Is the world remaking you in its image?

In Romans 12, Paul warns believers not to be conformed to the world but transformed by the renewing of the mind. In this sermon, Dr. Toby Holt unpacks this crucial choice between conformation and transformation.

Questions this sermon answers:

1. Why is conformity dangerous? Because the world is always pressing us to adopt its priorities and values, shaping us away from God without our even noticing.

2. How does transformation happen? Not by willpower alone, but by "the renewing of your mind" — having our thinking reshaped by God's truth.

3. What does it mean to renew the mind? To saturate our thinking in God's Word until we see and value things as He does.

"And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God." — Romans 12:2 (NKJV)

Speaker: In Romans 12, Paul warns believers not to be conformed to the world but transformed by the renewing of the mind. In this sermon, Dr. Toby Holt unpacks this crucial choice between conformation and transformation.

As Christians, we believe that God is at work fashioning and refining us.

We believe that He is remaking us in His own image.

However, the world is trying to do the same thing.

The world is trying to conform us to its own ways,

to have worldly priorities, attitudes, and behaviors.

Well, in Romans 12, the Apostle Paul says that we are not to let that happen.

We are not to be conformed to this world, but are to be transformed through the renewing of our minds.

Earlier this morning, we heard a Scripture reading from the book of Numbers.

Specifically, Brian read from Numbers chapter 6, and what he read was about a group called the Nazarites.

Now, what do you know about the Nazarites?

Give me one famous Nazarite.

Who? Samson.

All right, that's a good call.

If you remember early on in Scripture, especially there in the book of Numbers, you find that a group of individuals, a sect, so to speak, with an intention to live and to act and operate in holy ways that were different than what the rest of their culture was doing.

And so in Numbers chapter 6, as Brian read, you see that the Nazarites, they lived in ways that were different.

They had behaviors that were different.

They did things that others did not do, and they didn't do other things that others did do.

This is a separation. In fact, that's what the word Nazir even means. It means to separate.

Now, practically speaking, how would you recognize a Nazirite? Well, how did you recognize Samson

apart from his prodigious strength? The hair was one of the main ways. They didn't let a razor

touch their head or their beards. They also abstained from alcohol. They abstained from

touching a dead body of any kind, including animals. They had a number of outward signs

that spoke to everyone around them about their inward convictions. You see, it's not that long

hair or short hair by itself makes you holy per se. However, these sort of behaviors spoke to a

separation and a holiness and a dedication to God in the face of what anyone else in the world

around you might be doing. So Samson is a familiar Nazirite. There were others. Samuel was dedicated.

Remember Samuel? He was dedicated as a Nazirite from his birth. And even when you go into the

New Testament, there were individuals who operated as Nazirites. John the Baptist is an example of

someone who operated as an ascetic, as a Nazirite. He was someone who was not confused with the rest

of the world around him. He absolutely lived set apart. Luke 115 said John would be great in the

side Lord. He would neither drink wine or strong drink. He had the Spirit of a Nazirite even if he

was not formerly one. So Nazirites, Nazirites were those who were set apart from the world. They lived

in holy ways. Now in our day and age, it goes without saying there's not a lot of Nazirites or

even people who attempt to live as Nazarites do.

But there are within greater Christendom,

within the greater visible church,

there have been sects, both past and present,

who attempt to live in ways

that are different from the world around them.

And you think of any groups that do that

in present-day North America,

you might come up with the Amish or example,

mennonites and the like.

There are groups that see nonconformity as very desirable.

There are groups that see nonconformity

even as scriptural based on what we see here in this text.

And that's good. Nonconformity is good.

However, it can be taken in ways that depart from the scriptural teaching.

The Amish, for example, will avoid buttons and electricity and all those different things.

That's not really what God was teaching.

But there are some, past, present, and future, monastics and others,

who think that you have to absolutely flee from everything in the world

in order to honor what Romans 12 verses 1 and 2 say.

For what it's worth, nonconformity is not the end goal here.

You see, it's not enough to raise up Christians who will stand there and shake their fists at culture

or shake their fists at politicians or shake their fists at whatever.

Now, we can do that, and a lot of times we're given every good reason to do it.

We have a lot of reason as Christians to shake our fist at a lot of nonsense going on in the world around us.

Absolutely.

And we have a lot of reason to step back and say, ah, that's not for me.

