Sermon from September 8, 2002

Harrison Ford has been a film star for nearly three decades. One of his more thoughful roles occured in Regarding Henry. It tells the story of a hard-driving lawyer, who goes into a convenience store one night and walks into a hold-up. The robber shoots him in the head, and he is left crippled and with no memory of his past.

The film traces the rehabilitation of his body and the gradual return of his memory. A profound moment of truth comes, when Henry (Harrison Ford) begins to realize that he has been dishonest with clients and unfaithful to his wife (and she to him). He says, "I don't think I like who I was."

His amnesia gave him the unexpected luxury of stepping outside himself and gradually seeing himself for what he was becoming. Stripped of the mindset and the social expectations that were making him what he was becoming, he was able to evaluate his life, and by his own accounting he was found wanting as a human being.

Christian worship provides an environment in which we may step outside ourselves and see ourselves for what we are becoming. For people who don't like what they are becoming the Gospel offers alternatives.

For most of us the desires of our secret heart are like a dog kennel, full of yelping, yapping, barking, baying hounds, all wanting to be turned loose. If we turned some of them loose, they would tear our lives to pieces. If we turn loose too many of them at one time, our lives become unmanageable. Some of them, turned loose at the same time, turn our lives into a civil war.

A wise spiritual director said one time, "I am only facing the two quite general, but quite sufficiently rousing facts: that we all of us have 'selves' (the enemies of our good true selves) to fight, and that only so fighting are we adult, fruitful and happy," (von Hügel, quoted in Howatch, Glittering Images, 181).

The year ahead provides a good time to take that civil war to a new level. It is a good time to take stock of what you are becoming as a human being and of what part your relationship to God has in that. It is a good time to reconsider what it means for you to be a follower of Christ and a part of His Church. Scripture will help us do these things, and here is the passage I have chosen to work with in the months ahead.

Romans 12:1-2 says: I urge you, brothers, in view of God's mercy, to offer your bodies as living sacrificies, holy and pleasing to God - this is your spiritual act of worship. Do not conform any longer 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. Let's spend today and next Sundaying unloading this rather full cargo piece by piece. Let's cut to the chase.

I am challenging you to place your body at God's disposal. Don't be hasty; this is for thoughtful people. Don't be half-hearted; this act affects your whole being. Don't be afraid; it will not turn you into a religious freak; it turns people into something beautiful and winsome. You should count the cost of doing this. That does not mean that anyone can anticipate all that lies ahead; it does mean to have a reasonable idea of the purpose of living at God's disposal. Romans will help us be clear and realistic about that.

Place your body at God's disposal. Doing this makes possible the renewing of your mind and the transformation of your character. The decision to do this is inviolably personal. It is also inescapably communal in its context and in its impact. We are in this together. We can help each other in this process. So, talk with each other about what you hear, about what you are being asked to do.

Verse one is so densely packed, that I need to take time to unpack some of the items from it, so that we can manage it more adroitly and fruitfully. I want to do this by asking questions that any of us might ask as a result of interacting with this verse. Here is the first one. Verse one uses language that is odd, to say the least. I urge you, brothers ... to offer your bodies ... to God.

Why "bodies?" That sounds carnal, earthy, unspiritual. Why not say, "Offer your hearts and souls?" or "Offer your very selves?" Christians are sometimes embarrassed by the body with its imperial hormonal powers, sheer necessities and irresistible mortality. Some Christians and non-Christians have viewed the body as the evil prison of the beautiful human soul. The Christian Church rejected that embarrassment and that view as heresy.

So, why does the Scripture tell us to place our bodies at God's disposal? Here is one reason. The body is the instrument by which the world "out there" reaches our minds and spirits. It is also the instrument by which our thoughts and intentions infuence the world "out there." So, isn't it important to place this unique and powerful instrument at God's disposal to serve God's purpose?

Here is another reason. What we do with our bodies influences our unseen human spirit. The body serves as a teacher of the spirit as well as an instrument of the spirit. Kneeling, for example, with its discomfort and inconvenience, teaches us something valuable about humility. That brings us to a second barrier.

This one has to do with relevance and with fear. The apostle wrote, I urge you, brothers, to offer your bodies as living sacrifices ... to God. You may say, "I don't like the sound of 'sacrifices.'"

Here is where the issue of relevance comes in. You may say, "Isn't this talk of offering one's body as a living sacrifice meant just for religious people?" I take that question to mean that for some people religion is a kind of hobby like skydiving or mountain climbing. If you go in for that kind of thing, it is okay to talk about being a living sacrifice. For others, who believe in God and Christ but are not particularly religious, this talk about living sacrifices does not apply.

