With a heavy heart, earlier in the service we were all invited to bring our burdens, our troubles to Jesus, and to leave them there. I wonder if there may be some few who are especially disturbed, distressed, distraught. I hope that song is ministered to you. We have a wonderful priest, a great high priest, who intercedes in our behalf. We may come directly to the Father through him.
We are reminded, Lord, that you have invited us to cast our heavy burdens upon you and know your sustaining care and grace. And while all of us carry our burdens, we fight battles, we want to pray tonight especially for those who have heavy, heavy hearts amongst us. You know them. I pray that you will touch them to encourage, to lift up, to bring wholeness and healing according to your great grace. We come to you, Father, through Jesus with this prayer.
Amen. Well, it was good to see a brother and sister sing a duet, wasn't it? It's nice to know that brothers and sisters eventually do get along. I read a statement recently that said, no man knows his true character until he's run out of gas, purchased something on the installment plan, and raised a teenager. Romans chapter 12 will be our beginning place tonight.
The theme of the book of Romans, this marvelous book that we have sought to understand better, the theme of it is the righteousness of God. God's righteousness is his impartial justice. It is his transparent holiness leading to fairness of action in every relationship that he has. God's righteousness is his attribute describing the way that he acts towards everything and everyone outside of himself.
We have seen in our study of the book of Romans that God is righteous in his relationship to the world of sinners. The one word that summarizes that is the word condemnation. God righteously condemns those who are in sin. And God is righteous toward believers, thank God. He has extended toward us salvation, including both justification and sanctification, which we've talked about, not because of who we are, but because we have believed on his Son, Jesus Christ.
And so the one word that summarizes God's relationship to believers, his righteous relationship to believers, is the word salvation. Last Sunday night we talked about God's relationship to the nation of Israel. And really three words are necessary to describe the scope of that relationship. Again, it is a relationship characterized by righteousness. The first word is the word election, chapter 9, God chose them.
The second word is the word rejection, chapter 10, because of unbelief they failed and did not attain unto the righteousness that comes by faith alone. But in chapter 11 the word restoration, God will righteously restore the nation of Israel one day to himself when the fullness of the Gentiles has come in. Now we come to the final section of the book of Romans, chapters 12 through 16. It is a section that applies the righteousness of God to life.
If the first 12 chapters, first 11 chapters rather, are doctrinal, the last chapters are practical. God desires his righteousness to be demonstrated in every relationship of believers. That's the sentence you may be looking to fill in, because it summarizes the final chapters of the book. God desires his righteousness to be demonstrated in every relationship of those who are believers. Who call upon him as God and Father.
In other words, God wants us to live out in a practical manner the beauty of this wonderful quality of righteousness. He wants us to do what is right. He wants us to do in the world what Jesus would do. Sheldon in his book, In His Presence, again and again comes back to that question, what would Jesus do? What would Jesus do? God wants us to live our lives, asking that question, how would Jesus respond? What would Jesus do in this circumstance?
And if we answer that question rightly, it will expose through us the righteousness of God. We heard sung this evening, I want to be like Jesus. But what does that mean? What does it mean to be like Jesus? What does it mean to live out the righteousness of God? What does that look like? Well, these chapters are devoted to the answer to that question. The first part of the division is the believer and his body, chapter 12 verses 1 and 2.
This is the most intimate environment a believer has, his own body. It is an environment where stewardship is to be expressed. It is also the battleground as all of us know. The body itself is not inherently sinful and bad, but the body is the seat of indwelling sin as we saw in chapter 7. Paul says that the principle of sin dwells in his body and it does for all of us who are believers. There is a battleground with sin in our bodies and it is our bodies which relate to the sinful world.
It is the point of temptation for us. So he says in chapter 6 that we are to yield the members of our bodies to God as instruments of righteousness and we are to stop presenting them to sin so that sin can use them. The body is the instrument by which we are to serve God in this world. So he tells us of an important action in these two verses. He says we are to present our bodies to God. A few weeks ago we talked about these two verses and so I am not going to spend a lot of time on them.
But the word present here means to place beside and it is a technical term referring to placing the sacrifice beside the altar. It has the idea of putting the sacrifice at the disposal of God. And so he says present your bodies to God. That is put them at his disposal. The word sacrifice here is the word thesia in the Greek and it comes from a verb that means to go up and smoke. We talked about these two verses around Christmas time in conjunction with the burnt offering described in Leviticus.
One of the offerings of the Old Testament Jewish nation was the burnt offering in which the whole offering was consumed and went up in smoke. That is exactly the picture that Paul uses here. He says we are to present our bodies to God as a living burnt sacrifice. Our bodies are to be given to God irrevocably, completely, just as completely as were those animals brought to the altar for burnt offering in the Old Testament. Except there is a contrast.