Absolutely.

But nonconformity is not the end game of your Christian walk.

What is?

Well, here, here we see in Romans chapter 12, verses 1 and 2,

we see that nonconformity is desirable, but it's to be yoked with something called renewing your mind.

It's not enough to be cut off from that which is wicked.

You are supposed to be conformed to that which is Christ-like.

You see the difference?

It's not enough to say, I'm going to avoid that sin.

What we're called to do is to avoid that sin,

but also to embrace the personal work of Jesus Christ

and to be more like Him.

So in Romans 12, verses 1 and 2, just two verses,

there is a wealth, there is a depth of theology

that speaks to this idea that we are all called to be holy,

not just in what we believe, because that's the easier part,

not just holy in our theology, that's simpler,

not just holy in our orthodoxy, but also holy in our orthopraxy, in what we do with it. And that's

the great transition to the imperatives that begins in Romans 12, verses 1 and 2. All right,

I'm going to go ahead and reread verse 1 for us briefly, then we'll study it, and then we'll move

on to see verse 2. So verse 1 says this, I beseech you, therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God,

that you present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God, which is your reasonable

service. All right. If you were to go one chapter back at the very end of chapter 11, you would see

that chapter 11 ended with a doxology. Well, here we have this transition, and we know it's a

transition because of the word therefore. Paul has told his audience what they are to believe,

what they are to understand about the Gospel, and now it's therefore. Now it's here's what you are

supposed to do with it. So he makes this pivot to the imperative. So what is the imperative?

If this is the pivot, the demarcation line between that which he was teaching before and that which

we're supposed to do with it now, what are we supposed to do? Well, here in verse 1, we see

this much at the outset. We see that we are to present our bodies as living sacrifices, holy

and acceptable to God. You know, there are a lot of sacrifices in the Bible. There's a lot of

sacrifices in the Old Testament. But guess what? God didn't like a whole lot of them.

Can you give me an example of a sacrifice God didn't like? Did someone say Cain? Yeah,

start right from the get-go. You got two brothers. They both offer different things. God likes one of

the sacrifices. He liked the motivations, the heart, the intentions of one of those who was

performing the sacrifice, but not necessarily the other. Now that continued, whether you're

talking about Saul or whether you're just talking about the sacrifices during the age of guys like

ezekiel and the like. They had all manner of sacrifices going on in the temple for centuries

and centuries. But for huge swaths of that time, God looked down upon those sacrifices and the

smell of it rose up to his nostrils like a stench. Why? It was not because they were offering the

wrong animals, although they did do that. In the book of Malachi, God got on them. He says, come on

guys. I said, give me the good stuff, the first fruits, the best of what you have. You're giving

me the three-legged, lazy-eyed, buck-toothed lambs or what you throw up here on the altar. He says,

you're regularly giving me that which is bad.

So sometimes it was a function of that which was bad.

And other times they gave them the right stuff, but their hearts were gone.

Their hearts weren't into it.

They were doing it just out of compulsion or out of habit.

Or, God forbid, they would march on in with a sacrifice to Yahweh, a sacrifice to Jehovah,

and then march right down the street and honor the pagan gods of their neighbors.

In the days of Ezekiel, that's exactly what was going on.

God hated it.

God gave vision to Ezekiel and says, come see what's going on in my temple.

And he shows them all the drawings and all the false gods they'd propped up right there in the temple court.

Yards. Now, they still had sacrifices. They were still sacrificing. At 10,000 feet, you'd see the

guys in the tall pointy hats sacrificing lambs and goats. And if you looked at it, you'd say,

all right, they're doing what they're supposed to do. Wrong. God looked at that same stuff and

He says, I hate it. They're going through the motions. They're doing some of that which I

prescribed, and yet they're doing it with a heart that is far from me. Some sacrifices stink. Some

sacrifices amount to nothing in the eyes of God. So what do we see here? God says that you and I,

we no longer go to a temple in Jerusalem in order to lay down our fatted calf.

We no longer go someplace, make a pilgrimage somewhere to slay an animal on our behalf.

Rather, we do something better.

We don't offer a dead animal.

We offer a living us.

Romans 12, verses 1 and 2 talk about us as the sacrifice.

Fortunately, it's not a mortal sacrifice.

Fortunately, it's a living sacrifice.

In verse 1, what does Paul say?

