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The Daily Word of Righteousness
Presenting Our Body a Living Sacrifice, continued
Therefore, I urge you, brothers, in view of God's mercy, to offer your bodies as living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to God—this is your spiritual act of worship. Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God's will is—his good, pleasing and perfect will. (Romans 12:1,2—NIV)
Presenting Our Body a Living Sacrifice
Since the late forties we have witnessed several people who have been prophesied over concerning what they were called to do in the Kingdom of God. There is no doubt in my mind these were genuine prophecies. The prophecies were given by godly ministers, sometimes confirmed by two or more elders. The settings have been orderly assemblings of Christian people, not wild or disorderly meetings.
More often than not the ones prophesied over continued on with their life, no radical change taking place.
Why is this? Why was there not an evidence at some point that the glorious prophecies were being fulfilled or were soon to be fulfilled?
Is it because prophecies are going to be fulfilled during the thousand-year Kingdom Age? I don't think so. I think the answer lies in Romans 12:1,2 (above).
If I am correct, then most Christians, prophesied over or not, have been given gifts and assigned roles in the Kingdom that never will be activated or fulfilled. They do not do what God commanded through the Apostle Paul.
If I am hearing from the Lord He is saying that He is emphasizing in our day the operation of the ministries and gifts of the Spirit. Now is the time for the Body of Christ to come to maturity. Now is the time for the holy nation, the royal priesthood, to be born "at once." And the Body of Christ, the royal priesthood, cannot be formed apart from the multitude and diversity of ministries set in the Body by the Holy Spirit.
Paul urged us:
To offer our bodies as living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to God.
To not be conformed to the pattern of this world.
To be transformed by the renewing of our mind.
Paul said if we would do this we would be able to determine God's will for our life.
Christian people, at least in America, are not presenting their body as a living sacrifice, holy and pleasing to God. They are being conformed to the pattern of this world by the television, the newspaper, and now the Internet. They are not being transformed by the renewing of their mind in the Word of God.
Because they are not obeying Romans 12:1,2 they do not know what God's will is. They suppose if God wants them to do something He will wake them up in the middle of the night and tell them. But this is not how it works for most of us.
The reference here is to the burnt offering, described in the Book of Leviticus. There were several kinds of animal sacrifices the Jews were taught to observe. Some of them, such as the sin and trespass offerings, were obligatory. When you sinned or committed a trespass you had to make the prescribed offering or be cut off from Israel.
But the first offering listed, the burnt offering, was voluntary. It was a gift from you to God, a freewill offering. The Altar was named after this offering, being called The Altar of Burnt Offering.
To be continued.