Page 17 - Florida Sentinel 8-26-16 Online Edition

LOVE Is God (Romans 12:1, 2; 13:8–10)
The most outstanding at- tribute of God is LOVE (1 John 4:8).
The greatest command- ment is to love God (Mark 12:30).
The second greatest com- mandment is to love one’s neighbor (v. 31).
The first listed fruit of the Holy Spirit is love (Gala- tians 5:22).
All the commandments of God are swallowed up in love. This is why love fulfills the law.
We come to the end of our time in Romans with a lesson from this practical section where love is men-
tioned in every chapter (Ro- mans 12–16).
Love is to be sincere and causes devotion to one an- other (12:9, 10).
Love fulfills the law and does no harm to one’s neigh- bor (13:8, 10). Love means caring about a fellow be- liever’s conscience (14:15).
Paul appealed to the church in Rome to strive with him in prayer by the love of the Spirit (15:30).
Offer Yourself
| Romans 12:1
Paul turned the corner to this practical section of Ro- mans by using an appropri-
ate transitional phrase.
Therefore, I urge you, brothers and sisters, in view of God’s mercy. Therefore connects the dots from the doctrinal to the duty section. I urge you in- dicates the passion Paul had for the obedience of faith. In view of God’s mercy sum- marizes the plan of God from chapters 1–11.
One way we love God is to offer (stand before) our- selves to God as a living sac- rifice. When we do this we show our true and proper worship (which really should be translated “rea- sonable liturgy” or “reason- able service”).
In many ways all the of- ferings of the Old Testament rolled back sins until the sacrifice of Christ on the cross removed them (He- brews 10:3, 4). Jesus was the real temple of God and extends that presence of Godtousinthenew covenant. So when we offer our lives and praises to God (Hebrews 13:15), in essence we are offering our-
selves as Jesus offered him- self.
Transform Your Mind | Romans 12:2
The Old Testament was against impure offerings. The same is true for believ- ers offering themselves to God. If we are to offer our best, then it will be that of a transformed mind.
The world wants us to conform. God wants us to be transformed.
The means by which this transformation takes place is the renewing of the mind. As goes the brain, so goes the behavior.
This makes us very dis- cerning. We can test things in life to see if they match the will of God, which is de- scribed as morally good, well pleasing, and mature or complete.
Love Others
| Romans 13:8-10
Offering ourselves to God and being transformed are means of loving him. If we do those two things, then
we are more able to love oth- ers.
Paul moved from obey- ing the authorities, a very specific arena, to loving everyone. Paul framed it up with a financial metaphor— debt.
How we understand re- maining debt free is debat- able. But not up for debate, is the debt of loving others.
Twice in this brief para- graph Paul said that when we love others we automati- cally fulfill all the demands of the law. He drilled down into specifics by mentioning four of the Ten Command- ments from the latter half of the Decalogue (adultery, murder, stealing, and coveting) and added a generic phrase (and what- ever other command there may be) to be as encompass- ing as possible.
To this he added a phrase from the code of holiness (Leviticus 19:18) as well as a reminder that love does no harm to a neighbor.
“Love God and do as you please.”
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