. I don’t want to cheat.

And if you think that I’m forcing material into a pattern in a way that I ought not to, well, you can easily knock me on the head over coffee. In any case, when you preach through this material for yourself, you must make up your own mind. So then here is apostolic application of priceless value. One other question needs to be looked at before we plunge in. How general is this, and how particular? That is, is this application general to all churches in the first century?

Might he just as well have written it to the Church of Colossae as to the Church of Rome? Or is it very particular? An important question, because a lot of Romans does not seem to be particular. It seems to be of value to all Christians and not necessarily to hone in on the particular issues in Rome. Well, my answer to that, I don’t know what you feel about it so far.

But my answer to that, from my study so far through to the end of chapter 13, is that he does appear to have Rome very much in mind in this application in chapters 12 and 13. But, of course, all such material does have a wider use, as we know, because we will have heard Romans 12 and 13 preached to us without any suggestion that it first had something to do with Rome.

One of the things I said at the beginning is you must go to Rome in the proper way if you’re going to expound the letter to the Romans. My guess is that ninety-nine out of a hundred expositions of Romans 12:1-2 pay no attention to Rome whatever.

I must have heard sermons on Romans 12:1-2 more often than I can remember, since I’ve been a Christian now for over forty years, and as far as I can remember, not one of the preachers on Romans 12:1 showed any sign of having visited Rome. And yet, verses 1 and 2 are unintelligible in the fullest sense if we don’t take into account the context of the letter to the Romans. Let me give another example of this, Romans 13:1-7, that we’re going to look at after coffee.

This is a very unexpected section, isn’t it, on our duty to the powers that be, and there are not a few scholars who say, “How does it fit in?

¹ Let every person be subject to the governing authorities. For there is no authority except from God, and those that exist have been instituted by God. ² Therefore whoever resists the authorities resists what God has appointed, and those who resist will incur judgment. ³ For rulers are not a terror to good conduct, but to bad. Would you have no fear of the one who is in authority? Then do what is good, and you will receive his approval, ⁴ for he is God’s servant for your good. But if you do wrong, be afraid, for he does not bear the sword in vain. For he is the servant of God, an avenger who carries out God’s wrath on the wrongdoer. ⁵ Therefore one must be in subjection, not only to avoid God’s wrath but also for the sake of conscience. ⁶ For because of this you also pay taxes, for the authorities are ministers of God, attending to this very thing. ⁷ Pay to all what is owed to them: taxes to whom taxes are owed, revenue to whom revenue is owed, respect to whom respect is owed, honor to whom honor is owed. (Romans 13:1-7, ESV)

What’s it got to do with the Roman church?” Well, since we know in this letter that Paul is writing to a church which had many Jewish members, and that a good deal of what he has said so far applies specifically to the Jewish members of the church, then I think some words of Hodge in his old commentary are worth reading to you.

Forgive me for a rather long quotation, but I think it shows very plainly, right at the beginning of our study this morning, that each of these sections is chosen in the first instance because it has something to say to the church at Rome, and then only secondarily, may we apply it to ourselves. Here’s the blessed Hodge: There was a peculiar necessity during the apostolic age for inculcating the duty of obedience to civil magistrates.

This necessity arose in part from the fact that a large portion of the converts to Christianity had been Jews and were peculiarly indisposed to submit to the heathen authorities. This indisposition arose from the prevailing impression among them that this subjection was unlawful, or at least highly derogatory to their character as the people of God who had so long lived under a theocracy. In Deuteronomy, it is said, “Thou shalt in any wise set him king over thee, whom the Lord thy God shall choose. One from among thy brethren shalt thou set king over thee.”

Thou mayest not set a stranger over thee, which is not thy brother. It was a question, therefore, constantly agitating the Jews: is it lawful to pay tribute to Caesar or not? A question which the great majority were at least secretly inclined to answer in the negative, and so on. I won’t go on with the quotation. But he makes there, I think, a very strong and important case for the relevance of Romans 13:1-7 to the particular situation in the Church of Rome, as in all churches where there was a very large Jewish-Christian group.

So to summarize, then, before we plunge in, sorry to have taken some time, we will try to apply each section to the realities of the first century, and then we will apply each section to the realities of the twentieth century. Not one without the other, is it? Most of the preaching that I’ve heard on Romans 12 and 13 has gone straight to the realities of my life now, without going to Rome, but we mustn’t fall into the other trap, must we, of saying that because this speaks so powerfully to the Roman situation in the first century, it’s not suitable for us.

