5-16-21 pm All In - Noah Hooper

so we're going to read the first two verses of romans chapter 12 tonight and i just want to join in with the apostle paul and echo what he calls the romans to in these two verses he says i beseech you therefore brethren by the mercies of god that ye present your bodies a living sacrifice holy acceptable unto god which is your reasonable service and be not conformed to this world but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of god would you join me in prayer father lord i want to thank you for the honor of preaching tonight lord i want to thank you for the my lord and savior jesus christ lord i know how unworthy i am but how worthy you are lord i pray that you would use the message tonight that you would let your word have free course that you would speak to your people that you would transform us by your grace that you would teach us to be all in lord i thank you for all that you've done and all you're going to do in christ and i pray amen thank you so much for saying you may be seated a soldier marching in the battle a quarterback getting prepared for the big game or a fireman going in to fan to take down a fire there's one requirement that must be had of all of these people and of us tonight and that is they must be all in right you cannot go into battle and not be all in you cannot win the game and not be all in you cannot face the fire and not be all in and neither can you live the christian life and not be all in the christian life is not lived from the sidelines there are no bench warmer christians they're not there is no room for a christian to just lean back prop up in your lazy boy and just sit back and recline and watch god work we are active participants in the work of god in our life he is the one who started the work and he is the one who finished the work but we must take part in the work with him and that is what i want to encourage you tonight the passage reveals what our response should be to the work that god has done is doing and will do in our lives i want to point you to the one word in verse 1 as i introduced the passage tonight and that is therefore the weight of this passage hangs upon this word in verse number one without this word this is nothing more than a call to moral living paul is nothing more than a motivational speaker or even a leader just trying to coerce the wheels of the romans but with this word with this therefore this is a passionate summons to true christianity you see in this therefore he is pointing us back to the first 11 chapters and in the first 11 chapters we see a buffet of gospel truths to feast upon we see that we were utterly sinful we could do nothing to get to god we could do nothing to be saved we were sinners and the wages of sin was and still is death but then paul shows us by the inspiration of the spirit that god has sent justification that we can now stand righteous before god by faith in the lord jesus christ and that now we have peace with god those of us who were wicked and vile and ungodly and by the way that was every single one of us whether you grew up in church or whether you came into church off of the street later in life whoever you were that is who you were but then he says but now we have peace with god through faith in jesus christ then the next couple of chapters in romans 6 and 7 it shows us that we have a new nature in christ that we have victory over the old man though we still war against the old man as romans 7. and then it pinnacles in romans 8 and tells us that there is no condemnation there is no separation but that god is for us because of all that he has done for us in christ and at least to this exclamation point in romans 11 verses 33-36 chapters 9-11 deal with some difficult truth that has been debated down through the ages but i love the explosion of praise from paul's heart in romans 11 33 oh the depths of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of god how unsearchable are his judgments and his ways past finding out for who hath known the mind of the lord or who hath been his counselor or who hath first given to him and it shall be recompensed unto him notice this verse for of him and through him and to him are all things to whom be glory forever amen after consenting that difficult truth paul said i cannot understand everything about god but it caused his heart to erupt in worship for considering who god is that is the conclusion of the first 11 chapters the first section of this book on the doctrine of the doctrine of the gospel after he considered everything that god has done for us in christ it caused him to worship and by the way it should cause us to worship we should not be able to look at the cross of christ and see what he has done and not be able to worship but then it causes his heart to erupt in worship and he says that everything that god did for us because romans 1 through 11 is essentially about everything god has done and he says everything god did was for his glory and now he says in romans 12 verses 1 and 2 and here is how you bring him glory here is how you respond to everything that god has done the marvelous riches of his grace that he has lavishly poured upon your life here is how you respond to that and it is by worship and this worship is not just raising a hand or kneeling at an altar but this worship is a life that is all in this worship is a life that is completely and entirely surrendered to god in the first 11 chapters he told us in romans 8 29 that he is going to make us like jesus as i said in the beginning that is a work that god started and god will finish but we are active participants in that work we have a responsibility to see what he has done and be all in and respond in true worship so what does it look like to be all in we'll see three truths in this about being all in in these two verses we'll see that it looks like a completely surrendered life a radically transformed mind and an entirely satisfied will that is what it means to be all in first of all notice in verse one a completely surrendered life notice the passionate plea he begins with i beseech you therefore paul is not merely suggesting something this is a summons this is not a recommendation this is a commandment we see the absolute necessity of obeying this call in this phrase he implores them the word besiege it means to implore to entreat he literally is saying i beg you to do this this is of utmost importance this is not optional it is a commandment it is a summons to do this but notice it is also particular he says i beseech you therefore brethren if there was a disclaimer over this verse it would say for believers only there's a couple of observations i had about this this call is only to those who are in god's family you cannot receive obey or even understand this call unless you have first been saved