Our sacrifice is a living sacrifice, not a dead sacrifice. He further describes this as a holy sacrifice. It is dedicated to sacred use. No longer are our bodies our own. They have been redeemed by a price, the blood of Christ. Our bodies are not common any longer. They are sacred, sacred vessels of God himself. They are holy, set apart for God's use. He says that when you and I present our bodies to God as a living and holy sacrifice, it is acceptable to him.
It pleases him well when we do this. Why? Because it is the right sacrifice with the right spirit. He says further that when we do this, it is on our part a spiritual service of worship. Murray in his commentary says the use of our bodies is characterized by conscious, intelligent, consecrated devotion to the service of God. That is what he means here. This service of worship is spiritual in the sense that it is an act of intelligent, definite worship on our part. It is deliberate.
It is not careless. It is to be done as an act of worship as though we were priests in the temple offering our bodies to God. It's a righteous thing that we should do this. He says that there is an important realization that we need to come to about it. This involves the total person. It's not just the outward body. It's all that we are. He says it begins, this consecration of our bodies begins actually in our minds. Notice how he says it here in verse 2.
Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your minds. The renovation of your attitudes, your ideals, your imagination, your memory. The way you think, the way you judge, the way you understand, let all of that be renewed by God. As your mind is renewed, then from the inside out you will be transformed. Don't be coerced into the mold of people around you who do not know God, the world. This age in which we live.
Don't succumb to peer pressure, he says, but from the inside out be changed in the very form that you are. The word is metamorphosis. Be transformed. The idea is to be changed just as completely as a tadpole is that becomes a frog or as a caterpillar that becomes a butterfly. The same creature, but metamorphosis takes place.
So he says, let there be a transformation on the inside that will result in a change of conduct, a change of lifestyle, a change of standards of your living that reflects the new person that you are in Jesus Christ. As Paul begins to describe what righteousness looks like in our lives, first of all he begins with the most intimate relationship that we have and that is with our own body. Our own body.
And he says, if God's righteousness will ever be seen in your life, it begins there in the inner person with transformation and with your body being presented to God with all of its capacities, all of its potential laid at his disposal. He moves ahead then to talk about a second relationship of the believer. It is the believer and the body. And I'm putting that in quotes because he's talking about the body of the church, verses three through eight of this chapter.
How is God's righteousness revealed in our relationships in the body, the church as a whole? Well, he tells us that there are two actions we have to take. First we have to think properly. And he emphasizes by the use of several words in verses three through five, the importance of the way we think. Basically he says, here's how we are to think in our relationships in the church with one another. We are each gifted for the good of the whole. Those gifts come to us from God.
They're not our own as though we created them. Therefore we're to think humbly about ourselves. We're to think humbly because God has given a grace gift to every believer. And he says, as you think about that, remember God's given it to you for stewardship. You're to use your gifts in the body. Think properly. And he says in verses six through eight, minister properly in the body. Not only think properly, but minister properly. And he mentions seven of the gifts that God gives.
This is not an all-inclusive list by any means, but it is a representative list of the various kinds of giftings here tonight in the body. And he tells us how we are to minister properly within the body for the good of the whole. So how is God's righteousness revealed, first of all, in our relationship to our bodies, our physical bodies and all that we are presented to God? Then God's righteousness is revealed in the way that we act in the body of Christ within the local church.
We're to think properly about each other. And we're to minister to each other as God has gifted us to do so. A third relationship which exposes the righteousness of God in the believer's life is that of others, the believer and others. Verse nine through verse 21 of chapter 12 talks about this. Having talked about the body goes on to speak about others who are Christians and how we are to act toward them. He explains what God's righteousness looks like in terms of our actions toward each other.
It might be summarized in the word love. He begins in verse nine by saying, let love be without hypocrisy. And then he begins to explain what that means within our relationships to others who are believers. Notice all the one and others in these verses through verse 16. But in verse 17 he shifts gears and now he wants to talk about others who are not Christians.
For you see, God's righteousness is to be revealed in our lives not only in the way we treat others who are Christians, but others also who are not Christians. And he gives us the principles by which we are to live in regard to them. How God's righteousness can be revealed toward those who are even our enemies, verses 17 through 21. That brings us to a fourth relationship that believers have in which the righteousness of God is to be expressed in a very practical daily way.
And that is the believer and the government. Chapter 13, verses one through seven. Righteousness toward authority over us is summed up in the idea of submission. God ordains authority, Paul says in these verses, and God will use that authority for his own purposes as well as for our progress. So he says, let every person be subject to governing authorities. Now these people who received the letter lived in the capital city of the empire. They knew both the glory and the shame that was Rome's.
