Prefer to listen to today’s devotional? Click here.
Begin by reading John 17
Romans 12:1-8 is one of those power packed passages. We’ve spent 24 days analyzing it, and we’ve only gotten through the first two verses. If we step back for a minute, we see that there are essentially two parts to this passage of Scripture. It may help that your Bible divides them with a paragraph and maybe a heading as well.
Romans 12:1-2 talks about our personal responsibility as a Christian. Being a 24/7 worshiper, a living sacrifice is something that primarily you will do when no one else is around. It is about integrity and a personal walk with God. And because you are a Believer and have the blood of Christ over you, you are a member of an invisible church, made up of Believers from the past, the present, the future – from the Americas to the far ends of the earth.
The second part of this passage, verses 3-8 deals with our responsibility as a member of the body of Christ. As we’ll see in the upcoming weeks, Paul is talking about how we are to work together with other Believers to use our gifts to serve the Lord. If verses 1-2 talk about our personal responsibility as a member of the invisible church, then verses 3-8 deal with our personal responsibility as a member of the visible church.
Have you ever heard someone say, “I don’t have to go to church to be a Christian?” Maybe you’ve heard the statement, “Going to church makes you as much of a Christian as going to McDonald’s makes you a hamburger.” Both statements are equally true. There are many Christians who are members of the invisible church but are not part of a visible church. On the other hand, there are people who are involved with the visible church but aren’t members of the invisible church.
Both are important. While God relates with us individually, He is also the Father of a family and will relate to a collective group of Believers. When Jesus poured out His heart in the Garden of Gethsemane, He prayed for the unity of His children – His disciples. I have three young children, and when I think about them growing up, I hope that they have a close relationship with each other. No father wants to see his children grow apart let alone bicker and argue their whole lives.
Since our Father relates with us all on a personal level, in a sense, the closer we draw to each other, the greater we realize our Father is. Because of our sin and human limitations, we cannot experience everything God has to offer. Someone may experience God as a healer. Someone else may have experienced God as one who forgives the most dismal of past sins. Someone else may experience God speaking to them about a future event. If we don’t share our experiences together, we will tend to see God only as He pertains to us in our limited view. There are always others around us who know more about God, have a stronger relationship with Him, or have had different experiences with our Heavenly Father. When we spend time with each other, we experience God in new and perhaps different ways. We begin to see more of Him.
Our dual responsibility as Believers is to grow personally in our walks with God. Then, we are to share that relationship with other people. We are to encourage our brothers and sisters by telling and exemplifying what God is doing in our lives, and we are to learn and share in their experiences and personal encounters with our Father – the Creator of the world.
Click here to subscribe to get the 40 Days of Living Sacrifice directly in your email.
Missed a day? You can find previous devotionals here.