And, of course, there are quite a few liberals who do say that. The marvel about the inspiration of scripture is that the word that was particularly applicable to them fits us as well. That’s the marvel, isn’t it, of scriptural inspiration. We don’t find that the writer has accommodated him so much to first century perspectives that it is unable to speak to us.

Right, let’s get some kind of order then into our session this morning before coffee. Chapter 12, verses 1 and 2 seems to be a summary that governs the whole of the rest, and I’ve called it simply The True Worshippers. And then verses 3 to 13 is The True Worshippers as Members of the Body of Christ. And then verses 14 to 21, The True Worshippers as Living in an Evil Society, an Evil World. So let’s start with this brief summary that governs everything, I think, right through to the end of chapter 13.

I think there is a very natural break between chapter 13 and chapter 14. I think chapters 12 and 13 are the basic instruction for living the Christian life, such as he would give to a living church in his own day, and particularly to these people. With two very natural applications here in chapter 12 to the church and to the world, our behavior in both of those.

Right. Let’s start then in 12:1-2, and I’ll read it. We start with a great apostolic exhortation.

¹ 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. ² 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. (Romans 12:1-2, ESV)

Marvellous words, aren’t they? And wonderfully familiar to all of us, I think.

Now, I’m not going to be able to go into all the fascinating details of these two chapters or indeed of these two verses. If you will forgive a crude way of putting it, I want to go to the guts of the matter. What I want to do is to find out what he’s really getting at. So I am not going to be able to say in this next three quarters of an hour many things that you ought to say if you’re teaching Romans.

For example, we ought to say what Dr. Charles Erdman says with regard to these two verses, that we do not serve God to win his favour, but because we have received his favour, we serve him in gratitude and love. That’s a brilliant way, isn’t it, of summarising where we’ve got to. We’ve heard about his grace and mercy to us, which puts us in right relationship to God. Nothing we did could merit that. But having received this mercy, then there is a life to be lived in the light of it, in gratitude.

Christian ethics are, of course, gratitude, as the saying goes. Now, I’m not going to look at all the details of it. I want to go for those leading thoughts that reveal what is Paul’s special message to the Roman Church. And by leading thought, for example, I mean this phrase, “the renewal of your mind,” in verse 2. That seems to me to be a leading thought in these two chapters.

It comes out at the beginning of the second section, where we’re told, verse 3, not to think of ourselves more highly than we ought to think, but to think with sober judgment. In other words, to have a renewed mind. What he says in the second section is that I cannot deal with charismatic gifts, I cannot live in the body of Christ, I cannot be a true minister of God in the church, unless I have a renewed mind. Because I will think all wrongly. I will think as the world thinks.

So that’s what I mean by trying to go to the heart of these little paragraphs. Well as I look at these first two verses, which introduce the whole exhortation to live a Christian life, what we see here is an appeal to the Christians to be true worshippers of God. That is the calling of the believer. In the light of the mercy of God, I am to be a worshipper. That, as we know, is what the Father seeks. He seeks those who will worship Him in spirit and in truth.

What we are going to see in chapters 12 and 13 is precisely that. It’s an explanation of John 4, what it is to worship God in spirit and in truth.

²⁴ God is spirit, and those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth.” (John 4:24, ESV)

Send out a little bit of paper to your church congregation next Sunday morning. Put the question on top, “What is it to worship God in spirit and in truth?” Tell me where I shall find this out in the New Testament and see what answers you get.

You know as well as I do that people are very confused as to what it means to be a worshipper today. We indeed ourselves are very confused about the meaning of the word worship. Now we are going to see some sensational redraftings in these chapters. I mean, what we see here of course is a sensational change, isn’t it, from chapter 1. Everything in chapter 1 was upside down. The creature wanted to be like the Creator. The creature wanted the worship. And we see that, of course, in the twentieth century.

In secular humanism, which is an attempt to worship man, and we see it in the ethnic religions of the world, which are the worship of man, not of God. But what is just as sensational, I think, here, is to put this verse up against Chapter 9, verse 4. So will you turn back to Chapter 9, verse 4?

