Romans * 84
Immovable, firm,
Prepared and Ready
Brian Kocourek, Pastor
Last Sunday we have returned to our study in the book of Romans and we began by reading from chapter 12 and verses 1-2. We found last week that that the apostle Paul was addressing the people that they must present their bodies as a living sacrifice to God.
Now, we looked at this very thought and found that the word present can be also pronounced present as in presenting something to someone. We found that Paul was not only speaking of our giving God a present, that of our own selves, but it also speaks of the actual presenting or the presentation of that Gift of our selves.
We focused our thoughts last week on the importance of the presentation of any gift and how important that presentation is. The example I used was a man coming home from a hard days work, and facing one of two scenarios. The First one I mentioned was his wife making him a nice meal and having it hot and ready for him to eat. He comes in the door and the first thing his senses tell him that there is an apple pie baking, and then he smells the other foods that are being prepared, and by the time he sits down to the table to eat, his whole body has been made ready for the feast he is about to partake in.
On the other hand, we have scene number two. What if he comes home and he doesn’t smell anything. And so he goes into the wife and says, what’s for supper, and she says, I thought we would have turkey pot pie, and corn and stuffing and for dessert we will have apple pie, now here’s your frozen TV dinner, you’ll have to bake it yourself, I’m too busy with other things.
Can you see the difference between the two scenes. Now, both of these scenes the man received from his wife a meal. On the one hand the man was presented with an aroma first,, that set the stage for a good appetite, and a nice experience. On the other scene we have a man who also was given a meal from his wife, but no preparation went into it, and therefore no real sacrifice was made.
And so we found that it is not just the present that counts but the way it is given that really means a lot to the recipient. And that is exactly what the Apostle Paul is telling us here when he says that we are to present to God our own bodies as a living sacrifice.
Notice the word Paul chose to use in presenting this to us. It is the Greek word paristemi, which is made up from two words, the prefix para meaning beside or near, or along with, and the root word histemi which means to establish, to set or place in a balance, or to cause to make a stand. In the use of this word as to make a stand, the Greek dictionary shed some further light as to the meaning of Paul’s use of this particular root word. For when it speaks of taking a stand, it means to stand immovable, firm like a rock, ready and prepared. And in this sense it refers to being of a steadfast mind; one who does not hesitate, and does not waiver. One who knows just what you are presenting. Not “wishy- washy” in your coming to God, but immovable, bold and fearless, for you know where you stand in Christ.
In the Book of
James we read JAMES
1:2 ¶ My brethren, count
it all joy when ye fall into divers temptations; 3 Knowing [this], that the
trying of your faith worketh patience. 4 But let
patience have [her] perfect work, that ye may be perfect and entire, wanting
nothing. 5 If any of you lack wisdom, let him ask of God, that giveth to all [men] liberally, and upbraideth
not; and it shall be given him. 6 But let him ask in
faith, nothing wavering. For he that wavereth is like
a wave of the sea driven with the wind and tossed. 7 For let not that man think
that he shall receive any thing of the Lord. 8 A double minded man [is] unstable in all his ways.
Notice how the Apostle James was saying the same thing here. He tells us that we can’t even expect to receive anything from God if we don’t come in faith, believing that we will receive what we ask for. He tells us that a man that is uncertain and can’t make up his mind will not receive anything from the Lord. So immovable Faith is an essential part of our relationship to God. And that comes by knowing who He is and understanding that He does not change.
In HEBREWS 11:6 we read, But without faith [it is] impossible to please Him (God): for he that cometh to God must believe that he is, and [that] he is a rewarder of them that diligently seek him.
So our faith
must be diligent and unwavering. Not hot
one day and cold the next, but as was spoken of Abraham, the Father of our
Faith, God’s Word said, ROMANS 4:20 He staggered not at
the promise of God through unbelief; but was strong in faith, giving glory to
God; 21 And being fully persuaded that, what he had promised, he was able also
to perform. 22 And therefore it was imputed to him for righteousness. 23 ¶ Now it was not written for his sake alone,
that it was imputed to him; 24 But for us also, to whom it shall be imputed, if
we believe on him that raised up Jesus our Lord from the dead;
So we see that God is very willing to reward our faith, and to receive our own selves as a sacrifice to him if we come with the right attitude and know what it is that we are doing when we make that commitment and sacrifice to him. Jesus said, they that worship God must worship Him in Spirit and Truth. So many today are willing to worship Him in Spirit, but not Truth. And if they are willing to worship Him in spirit without Truth, then we have to wonder in what spirit they are worshipping. For even Satan himself at one point was a co-leader in the worshipping of God, before his great fall from heaven. But Jesus said, I am the Way , the Truth and the Life, and no man can come to the father except through me. And if we worship apart from Truth then we are worshipping in vein.
