Walk in Step

We function well when we work as a team.
The Body of Christ, a church, is a team. It is a team made up of individuals who are learning to function together for the glory of God. Each of us needs to do our part. Peter had to learn to walk buoyantly in the face of trouble. A woman from Tyre and Sidon taught us how to walk in faith. Paul, in Romans 12 helps us to walk in step.

Romans 21: 1-16 gives us pro-active challenge to live in unity for God
Paul’s Letter to the Romans may be said to be divided into three parts. Part One (chapters 1-8 outlines the Gospel (whether for Jews of for gentiles). Part Two is Romans 9-11, which deals with the dilemma that so many Israelites have rejected the Gospel even though it was through them that the saving message of Christ has come to all the nations. Part Three deals with Christian living. If we were saved by grace through faith alone, how is it that we are to live by faith alone?

1 The Life-style of the Grateful Surrender (12: 1-2)
Romans 1 had shown how the unsaved life of self-centredness and idolatry is characterised by ingratitude to God. We were not thankful! Not that we are saved by Christ, it is appropriate that we live by thanksgiving. The thankful heart is a surrendered heart. This is the very essence of worship. True spirituality operates in bodies and minds.

Bodies
God is interested in our bodies and not just our feelings or our “spirits”.

Spiritual Sacrifice
Our bodies are to be involved in a life-style of sacrifice. The culture’s of Paul’s time were familiar with the offering of dead animals in sacrifices. The Christian life is about the continual offering of ourselves as living sacrifices.

Renewed Minds
Repentance is change of mind and will. The Christian life is a life-style of progressive repentance. We need to keep getting our minds changed by God to see his perfect will proved in our lives.

2 The Life-Style of true self-assessment:
The Christian life has no place for the hypocrisy of false humility or the nursing of an unhealed low self-esteem. We are to be humbly available to serve as made (12: 3)

3 Diversity of Function in the Unity of the Body (12: 4-8)
Eric Liddle said, “God made me fast”. He ran to the glory of God. God has made us all with such variety of gifting and ability. We can grow together as we learn to operate in our different abilities.

4 The Life-style of Philadelphia (Brotherly Love) (12: 9-10)
Before the Christian era the Greek language did not use “brotherly love” for any relationships outside the family. It is for the family and for the church.

5 A Life-style of Creatively channelled energy (12: 11-16)
Pressure and programs can produce good or bad responses. Look at these verses for God’s way.

Lindsay Johnstone

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