He says, this is a wonderful transition.

In the economy of God, we have done away with the signs and shadows and types that all pointed to

Jesus Christ. Every dead animal that was ever slain in the Old Testament pointed forward to

Jesus Christ, the Lamb, the Lamb of God who was slain for us all, right? So we're no longer in

that economy where we're slaying the animals with the idea that we need to do that. Once and for

all, Christ's sacrifice accomplished everything that those things pointed forward to. With that

said, we still approach God when we worship Him with sacrifice in mind. I hope when you come into

church, you see that sacrifice is part of it. We usually go, how? How is that supposed to work?

Well, that's because we've strayed so far sometimes from Romans 12, verses 1 and 2.

you and I are to be living sacrifices, holy sacrifices. Verse 1 said, by the mercies of God,

I beseech you. He says, I beseech you. He says, please get this right. Please don't miss what I'm

about to tell you. I beseech you. I'm begging of you. I'm pleading with you. By the mercies of God,

present yourself, present your body, present the you-ness of you to God, holy.

Present your body as a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God.

Not as the three-legged, buck-toothed, lazy-eyed lamb that they used to give in the days past.

Not as an afterthought, not as seconds, you know, seconds to God.

But give him your best, and by giving him your best, you're refining yourself because you are the sacrifice.

What that means, practically speaking, is cut off all the stuff that ain't holy.

If there's affections and behaviors and attitudes and emotions and things you've been doing that

you know are wrong, that you know you shouldn't do, what God is saying is if you want to present

yourself to me, get rid of these things. If your left hand stands, cut it off. The idea is that we

are willing to separate that which we shouldn't do so that we might be more Christ-like. We cut

off that which we shouldn't engage in so that we might better resemble his son. So we present

ourselves to him wholly. For many of us, we're happy just to present ourselves at all. I was

there. I was at church. I went to church, you know, not every week, but most of the time. I did this, I did

that, right? God's going to have all sorts of people who are going to come to Him and say that.

Matthew 7 says on that great day, there's going to be all sorts of people who are going to come

and say, Lord, didn't I do this? Didn't I do that? Didn't I do these other things for you? What's He

going to tell them? Depart from me. I never knew you. I never knew you. You thought you were

sacrificing something for me? Come on, man. You thought you did those things? It was never about

doing those things. It was about you being different. It was about you cutting off the

sins. It's about you being more like my son. When I see you, I see someone who went through the

motions. I see someone who did some activities. What I don't see is Christ in you. Newsflash,

at the end of time, no matter what it is that you've ever done, no matter what activities your

life has pursued, no matter what your vocation has been, no matter how you've been used, a little or

a lot in the kingdom of God, none of that's going to be the basis on which God looks at you. God

looks at you and assesses you even now with this in mind, to what extent, to what degree does this

Son or daughter resemble my son, Jesus Christ? To what extent does this individual reflect my son?

Not all the things that you did, not all the motions that you go through. To what degree

are we more Christ-like? That's the focus. That's the function. That's the aim of the Christian walk.

Whether God gives you 10 years, 50 years, 100 years to pursue it, that's the aim.

That's the objective, and that's what we see here.

I beseech you, Paul says.

He says, please get this, which is why I'm talking passionately,

because I want to try to reflect some of his passion.

It's like he's grabbing the early church by the lapel, shaking them,

saying, I beseech you, I beg of you, get this right,

if you don't get anything else right.

Jesus died. He didn't stay dead.

He rose. He sits at the right hand of God the Father,

and your reasonable service, your reasonable response,

is to make your life more holy, more like the guy who saved you.

But so often we're content to go through the motions.

I'd say I checked off this list I did these things you know seem to satisfy my spouse my

father my pastor whoever but that's not the metric the metric is this do we have faith in Jesus

Christ and through that faith through the regenerative work that God has started in us

are we becoming more Christ-like day by day are we living sacrifices devoted to him and the end

verse one says amen this is reasonable service reasonable that's a nice way of saying if God

has done all that for you, if he has saved you, if he's purchased you back from sin and death,

don't you think, don't you think that today or maybe this week when you go out in the world,

that you could be a little more like his son, the guy who saved you? Wouldn't that be reasonable?