In fact Jesus
said those very words. He said in Mark chapter 7…MARK 7:6 He answered and said unto them, Well hath Esaias prophesied of you
hypocrites, as it is written, This people honoureth
me with [their] lips, but their heart is far from me. 7 Howbeit in vain do they worship me,
teaching [for] doctrines the commandments of men. 8 For laying aside the commandment of God, ye hold the
tradition of men, [as] the washing of pots and cups: and many other such like
things ye do. 9 And he said unto them,
Full well ye reject the commandment of God, that ye may keep your own
tradition.
Now, in getting back to this thought on how we are to present our present, it is not how big or how small the present is that we give, but more important is the way in which we present it to the one we are giving it to.
Jesus gives us an example of the importance of how we give to God in Mark chapter 12.
MARK
Notice that he sat there for a while and just watched the approach of the people and how they presented there abundance back to God. NO doubt the rich men who gave very much were very thankful to God for the riches that they had. And therefore, they gave very much. But Jesus watched as this widow came and she didn’t have much, but what she did have she was willing to give.
That putts me in mind of another widow who one time was faced with the same kind of challenge to her faith. Turn with me if you will to the first Book of the Kings.
I KINGS 17:1¶ And Elijah the Tishbite,
[who was] of the inhabitants of
5 So he went and did according unto the word of the LORD:
for he went and dwelt by the brook Cherith, that [is]
before
So here we see Elijah obeying God’s Word and staying in this place, hiding out there and being nourished through this God ordained drought. But what was going on in his mind. We read that it came to pass that after a while the brook dried up, and surely Elijah knew why the brook dried up, because it was out of his very own mouth that God’s curse came forth that spoke of no rain coming until he called for it. And surely he also knew that God had said to him, that when he called for rain, it would rain, and so we see how that Elijah must have been tested himself to simply speak the word and the rain would come. But just as Jesus was so tempted by Satan when he was in the desert fasting, so too Elijah must have been tempted to speak those words for rain, and thus he would have water for his parched lips to drink.
The
scripture gives us no time reference here to let us know how long Elijah was
without water, but it must have been a long enough period of time that he was
thoroughly tested himself as to his own faith. And so we see that God always
watches patiently to see what we are made of, and to He tests us see where we are at in our faith.
8 ¶ And the word of
the LORD came unto him, saying, 9 Arise, get thee to Zarephath,
which [belongeth] to Zidon,
and dwell there: behold, I have
commanded a widow woman there to sustain thee.(Again we se that
God has told Elijah that He has commanded someone to sustain him, and this time
it is a widow woman. Again we find that it is the same Hebrew word that was
used of the ravens, and it means simply that God ordained for the nature of
this person to be such that they just had to help this man Elijah.) 10 So he arose and
went to Zarephath. And when he came to the gate of
the city, behold, the widow woman [was] there gathering of sticks: and he
called to her, and said, Fetch me, I pray thee, a little water in a
vessel, that I may drink. (Now, I do not believe this was a well
watered Elijah barking out a command to this woman, and she just stopped
everything and obeyed his every command., but rather
here was a man who had been obedient to God and stayed at a dried up brook
until God told him to move on. I can imagine his lips must have been cracked
with dryness, and his countenance must have been withered and peaked, and one
look at this man and the woman must have seen someone in worse shape than she
was in, and so being a woman full of compassion, she must have forgotten her
own trials for the moment and saw that this man was in worse shape that n even
she. And so she responded to his cry for help with going for the water to help
this poor soul. 11
And as she was going to fetch [it], he called to her, and said, Bring me, I
pray thee, a morsel of bread in thine hand.(Now, watch what he said
to her, because his words brought her back to reality, and to her own
condition,) 12
And she said, [As] the LORD thy God liveth, I have
not a cake, but an handful of meal in a barrel, and a little oil in a cruse:
and, behold, I [am] gathering two sticks, that I may go in and dress it for me
and my son, that we may eat it, and die.(You know those two sticks
represent the cross of Jesus Christ. In fact Jesus said, in LUKE
In the book of HEBREWS 12:5 we
read, And ye have
forgotten the exhortation which speaketh unto you as unto children, My son,
despise not thou the chastening of the Lord, nor faint when thou art rebuked of
him: 6 For whom the Lord loveth he chasteneth, and scourgeth every
son whom he receiveth. 7 If ye endure chastening, God
dealeth with you as with sons; for what son is he
whom the father chasteneth not? 8 But
if ye be without chastisement, whereof all are partakers, then are ye bastards,
and not sons.
Even Jesus learned obedience by the things that he suffered. That’s Hebrews 5:8
Now, in getting
back to our story, we pick up at verse 17 ¶ And it came to pass after these things,
[that] the son of the woman, the mistress of the house, fell sick; and his
sickness was so sore, that there was no breath left in him. 18 And she said unto Elijah, What have I to do
with thee, O thou man of God? art thou come unto me to
call my sin to remembrance, and to slay my son?