⁴ They are Israelites, and to them belong the adoption, the glory, the covenants, the giving of the law, the worship, and the promises. (Romans 9:4, ESV)

Now what he said there, you remember, about his Jewish kinsmen, is that to them, verse 4, belong, and then there was this marvelous list. To them belong the sonship, the glory, the covenants, the giving of the law, the worship, and the promises. To them belong the patriarchs, etc. Notice, to them, my kinsmen, the Israelites, belong the worship.

The worship belongs to them. That was their precious possession. But now, of course, no longer, as we turn to Romans 12:1, and now we’re going to find him reinterpreting this whole idea. It no longer belongs to the Jews, it belongs to the Christian community. So the whole idea of worship is radically reinterpreted.

Though, I have to say straight away, it’s reinterpreted in a way that would be instantly recognizable by the great 8th century prophets. There would be no difficulty with the great prophets like Isaiah understanding Romans 12:1-2. Because actually, this is what they were saying too. True worship has got to be the offering of my life. So these things, like the law and the worship, and we’re going to look at both this morning, no longer belong to the Jew, per se.

And if you’re a Christian Jew, would you please put that in your pipe and smoke it? I hope you realize that I do believe with all my heart as Paul does in the evangelization of the Jew and of the priority place they have in the Christian Church. But though you are the root and we are only the Gentile branches, nothing now belongs exclusively to you. The Jewish Christian is not travelling club class with all the rest of us herded into economy. All that God gives in Christ belongs to all of us.

And to us belongs now the worship rightly interpreted and the law rightly interpreted. What is the worship then? What is it to worship God acceptably? Answer, it is to do His will with my whole heart and my whole life. It is to please Him. It is to offer myself to Him. It is to give Him my life as a sacrifice of thanksgiving. That is what it is according to Romans 12:1-2. And in saying that, of course, he is not saying anything new even within his letter.

Turn back to Romans chapter 6:19 where it says, I am speaking in human terms because of your natural limitations. Just as you once yielded your members to impurity into greater and greater iniquity, so now yield your members to righteousness and sanctification.

He has already said it. Now he says it again: To yield myself, because of God’s mercy to me, I may do that; to yield myself to God, to do His will, to do that which is acceptable, perfect, and good. That is what it means to worship God.

And as such, of course, it has got nothing specifically to do with Sunday at all, has it, the Lord’s Day? It has to do with every day of the week. It has to do with the whole of life. Now, what is the will of God? There used to be, of course, according to Romans 9:4, one simple explanation of that, a very satisfying explanation. What was the will of God? It was the law of God. The people of God had the law of God, and therefore they knew how to please God.

Now we shall see later on that the law has not disappeared for the Christian, if we haven’t seen it already in Romans. Yet the law is not adequate by itself in this new era. It is not enough to be governed by the law, I’ve got to be governed by a renewed mind, which expresses itself in love. So although Romans is not an antinomian book, as we’ve already seen, and we’re going to see that again in chapter 13 this morning, it is not an antinomian book.

The law is wholly just and good, yet the law is not adequate for living the Christian life. And I shall say something about that in our summary at the end about apostolic ethics. The law feeds the mind of the Christian. It is through such things as the law that my renewed mind comes to grips with the will of God and discerns what it is for Monday morning.

As we look at verses 1 and 2, we cannot help but notice the technical language that is used throughout. There are four words at least which are technical terms.

The word “sacrifice,” verse 1, the word “offer” or “present,” verse 1, the word “holy,” and the word “well-pleasing.” All these are technical terms for sacrifice as used in the Old Testament. That does not mean, of course, that they are terms and thoughts and concepts that could only be understood by a Jew or a reader of the Old Testament, because the whole world knows this kind of language. Indeed, if you talk about religion to anybody anywhere on the face of the globe, they think in terms of buildings, priests, and ritual.

And now, as I turn to Romans 12:1-2, I find that buildings, priests, and ritual have all gone. And that is to say, they are no longer indispensable. If I have a building, it is only to keep the rain off my head. If I have ministers, it is to teach me God’s word, but I do not need any man to bring me into God’s presence or enable me to worship God. Nor is any ritual indispensable for me to serve God in my life.

Not that it is spiritualized away in Romans 12:1-2. How am I to worship God? It is very striking in verse one. By offering what? The body. Well, we only learned a little time ago that the body has much sin indwelling it. But did you notice how carefully Paul refuses, although he says that there is indwelling sin in my life, he refuses to say that the body is something evil. He keeps reminding me that this body is going to be raised in the last day.