And the apostle says to them, whether it be glorious or shameful, your responsibility basically to the authority that God has put over you is submission. He says we're to be cooperative and dutiful. Verse two he says, he who resists authority has opposed the ordinance of God. By the way, I take this not only in relation to government, but in relation to all of the authority that God puts into our lives and other kinds of authority in the home and in other realms in work.
And all of the authority that God allows in our lives, we need to be careful not to resist it. Now of course there is the caveat that if that authority is commanding something of us that is against what God has ordered, then the higher principle kicks in that we obey God rather than men. But basically we are to have the attitude of cooperation. He goes on to specifically mention we are to pay our taxes. That wouldn't mean as much in South Dakota as it does in Minnesota.
And unfortunately the book means the same thing here as it does there. We have to pay our taxes in this state. Even if they go up, God forbid, we have that duty as citizens in this state, in this nation. And he says we are to give honor to whom honor is due. So that's the basic relationship a believer has to the government. Before a believer resists the government, he better get on his knees and be very sure that his principles are right. Very sure. And it's not always easy to figure that out.
It's complicated. And sometimes believers come down on opposite sides of that question, as is the case with abortion, for example, where believers differ in their approach to resisting that. But we must be careful in our own conscience before God to live out God's righteousness. And Paul says in this text at least that basically that means we're to be submissive to that authority.
Now in verses 8 through 14 he describes a fifth relationship of the believer in which he is to live out the righteousness of God. Here he talks about the believer and his neighbor. Oh, nothing to anyone except to love one another, for he who loves his neighbor has fulfilled the law. Righteousness that is lived out in the neighborhood, and by the way I don't take that just geographically, geographically, but in other relationships as well.
Righteousness that is lived out with our neighbors can be described in two ways. First of all, that we're to be loving. He quotes here from the Old Testament some of the commandments related to society regarding murder and stealing and coveting and so on and adultery. And he says all of these can be summed up basically in this word, you shall love your neighbor as yourself. Love does no wrong to a neighbor. Love therefore is the fulfillment of the law.
And so he says in our relationships with our neighbors we're to express love, love. We're to do no wrong toward them. He describes it another way though in verses 11 through 14. We're not to be loving, but he says in 11 through 14 we're to be holy. We're not to be characterized by the same activities as some of our neighbors who are in darkness. He says knowing the time. I don't think he's saying well it's now 12 minutes till 7. That's not what he means.
He's talking about time in the sense of the Lord's eminent return that we're living in the last days. He says don't forget that. He says the day, he says rather it is already the hour for you to awaken from sleep. Now salvation is nearer to us than when we believed. The night is almost gone, the day is at hand. Paul is picturing the present age as night because Jesus is not here. But he says the day is at hand. It's about to dawn because the Savior is coming. You say when is the Savior coming?
I don't know what day and hour He's coming, but I do know this confidently. His coming is one day closer today than it was yesterday. That's what Paul says here. And in light of that he says we're to live holy lives. We're to behave properly as though the day were already here. Because we are the day. We're God's kingdom now in this world. We're light present already in the darkness. And so he says we're to avoid things like carousing or orgies is the word.
That was party life in Rome right there. And Paul says avoid the party life. They knew exactly what he meant. And drunkenness. Avoid sexual promiscuity and sensuality, impurity, debauchery and living. And strife, that means dissension and division and jealousy. All of those things he says are part of the night. You be holy, be of the day. How do we do that? Well he says in verse 14, put on the Lord Jesus Christ. It begins there. The idea is like clothing. We're to put on the Lord Jesus Christ.
In chapter 6 he told us that we're identified. We're united with Christ. We have died with him to sin. We have been raised from the dead in the likeness of his resurrection to walk in newness of life. And so he says that being true as it were put on Jesus Christ every day when you get up. And he says make no provision for the flesh to fulfill its lusts. The thought is don't plan ahead how you can fulfill the lusts of your flesh. Put on the Lord Jesus Christ, step number one.
And then don't make provision through the day for fulfilling the sinful desires that are at work still within your members, your body members. What he calls here the flesh. The believer and his neighbor, summarized in two commands, be loving, be holy. There's a sixth relationship and it's the last one but it's the most lengthy topic that he addresses in these chapters. It is chapter 14 verse 1 through chapter 15 verse 13 and it is the believer and the weaker brother.
The believer and the weaker brother. It gives us principles here that apply to matters where believers have legitimate differences of opinion. Some people call them the disputed things, some call them the doubtful things. It is those issues that arise among believers where the word of God is not specific and clear. And those vary frankly from culture to culture and from time to time. They're not precisely the same in 1992 as they were in 1963 when I graduated from high school.