Now, this really put Elijah on the spot. Here was a woman who freely gave of her own last morsel to this man, and now it appears that God has rewarded her with more suffering. But never forget those immortal words spoken in Romans chapter 8, and verse 28 And we know (And we Know, Faith is a condition of the mind, And We know, and we are aware, and we are certain, and we are immovable in our belief ) that all things work together for good to them that love God, (Now, watch how he qualifies this love for God,) to them who are the called according to [his] purpose. (Yes, to them that are the Called. Not just to them that are called, because many are called but few are chosen. But to them that are the called,) Now, Elijah’s own faith is once again challenged, but notice how he takes the challenge, He goes straight to God, boldly into the Presence of God, to make his petition known.
19 And he said unto
her, Give me thy son. And he took him out of her bosom, and carried him up into
a loft, where he abode, and laid him
upon his own bed 20 And he cried
unto the LORD, and said, O LORD my God, hast thou also brought evil upon the
widow with whom I sojourn, by slaying her son? 21 And he stretched himself upon
the child three times, (notice
the parallel here, for on the third day Jesus arose.) and Elijah cried unto the LORD, and said, O
LORD my God, I pray thee, let this child's soul come into him again. 22 And the LORD heard the voice of Elijah; and
the soul of the child came into him again, and he revived. 23 And Elijah took
the child, and brought him down out of the chamber into the house, and
delivered him unto his mother: and Elijah said, See, thy son liveth. 24 And the woman said to Elijah, Now by this I know that thou [art] a man of
God, [and] that the word of the LORD in thy mouth [is] truth.
This woman recognized vindication, and she understood by the vindication that what she had gone through was just to prove her own faith.
Now in reflecting back upon this story we see in the Bible, it is not just placed in there to give us a warm fuzzy feeling, but rather, God has placed these stories in His Word to show us that He demands that our faith be unwavering.
Here we saw how that God used Elijah to put the woman’s faith to the test. It was a time when no rain had fallen for the space of many months, and the crops had failed and the waters had dried up, and yet God was keeping Elijah fed by using the ravens to bring him sandwiches of meat and bread. Then God calls him to go to the Widow’s home and put her faith to the test. Now it would have seemed like that the test would have been over when she gave the first of the cakes to Elijah, But no, a far greater test was ordained for her and Elijah together, and yet God knew they would pass the test, for he ordained this woman and he ordained Elijah.
And we are told in the Book of Acts, that as many as were ordained to Life, believed. That’s all they just simply believe.
In fact in the book of 1 Peter we are told that this testing we must go through is called the Trial of our Faith
Let’s turn one
more time in our Bibles to I PETER 1:3 and read, ¶ Blessed [be] the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, which according to his
abundant mercy hath begotten us again unto a lively (or living) hope (a
hope that has been made alive, how?) by the resurrection of Jesus Christ (out ) from (among) the dead, 4 To an
inheritance incorruptible, and undefiled, and that fadeth
not away, reserved in heaven for you,
(and if the inheritance is reserved in heaven for you, it must man that God
knows you arr going to be there.) 5 (You) Who are kept by the power of God through faith (And
what is Faith? Faith is a revelation, it is something
that has been revealed to you. And so Peter says), (You) Who are kept by the
power of God through (revelation) unto salvation ready to be revealed in the last time. (You
see right there? It’s a revelation, a last time or last days
revelation he is talking about.) 6 ¶
Wherein ye greatly rejoice, though now for a season, if need be, ye
are in heaviness through manifold temptations: (You say, if Need Be? Who needs trials? But just remember, Jesus
said, that the Father would not place upon us anything that we could not bear.
So there is a reason for all the trials we must go through). After all, is it
not a Living sacrifice that we are to present our Lord.
Now, notice what peter says next here, 7 That the trial of your faith,(That’s
the trial of your revelation) being much more precious than of gold that perisheth, though it be tried with fire, might be found unto praise and honour and glory at the appearing of Jesus Christ: (notice
then, this tells us that there is an outcome that will result from these trials
of our revelation, and that in itself tells us that the test or trial is for
the purpose of being approved and the Wuest translation tells us… If perchance there is a need for it, you have been made sorrowful in
the midst of many different kinds of testings, in
order that the approval of your faith,
which faith was examined by testing for the purpose of being approved, that
approval being much more precious than the approval of gold which perishes,
even though that gold be approved by fire testing, may be discovered after
scrutiny, to result in praise, honor and glory at the time of the revelation of
Jesus Christ.)
So we see that our faith is to be tested. And that the test in itself and the fact that you are being tested ought to show you that you have been ordained to pass the test.
As I have said before, we do not give a college entrance exam to first graders, nor second graders, nor third, fourth, fifth etc, but we give the college entrance exam to those who we think will pas the test. We do not test to disprove as acceptable, but we test to approve.
And so we see with God there is a certain immovableness He is desiring from those that serve him. And so we find the Apostle Paul telling us that we are to present our bodies as a living sacrifice, and that presentation speaks of taking a stand, it means to stand immovable, firm like a rock, ready and prepared. And in this sense it refers to being of a steadfast mind; no hesitation on our part, and we do not waiver because we know what we are presenting and we know to Whom we are presenting. We are Immovable, we are bold and fearless in our stand, and in our offering to God our very lives, for we know where we stand in Christ.
Let us bow our heads in prayer.