by the grace of god through faith in jesus christ you must have had an ephesians 2 but god moment in your life wherein god intervened into your dead condition and redeemed you by his grace you must have been able to agree with the apostle paul in galatians 2 20 when he said speaking of christ who loved me and gave himself for me it is not just that christ died for the world or that christ died for you or you but you must have recognized that he died for me is only for those who are in god's family but i also notice that this call is to everyone in the family of god though those who are not in the family of god are excluded from this call there is no one who has been saved by grace who is is excluded from this call this call was as much for us today as it was for the romans when paul wrote this in the first century there is no one that is excluded i want to say that you are not excluded because you matter to the body of christ you'll notice in this verse and chapter as a whole because paul will deal with the christians relationship to the church that every individual matters in the body you all want to say tonight that you must respond to this call and be all in because this church needs you to be all in you may think i'm not the pastor i'm not a dick you may think i am just a young person but i want to say that the strength of this church the strength of the body needs every single member every single person to be all in and then notice it's powerful he said by the mercies of god he says i beg you every one of you have been saved by grace to do this but notice how he calls them to this he says by the mercies of god you'll see this a lot in just these two verses as paul is calling them to live this life he reminds them of mercy he reminds them of the riches of god's mercy that he has poured upon their life and that should be the motivation for our living for his glory for our seeking to honor him with his life and by the way that is how we should motivate other people to live for the glory of god we should not coerce them we should not guilt them into this but we should remind them of what god has done in pouring his mercy upon their life and ours so we see the importance of this in just these few phrases in the first part of verse 1. but so what is paul calling them to in this in this verse he says that ye present your bodies a living sacrifice holy acceptable unto god which is your reasonable service this phrase is the focus of verse one this is the call that paul is giving present your bodies a living sacrifice holy and acceptable unto god the word when we see the word body there we may think of just the outward appearance but paul is calling into something much deeper than this he is calling them to give everything he is calling them to surrender it all to him and there are a couple of things we notice about this sacrifice that it is a living sacrifice it is alive that seems like an oxymoron doesn't it do the fact of a sacrifice seems that something must die in it but god does not call every single person to die for him in the sense of physically dying we must all die to self i know you understand that but god calls all of us to live for him paul is pointing back to the old testament sacrificial system in this when a jew would bring a sacrifice to god he wasn't getting it back he wasn't bringing an offering to receive it again and likewise in living for him and giving our life as a living sacrifice we are saying to god that i am completely yours that i am wholeheartedly surrendered to you that i am offering myself to you every day of my life with not seeking to bring myself back not seeking to take my life back but that i understand that i am yours god therefore i give myself to you i remind you tonight of the words of paul speaking to the corinthian church so who had forgotten that they belong to the lord through their carnality he reminds them in verse 6 chapter 6 verses 19 through 20 what know ye not that your body is the temple of the holy ghost which is in you which ye have of god and ye are not your own for ye are bought with a price therefore glorify god in your body and in your spirit which are god's we ought to present our bodies to him as a living sacrifice completely without reserves we must burn the bridges of taking and going back in our life because we know that we are his but notice the sacrifice is also consecrated holy acceptable under god you must present your body as a holy sacrifice you see this call to be all in is a call to be all in into holiness is not a call to just uh live in the world but it is a call to be all in in regards to holiness i mentioned it a moment ago but in this verse paul is pointing back to how the sacrificial system used to work in the old testament and god wanted sacrifices that were without spot that were without blemish that were wholly consecrated and you see in our position tonight before god we stand holy because of christ but in our lives we must give our lives to him for the purpose of holiness we must give our lives to be completely dedicated to this call to be completely surrendered is to be surrendered to holiness and to be holy it does not mean that you will not sin again we understand from first john 1 2 that it is not god's will for us to sin but he understands that we will sin and there is an advocate in the lord jesus christ for us when we sin but we must be in pursuit of this holiness we must perfect holiness in the fear of god if you haven't gathered this yet as i've been preaching on the first verse this life is going to cost you everything the world offers this life is going to cost you everything your flesh desires everything satan presents it's going to cost you everything true christianity is not easy but it is reasonable notice the next phrase perhaps you may be thinking he says which is your reasonable service perhaps you may be thinking on one of two sides of this as we've been studying in the first verse you may be thinking on one hand that's a lot that seems like too much for god to ask is he really asking for my everything is he really asking for my whole entire life and then on the other hand some of you might be thinking well if i do this that seems like a lot but i may be a super christian if i do this because i don't know of anyone else that is really doing this and to both of you i would i would point you to the last phrase of that verse which is your reasonable service is it extraordinary to follow this is it absurd to follow this no paul just says that it is reasonable he says it is your really your rational service in other words it just makes sense in light of everything that christ has done for you in light of him justifying you in light of him making you holy in light of him doing all of this paul says this is but your reasonable service that word service could also