Taking Up Space

The last phrase Paul uses to describe this sacrifice is this: “your spiritual service of worship.” Again, the word for “service of worship” here is the Septuagint’s word to describe the temple worship of the Old Testament. The word spiritual here is a rich word. It’s the word logikos, which means logical or reasonable. Now Paul is using Greek philosophy against itself. In Greek thought, logic was a spiritual activity, a work of the soul. So this offering of the body is a spiritual activity. Again, notice that Christian thought (the truth) opposes the idea that the body is bad or that it would be good to be a purely spiritual being, i.e. to be “free” from the body.

The use of the word logikos also carries another idea from Greek philosophy. It’s the word you would use to talk about the true nature or essence of a thing. So the idea or essence, or logikos, of, say, a horse was more important than any particular horse. Paul is saying here that the offering of one’s living body is the essence of true worship, and thus the ONLY life that makes any sense as a therefore to the Gospel.

You know, we call a lot of things worship. We call our Sunday morning meeting a worship service. We call singing worship. We call prayer worship. We call the reading of scripture worship. We call the exposition of scripture by a gifted preacher worship. We call daily quiet times in the word, and our day to day obedience, worship.

But if you come to church and sing and pray and read and listen, but don’t present your body to God a sacrifice, you are not worshipping. You are not giving God his due. If you spend time in the word every day and work hard to obey its commandments, but you don’t make yourself available to God to do with as he wishes, you are not worshipping. You are not giving God his due. You are not living a truly Christian life. The essence of the Christian life—the only life that is a reasonable therefore to the Gospel—is a total radical commitment of availability to God.

That is such a high standard that you may find it impossible and be discouraged. But let me say to you that while it is high, it is also simple, and by the Spirit who dwells in you, it is not at all impossible. And no matter what happened yesterday, it is possible today for every Christian to renew this commitment to availability, to present himself or herself again a living sacrifice.

I’m thankful that the Lord said “take up your cross daily,” because it means that if I lost track of my commitment to availability yesterday, I can take it up again today. Howard Hendricks said, “The trouble with living sacrifices is that they are constantly crawling off the altar.” That is, I think, why we have a worship service every week, so that we are constantly reminded that the life we are called to live is a life of radical availability to God.

Another thing Paul tells us about a living sacrifice—a life totally available to God—is that it’s acceptable or pleasing to God. Again Paul borrows the Old Testament language of Temple worship, which used this word to describe the aroma of a proper sacrifice—”a pleasing aroma” to the Lord.

The New Testament sacrifice of radical availability is also pleasing to God because it forms in us a personal motive and opportunity for specific obedience—a way of life that pleases God. As we live this way, we ourselves become revelations of His righteousness. We are no longer working to develop some legalistic merit, but we are set free to pursue the pleasure of the one we love and worship. The moral law of God becomes a guide to liberation rather than a simple death sentence. Radical Availability is the essence of the Christian life.

What kind of life does the Gospel call for? Paul spells it out in Romans 12:1: “THEREFORE, I urge you, brethren, by the mercies of God, that you present your bodies a sacrifice.” In these words, Paul is summarizing the proper response to the Gospel. Everything that comes after this in the book of Romans is simply an exposition of the details of this commitment: Present your bodies a sacrifice.

So what does it mean? Here in verse 1, Paul is using the same vocabulary that the Septuagint uses for the sacrifices of the Old Testament Law. (In case you don’t know, the Septuagint is the Greek translation of the Old Testament that was the everyday Bible of Paul’s day. So Paul is intentionally using the image of Old Testament sacrifices to describe this New Testament sacrifice.

The word present here is the word the Old Testament uses for placing an animal on the altar, for making it an offering to God. The word sacrifice is the word the Old Testament uses for the animal itself. But here in Romans, it’s not a lamb or a bull; rather, it’s our own bodies. So in the Old Testament, the body of an animal was presented to God as a sacrifice. In the New Testament, we are called to present our own bodies as a sacrifice. The animal on the altar is you.

Fortunately, the sacrifice Paul is describing is unusual in another way: it’s living. That’s the difference between this New Testament sacrifice and Old Testament sacrifices: Those were offered to God having been killed; these are offered to God alive.

And that is where the concept of availability comes in. The key is in the word holy, which means completely set apart to God. Animals were killed and burned in order to be completely set apart to God. They could no longer belong to the one who gave them; they belonged entirely to God. So to present my body as a sacrifice, living and holy, is to make it available to God exclusively. It is his to do with as he wishes; it is no longer mine or anyone else’s.

This is what Jesus was talking about when he required his disciples to deny themselves and take up their crosses daily, and follow him. This is what Paul was talking about when he said, “Therefore, it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me, and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.”