Let's briefly recap, just for a few moments, let's recap some of the things God has done for you,

just to remember what a reasonable service might be. Number one, he formed you, he made you. Let's

start there. If you had nothing else to work with, that would be enough. The fact there is a you-ness

to you is because he made you. The fact you're here at all, the fact you exist at all is because

God knitted you together in the womb. God formed you from before you ever existed. He purposed your

existence. Even if you had no other reason to be grateful and to thank him, even if you had no

other reasonable service to offer except that alone, that should be sufficient. You have life

in your bodies. You have breath in your lungs because he formed you. Secondly, after he formed

you, after you were born, after you were brought into this world, God put people in your life.

He put people in your life to teach you, hopefully to love you, hopefully to be some encouragement to

you. Hopefully that was your family. In some cases, it's been others external to your family.

Beyond this, for you to have gotten this far in life, for you to be in this room at all today,

there is this presumption. God has provided for you to get here. You have had sufficient food and

shelter across yamany years or decades in order to get to this point. That's not an accident.

God has made provision for you.

He's given you sufficient food, shelter, and other needs to sustain your life to this day.

Furthermore, he's given you a 2,000-page book.

He's provided for you materially.

He's also provided you spiritually.

He's given you a 2,000-page book that details his plans for you and for the rest of humanity.

He's forgiven your sins despite your ongoing rebellion, despite your ongoing transgressions.

He purchased you back from sin and death, not just at any cost,

not just he had to go open the treasure chest in heaven and say,

hey, boy, that Roddy, I'm going to have to really dig deep here.

Not that he did anything like that.

Rather, there's no treasure chest in heaven that he used.

Rather, in order to purchase back Arati or myself or you or everyone gathered in this room,

He gave that which was most precious to himself.

More than any coffers in heaven could ever have, he gave this lifeblood of his own son on Calvary.

Furthermore, he's given you heavenly promises that he's not done with you.

He's given you a Spirit, even now it indwells you, sanctifies you.

He's given you a church community.

I hope it's this one.

If not, I hope it's another one.

But he's given you a church community so you'll not have to go through this world alone.

We could go on and on and on with all the things that he's given you.

With that said, what's your reasonable response?

To live with faith and dedication in he who did all these things.

So that's the reasonable response we see at the end of verse 1.

All right, let's look at verse 2 now.

Verse 2.

And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind,

that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God.

If you were to take a ball bearing,

let's say you have two magnets on either side,

equal distance from that ball bearing.

What's going to happen?

What's going to happen?

Well, outwardly, nothing.

If you have two magnets and there's a magnetized object in the middle,

but directly in the middle,

what's going to happen is nothing to the outside eye.

It's just going to sit there.

Why?

Because the different forces are acting on it equally.

So there'll be no movement.

And yet, that doesn't mean that the forces are not acting.

Even if the thing doesn't move at all,

it does not mean that it's not being affected, that it's not being influenced by these two

competing forces. Now, in a similar sense, you and I, we live out our days between what you might

call two competing forces, and this is true even for us as Christians. Now, on the one hand, we

have our Creator, we have our God, we have our Maker, and our Maker obviously has the dominant

pull on our life and should have the dominant pull on our life, and yet there is a competing force.

Even as Christians, we acknowledge that the world has a certain pull on us.

And we experience that at a very young age.

When you were a kid in high school, especially in junior high,

do you remember the pressures of conformity?

Do you remember what it's like to have peer pressure?

You know, I was a kid in the 80s, and you had to have the gotcha shirts

and the swatches and all these different things, the OP shirts.

I wasn't that cool, so I didn't have a lot of that.

But the cool people did.

With that said, there was all these things.

And if you had those things, then you kind of walked the line.

What if you were to walk into a room in 1987 and what if you were to walk into junior high

with, say, a pencil protector in your pocket?

How would that have gone for you?

Well, they'd say, boy, look at that nerd, right?

What a dork that guy is.

So with that said, we've experienced on some level what this is like.

We've experienced the pressures of conformity.

We've experienced the world looking and seeing something in us that it doesn't like or that

it does like, and it celebrates that which affirms itself.

The world will always celebrate that which affirms the world.

And if you do the things that the world does,

if you say the things that the world says,

if you're in lockstep with the world's behaviors and principles

and attitudes and appetites and affections,

then things will go right for you.

Things will go well for you.

But what if, what if you say,

I'm going to live like a Nazarite, so to speak.

I'm going to live holy.

