A living sacrifice

Romans 12:1-2

New International Version - UK (NIVUK)

A living sacrifice

12 Therefore, I urge you, brothers and sisters, in view of God’s mercy, to offer your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and pleasing to God – this is your true and proper worship. 2 Do not conform 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.

I’ve had a few difficult and challenging months recently, and I have had a lot of questions that to be honest if I’ve not been able to find answers for. Having spent a lot of time praying,  reading and writing but I’ve also spend many hours thinking about things, and if I’m honest over-thinking things.

I have great friends here in Southport and other places, and I know a lot of friends have been and are praying for me.

All of us have been influenced in the way we think or act by the way our parents and grandparents thought and we have developed learned behaviour patterns from both our family backgrounds and our culture or society. I grew up in the South Wales valleys which is predominantly white and working class. I remember going to a Youth Camp in the 1980’s and meeting people from an Afro-Caribbean background and spending time with them and making friends with them,  but it was something of a culture shock and again in the late 1990’s living in Leicester and working alongside people from an Indian Subcontinent background in many ways both were culture shocks for me  and I learned valuable lessons it was strange for me  coming from a predominantly white background being somewhere that was more of cultural melting point.

I love living in England, and I’m Welsh please don’t think that is an oxymoron, it was a cultural shift coming from the Welsh Valleys to live in the East Midlands, later living in West Yorkshire and now living in Merseyside.  The English were something like us but not entirely like us and we enjoyed beating them at Rugby, which is ironic for me because at least on the maternal side of my family, 100 plus years ago,  3 out of 4 of my great grandparents moved to Wales from Devon and Somerset!

I said earlier that we have developed learned behaviour patterns from our parents and grandparents, as children we observed the way our parents and other relatives dealt with certain situations and circumstances,  for example my granddad would gradually change the time on clocks, watches etc., but would leave one clock on watch on the right time until he went to bed when the clocks either went forward or back an hour, this year I noticed that I do exactly the same.

I was raised in a Christian Family so in many ways, a lot of things that happen in Church I understand and accept,  such as tithing,  male leadership,  breaking of bread or communion, although in many ways these come from learned behaviour I came to accept these for myself.

Today, we face many challenges and difficulties because culture and society try to break free of the Christian heritage that for hundreds of years have been the guiding light for society in the western world,  for example many believe that gay people have the right to marry other gay people, personally speaking I’m opposed to such views because they go against what the Bible teaches about Marriage,  I’m not anti-gay or homophobic, firstly I can’t be anyone’s auntie because I’m a man and it would be physically impossible for me to be an auntie, sorry some humour there.  Because of the fall of adam, sin entered the world

Romans 5:12ff

¹² Therefore, just as through one man sin entered into the world, and death through sin, and so death spread to all men, because all sinned— ¹³ for ^[h]until the Law sin was in the world, but sin is not imputed when there is no law.¹⁴ Nevertheless death reigned from Adam until Moses, even over those who had not sinned in the likeness of the offense of Adam, who is a ^[i]type of Him who was to come¹⁵ But ^[j]the free gift is not like the transgression. For if by the transgression of the one the many died, much more did the grace of God and the gift by the grace of the one Man, Jesus Christ, abound to the many. ¹⁶ The gift is not like that which came through the one who sinned; for on the one hand the judgment arose from one transgression ^[k]resulting in condemnation, but on the other hand the free gift arose from many transgressions ^[l]resulting in justification. ¹⁷ For if by the transgression of the one, death reigned through the one, much more those who receive the abundance of grace and of the gift of righteousness will reign in life through the One, Jesus Christ. ¹⁸ So then as through one transgression ^[m]there resulted condemnation to all men, even so through one act of righteousness ^[n]there resulted justification of life to all men. ¹⁹ For as through the one man’s disobedience the many were made sinners, even so through the obedience of the One the many will be made righteous. ^20 [o]The Law came in so that the transgression would increase; but where sin increased, grace abounded all the more, ²¹ so that, as sin reigned in death, even so grace would reign through righteousness to eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.