There are people who are religious in a way that other people are not. But the apostle did not address Romans only to pastors, religious mystics, and other religious types. He addressed it to the congregation in Rome, whom he had never met. Presumably, that congregation was made up of ordinary people, many of whom, like us, did not consider themselves especially religious. The apostle calls upon them also to become living sacrifices and to work out what that means in light of their unique personalities and circumstances. So, the message is, be yourself, but place your body at God's disposal.

The apostle's language is again awkward here. I urge you, brothers ... to offer your bodies as living sacrifices. What is a "living sacrifice?" Two observations may help. First, a living sacrifice is the opposite of a dead sacrifice. A worshiper sacrifices an animal and may easily assume he has done his religious duty. He can walk away from that altar and go about the rest of his life with no thought about his god. Living sacrifices cannot do that, because they have placed their bodies at God's disposal, and sooner or later God will touch every part of their lives.

Second, the sacrifice of an animal is final; the animal is dead. However, a living sacrifice can, so to speak, climb down off the altar. We are free agents, we can take it back. We need times of rededication. We must bring the offer of our body to God up to date in light of personal changes and changes of cirucmstances.

Another barrier has to do with motivation. Why should I do this? These two verses alone speak directly to motivation. Here are four motives they give.

First, you won't be alone. Verse one opens by saying, I urge you, brothers ... to offer your bodies. It is brothers and bodies in the plural. Placing our bodies at God's disposal creates a community of living sacrifices. We are in this together.

Second, the apostle says in verse one that God's mercy offers a reason big enough for us to place our bodies at His disposal. I urge you, brothers, in view of God's mercy, to offer your bodies as living sacrifices.

The more God's mercy takes hold on our imagination and affections, the more we experience our faith as a matter of love and less as a matter of compulsion. The nature of love is to sacrifice for the beloved. As a result, placing our bodies at God's disposal will come more naturally. As we read through Romans in the months ahead, we will be able often to see and to experience the nature and the scope of His mercy. These moments will provide both formal and informal occasions for placing our bodies at God's disposal.

A third motive is that verse one calls the offering of our bodies as living sacrifices your spiritual act of worship. This is a powerful act of personal and communal worship.

Fourth, verse two says that the end result of putting your body at God's disposal is that then you will be able to test and approve what God's will is - his good, pleasing and perfect will. Part of that means discovering what God designed you to be and to do.

I think this language also engenders the fear that placing your body at God's disposal may be more relevant than you would like. This is a fear that cuts very close to us who have a long evangelical background. You say, "If I place my body at God's disposal, one of two bad things will happen to me. I will have to become a missionary to deepest, darkest Africa, or I will have to give away my money."

Listen! "Christianity's about ... expending blood, sweat and tears to be what you've been designed by God to be and do what you've been designed by God to do .... What's incompatible is not bothering to find out who (you are), settling for something less or something other that what (you) should be, trampling on others in order to realise a self designed by the ego instead of valuing and caring for others in order to realise the true self designed by God," (Howatch, Absolute Truths, 444, parentheses mine). Placing your body at God's disposal is the personal dedication to finding out what God designed you to be. 

It is also finding out what God designed a congregation to be. Congregations have unique personalities and possibilities as surely as do individuals. What has God designed BVBC to be? What would happen here if a congregation of people, without fanfare, placed their bodies at God's disposal?

Let me say it again. I am challenging you to place your body at God's disposal. Don't be hasty; this is for thoughtful people. Don't be half-hearted; sacrifice requires your whole being. Don't be afraid; this action does not turn people into religious freaks; it turns them into something beautiful and winsome. You should count the cost of doing this. This does not mean that anyone can anticipate all that lies ahead; it does mean to have a reasonabble ide of the normal responsibilities of living at God's disposal. Romans will help us be clear and realistic about that.

Place your body at God's disposal. Doing this makes possible the renewing of your mind and the transformation of your character. The decision to place your body at God's disposal is inviolably personal. It is also inescapably communal in its context and in its impact. We are in this together. Help each other in this process. Talk with each other about what you hear, about what you are being asked to do. Now, we need to talk briefly abou thow to place your body at God's disposal.

Well, you think about what you've heard and at some point along the way you tell God that your body is now at His disposal. You may be doing this for the first time, or you may be renewing your commitment to God. If you are prepared to do this, say it to God in whatever words you can use. He speaks your language. I will also lead us in a formal prayer that may express the intention of your heart.

Gracious and holy God,
Lord and sovereign of every created thing,
I humbly present to your divine majesty
my body and soul,
my thought and my words,
my actions and intentions,
my passions and my sufferings;
to be disposed of by you for your glory,
to be blessed by your providence,
to be guided by your counsels,
to be sanctified by your Spirit;
and that hereafter my body and soul may be received into glory.
For nothing can perish that is in your custody,
nor can the enemy of souls devour what is your portion or take it out of your hand. Amen.