What if I'm going to do what God would have me do?

Well, if you try to walk that walk,

what you'll find is very quickly, others will see it.

And the world around you will reject it.

If you have a certain attitude towards sexuality,

they'll say, he's a prude.

If you have a certain attitude,

whether it's to wealth or finances or fame or what have you,

they'll demean and denigrate you

as not living up to their standards.

The world wants you to be more like the world.

And frequently, even Jesus himself identifies

that that's the world's great desire,

but your great desire as a Christian

is not to be like the world, but to be more like Christ.

So verse two of Paul saying that, he says,

look, there's a pull, there's an influence,

an emphasis that's being given both by the world

and by God. You are to reject the world's call upon you. You are to reject its magnetism, its

pull, even if it costs you, and it will cost you. It 100% will. If you try to live out your days

Holy in this darkened age, even in our culture, if you try to live out your life in a holy way,

it will absolutely cost you. It will cost you friendships and relationships, and people will

rip on you, and when you won't engage in some of the things that the world engages in, people will

look down upon you. But let them. Dear heavens, if the world looks down on you, you're doing

something right. If the world rejects something in you, if the world looks at you and sees that

you're not tolling Islam because you're attempting to be more holy, more like Christ, you are doing

something right. And God himself celebrates and calls us to that. Verse 2, do not be conformed

to the world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind that you may prove. You may prove

what is good and acceptable and the perfect will of God. You may prove, not necessarily to God,

He already knows these things, but you will prove it to the world around you. You will bear out your

testament. When you do that which is right, it's like putting out a standard that the world sees.

It won't like it or reject it. It will fight against it, but they still see it. It demonstrates

that Christ is our Savior when Christians act accordingly. There's all manner of good things

that come when we do what we're called to do, that bear out, that prove, that give evidence to

our faith. With that said, notice there where it says, do not be conformed to this world,

but be transformed. And the picture there is like a butterfly, really. It's a picture of

transformation. You see a butterfly, you know, what does it start at? It starts with a caterpillar.

Now, I've always enjoyed, we've gone to the butterfly farms, you know, where the butterflies

fly around. You're inside an enclosed netting, and they fly and land on you. You're like, oh,

this is so awesome. But you put your finger, and the butterfly comes and lands on it. I think this

is cool. Well, guess what? No one has the same reaction to the caterpillar. No one has gone to

the caterpillar farm to lay there and let the caterpillars come upon me. Why? Because the

caterpillars are gross, man alive, and no one wants any part of the caterpillar. But the good

news. The caterpillar doesn't stay a caterpillar, but it goes through that process that I'm not

articulate enough to describe, but that process, that metamorphosis by which it evolves, it changes,

it transforms into the beautiful butterfly. In a sense, he says, that should be you. You used to

be that ugly wriggling thing over there. You used to be that, but you've been called to be this,

to be this thing that ascends up to heaven, so to speak, that takes flight. You've been called to

be that. Well, that's said so often. We're content in the wriggling. We're content in the catapults.

We're content in sticking our head in the trough. We're content in all manner of things that are not

the beauty and the flight that we're called to. In any case, it says, do not be conformed, verse 2,

to this world, but be transformed, and then it gives us the means. Be transformed by what?

By the renewing of your mind. The impetus here is that there's something wrong with your mind,

and there is.

We've identified this before.

It's what we call the noetic effect of sin.

People get old and gray and creaky and they lose their hair.

All of the above can happen to you.

And the reason all that stuff happens to you, given enough time,

is because you and our sinners and the wages of sin is death.

Now, we oftentimes recognize the way in which sin has affected our flesh and life,

but we think our minds are free from that.

We think our minds are like these neutral free agents,

able to understand truth on its own and figure out logic and reasoning the world around us.

Do you think that's the way it really works?

I've asked this question, I know of you before,

but what tide I were last week?

What was it?

Well, here's the thing, I don't even remember.

You don't remember, I don't remember.

Why?

I made the conscious choice to put it on.

You looked at it for 45 minutes.

What was it?

I don't know, but that's the thing.

Our minds are not as powerful

as we like to think that they are.

They're given to forgetfulness and dementia

and cognitive defects and the like.

