Chapter 12:1-8 

” ¹ I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that you present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God, which is your reasonable service. ² And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God. ³ For I say, through the grace given to me, to everyone who is among you, not to think of himself more highly than he ought to think, but to think soberly, as God has dealt to each one a measure of faith. ⁴ For as we have many members in one body, but all the members do not have the same function, ⁵ so we, being many, are one body in Christ, and individually members of one another. ⁶ Having then gifts differing according to the grace that is given to us, let us use them: if prophecy, let us prophesy in proportion to our faith; ⁷ or ministry, let us use it in our ministering; he who teaches, in teaching; ⁸ he who exhorts, in exhortation; he who gives, with liberality; he who leads, with diligence; he who shows mercy, with cheerfulness.“

We spent the last few weeks in chapter 9-11, and as we were speaking, we were seeing in the news the enemies of Israel begin to sign treaties with them. Now, I cannot think of one commentator that thinks that President Trump is the anti-Christ. As I understand the scriptures, he is too old, not Jewish and is the head of a country that has never been a part of the Roman Empire. He is also too well known; as far as I can understand, the anti-Christ is a nobody. He just comes out of nowhere and helps broker a deal with Israel and her enemies that includes rebuilding the Temple. No such treaty has been signed. But make no mistake, these small victories, small doors opening, are the key to the big one that is to come.

If you were to go back and read the end of Romans 8 and then skip ahead to Romans 12, there would be continuity. Once we have been assured of our security in Jesus, then the great Apostle Paul can beseech us to be transformed. Security in Jesus is the catalyst for true transformation. This is a very important doctrine to grasp. We do not transform to be saved; we seek to be transformed because we are saved and secure in Jesus. This is so important.

I have children, three to be exact. I love them dearly; they are mine. Two of them were born to my wife before my wife and I even met, the third during our marriage. I introduce all of them as my kids. I love them and they identify with me. They have security to know that even when they fail, I love them. Now, there are times when I fail and I have to ask for forgiveness of them. My littlest is no more my kid than the other two. Most people who meet us for the first time cannot deduce that the first two are not mine by blood. They have security, and I as a dad have security with them. Now that there is security, I have the right as the dad to expect certain things of them and they of me.

In the passage we are about to look at here in Romans 12, we will see that we have the same situation because of our security in Jesus; go back and read the end of chapter 8. Now, Jesus expects something of us, and we expect something of Him. He expects us to surrender our bodies to Him, and we expect Him to transform us first by renewing our minds, verses 1-2. In verse 1, we find that the surrender of our bodies to Jesus, to give Him absolute control over our bodies, is a reasonable service. Paul, via the Holy Spirit, is not asking us to do something that is unreasonable. The least we can do, based on the security we have in Jesus, is to give Him control of our bodies. This is a reasonable request that is made of us.

When I was 17, I answered the call into the ministry. When I left home that Sunday in the spring of 1984 to go to a Fifth Sunday Youth Service, I had no idea that I would come home heading to seminary and not to a secular university to study accounting. But during the invitation, I felt the leading of the Lord to go and surrender to the ministry; I have never looked back. Sometimes I feel as if the Lord made a mistake, but that is an impossibility.

I have recently finished my Ph.D. in Theology and look forward to learning more. It was a reasonable request for the Lord to ask me to enter the ministry. It was a reasonable request for the Lord to ask me to give up the perceived security of the secular degree for seminary degrees. It was reasonable for the Lord to ask me to leave my home, my family, and travel far away to a Biblically conservative seminary so as to be equipped for the work ahead. The call on you is no less reasonable. Whatever God has called you to surrender your body to is reasonable when we consider the salvation and eternal security we have in Him.

In turn, Jesus will transform us. The word that we get the English word transform from is the root word for metamorphosis. We understand this process best in the caterpillar. It cocoons itself and emerges a short time later as a beautiful butterfly. No one erects caterpillar sanctuaries, but we have a rather large butterfly sanctuary not far from my home in Niagara Falls. But, without the caterpillar, there are no butterflies. Once we have presented our bodies to Jesus for His service, He then transforms us, and this first happens in the mind. If you can change the way a person thinks, you can change the way they act.

