Taking a Closer Look at Romans 12:1–2

A Turning Point in Romans

I appeal to you therefore, brothers, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship. Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect. —Romans 12:1–2

I love this passage. It’s a real turning point in the book of Romans. Up until now, Paul’s been outlining his gospel in full. In Romans 1-4 you get the fact that we’re all under sin. None of us is righteous, but we’re declared righteous through the death and resurrection of the Lord Jesus. Then, in chapters 5–8 we learn about life in the Spirit. We’re not under the law. In chapters 9–11 we see that even though Israel, Paul’s fellow Jews, have rejected the gospel and the righteousness of God, there’s still a future for the nation of Israel (for ethnic Israel). The Gentiles have been grafted into one body. And then in Romans 12, Paul brings it home and applies it to Christian living. So, the rest of Romans 12–16 is the practical section.

Now, don’t mishear me. The first 11 chapters have a lot of practical stuff in them, by implication, in many cases. But here it’s much more direct and explicit. And what we have here is an explanation or an introduction to what we might call the good life. Everyone wants to live a good life, don’t they? Basically, that’s what you want for your kids. That’s what you want for yourself.

The good life is actually something that the ancient world talked about as well. Aristotle and many philosophers wondered about the good life and what a good life consists of. In these two verses, we have seven points about what it means to live a good life.

What Is Required to Live a Good Life?

First of all, Romans 12:1, it says, “I appeal to you.” So the good life requires some urging. It’s not a kind of set-and-forget project. Salvation is a gift, we are given this new identity in Christ, but we have to put it on. We have to work hard along with God to work out our salvation. We don’t work for our salvation, but we need to work it out. And Paul makes that very clear with this initial verb, “I appeal to you,” or I urge you.

The second point about the good life is in the word you—which is plural. And what that means is the good life is not something you can do on your own. It requires other people around you. It’s a community project. It takes a village to bring up a child, as the saying goes, and to live the Christian life, it takes a church. You’ve got to have some people around you who can encourage, rebuke, and whom you can serve in order to live the good life.

Third, it’s a response to the mercies of God. “I appeal to you therefore, brothers [and sisters], by the mercies of God . . . .” Paul’s really outlined the mercies of God in chapters 1–11.

That’s what the gospel’s all about. We’re saved by grace. We could just as easily say we’re saved by the mercy of God. Our pitiful condition before him is we are deservedly expecting his judgment. We now have the embrace of his love. He knows us intimately and personally as his children. The mercy of God is such a wonderful thing. And that’s what is the basis for the Christian life, for the good life.

He forms our minds so that our behavior is conformed to a new way of living.

Fourth, the good life requires total dedication. Paul says, “. . . to present your bodies as a living sacrifice . . . .” Now, all of the Jewish members of the Roman church—and the Gentile ones for that matter—would’ve known about sacrifices. In Leviticus we read about the different sacrifices that the people of Israel were taught to observe. And Gentiles, too, had pagan religion which involved sacrifices. So Paul puts a spin on the idea of sacrifice that would’ve taken them by surprise. They’re not to bring an animal as a sacrifice; they’re to bring themselves, in total dedication to God, as a sacrifice. So the focus of our lives is to be living lives that please God and are dedicated to him and his service, in response to his mercy.

Fifth, the good life is countercultural. Now, culture is that invisible force that informs all sorts of things about how we live, what we think, our conduct, how we bring up our children, how we deal with conflict, the kind of holidays we have, how we dress.

Culture isn’t a bad thing in itself, but there are some bad things about all cultures that need to be addressed. And Paul says in verse 2, “Do not be conformed to this world . . . .” So Christians are to live in a different way than those around them. We’re not to cut ourselves off, of course, from the those in the world. On the contrary, we’re to love our neighbors as ourselves, but we’re not to live conforming ourselves to the desires of the world. Maybe the big three obvious ones would be pride, greed, and lust.

They’re the three that the apostle John picks out in 1 John 2 when he talks about the desires of the world. We’re not to conform ourselves to those things.

The sixth point is one of the keys here, and it is that to live a life of total dedication—a cross-cultural life, a sub-cultural life—requires thinking differently. Paul says the good life requires a renewal of our minds. Be transformed in your behavior, Paul says, “by the renewal of your mind . . . .” You will act differently when you think differently. And in a sense, the whole book of Romans is telling us how to think differently. Paul never just says, Do this, do that, don’t do this, don’t do that. He forms our minds so that our behavior is conformed to a new way of living.

And then finally, the seventh thing about the good life is that it is God’s will for us. At the very end it says when we live this way, we will discern what the will of God is—what is good for us, what is acceptable or pleasing to him, and what is perfect in his sight. It ends by saying that the good life will involve living in a way that God wants us to live. That’s the will of God in this case.

God’s Will for Us

So, seven things are required for the good life: urging, other people, in response to God’s mercy, in total dedication, countercultural living, having our minds renewed, and then testing and proving that God’s way of living is the best thing for us and is pleasing to him.

Brian S. Rosner is the author of Strengthened by the Gospel: A Theology of Romans.

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