Ok... ok... I know we are moving slow through these first few verses. I promise we will move faster through the rest of the chapter. These first 2 verses are the basis for Paul's whole argument for Christian living so we are lingering here a while.
Romans 12:1–2
1 I appeal to you therefore, brothers, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship. 2 Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect.
Verse 2 begins describing what it looks like to live a life that has been offered as a living sacrifice to God. Those who are living sacrifices to God are to not be conformed to this world, but to be transformed by the renewal of their mind. This negative-positive imperative is the basis for living as a living sacrifice. The word translated "world" is usually translated "age". The meaning is of course similar, but implies a contextualized cultural framework for thinking. This verbiage carries the Jewish idea of this present age and the age to come (ie. when God's kingdom comes in full). "Don't adapt to the thinking of your culture and time over and against the will of God" is the meaning here.
Eugene Peterson, in The Message, translates this verse:
Romans 12:2 Don’t become so well-adjusted to your culture that you fit into it without even thinking. Instead, fix your attention on God. You’ll be changed from the inside out. Readily recognize what he wants from you, and quickly respond to it. Unlike the culture around you, always dragging you down to its level of immaturity, God brings the best out of you, develops well-formed maturity in you.
Note that the "be conformed" and "be transformed" are in the passive tense. The active tense would be "Don't conform to this age" and "transform your mind". Writing these in the passive implies that there are forces (likely Satan and God, evil and good, respectively) at work on us. For Paul, it seems our choice is which force we will surrender to. To move towards one is to move away from the other. So perhaps our choices are not as free as we would like to think. We are constantly being pushed and pulled by spiritual forces.
Paul is exhorting the church in Rome to learn how to think well by allowing their minds to be transformed by God and his Word. This is the reverse of the process of the ungodly and unrighteous as Paul has discussed in 1:18-32. Our minds, prior to faith in Jesus, had been conformed to the patterns of the world, that is we had been overly influenced by Satan, evil and our sinful nature. Now, under Jesus, our minds are renewed, that is everything that he is going to say in the rest of the book.
Paul says that when we are transformed by the renewing of our minds the result is that the believer will be able to discern God's will. This doesn't just mean God's will for the big decisions in your life like what house to buy, who to marry, what investment to make, etc. Before we jump to conclusions, let's let Paul tells us what he means by this. Basically for the next 3 chapters, through 15:13, Paul is explaining what it looks like to be transformed by the renewal of your mind. This we will begin to discuss tomorrow.
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Reflection
How committed are you to life transformation by the renewing of your mind? This is a lifelong process of learning, deeply pondering the mysteries of God, and knowing his Word more and more. This we constantly need in order to resist the allure of the world to conform our minds to its standards. This is a constant battle that we need to fight by immersing ourselves in the truth.