We have all met people and, sadly, one of those people is the man or woman in the mirror that can act a certain way but think another. We have all made assumptions about a person’s mind by the way they think, only to be surprised later as we get to know them more. Jesus wants to illuminate this discrepancy. He wants the way we think and the way we act to be the same, so the first transformation must be in the mind.

Most churches spend forever working on the outside, and we conservative Baptists are the worst for that. Some of the things that have gone on in conservative churches, from sexual trysts and deviation to just about anything you can think, is testimony that unless you change the mind, no amount of acting will work. Sooner or later, they all find out that you are acting and not truly transformed. The mind is transformed by the Holy Word of God and the Holy Spirit; they work hand in hand to change the way we think. For the butterfly to live, the caterpillar has to die; they cannot co-exist. The same is true for us; we must die to self and put aside all of our dreams and hopes for Jesus and His ways only. Anything that gets in the way has to go, and this is not an easy task.

In verses 3-8 we are told that there are some things that we will become as we are transformed. First of all, humility is the most important thing. One of the first things that Jesus will change through the Bible and the Holy Spirit is how you see yourself. You and I are nothing without Jesus. You and I are just a part of the absolutely gargantuan family of God. We need each other, and none of us are more important than the other. There are no big “I(s)” in the Kingdom. Each has a God-ordained part to play, and none are more important than the other. Jesus is the only Superstar.

Think of all the ‘great’ preachers that have died; from Billy Sunday to Billy Graham to Jack Hyles, and someone else has taken their place. We are all replaceable. If you do not want to do God’s work, He has others that will take your blessings and take your place. The world system has conditioned us to think that we are important; we are not. Jesus and His way are important. Too many of the Lord’s churches are people-centered and not Jesus centered. If the church you attend can only survive if the pastor stays, then Jesus is not the Head and Center of your local church. I tell my people often, preachers leave in U-hauls or hearses, but they always leave.

We need each other. We are supposed to be helpers to each other. We are to carry each other and serve each other. We all have strengths and gifts. I am not an emotional person, most of the time, but my wife can empathize and cry with everybody. She is strong where I am weak, and vice-versa. I need her. She completes me as a minister and gives me the help I need to serve and reach more people for Jesus. This is what verses 4-8 is about. We all, via the transformation brought about by Jesus, are called to do certain things. Now, some of us will have several of these strengths, but one or two will be dominant. We will all have a way to serve in the Kingdom. No one gets left out; God will give you one of these callings to be transformed with. Notice that they all include serving others:

“⁴ For as we have many members in one body, but all the members do not have the same function, ⁵ so we, being many, are one body in Christ, and individually members of one another. ⁶ Having then gifts differing according to the grace that is given to us, let us use them: if prophecy, let us prophesy in proportion to our faith; ⁷ or ministry, let us use it in our ministering; he who teaches, in teaching; ⁸ he who exhorts, in exhortation; he who gives, with liberality; he who leads, with diligence; he who shows mercy, with cheerfulness.”

Even leadership in verse 8 has to do with others; one has to have someone to lead, and anyone who has done leadership right will know that the essence of good leadership is serving. You see the progression; give your body as a sacrifice to Jesus, He transforms you in your mind and you humble yourself, then you become a great servant. This is the Christian transformation; sacrifice, humility and service. Come, let us old caterpillars die so we can be butterflies in Jesus. I leave you with Philippians 2:5-8 (MEV):

“Let this mind be in you all, which was also in Christ Jesus,

who, being in the form of God,

did not consider equality with God something to be grasped.

But He emptied Himself,

taking upon Himself the form of a servant,

and was made in the likeness of men.

And being found in the form of a man,

He humbled Himself

and became obedient to death,

even death on a cross.”

