In this verse “will” is to be interpreted in its context, and the context indicates that the will of God that we are encouraged to follow is the general will of offering our bodies to God as living sacrifices, refusing to be conformed to the world’s ways, and instead being transformed from within by the renewing of our minds. It is this that we are to pursue and thus find to be good, pleasing and perfect, though, of course, if we do it, we will also find ourselves working out the details of God’s specific will for our lives.
In this verse “will” is to be interpreted in its context, and the context indicates that the will of God that we are encouraged to follow is the general will of offering our bodies to God as living sacrifices, refusing to be conformed to the world’s ways, and instead being transformed from within by the renewing of our minds. It is this that we are to pursue and thus find to be good, pleasing and perfect, though, of course, if we do it, we will also find ourselves working out the details of God’s specific will for our lives.
I find it significant that this is where Paul’s statements about being transformed by the renewing of our minds, rather than being conformed to the patterns of this world, end. They end with proving the way of God to be the best way and the will of God to be perfect.
The doctrine of redemption—the fact that “God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life” (John 3:16)—infinitely intensifies man’s value, because it teaches that even in his fallen condition in which he hates God and kills his fellow creatures, man is still so valuable to God that God planned for and carried out the death of His own precious Son to save him.
If human beings are more important and more valuable than the humanists imagine, why is it that things are so bad? The answer is the Christian doctrine of sin, which tells us that although people are more valuable than secularists imagine, they are in worse trouble than the humanists can admit.
If we are to have renewed minds, we need to stop thinking about ourselves and other people as the world thinks of itself and others and instead begin operating within a biblical framework.
In the last twenty years something terrible has happened to Americans in the way we relate to other people, and it is due to the twisted humanism we looked at yesterday. Christians have become conformed to the world in this area, and we must take a good hard look at this to be sure we don’t get swept into the pattern of our culture.
In our last study from Romans 12, I introduced the Christian doctrines of God and revelation as the biblical response to the world’s way of thinking. The Christian doctrine of God is the Bible’s answer to secularism, humanism, relativism and materialism. The only one I did not write about explicitly was humanism, and I come to the answer to that “ism” now. The answer to humanism is the Christian doctrine of man.
Canadian Committee of The Bible Study Hour
PO Box 24087, RPO Josephine
North Bay, ON, P1B 0C7