Living Sacrafice

“Therefore I urge you, brethren, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies a living and holy sacrifice, acceptable to God, which is your spiritual service of worship.” –Romans 12:1 (NASV)

This verse has some serious implications on our lives as Christians. Not only is this a foreign idea to our culture, it requires a totally different way of living. In order for us to be considered a holy sacrifice and be acceptable by a Holy God we have to be the following things: Holy, which is set apart, sanctified, righteous in God’s eyes, without blemish, or defect.
Leviticus 6:6 says, “Then he shall bring to the priest his guilt offering to the Lord, a ram without defect from the flock.”
Leviticus 2:1 says, “Now when anyone presents a grain offering as an offering to the Lord, his offering shall be of fine flower.”
Leviticus is full of these examples, without defect, fine or finest, choice of the flock/herd. We are supposed to live our lives in this way, a sacrifice Holy and acceptable to God. As the best of all our people, not to incite competition, instead that we should love God so much to worship him in this way.

What this means for our worship?
This is how we are supposed to live, as a sacrifice, which is our service of worship. We are supposed to live, present our bodies to God as Holy sacrifices, that is our service of worship, wow! Whichever way I say it, the weight of this verse remains. How does this affect what we eat, anything we put in our bodies, or on our bodies if our bodies are to be a living sacrifice to God? A sacrifice is given, the bible also says, “For I am not my own I was bought at a high price” (that price being Jesus the ultimate sacrifice.) For those things we put in our body or our minds, television, games, emotions or anything we put in our hearts. Those things should also be acceptable to God, if we are living a life of worship, as a sacrifice.
This in conjunction with our bodies being temples of the Holy Spirit makes us think twice about how we are living. Our decisions, how we spend our time, and what we do with our bodies. This is something I wrestle with, so I am preaching to the choir.

Recommended listening: “Everything Glorious” by David Crowder Band