So there is nothing evil per se in my body. And there is no other way to worship God but through my body and my members. And so this tells me that I am to worship God, living it out in the practical context of this world. But although I am to live in the body in this world, and verse one makes that very plain, I am not to live by the standards and priorities of this world, as verse two makes plain. I am to live by the standards and priorities of the age to come.

Now you see how that must be, the essence of worship, or worth-ship. What do you think is ultimately worthwhile? If you think that this world in which you live is that which is ultimately worthwhile, you will live by those standards, won’t you? And that’s what we all do by nature. If on the other hand you come by God’s mercy and grace, and through his electing love and through the blood of Christ, to see that the only one who is worth your life is God himself, then even in this world you will be governed by him.

See what a striking thing it is. What is the ultimate worth for which I live? And the man of the world, of course, lives for the world. That is what is ultimately worthwhile for him. Its honors, its rewards are what he’s living for. What a tremendous privilege to be rescued from that, brothers, isn’t it? Because otherwise, we would inevitably go that way as well.

So that we are to live very definitely in this world, verse 1, but we’re going to have a renewed mind because we’re going to live, astonishing as it sounds, absurd as it sounds to the world, we’re going to live by an altogether different set of values. Notice the incredible power that is inherent in this exhortation in verses 1 and 2. Here is a call to live a life in this world, but to live by having my mind a heavenly mind.

There is a plain statement that unless I am heavenly minded, I cannot be any earthly good. That is our position, isn’t it? The problem today is that so many Christians are earthly minded, and that’s one of the reasons why the Church…

Church in this country and in the West is so weak and so little attended to by the world. This matter of being conformed away, of course, from the world’s standards, applies to our own lives and ministries as ordained men and pastors of churches.

Yesterday morning a younger evangelical minister called on me who had heard of our conferences but has not been to any of them. He is in the country. He is a man of God who wants to preach the word and build up the flock in Christ, but he has been waking up to the fact that there are enormous pressures on him from the wider church, on the one hand, and from his local people on the other, as to what they expect of him.

And he said to me, I am beginning to realize that if I am going to do what they expect of me, I can never do what I believe God expects me to do. I thought it was very striking. That is one of the reasons why our Proclamation Trust conferences and fellowship exist, is that we might rethink what we are doing as pastors according to the will of God and not the pressures of the world. Because the world has a very clear picture of what it expects this nice good man to do.

Endless cups of tea and so on. But what are we called to do? What is the will of God? So this amazing reinterpretation of worship touches every part of life, and it must be taken with seriousness. And of course, it is not an isolated outburst. You will find it in other New Testament letters, as in 1 Peter 2:4. Exactly the same reinterpretation of worship. Not spiritualizing, because it is still body, but reinterpretation. Now, it’s interesting, isn’t it, that when people begin to see these things, you see, they immediately get frightened.

Cranfield, who has done such remarkable work on Romans, is an honest enough commentator to see how this view of worship turns upside down most of the things that are going on in the church under the heading of worship. And so, having expounded it brilliantly, he rushes to rescue us from disaster, as though we can’t look after ourselves, and as though the Word of God can’t be left to say what it does say. And you can read that for yourself in the shorter Cranfield. Personally, I found it rather complacent. We don’t have to rescue ourselves.

None of us here is likely to want to stop from today onwards assembling together to render thanks for the great benefits that we have received at his hands, to set forth his most worthy praise, to hear his most holy word, and to ask those things that are requisite and necessary as well as for the bodies and soul. You may not read those words today, but our Reformation forefathers had a very clear understanding of what we’re meant to be doing when we assemble together. And we all do that when we assemble together.

But once we’ve understood the New Testament on worship, of course, that is only a tiny part of what it means to worship God. Well, we certainly need to do some thinking about this that I haven’t time to do this morning. But just for a moment, try to calculate, if you can, the harm that has been done in our country with its long-standing traditional Christianity, the harm that is done by supposing that divine service is something that happens at 11 o’clock on Sunday morning.

That worship is churchgoing and churchgoing is worship and that if I do that I fulfill my obligations to worship God. Just imagine the harm that has been done by that age-old tradition within our country. No wonder the world mocks the church when it sees somebody supposedly worshiping God at 11 o’clock on Sunday morning and then living from Monday to Friday in the office, a life that is totally inconsistent with it. But I must leave all that to you.

