Did you bless the Lord? (Part 4)
Verse of the day: Romans 12:1 “Therefore, I urge you, brothers and sisters, in view of God’s mercy, to offer your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and pleasing to God—this is your true and proper worship”
In the third part, I talked about the first condition (a) of the body to be a proper worship and today I’ll talk about the second and the third conditions:
b. The body has to be a holy sacrifice
A holy sacrifice means a sacrifice set apart or consecrated to God. For a longtime I always thought that God is only interested in my spirit but I finally understood that even my body counts. A body cannot be offered as a holy sacrifice for God on one side and be used to please the flesh on the other side. A holy body is not used for anything because if it’s sacrificed for God in order to honor Him. I often hear those who say: “it’s my body and I do from it whatever I want”… but the bible tells us that our body is the temple of the Holy-Spirit (1 Cor 6:19). The bible also says: “May God himself, the God of peace, sanctify you through and through. May your whole spirit, soul and body be kept blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. The one who calls you is faithful, and he will do it” (1 Thess 5:23). Therefore, for a worship to be proper, the body has to be sanctified.
c. The body has to be a sacrifice pleasing to God.
According to the same verse of the day (Rom 12:1), for a worship to be reasonable, the sacrifice has to be pleasing to God. Like I said, in other versions, the worship is translated as a spiritual act of worship. Every time you enter in prayer, your action is considered as an act of worship before God. However, further in the book of Hebrews, the nature of the act of worship is well described: It is said: “…Therefore, since we are receiving a kingdom that cannot be shaken, let us be thankful, and so worship God acceptably with reverence and awe” (Hebrews 12:28).
The act has to be an act that is pleasing Him and if the act pleases Him, it means that the sacrifice pleases Him as well.
The big question is to know how is the sacrifice that pleases Him? The answer is in the same verse (Heb 12:28): The sacrifice that pleasing to God is followed by reverence and awe. We cannot pretend to bless the Lord without reverence and awe. We may be weak in some area but above all, God wants to see awe in us.
In the fifth part, we will discover another fundamental condition to be able to always bless the Lord.
Chris Ndikumana
