Conformed to this world

Romans 1:2-3

“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.

For by the grace given to me I say to every one among you not to think of himself more highly than he ought to think, but to think with sober judgement, each according to the measure of faith that God has assigned.”

“Do not,” does not sound like a suggestion, but more like a command and is it understood in that fashion by many who go by the title of Christian?  That is I believe a rhetorical question, for it requires little thought for many who use the title Christian and do not have a clue where they put their Bible, till the next Sunday.  And you and I who do study to show ourselves approved as workers of God, also struggle with “Do not be conformed to this world” we hate the truth that we have been molded by the world system but seem to be powerless to break the hold it has on our Christian life, our Christian witness, our spiritual worship.

It is not like we have not read the rest of the verse, “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.”  I stated earlier that it is hard to break a habit, it requires a mindset on change, of going in a new direction, but that is a piece of cake compared to renewal of your mind.  For I’ve found my will does not submit willingly to my desires, I have to be transformed, become something new, and the only place I find any hope is giving up on anything of myself.   Looking to my loving and wonderful Father, who gave His Son to pay in full for my life of trying to make it in this world without Christ, the independent life, getting my needs met by my on efforts.

Now here is some great news, Jesus never expected you or me to live the Christ life, for He is the only one who has or can live that life, but by faith and the grace of God we have entered into Christ, and He has given us the Holy Spirit to be our Helper, but it comes down to; Father, I can’t you never said I could, you can and you promised You would, so I’m through.  Bob can’t but God can, and I will trust and believe for in Christ I’ve learned to trust.

The third verse is a watch-out verse, for it is easy to become like the prophet Elijah, after great difficulty and then even greater success, when all hell brakes out in your life and you tell God to just kill you for you’re the only one left who cares.  Listen to this warning; “For by the grace given to me I say to every one among you not to think of himself more highly than he ought to think, but to think with sober judgement, each according to the measure of faith that God has assigned.”  It is easy to look past grace, it is easy to become prideful and not be teachable, and it is easy to be as Demas who left the apostle Paul in Rome because he loved what the world had to offer.  You have been assigned a measure of faith and I’ve often said I have little faith, but a good and mighty God.  But if you are like me take heart, for you can ask the Father for more faith, and do not believe you can con Him, for He is aware of each thought.

“Now let us go to the Bible and see if it tells us where faith comes from. Heb 12:2 says "...Jesus, the author and perfecter of faith". And Rom 12:3 says " ... God has allotted to each a measure of faith.” These two verses clearly tell us that faith is not something that we do or a presence of mind that we develop, but that faith is a gift from God. Rom 10:17 says " ... faith comes from hearing and hearing by the word of Christ." So faith is a gift from God that we receive from the word of Christ, which in this dispensation we get from the Bible rather than from a burning bush. So in His time He will allot faith to us as needed from the word of the Bible. In 2 Cor 10:15 we see that faith can grow, so as we study the Bible God can add to our faith.”  (Leon L. Combs, Ph.D. “What is Faith”)

From the Back Porch,

Bob Rice