mean worship this is your reasonable response to everything that god has done to say that i am completely surrendered to you it just makes sense you know some of you tonight you may be dealing with wondering do i really want to surrender some of you that are still in high school sounds weird to me because i was just in high school two years ago but some of you may be thinking should i really surrender completely to whatever god might have for me and to that i want to encourage you to consider that last phrase it's your reasonable service and i want to i want to say also that god in this verse he's saying that i just want you god just wants your life he wants your everything and in light of what christ has done it is reasonable the question is are we surrender are you surrender to him we must be completely surrendered to god but we must also be radically transformed from the world secondly verse one deals with our relationship to god and verse two deals with our relationship to the world we are to be radically different from the world in the way that we think he says and be not conformed to this world but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind this begins with a radical separation we are to relate to this world as strangers and pilgrims we are to relate to this world not as residents but as foreigners so what does it mean he says and be not conformed to this world so what does it mean to be conformed to this world it means to pattern your life after the way that this world thinks after the way that this world operates john phillips succinctly stated this about the world he said it is human life and society with god left out true worldliness is to live life in ignorance of god is to live life without care or concern for god and i want to say that this conformity to the world is much deeper than we often preach it as conformity of the world is so much deeper than just where you go and what you wear and what you do you can be in a suit and tie you can be going to bible college you can sing in the choir you can tithe you can do all of these things and still be conformed to the world this conformity to the world is about identity and we will not be conformed to this world by choosing to identify with those who have gone before us who refuse to identify with this life they saw that this world wasn't all there is they saw that this wasn't everything that was but they had their eyes fixed upon god and they decided to not be conformed to this world i want to say you must identify with abraham who left his kindred behind by god's call you must identify with moses who chose to not be identified with egypt you must identify with esther who aligned herself with israel in the midst of a foreign nation you must identify with peter and john who stood before those who crucified christ and preached him without fear you must identify with paul who rejected the traditional or religious system of judaism that deny that said that man is saved by works you must choose to identify with those who said i will not be conformed to this world but i will find my identity in god simply you must have a colossians 3 2 focus you must set your affection on things above not on things of the earth see you are not a resident of this world if you are part of the brethren that have been saved by his grace you are not a resident of this world you are a foreigner you are a pilgrim you are just passing through this life you are salt you are alive you are alive in a world that is full of dead men you have been made different therefore we must live differently you have been made new in christ therefore you must be different from the world if we will not be conformed to this world we have to understand who we are in christ when we conform to this world we have a case of mistaken identity we have forgotten who we are in him when i live like this is all there is when i seek to make a name for myself when i seek to make magnify my name and make my name great over the name of christ i have forgotten who i am in him you must know who you are in christ we must embrace the exile life we must embrace the pilgrim life of understanding that we are different in a world that is still dead in sin we are not to be conformed to this world and how do we do this because to be in exile to be a pilgrim to be a stranger that goes against everything that we think is right that goes against the flesh that goes against the world that goes against satan that goes against everything and to that i would say that if you are going to be different then you must think different for you to understand that this is the life i must pursue that if i will truly be all in then god must radically transform the way that you think and we see this in the next phrase but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind paul says don't be true don't be conformed but be transformed you see transformation is much deeper than conformity conformity is fitting a mold conformity is taking this outward appearance and just fitting into something that by the way when we try to conform to the world as a believer we are fitting trying to fit into something that we cannot fit in anymore but transformation is deeper conformity is out where transformation is inward conformity is surface level transformation is deeper you see god is calling us to something deeper than fitting in a mold he is calling us to be radically changed from the inside out this is what being transformed is all about a good way to understand this truth is to look back at god's conforming work in our lives to be like jesus romans 8 29 for whom he did foreknow he also did predestinate to be conformed to the image of his son that he might be the first more among many brethren god is conforming us to the image of christ but he does that through transformation he does not just take who you are at salvation and say all right do this live like this be this fit this mole no no no god changes who you are then he changes what you do god works from the inside out he radically and marvelously transforms us from the inside out to then make us like the lord jesus this transformation gives the idea of metamorphosis as a caterpillar is radically transformed into a butterfly so are we radically changed by the renewing of our minds he's calling them to be different but how does this occur by the renewing of our minds this word for renewing is used only one other time in the word of god in titus 3 5 it says not by works of righteousness which we have done but according to his mercy he saved us by the washing of regeneration and renewing of the holy ghost in that verse paul detailed the regenerative work of the spirit he radically transforms you from the inside out and that is a one-time work but this work he is speaking of here this renewal he is talking of here must occur every