1 For this reason I make request to you, brothers, by the mercies of God, that you will give your bodies as a living offering, holy, pleasing to God, which is the worship it is right for you to give him.
You, as living stones, are being made into a house of the spirit, a holy order of priests, making those offerings of the spirit which are pleasing to God through Jesus Christ.
And do not give your bodies to sin as the instruments of wrongdoing, but give yourselves to God, as those who are living from the dead, and your bodies as instruments of righteousness to God.
Let us then make offerings of praise to God at all times through him, that is to say, the fruit of lips giving witness to his name. But go on doing good and giving to others, because God is well-pleased with such offerings.
And let not your behaviour be like that of this world, but be changed and made new in mind, so that by experience you may have knowledge of the good and pleasing and complete purpose of God.
In the past you were not a people, but now you are the people of God; then there was no mercy for you, but now mercy has been given to you. My loved ones, I make this request with all my heart, that, as those for whom this world is a strange country, you will keep yourselves from the desires of the flesh which make war against the soul; Being of good behaviour among the Gentiles; so that though they say now that you are evil-doers, they may see your good works and give glory to God when he comes to be their judge.
Let the words of my mouth and the thoughts of my heart be pleasing in your eyes, O Lord, my strength and my salvation.
Are you not conscious that you are the servants of him to whom you give yourselves to do his desire? if to sin, the end being death, or if to do the desire of God, the end being righteousness.
What may I give to the Lord for all the good things which he has done for me?
But when the mercy of God our Saviour, and his love to man was seen, Not by works of righteousness which we did ourselves, but in the measure of his mercy, he gave us salvation, through the washing of the new birth and the giving of new life in the Holy Spirit, Which he gave us freely through Jesus Christ our Saviour; So that, having been given righteousness through grace, we might have a part in the heritage, the hope of eternal life. This is a true saying; and it is my desire that you may give certain witness about these things, so that those who have had faith in God may give attention to good works. These things are good and of profit to men;
And last of all, the prayer which we make to you from our heart and in the name of the Lord Jesus, is this: that as we made clear to you what sort of behaviour is pleasing to God, as in fact you are doing now, so you will go on in these ways, but more and more.
We then, working together with God, make our request to you not to take the grace of God to no purpose.
Take away, then, the old leaven, so that you may be a new mass, even as you are without leaven. For Christ has been put to death as our Passover. Let us then keep the feast, not with old leaven, and not with the leaven of evil thoughts and acts, but with the unleavened bread of true thoughts and right feelings.
Now I make request to you, brothers, by our Lord Jesus Christ, and by the love of the Spirit, that you will be working together with me in your prayers to God for me;
I will give praise to the name of God with a song; I will give glory to him for what he has done. This will be more pleasing to the Lord than an ox, or a young ox of full growth.
Am I to take the flesh of the ox for my food, or the blood of goats for my drink? Make an offering of praise to God; keep the agreements which you have made with the Most High;
Now I make request to you, my brothers, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that you will all say the same thing, and that there may be no divisions among you, so that you may be in complete agreement, in the same mind and in the same opinion.
Food is for the stomach and the stomach for food, and God will put an end to them together. But the body is not for the desires of the flesh, but for the Lord; and the Lord for the body: And God who made the Lord Jesus come back from the dead will do the same for us by his power. Do you not see that your bodies are part of the body of Christ? how then may I take what is a part of the body of Christ and make it a part of the body of a loose woman? such a thing may not be. Or do you not see that he who is joined to a loose woman is one body with her? for God has said, The two of them will become one flesh. But he who is united to the Lord is one spirit. Keep away from the desires of the flesh. Every sin which a man does is outside of the body; but he who goes after the desires of the flesh does evil to his body. Or are you not conscious that your body is a house for the Holy Spirit which is in you, and which has been given to you by God? and you are not the owners of yourselves; For a payment has been made for you: let God be honoured in your body.
So we are the representatives of Christ, as if God was making a request to you through us: we make our request to you, in the name of Christ, be at peace with God.
But God, being full of mercy, through the great love which he had for us, Even when we were dead through our sins, gave us life together with Christ (by grace you have salvation), So that we came back from death with him, and are seated with him in the heavens, in Christ Jesus; That in the time to come he might make clear the full wealth of his grace in his mercy to us in Christ Jesus: Because by grace you have salvation through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is given by God: Not by works, so that no man may take glory to himself. For by his act we were given existence in Christ Jesus to do those good works which God before made ready for us so that we might do them.