We're born with sin impacting us

just as sin will strip your body of its flesh in time and leave you disease-ridden, all manner of

bad things will happen to your body, given enough time, given a long enough runway, although that's

all true, our minds, things happen similarly. And we start in that condition. We start with a fallen

cognition. We start with a fallen mind. With that said, what has to happen? Well, we have to be

renewed. It says, don't be conformed to this world, be transformed through the renewing of your mind.

Your mind needs to be renewed. And that's not a function of simply working through puzzles to

make your brain sharper. It's a function of renewing your mind and truth. Dear heavens,

you've lived on this globe long enough. You've heard enough lies to fill a thousand books.

You've heard all manner of things that just aren't true. But there's one book that contains

100% truth from the first page to the last. And the more time you spend in it, the more time you

spend meditating and reading, observing and studying and applying its contents, the better

off you will be. Now, some people will say, well, but the Bible doesn't tell me everything I need

to know. I'm deciding about this job, or I'm deciding whether to be engaged to this person.

I'm deciding on this, that, or the other thing. And the Bible doesn't tell me what I should do

there. All right, granted, the Bible does not have the specifics for every left or right turn you'll

ever make in your life. However, the principle by which you will make every decision you will ever

make is in this book. The principles are talking about marriage. Who should I marry? Who should I

not marry? The principles for what makes a good spouse are 100% in this book, aiding you in making

that decision. The more time you spend in this book, studying what it says, studying the principles

and the precepts thereof, the more renewed your mind will be. And then when you apply that renewed

mind to the choices that are before you, you will make choices that not only make better sense,

that are more appropriate, that work out better for you, but they will also make you more Christ-like.

The more you make decisions based on the principles in Christ's book, the more Christ-like you will

become. But it involves some intentionality on our part. Most everything I'm saying here, you can say,

yeah, yeah, read the Bible more. I got it. Read the Bible, and I'll get right on that. Most of us

understand that, right? The key is to take some intentionality and go, all right, all right,

renewing my mind is important, and honestly, I don't do much of it. Honestly, I encounter

Scripture once a week when the pastor reads from it, or I encounter Scripture in these intervals

of my life. Maybe I need it, maybe I don't. Remember, people argue with themselves. They'll

say, yeah, other people need that stuff. Other people need the crutches of regular Bible reading

about having it. We think that we can somehow be above it. Wrong! Dear heavens, this is an

admonition. Remember Paul shaking the lapel of the church and saying, Dear heavens, get this right.

Renew your minds. You need to be transformed into something different than you once were. The good

news is God's already started that process. It's what we call regeneration, being born again. He

started to work in you. He changed your heart from a heart of stone to a heart of flesh. And that was

His volitional work that he did for his own purposes. But he calls you to work with him in

your sanctification, to work with him in renewing your mind and your emotions and your thoughts and

the like. And that requires some intentionality. It requires you to look back and say, you know,

I haven't been in the word the way I should be. I do feel convicted that I should do something

different. Well, what would that look like this week? Honestly, if you're dragging, if somehow

the word has not been a big deal to you and you haven't been renewed in it, despite knowing that

you should, despite nodding your head and giving the holy, you know, when I say read your Bible

more. Despite that knowledge, what are you going to do about it if you've been dragging last week

or last month or last year? Do something. Be intentional. Make a choice. Say, I haven't been

reading God's word. I will start. I will start today. I'll start tomorrow. I'll start on Monday.

I will start. I'll do something different. And what you'll find is that when you start and you

continue and you perpetuate that approach that you will grow and your transformation will not

be simply something that God sees, but your spouse and your children and the people around you will

see it too, and you'll become more holy and more holy the more you not only study this book, but

the more you apply its precepts to your life. That's what we're called to do as a start. In the

next four chapters, which I will not get to, the study on the book of Romans is going to go through

all of this in our Sunday school class. The next four chapters, Paul gives us more details. The

end of the book of Romans is more details on what this looks like in the specifics. But that said,

my encouragement to you this morning is that when Paul gave us the indicatives of what Christ has

done, who Christ is, what he did for you, and when you recognize that he has done that, the question

is put before you, what are you going to do about it? For each one of us, we could answer that

differently because each one of us are at different levels with regards to our sanctification and our

spiritual maturity. But the fact remains, from the young people to the old people in this room,

that tomorrow is a new day. What are you going to do intentionally to be more transformed,

more renewed, that you may become more like Christ and that others might see him in you.

Pray on it, think about it, and act accordingly. Let's pray.