single day the spirit made us new at salvation he radically changed us at salvation and he's saying here that you must be radically made different in the way that you think every day of your life so how then do we renew our minds you may be thinking as i am every time i read this well if you want me to renew my mind how do i do this well this passage doesn't explicitly state how it occurs but we know from the rest of the bible that this occurs through the spirit by the word of god god radically transforms the way that we think by his spirit and through his word that is it it is no deeper it is no shallower than that the transformation of our mind occurs when our thinking is shaped by the word of god through the spirit consider the blessed man in psalm 1 as the example for this truth of living by god's truth blessed is the man that walketh not in the counsel of the ungodly nor standeth in the sinners nor sitteth in the sea of scorpio here it is but his delight is in the law of the lord and in his law doth he meditate day and night that blessed man that the psalmist is talking about there is the perfect is a really good description of this he doesn't fit in among the world he separates from the thinking of this world how by delighting in the word of god his thinking is shaped by what god's word has said if we will be strangers if you will be a pilgrim in a world that says live for yourself do what you want to do live how you want to live if you will be a christian and a pilgrim that says i will be completely surrendered to god your mind must be made different and it will be made different by the word of god that is how we think differently that is how we renew our minds but what is the result of this we see in the in the latter part of verse 2 that this is lastly an entirely satisfied will that ye may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of god when you are completely surrendered to god when your mind is shaped by the truth of god's word here is what you find out that there is nothing better than being in god's will and by the way god's will is not shrouded in mystery i will acknowledge tonight and agree with you that there are absolutely unknown aspects to god's will i have no idea what god's will is for your life in five years in the sense of where you're gonna be and what you're gonna do but though that aspect of god's will is unrevealed god's will is known because god's will has been revealed in his word and you see once you are completely surrendered and transformed you are able to examine that's what the word prove means it means to test to try and to see and here is what you find out when you do that that it what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of god when you are living this life as all in you find out that there is nothing better than god's will it is good it is acceptable and it is perfect i believe this implies a couple things we must recognize about god's will when we are surrendered and transformed you will see when you are shaped by the word of god when you are surrendered to god that that violent trial you are facing is god's good acceptable and perfect will you will see when you are surrendered and transformed that god's commandments upon your life to surrender to be holy to live a life that honors him is his good acceptable and perfect will and by the way on the other side of it if you are not following the principles of these verses you will not be able to test and see that god's will is good acceptable and perfect but when you are following this life you find out that there is nothing better than to be all in you see all in looks like a completely surrendered life it looks like a radically transformed mind that results in you being entirely satisfied in who god is and what god has for your life you must say to this what should be our response you must say to this lord i am completely surrendered to you lord i embrace this pilgrim life to live through your spirit and by your word and lord i want to be completely satisfied in your will you see this passage calls us to a transcendent life above this world we are called to be different through god's transformative work we are to be different this goes against the grain of this world this goes against the grain of most of our king and the way that we live this life i point you back to therefore the gospel must be our motivation it must remind us of what christ has done for us because if you just try to do this without remembering what he has done for you you will not be able to live this life believe there's a misconception that we think the gospel is just for salvation that is just from the moment we get saved but friend the gospel is for your life every day because i cannot speak for you but i know for me i fail all the time and when i fail i don't need to just look and say all right i must do this i need to get back on track but i must remind myself of what christ has done of how he has poured his grace into my life and then i'm able to come back to romans 12 verses 1 and 2 and surrender to god once again i point you back to therefore that is the key to all of this if you will live this life if you will be all in you must live by the gospel you must live with the understanding of what he has done for you and by the way when you know that you can re you can open your arms wide and just run jump into the ocean of god's will for your life without fear without hesitation because you know that god has been good god is good and god will forever be good and you can agree with paul in saying this is my reasonable service this just makes sense so i ask you tonight will you be all in if there is some hesitancy in your heart to say god i am yours consider what christ has done consider the work that he has done for your life and i do not see how you could consider his crawls consider his death consider his resurrection and then say i'm not going to be all in so i call you as paul did to these romans by the mercies of god to completely surrender give yourself to the pilgrim life and to be entirely satisfied in god's will this is our reasonable service will you be all in let's pray father lord i thank you for the truth of your word lord i thank you for this passage tonight and lord how you've spoken to my heart through it i pray that you would help us to be all in would help us to surrender in our lives what is not given to you help us to refuse to be identified with this world and help us to see that your will is the best thing for our life lord help us to be all in or thank you for all that you've done in christ and i pray amen you

Channel: Calvary Baptist

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Keywords: calvary baptist church, gospel

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Length: 31min 46sec (1906 seconds)

Published: Sun May 23 2021