I think that the article by Michael Griffiths in reaction and response to a theological article written by Professor Howard Marshall, which some of you have seen and I couldn’t find in my filed copy for you this morning, but it’s well worth getting. I think that that reaction of Michael Griffiths shows just how unexpected it really is when we start to use Bible language in a Bible way. Well now, we must go on.

What then is it going to mean to be a true worshipper of God, doing the will of God first of all within the Christian community, verses 3 to 13, and then within the pagan world, verses 14 to 21? Well, in both of them, I’m called to be a blessing. Whether in the Christian community or in the secular community down your street, we are called to be a blessing. Verses 3 to 13.

I won’t, if I may now read 3 to 13 because time is catching up on us and I’m going simply to give you my headings by way of notes because I’ve been too long on that first bit. In this paragraph, he looks at the gifts, the spiritual gifts, the charismatic gifts, in the widest sense of the word, because, as you can see from verse 8, some of them are very natural gifts, in a sense very ordinary gifts. He looks at these gifts and he brings to bear the principles of verses 1 and 2 upon them.

Now what is, what will these gifts mean to me if I am conformed to the thinking of this world? Supposing God has greatly blessed me in spiritual gifts, what will it mean to me if I have a worldly way of thinking? Well, obviously, the word that comes to mind is the word distinction. It will set me apart from my fellow Christians as a remarkable person. So I looked at the thesaurus for distinction and I got celebrity, consequence, credit, eminence, excellence, fame, greatness, honor, importance, name, prominence, rank, renown, reputation, repute, superiority. Well, precisely.

And what is Paul saying? He’s saying if you are now a worshipper of God and seek to do the will of God within the Christian community and find yourself greatly gifted with the spiritual blessings of God, they will not cause you to see yourself as a person of distinction. That was precisely the Corinthian attitude. In Paul’s thinking, our different gifts do not make us inferior or superior. They simply equip us to do God’s will, which is what? To serve his people.

If you belong, if you are an Anglican, you will know how some devoted aunt of yours, when they knew that you were about to be ordained, said how wonderful it was you were going into the church, that dreadful phrase. You see, what Paul is saying to us is that the moment we become true worshippers of God, we go into the church to serve it in ministry, directly. That’s the connection, isn’t it, between the first paragraph one and two and then three to eight.

And such distinctions as I have in terms of spiritual ability are not given for the purpose of self-exaltation or self-indulgence, but that my fellow believers may be blessed and the body of Christ may be built up. So the whole point of gifts is that they should be used, and that’s why you get this repetition: if your gift is that of service, serve; if teaching, teach. And I am to do neither less nor more than I am equipped to do, and that presumably is the meaning of that rather difficult phrase at the end of verse six.

If a person in the early church was given this remarkable gift of inspired, direct speech from God to man, then that gift must be used to the full, but not beyond the boundaries of the gift. It’s quite obvious, isn’t it, how a gift of that magnitude would easily corrupt somebody. How easy it is to drive that gift into a position where I am becoming a person of importance whose every word everybody must listen to. So I must do it according to the proportion of my faith, according to the limits that God has given.

This then is the priority for the Christian. This is the first thing that he is responsible for doing if he is a consecrated worshipper. He is to realize that he is to serve his fellow Christians, and that wholehearted consecration to God versus one and two will mean wholehearted commitment to God’s people. And remember who God’s people are now? It is not the Judaism, it is the whole people of God. So Jewish Christian is committed to Gentile Christian, and Gentile Christian committed to Jewish Christian.

And there is no doubt that Paul has that in his mind and at the tip of his pen, because we’re going to spend two whole chapters in 14 and 15 spelling that out in ways that were rather painful for them. Now this unity, this being members of one another as I say will emerge again in chapters 14 and 15 and I’ll leave it until then, except to say that of course this is a sign of the reconciling power of God. And I think this is going to become an important aspect of the rest of Romans.

So much of Romans is about how God reconciles us to himself, but if that is not seen in any way on earth, in the body, by a reconciliation between Jew and Gentile, then it’s going to be hard for the world to believe in the reconciling power of God. That’s one of the major emphases of the letter to the Romans.

The miracle of God, the miracle of God’s grace, is not simply that he can bring a sinner into the presence of God, a holy God, as we learnt through the whole issues of justification by faith, but the marvelous mercy of God is that he can bring the Jew and the Gentile together into one another’s company as equals in Christ, as together. 9-13 is actually in the same basket as 3-8. I’m going to read this, and you’ll find that 9-13 has four strands in it, four thrusts, each consistent within itself.

