Reverend David Wiggs

Senior Pastor

Gary Smalley is a relationship expert. He has written several best-selling books and does numerous relationship and marriage seminars every year. Recently in one of his emails, he wrote about perspective.

He said for years he had a very difficult time sorting out his to-do list. He dreaded the first of the week because there was always too much to do. But he says that all changed when he changed his perspective. Finally he said he began to look at his list from an eternal perspective. He began by asking: Will this issue make a difference in ten years? He realized that many of the things he had allowed to burden him were of little consequence when seen in the light of eternity.

I want to read you a few lines he wrote: “When you live in light of eternity your values change. Your priorities are reordered. You use your time and energy more wisely. There's a higher premium placed on relationships and character rather than things, wealth, or achievements.

Think about your relationships, circumstances, and even your to-do list for today. Are they rooted with an eternal perspective?”

That’s exactly what Paul is encouraging the disciples at Rome to think about. Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your minds, so that you may discern what is the will of God—

(v. 2) The will of God comes from the eternal perspective.

Let’s look closer at what Paul lays out in these two verses we read earlier today. It starts in verse one when he says, I appeal to you therefore brothers and sisters by the mercies of God. Now that is a strange sentence, unless you have noticed a few verses before this Paul has said that we are saved by the mercies of God, that we are freed from our sin and disobedience because God is merciful.

So in verse one he is saying I appeal to you therefore brothers and sisters, by the mercies of God, [because you have been saved, because you have been set free] to present your bodies as a living sacrifice. This is in contrast to offering a lamb or a pigeon or a bull as a sacrifice on the altar of God. Paul is saying no need to do that, offer yourselves, not to be burned on the altar, but as a living sacrifice. Or, in other words, give your whole self to God. It is the same as saying: You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and all your soul and all your mind and all your strength. Offer it all to God.

Then in verse 2 he explains further what being a living sacrifice means – did you hear it? --so that you may discern what is the will of God.

Paul and Jesus are saying the same thing: It starts with God and ends with God. You are saved by God and you are led by God. If you are an obedient disciple, it is all about God’s will. What God has done and is doing, through Christ, is to be at the center of our lives. Not us at the center, but Christ at the center. I think that we often have trouble discerning the will of God because we have not offered all of ourselves. We are still at the center rather than Christ.

Being a living sacrifice is giving our entire self over to the will of God.

Let me give you some examples.

The first is another video with one of our members. This week I am talking with Greg Diel. Greg has been a member here since 1986. He has been a youth sponsor and a Sunday School teacher and served on any number of committees for the church, but recently I sat down with him to ask him about this whole idea of living God’s will and integrating it into our daily lives. Show video 3:30.

Do you remember when Jesus was in the Garden of Gethsemane? It was the last night of his earthly life and he says God let this cup pass from me, but if it cannot, then your will be done. Can you hear Jesus praying for one thing, but yielding to God’s will even if it is different?

Or do you remember the speech Martin Luther King, Jr. gave the night before he was assassinated? It is in the same vein. They say he didn’t plan to speak that night but the crowd called for him again and again. So, finally he got up and made an unplanned speech that is truly remarkable. But at the very end after talking about the struggle for civil rights and even about his own stabbing and near death experience and the ongoing threats to his life, he begins to talk about his desire to do the will of God. Listen with me a minute. Show video 1:16.

Paul says, it starts with God’s mercy but it unfolds by following God’s will. Did you hear Dr. King say, “Longevity has its place. But I'm not concerned about that now. I just want to do God's will.” Now that is it. He has sacrificed his will for God’s will. He is giving his all to express his love for God to the fullest. Express God’s love in all you say and do, that is God’s will, that is being a living sacrifice.

Yet, we know that sometimes following God’s will is difficult for us, just like it has been for every disciple through the ages. But the Good News is that we can do this, because God will provide.

I told you about a devotional book I have been reading now off and on for over a year, in the sermon a couple of weeks ago. Two women who were really struggling began to seek God together daily. They began to receive guidance. They began to realize how much they could rely on God. Listen to what they recorded as messages from Christ:

I have promised that for every day you live, the strength shall be given you. Do not fear.

Face each difficulty sure that the wisdom and strength will be given you for it. Claim it.

Rely on Me to keep My Promise about this. In My Universe, for every task I give one of my children, there is set aside all that is necessary for its performance. So why fear? So why doubt? (9/30 God Calling)

I am your Lord. Enough. Then I can command your obedient service, your loyalty. But I am bound by My Lordship to give you protection.

I am bound to fight for you, to plan for you, to secure you a sufficiency of all within My power to provide. Think how vast that provision can be. Never doubt.

Such marvels are unfolding. Wonders beyond your dreams. They only need the watering of a grateful spirit and a loving heart to yield abundantly.

(9/2 God Calling)

God will provide. Trust it.

God will provide. Believe it.

God will provide. Test it.

I appeal to you therefore brothers and sisters by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice! Amen and thanks be to God!

Romans 12:1 – 2

A Living Sacrifice ? 9/27/09

…look at his list from an ___________ perspective.

Will this issue make a difference in ten years?

v. 2

The ______ of God comes from the eternal…

I appeal to you therefore brothers and sisters, by the

mercies of God, [because you have been saved, because

you have been set free] to ___________ your bodies

as a living sacrifice.

If you are an obedient ____________,

it is all about God’s will.

…have trouble discerning the will of God because

we have not offered _____ of ourselves.

Being a living sacrifice is giving our ___________

self over to the will of God.

Paul says, it starts with God’s mercy but it unfolds

by following God’s ______.

Express God’s love in all you say and do, that is

God’s will, that is being a _________ sacrifice.

…we can do this because God will ___________.

Kid’s Question: How much of me does God want?