They're a little different today. I remember there was one church in our area that said believers should never roller skate because in roller skating you're basically dancing on wheels. And so they said don't roller skate. We did in our church and we were a legalistic church but we roller skated. There were other things we didn't do. And today there are similar kinds of issues where believers have difference of opinion. Should I do this? Should I not do that? Should I observe this?
Should I not observe that? One of the ones that comes to my mind is the issue of Halloween. Even in our church we have a difference about that. Some people are very sensitive about that. Feel it's the devil's night and the children should not be involved in any kinds of those activities. And there are others of us who believe that it's a night like any other night, it's a cultural night and there's no harm for children to participate. Now it's issues like that that divide churches folks.
Isn't that right? It's issues like that that can become such divisive things. What does the Word of God say about it? Well people would go to the Word and come up with some different answers. When the Word of God is not specific. By the way the Word of God is specific in a lot of things. But in those issues where the Word of God is not clear, where there's doubt, there's dispute among the people of God, how do we know what we ought to do?
That was a very real issue in Rome where there were Gentiles and Jews and remember that that is probably the core issue that Paul is trying to get at in this whole book. And how are Gentiles and Jews who have different cultural backgrounds to get along together in the same church? So he spends a lot of verses here discussing how we're to get along together in those areas where the Word of God is not specific and clear.
The first principle is in chapter 14 verses 1 through 12 and it can be summarized in this sentence. Accept one another. Verse 1 says, Now accept the one who is weak in faith, but not for the purpose of passing judgment on his opinions. One man has faith that he may eat all things, but he who is weak eats vegetables only. Paul is not here commending those who are weak. He's not saying that people ought to be weak habitually and consistently in their life.
In fact, he calls them weak, but the point is that they have a sensitive conscience about something and there are others in the church whose conscience is free to participate. Now recognizing the reality of that, he says, you are responsible whether you are strong or you are weak to accept one another. Why is that? He says, in verse 3, we're accepted by God and therefore we're not to judge nor are we to hold and contempt the other person. God has accepted him.
So he says, you accept him too, though you differ in your opinions about that issue. He says we're to accept one another furthermore because we serve the same Lord, verse 4, who are you to judge the servant of another. To his own master he stands or falls and stand he will for the Lord is able to make him stand. We're not in the business of judging the Lord's other servants. We're to accept the Lord's other servants even when we may disagree on some issues.
He says furthermore in verse 10, we're to accept one another because all of us someday are going to stand at the same judgment seat of Christ and give answer not for the other person but for ourselves. So in light of that he says, now, right now, in those issues that may divide you, learn to accept one another and leave the judgment to God. Now that doesn't mean that there is never any judgment.
Especially if a fellow believer is in sin, we are to discern that and go to that brother and seek to help him. We're not to say, oh, well, you know, that's just his way, that's his opinion. No, if he's definitely in sin as the word defines it, we have a responsibility to go to that brother and to correct him, to admonish him, to seek to restore him. But in these issues where there is doubt, we're to be careful of judgment. The second principle is found in verses 13 through 23.
It's an important principle and it can be summarized in this one sentence. Build up one another. Build up one another. How do we do that? Well, he tells us in verse 13, by giving no cause for hindrance. Let us not judge one another anymore, but rather determine this, not to put an obstacle or a stumbling block in a brother's way. And now he begins to speak to those who have more liberty, who are stronger.
And he says, be careful that you don't use your liberty in such a way that it will cause a brother who is weaker to stumble. Don't give cause for hindrance, but rather walk by the law of love, verses 14 and 15. He tells us that we're to seek the kingdom's priorities, and the kingdom's priorities really are not dealing with food and drink, but what he describes here is righteousness, peace and joy in the Holy Spirit.
So in verse 19 he says, let us pursue the things which make for peace and the building up of one another. He tells us further that we are to live without self-condemnation. If you and I are not sure where something is right or wrong, we're torn about that issue, we're better off not doing it, not being involved in it. Don't do something that will condemn you, in which you condemn yourself and your conscience. Basically the idea is, if you doubt, don't.
And if you live by that, then you'll not cause yourself or a brother to stumble. The principle is build up one another. And then the final principle in chapter 15, verses 1 through 13 is that we are to please one another. To please one another. What does that mean? He says, we who are strong ought to bear the weaknesses of those without strength, and not just to please ourselves, let each of us please his neighbor for his good to his edification.