The first has to do with love. Let love be genuine, hate what is evil, hold fast to what is good, love one another with brotherly affection, outdo one another in showing honor. That’s what it means to love within the body of Christ. Second, zeal. The three phrases here all add up to the same thrust. Never flag in zeal, be aglow with the Spirit serving the Lord. Third thrust, patience, endurance. Rejoice in your hope, be patient in tribulation, be constant in prayer. That’s what patience means within the body of Christ.

And then fourthly, generosity within the body of Christ. Contribute to the needs of the saints, practice hospitality, gifts which are more ordinary, you may say, but pick up the gifts of verse eight.

⁹ Let love be genuine. Abhor what is evil; hold fast to what is good. ¹⁰ Love one another with brotherly affection. Outdo one another in showing honor. ¹¹ Do not be slothful in zeal, be fervent in spirit, serve the Lord. ¹² Rejoice in hope, be patient in tribulation, be constant in prayer. ¹³ Contribute to the needs of the saints and seek to show hospitality. (Romans 12:9-13, ESV)

Now, the reason why I’ve become persuaded myself that these four thrusts follow so closely to three to eight that they can be put within the same paragraph is because they are so well-chosen. And I think I’ve only time to do one of them, so I will do the one, love.

I want to tell you that I think verses nine to ten are marvelously well-chosen to follow three to eight. Do you remember that when there was trouble with spiritual gifts in Corinth, what did Paul do? Do you know what he did? He wrote 1 Corinthians 13, right back in the middle of the chapters on spiritual gifts, 12 and 14. It is very interesting to me, therefore, that you have exactly the same apostolic care here to say that I can only serve the Church with my gifts if I love my fellow Christians.

This will mean, for example, that I outdo others in showing honor, whereas a worldly use of gifts goes precisely the other way. I am asking everybody else to honor me. But most important, I think, the more gifted a church is, according to verses 3 to 8, the more wonderfully blessed by God in spiritual life and charismatic endowment, the more moral integrity is at risk. We saw that, of course, with the Pentecostal evangelists in the United States, and Jimmy Baker in particular. Tommy, as yet I cannot remember. Listen to Don.

I find him tremendously stimulating on this ethical section. There is a vehemence in the first phrase, hating the evil, which suggests Paul was no stranger to the danger of both charism and love being corrupted. The more spiritual the claim, the more dangerous and demonic the corruption. The fact that Paul uses the most general category as evil good indicates an awareness that unbalanced emphasis on spiritual factors can result in attitudes and conducts which others can see to be evil, but which the devout claim to be able to justify.

As elsewhere, Paul evidently sees a need to correlate talk of spiritual gifts with an open-eyed and level-headed life, which recognizes evil for what it is. But to be an effective check, there must be a passion both in the revulsion against evil and in the commitment to what is good. If the Baker Empire had understood verses 9 and 10, then the tragedies that we have read about in the papers recently would never have happened, wouldn’t they? See?

We can be so carried away with the spiritual blessings, the charismatic endowments that God gives to the Church, that we can lift ourselves above the ordinary level of good and evil, and no longer think that they apply to us. We’ve all seen that happen in small and big ways. So you see, the love that should have been the mark, and was the mark no doubt, of the Church of Corinth and the Church of Rome, that love had to be bedded down in a moral integrity that hated evil and loved that which was good.

Similarly, I think the whole emphasis on zeal in verse 11 is to point out that however full of zeal and aglow in the Spirit we are, what we are doing is to serve the Lord, and he’s pointed out what service for the Lord means. If all our steam in the engine is not driving the wheels, then there’s something wrong. Again, verse 12: Spiritual gifts often do not go well alongside patient endurance. The mark of the Church is not only brilliant gifts, but constant prayer, hope, patience in affliction.

¹¹ Do not be slothful in zeal, be fervent in spirit, serve the Lord. ¹² Rejoice in hope, be patient in tribulation, be constant in prayer. ¹³ Contribute to the needs of the saints and seek to show hospitality. (Romans 12:11-13, ESV)

They should live together. Again, verse 13. These gifts, which appear to be less brilliant but which are nevertheless underlined in verse 8, are very, very important gifts, aren’t they, for churches to hold together, if we are actually to minister to real people. So, I think that these qualities in verses 9 to 13, I’ve come to the conclusion that these qualities are added on purpose with quite definite intention to earth the spiritual gifts, the blessings of the spiritual gifts, into real Christian living and into real church life. It’s not that Paul is wanting to dampen us down.