All of the language of Romans 12:1 supports the idea that the very essence of the Christian life is this sort of radical availability. The word present literally means to place something at someone’s disposal. The concept of the body carries the idea of availability, also. Paul is not saying, “Give your body to God, but you can keep your heart, soul, and mind.” Instead he’s simply referring to the fact that your body is the aspect of your existence that makes you available to others—the way in which you are one place or another, with one person or another.

Paul is doing battle with the Greek philosophers and gnostics, who thought that the body was an obstruction to anything truly spiritual and good. Paul says no. The proper Christian life is an embodied life. The whole human being—body, soul, and spirit—is created in the image of God. The Christian life is not to be over-spiritualized in the sense that it might be considered entirely mystical or mental. The ultimate state for the Christian is life in a resurrected, physical body. We do not seek escape from the body; instead, we are called to present our bodies to God for his service. When we offer our bodies, our hearts, souls, and minds are included in the deal. This is especially evident in Paul’s use of the word living. A body without a spirit would no longer be living.

So this New Testament sacrifice is a life of radical availability to God, a life lived solely as an extension of the life of Christ, a life under the exclusive control of the Holy Spirit, a life that does not belong to the one who lives it.

As I mentioned on Friday, Romans 12:1-2 is a pivotal passage of scripture. We know that, in part, because it begins with the word therefore. Have you noticed that sometimes small and common words carry the most weight? Such is the case with Paul’s use of this little three-letter Greek word (oun) in this text. In Romans 12:1, this little word is one of the biggest words in the Bible–the connector between Paul’s glorious exposition of the Gospel through the first eleven chapters of Romans and his exposition of its practical implications through the rest of the book. Because the gospel is true, he says, it calls for a particular response.

The Gospel is the power of God to salvation for everyone who believes; therefore, I urge you brethren…

The righteousness of God is revealed in Christ; therefore, I urge you, brethren…

The wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness; therefore, I urge you brethren…

The wrath of God is propitiated in the death of Christ; therefore…

The believer is justified by faith and credited with the very righteousness of Christ; therefore…

The one so justified is reconciled to God and stands in Gods favor and hopes in God’s glory; therefore, I urge you brethren…

Even tribulation is a cause for exultation; therefore…

We who believe are the objects and vessels of God’s unbounded love; therefore…

We are indwelt by the very Holy Spirit of God; therefore I urge you brethren…

By that Holy Spirit who indwells us, we can actually live out the righteousness of Christ; therefore…

God is sovereignly revealing his Glory through both his grace and his wrath; therefore…

This revelation will one day be consummated when Christ returns; therefore…

We have the privilege of proclaiming this Good News to lost people everywhere; therefore…

We are caught up in the unfathomable and unbounded mercies of God…

THEREFORE, I urge you brothers…

The word therefore raises some very practical questions: What comes before the therefore in my life? What is the logical basis of who I am and what I do? For the Christian, the Gospel of God’s grace in Christ should be the idea that explains our consequences, the source and the goal of living. Does my life make sense as a therefore of the Gospel?

So what kind of life does the Gospel call for?  Stay tuned…

Availability is a big issue among us humans. You see it in lots of society’s little dramas:

The teenage girl who’s trying to decide whether to say yes to the offer of one prom date or hold out for an offer from someone higher on the popularity food chain.

The young man struggling with “commitment issues” who can’t make up his mind whether to marry the one girl or stay available for the many.

In sports, the high school coach who is “totally committed” to his team… until the right offer comes from the right college.

We all deal with issues of availability all the time. Should Dad be available for his kid’s soccer game or should he be available to his boss after hours, hoping to get that promotion that will enable him to buy his family a better home or pay for his kid’s college education?

Office politics is all about who’s available to whom and for what. Our whole economic system, in one way of looking at it, is aimed at sorting out who and what will be available to whom.

Why is availability such a big deal? Maybe it’s because availability is about our limitations. I can only be in one place at one time, so I’m forced to choose. If I’m available for one thing, I’m not available for other things. Jesus taught this principle in the simple expression, “No one can serve two masters.”

There’s a pivotal passage of scripture that’s all about availability. In fact, this passage shows that the concept of availability is at the heart of all true Christian living. When we come to Christ, we enter into a life of radical availability to God.

The text is Romans 12:1-2:

1. Therefore, I urge you brothers, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies a sacrifice, living, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual service of worship.
2. And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. so that you may prove what the will of God is, that which is good and acceptable and perfect.

I think this text says three things about Availability:

1) Radical Availability to God is the essence of the Christian life.

2) Radical Availability to God makes us unavailable to the world’s influence.

3) Radical Availability to God is the only path to full-fledged, image-bearing humanity.

Over the next few days, I’ll be developing each of these three points. Feel free to comment along the way.