We are to please the other in the sense that we are willing to restrict our own freedom in Christ for the sake of the other person's growth and edification. Now how is that done? Because being willing to restrict ourselves when we feel freedom to do something seems to step on our toes. We want to express our rights. Paul says here that we are to trust the power that God gives us, the supernatural source, this God who gives perseverance and encouragement.
We are to trust him for what we need so that we might live according to this principle. When we do live this way, what does it accomplish? He says it accomplishes unity in the fellowship of the church. Unity oneness of heart and oneness of mind. And the motive for that is the glory of God. God is glorified when a church is united. God's name, God's reputation in a community is harmed when a church divides. Sometimes we joke and we call church divisions church planting.
And in a sense, I suppose that does happen on occasion. But it's a sad thing when a church divides. We need to rather set unity and oneness of heart as our goal, our priority, because that glorifies God. And so if we practice these principles, we will have the righteousness of God revealed in our lives in our relationship with the weaker brother. Now beginning in verse 14 of this chapter, Paul starts his conclusion, and this is the longest conclusion that Paul writes in any of his epistles.
He ends chapter 15 with an affirmation of his own calling so that they might know that God has called him and how God has called him and what he's called him to do. He speaks about his plans to first go to Jerusalem with an offering that he's collected and then finally to come to see them after he's visited them to go on to Spain. There to minister the word of God where no one has yet preached. That was Paul's heart.
He wanted to get out there in the regions beyond where missionaries had not been yet and to share the gospel. In chapter 16 we find greetings to Paul's coworkers and his friends. From the names that are listed here we see quite a diverse church. It was a cosmopolitan church, and apparently some of Paul's own relatives had come to faith in Christ and were a part of it. Then in verses 17 through 27 he begins to bring it to a close with some final words.
Remember they are a church of Jew and Gentile where there's conflict. So as he begins to draw the line at the end of the book he says, I urge you brethren keep your eye on those who cause dissensions and hindrances contrary to the teaching which you've learned and turn away from them. They're to be ostracized. Don't listen to them if they cause dissension and division. Why? Because God wants us to be of one heart and mind. He further describes them.
In verses 21 through 24 he gives some greetings from those who are with him as he writes the epistle. It is interesting in verse 22 he gives the name of his secretary. His name was Tertius and Tertius inserts his own word of greeting, I Tertius who write this letter greet you in the Lord. And then in verses 25 through 27 he gives the benediction. He praises God in the first place for his work. His work of establishing believers. He says now to him who's able to establish you.
That's what God was doing in Rome. Establishing this church and that's what God is doing in our midst. The word here means to fix or to set in place or to make stable. He praises God not only for his work but for his word. For the gospel. Who is able to establish you according to my gospel. That's not a gospel Paul has invented but a gospel that he first believed himself and possessed in that sense and now he passes on to them. And the preaching of Jesus Christ.
He says this word of God has been kept secret in the past. This preaching of Jesus Christ. It was a mystery which had been kept secret for long ages. What does he mean there? He means that the cross of Jesus Christ was to the Old Testament prophets and the Old Testament people unknown. They did not have that part of the picture. But he says now it has been manifested. This wonderful mystery of Christ. God come in the flesh. Crucified and raised from the dead for our salvation.
That message from God he says has been manifested and has been made known. To all the nations leading to obedience of faith. There is Paul's heart. It goes right back to the mission that we talked about this morning. We are here in a mission center to get a job done. The same job that Paul was talking about here. That the word of God may be known, made known to all the nations.
Whether it be a foreign nation across the sea or it be that foreign nation that's right outside the walls of this church in that culture that's so alien to the standards in the life and the gospel that you and I love and believe. Were to take the gospel out there. That it may be made known that they may come to the obedience of faith and thus be saved. He says to the only wise God through Jesus Christ be the glory forever and forever. What a marvelous book is the book of Romans.
I hope that these last few Sunday nights in which we've tried to gain an overview have been helpful at least to some of you who have not been exposed to this marvelous book. If you can only master one book in the Bible, seek to master the book of Romans with its depths, with its wisdom, with its truth. For it will inspire you not only to be a better Christian but to be a better witness for Jesus Christ in the world. The righteousness of God, God is fair in all of his dealings.
You and I are to be fair and righteous in all of our relationships as well. Let's pray together as we close. Father God, we give thanks to you for this marvelous book. We pray that the beauty of Jesus Christ may be seen in us. The beauty of his righteousness revealed in all of our relationships. We understand that it begins with our bodies being presented as a living sacrifice.
Then it moves out to others in the body and outside the body and to the governing authorities around us and to the weaker brother. God, give us grace through the Holy Spirit who indwells us to live as Jesus would live. This we pray in his blessed name. Amen.