It’s not that he’s saying we’re getting too keen. Notice the adverbs: wholeheartedly, zealously, liberally, cheerfully. Tremendous words, aren’t they? But it’s so marvelously balanced, isn’t it? And all that God has given me does not rest here, but goes straight out to his people. Wholeheartedly, zealously, liberally, cheerfully.

Now, verses 14 to 21. I want to suggest that this is the next stage, which is how the Christian is to be a blessing not only within the Christian community, the local church, but within the local secular community down the street.

And you’ll notice that Paul takes it for granted that this community will be an evil one, verse 21, and that it is likely to be a persecuting and inhospitable community and influence against the church, hating this new gospel. A place, in other words, where evil is endemic and where it is very uncomfortable for the Christian to live in the body.

I want you please to notice what he is doing in 14 to 21. I hope in these last three minutes I can persuade you. What he is doing is this.

He is saying, you who have been transformed, verse 2, will be a transforming influence in that society, verse 21. Do you see how that holds the whole chapter together? You who have been transformed yourself and no longer conform to this world will be able to overcome evil with good, be a transforming influence down your way, in your street. Thus, I personally, you may think it is cheating, but I personally want to see verse 15 bedded right into that context. And surely it is very vivid in that context.

How am I actually to live in this evil world that is constantly troubling me, persecuting me, attacking me, misunderstanding me? Shall I retreat from it? Shall I live constantly amongst my Christian friends? Shall I put up the shutters and have nothing to do with them? No, I am to rejoice with those who rejoice and weep with those who weep. That is, I am to share their joys and their sorrows. I am to be alongside them. What a wonderful way to commend my Lord and Saviour to them.

Surely, this is not simply within the body of Christ. This is living in society. I am to live in harmony. I am not to be proud. I am to associate with the lowly.

¹⁶ Live in harmony with one another. Do not be haughty, but associate with the lowly. Never be wise in your own sight. (Romans 12:16, ESV)

I am not to be conceited. There is nothing that the world dislikes more than religious priggishness or stuck-upishness. Is there such a word? I’m not sure. I’ll look up my thesaurus afterwards. You who are better at grammar, make up your own word.

The Pharisee, then. The Pharisee. There’s nothing the world dislikes more than the Pharisee. Verse 17. Isn’t that remarkable? And verse 18.

I love the realism of verse 18, don’t you? “If possible, so far as it depends upon you, live peaceably with all.” It isn’t possible always, and it doesn’t entirely depend upon you. Because you have a neighbor across the fence, don’t you? They can be a pain in the neck. They may make it impossible to live peaceably with them.

¹⁸ If possible, so far as it depends on you, live peaceably with all. ¹⁹ Beloved, never avenge yourselves, but leave it to the wrath of God, for it is written, “Vengeance is mine, I will repay, says the Lord.” ²⁰ To the contrary, “if your enemy is hungry, feed him; if he is thirsty, give him something to drink; for by so doing you will heap burning coals on his head.” (Romans 12:18-20, ESV)

You may have to go to court, Romans 13:1-7. But as far as you can, live peaceably with them. Verses 19-20. There will be many opportunities for bringing God’s vengeance upon them, but we must leave that to God.

And the final don’t: Don’t be overcome with evil, which wonderfully links with that don’t of verse 2. Don’t be conformed to this world. Indeed, I think all the don’ts of this chapter hang together. Don’t be conformed to this world. Verse 14: Don’t curse this world. Don’t be conformed and not be overcome by this world.

But rather, in the power of the Spirit, by nature of who you are, seeking to serve God, to do his will in this world, members of this body where we receive our strength, our fellowship, our joy, our help, we are to be a blessing to those who persecute us, and we are to overcome the evil around us with God’s good.

¹⁴ Bless those who persecute you; bless and do not curse them. (Romans 12:14, ESV)

So, we might put a title over the whole of chapter 14. Sorry, chapter 12, really, I’m losing my head, aren’t I? It says, “Time I Stopped.”

Put a title over the whole of chapter 12, Transformed and Transforming. Let’s pray together.