To what purpose does sweet perfume come to me from Sheba, and spices from a far country? your burned offerings give me no pleasure, your offerings of beasts are not pleasing to me.
For it is the love of Christ which is moving us; because we are of the opinion that if one was put to death for all, then all have undergone death; And that he underwent death for all, so that the living might no longer be living to themselves, but to him who underwent death for them and came back from the dead.
And even if I am offered like a drink offering, giving myself for the cause and work of your faith, I am glad and have joy with you all:
I have all things and more than enough: I am made full, having had from Epaphroditus the things which came from you, a perfume of a sweet smell, an offering well pleasing to God.
By the new and living way which he made open for us through the veil, that is to say, his flesh; And having a great priest over the house of God, Let us go in with true hearts, in certain faith, having our hearts made free from the sense of sin and our bodies washed with clean water:
What credit is it if, when you have done evil, you take your punishment quietly? but if you are given punishment for doing right, and take it quietly, this is pleasing to God.
O Israel, come back to the Lord your God; for your evil-doing has been the cause of your fall.
But we make this request to you, my brothers: give attention to those who are working among you, who are over you in the Lord to keep order among you;
And, truly, you are lovers of all the brothers in Macedonia; but it is our desire that your love may be increased still more;
If then there is any comfort in Christ, any help given by love, any uniting of hearts in the Spirit, any loving mercies and pity, Make my joy complete by being of the same mind, having the same love, being in harmony and of one mind; Doing nothing through envy or through pride, but with low thoughts of self let everyone take others to be better than himself; Not looking everyone to his private good, but keeping in mind the things of others. Let this mind be in you which was in Christ Jesus,
Testing by experience what is well-pleasing to the Lord;
For this reason, because we have been made servants of this new order, through the mercy given to us, we are strong:
In the measure of my strong hope and belief that in nothing will I be put to shame, but that without fear, as at all times, so now will Christ have glory in my body, by life or by death.
But if any widow has children or children's children, let these see that it is right to take care of their family and their fathers and mothers: for this is pleasing in the eyes of God.
To be a servant of Christ Jesus to the Gentiles, doing the work of a priest in the good news of God, so that the offering of the Gentiles might be pleasing to God, being made holy by the Holy Spirit.
For as you, in time past, were not under the rule of God, but now have got mercy through their turning away, So in the same way these have gone against the orders of God, so that by the mercy given to you they may now get mercy.
Worthy.Bible » Commentaries » Matthew Henry Commentary » Commentary on Romans 12
Commentary on Romans 12 Matthew Henry Commentary
Chapter 12
The apostle, having at large cleared and confirmed the prime fundamental doctrines of Christianity, comes in the next place to press the principal duties. We mistake our religion if we look upon it only as a system of notions and a guide to speculation. No, it is a practical religion, that tends to the right ordering of the conversation. It is designed not only to inform our judgments, but to reform our hearts and lives. From the method of the apostle's writing in this, as in some other of the epistles (as from the management of the principal ministers of state in Christ's kingdom) the stewards of the mysteries of God may take direction how to divide the word of truth: not to press duty abstracted from privilege, nor privilege abstracted from duty; but let both go together, with a complicated design, they will greatly promote and befriend each other. The duties are drawn from the privileges, by way of inference. The foundation of Christian practice must be laid in Christian knowledge and faith. We must first understand how we receive Christ Jesus the Lord, and then we shall know the better how to walk in him. There is a great deal of duty prescribed in this chapter. The exhortations are short and pithy, briefly summing up what is good, and what the Lord our God in Christ requires of us. It is an abridgment of the Christian directory, an excellent collection of rules for the right ordering of the conversation, as becomes the gospel. It is joined to the foregoing discourse by the word "therefore.' It is the practical application of doctrinal truths that is the life of preaching. He had been discoursing at large of justification by faith, and of the riches of free grace, and the pledges and assurances we have of the glory that is to be revealed. Hence carnal libertines would be apt to infer."Therefore we may live as we list, and walk in the way of our hearts and the sight of our eyes.' Now this does not follow; the faith that justifies is a faith that "works by love.' And there is no other way to heaven but the way of holiness and obedience. Therefore what God hath joined together let no man put asunder. The particular exhortations of this chapter are reducible to the three principal heads of Christian duty: our duty to God t ourselves, and to our brother. The grace of God teaches us, in general, to live "godly, soberly, and righteously;' and to deny all that which is contrary hereunto. Now this chapter will give us to understand what godliness, sobriety, and righteousness, are though somewhat intermixed.
Rom 12:1-21
We may observe here, according to the scheme mentioned in the contents, the apostle's exhortations,