1 I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the compassions of God, to present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God, [which is] your intelligent service.
yourselves also, as living stones, are being built up a spiritual house, a holy priesthood, to offer spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God by Jesus Christ.
Neither yield your members instruments of unrighteousness to sin, but yield yourselves to God as alive from among [the] dead, and your members instruments of righteousness to God.
By him therefore let us offer [the] sacrifice of praise continually to God, that is, [the] fruit of [the] lips confessing his name. But of doing good and communicating [of your substance] be not forgetful, for with such sacrifices God is well pleased.
And be not conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of [your] mind, that ye may prove what [is] the good and acceptable and perfect will of God.
who once [were] not a people, but now God's people; who were not enjoying mercy, but now have found mercy. Beloved, I exhort [you], as strangers and sojourners, to abstain from fleshly lusts, which war against the soul; having your conversation honest among the Gentiles, that [as to that] in which they speak against you as evildoers, they may through [your] good works, [themselves] witnessing [them], glorify God in [the] day of visitation.
Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable in thy sight, O Jehovah, my rock, and my redeemer.
Know ye not that to whom ye yield yourselves bondmen for obedience, ye are bondmen to him whom ye obey, whether of sin unto death, or of obedience unto righteousness?
What shall I render unto Jehovah, [for] all his benefits toward me?
But when the kindness and love to man of our Saviour God appeared, not on the principle of works which [have been done] in righteousness which *we* had done, but according to his own mercy he saved us through [the] washing of regeneration and renewal of [the] Holy Spirit, which he poured out on us richly through Jesus Christ our Saviour; that, having been justified by *his* grace, we should become heirs according to [the] hope of eternal life. The word [is] faithful, and I desire that thou insist strenuously on these things, that they who have believed God may take care to pay diligent attention to good works. These things are good and profitable to men.
For the rest, then, brethren, we beg you and exhort you in [the] Lord Jesus, even as ye have received from us how ye ought to walk and please God, even as ye also do walk, that ye would abound still more.
But [as] fellow-workmen, we also beseech that ye receive not the grace of God in vain:
Purge out the old leaven, that ye may be a new lump, according as ye are unleavened. For also our passover, Christ, has been sacrificed; so that let us celebrate the feast, not with old leaven, nor with leaven of malice and wickedness, but with unleavened [bread] of sincerity and truth.
But I beseech you, brethren, by our Lord Jesus Christ, and by the love of the Spirit, that ye strive together with me in prayers for me to God;
I will praise the name of God with a song, and will magnify him with thanksgiving; And it shall please Jehovah more than an ox, -- a bullock with horns and cloven hoofs.
Should I eat the flesh of bulls, and drink the blood of goats? Offer unto God thanksgiving, and perform thy vows unto the Most High;
Now I exhort you, brethren, by the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that ye all say the same thing, and that there be not among you divisions; but that ye be perfectly united in the same mind and in the same opinion.
Meats for the belly, and the belly for meats; but God will bring to nothing both it and them: but the body [is] not for fornication, but for the Lord, and the Lord for the body. And God has both raised up the Lord, and will raise us up from among [the dead] by his power. Do ye not know that your bodies are members of Christ? Shall I then, taking the members of the Christ, make [them] members of a harlot? Far be the thought. Do ye not know that he [that is] joined to the harlot is one body? for the two, he says, shall be one flesh. But he that [is] joined to the Lord is one Spirit. Flee fornication. Every sin which a man may practise is without the body, but he that commits fornication sins against his own body. Do ye not know that your body is [the] temple of the Holy Spirit which [is] in you, which ye have of God; and ye are not your own? for ye have been bought with a price: glorify now then God in your body.
We are ambassadors therefore for Christ, God as [it were] beseeching by us, we entreat for Christ, Be reconciled to God.
but God, being rich in mercy, because of his great love wherewith he loved us, (we too being dead in offences,) has quickened us with the Christ, (ye are saved by grace,) and has raised [us] up together, and has made [us] sit down together in the heavenlies in Christ Jesus, that he might display in the coming ages the surpassing riches of his grace in kindness towards us in Christ Jesus. For ye are saved by grace, through faith; and this not of yourselves; it is God's gift: not on the principle of works, that no one might boast. For we are his workmanship, having been created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God has before prepared that we should walk in them.
To what purpose should there come to me incense from Sheba, and the sweet cane from a far country? Your burnt-offerings are not acceptable, nor are your sacrifices pleasing unto me.
For the love of the Christ constrains us, having judged this: that one died for all, then all have died; and he died for all, that they who live should no longer live to themselves, but to him who died for them and has been raised.
But if also I am poured out as a libation on the sacrifice and ministration of your faith, I rejoice, and rejoice in common with you all.
But I have all things in full supply and abound; I am full, having received of Epaphroditus the things [sent] from you, an odour of sweet savour, an acceptable sacrifice, agreeable to God.
the new and living way which he has dedicated for us through the veil, that is, his flesh, and [having] a great priest over the house of God, let us approach with a true heart, in full assurance of faith, sprinkled as to our hearts from a wicked conscience, and washed as to our body with pure water.
For what glory [is it], if sinning and being buffeted ye shall bear [it]? but if, doing good and suffering, ye shall bear [it], this is acceptable with God.
Take with you words, and turn to Jehovah; say unto him, Forgive all iniquity, and receive [us] graciously; so will we render the calves of our lips.
But we beg you, brethren, to know those who labour among you, and take the lead among you in [the] Lord, and admonish you,
For also ye do this towards all the brethren in the whole of Macedonia; but we exhort you, brethren, to abound still more,
If then [there be] any comfort in Christ, if any consolation of love, if any fellowship of [the] Spirit, if any bowels and compassions, fulfil my joy, that ye may think the same thing, having the same love, joined in soul, thinking one thing; [let] nothing [be] in the spirit of strife or vain glory, but, in lowliness of mind, each esteeming the other as more excellent than themselves; regarding not each his own [qualities], but each those of others also. For let this mind be in you which [was] also in Christ Jesus;
Therefore, having this ministry, as we have had mercy shewn us, we faint not.
according to my earnest expectation and hope, that in nothing I shall be ashamed, but in all boldness, as always, now also Christ shall be magnified in my body whether by life or by death.
but if any widow have children or descendants, let them learn first to be pious as regards their own house, and to render a return on their side to [their] parents; for this is acceptable in the sight of God.
for me to be minister of Christ Jesus to the nations, carrying on as a sacrificial service the [message of] glad tidings of God, in order that the offering up of the nations might be acceptable, sanctified by [the] Holy Spirit.
For as indeed *ye* [also] once have not believed in God, but now have been objects of mercy through the unbelief of *these*; so these also have now not believed in your mercy, in order that *they* also may be objects of 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,