A Living Sacrifice to the Lord
As a Christian your commitment is giving your body as a living sacrifice to the Lord serving Him with all your heart, mind and strength. Find out how.
I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that you present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God which is your reasonable service (Romans 12:1)
Paul uses God’s mercies as the basis for his appeal to the believers in Rome. The core of every Christian’s commitment to Christ – our motivation for giving ourselves wholly to God, is the mercy He has demonstrated toward His us. What God has already done for us is the basis of everything we do for God.
The tone of Paul’s plead in Romans 12:1 makes it clear that there is a better way of living which is beneficial to us and a reasonable service to God. When we talk of sacrifice, it is something that is dead (killed for a purpose). So presenting our bodies as living sacrifice means a ‘living dead’ life. Sacrificing the things of the flesh to live for God.
To be a living sacrifice seems a figurative because sacrifices are usually dead. So how are Christians supposed to be living sacrifices? With sacrificial service, or worship, that is reasonable for someone who is genuinely grateful for what they have received from God. The goal of presenting oneself as a living sacrifice is service.
In Luke 1:74-75, Zacharias, the father of John the Baptist, prayed that “we…. might serve Him without fear, in holiness and righteousness before Him all the days of our life.” That is a beautiful model of what it means to live as a sacrifice to Christ. Dedicated people do not wear the label; they demonstrate their dedication by going places and doing things for the cause of Christ. They act constructively as people committed to fulfilling Christ’s plans and purposes in the world.
Consider this:
- Is your life a living sacrifice to the Lord?
- What sacrificial services are you rendering to the Lord?
Prayer: Father, I thank You! I lay my life before You, help me to present my body as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to You. Amen!
Read: Romans 12:1-10