God bless you,

Dr. Sean Gooding

Pastor of Mississauga Missionary Baptist Church

How to Connect with Us

On Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/MississaugaMissionaryBaptistChurch

Online: https://www.mississaugamissionarybaptistchurch.com/ (under construction)

Email: missionarybaptistchurch76@yahoo.ca

Chapter 11:11-36 

“¹¹ I say then, have they stumbled that they should fall? Certainly not! But through their fall, to provoke them to jealousy, salvation has come to the Gentiles. ¹² Now if their fall is riches for the world, and their failure riches for the Gentiles, how much more their fullness!¹³ For I speak to you Gentiles; inasmuch as I am an apostle to the Gentiles, I magnify my ministry, ¹⁴ if by any means I may provoke to jealousy those who are my flesh and save some of them. ¹⁵ For if their being cast away is the reconciling of the world, what will their acceptance be but life from the dead?¹⁶ For if the first fruit is holy, the lump is also holy; and if the root is holy, so are the branches. ¹⁷ And if some of the branches were broken off, and you, being a wild olive tree, were grafted in among them, and with them became a partaker of the root and fatness of the olive tree,

“¹⁸ do not boast against the branches. But if you do boast, remember that you do not support the root, but the root supports you.¹⁹ You will say then, ‘Branches were broken off that I might be grafted in.’ ²⁰ Well said. Because of unbelief they were broken off, and you stand by faith. Do not be haughty, but fear. ²¹ For if God did not spare the natural branches, He may not spare you either. ²² Therefore consider the goodness and severity of God: on those who fell, severity; but toward you, goodness, if you continue in His goodness. Otherwise you also will be cut off. ²³ And they also, if they do not continue in unbelief, will be grafted in, for God is able to graft them in again. ²⁴ For if you were cut out of the olive tree which is wild by nature, and were grafted contrary to nature into a cultivated olive tree, how much more will these, who are natural branches, be grafted into their own olive tree?

“²⁵ For I do not desire, brethren, that you should be ignorant of this mystery, lest you should be wise in your own opinion, that blindness in part has happened to Israel until the fullness of the Gentiles has come in. ²⁶ And so all Israel will be saved, as it is written: ‘The Deliverer will come out of Zion, and He will turn away ungodliness from Jacob; ²⁷ For this is My covenant with them, when I take away their sins.’

“²⁸ Concerning the gospel they are enemies for your sake, but concerning the election they are beloved for the sake of the fathers. ²⁹ For the gifts and the calling of God are irrevocable. ³⁰ For as you were once disobedient to God, yet have now obtained mercy through their disobedience, ³¹ even so these also have now been disobedient, that through the mercy shown you they also may obtain mercy. ³² For God has committed them all to disobedience, that He might have mercy on all. ³³ Oh, the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are His judgments and His ways past finding out!

“³⁴ ‘For who has known the mind of the Lord? Or who has become His counselor?’ ³⁵ ‘Or who has first given to Him and it shall be repaid to him?’ ³⁶ For of Him and through Him and to Him are all things, to whom be glory forever. Amen.“

Thanks to all those that read the lessons. Your kind words of encouragement are good to me. I had thought to write on another idea as I was preparing this; but as I began to look at the text, another thought came into my mind, and it is that we will explore today. There is a doctrine that is going around today, not a new one, but it is becoming more and more prevalent as we see the end of the Gentile age approach. The idea is that the New Testament church has replaced Israel in God’s plan and scheme. They rejected Jesus the week of His death, and God has washed His hands of them and moved on to the Gentile church. Too bad, so sad for Israel.

But God, in His wisdom and knowing that this doctrine would arise, prepared us with the scriptural ammunition to refute this completely. He began to refute this in Daniel 9 where He told Daniel about the 70 weeks (490 years) that were appointed to Israel. Those 490 years would complete God’s plan to redeem Israel and the whole world. The prophecy is told to Daniel, and it specifically is made about ‘his people and the Holy City’; these are the Jews and Jerusalem.

In Isaiah 2 and 65, we find promises made about the kind of rest the Messiah would bring to Israel in the ‘latter days’; these are our days. The same promises are mentioned in Micah 4, and there they are expanded. God builds further on that to the Jews in the New Testament age via the pen of the apostle Paul. Here in these three chapters 9-11 of Romans, God makes it clear that He is not done with Israel.

This book was written about 57 AD, some 25 years or so after Jesus’ death, burial and resurrection. Paul would die somewhere between 64-67 AD by execution. Nero would begin to kill and execute Christians, and a lot of the Christians in Rome at the time were Jews. By 70 AD, the city of Jerusalem would be ransacked and destroyed by General Titus and a large Roman army. The Jewish people would be scattered to the ends of the earth and the city sacked. The majestic temple would be torn down brick by brick, and Jerusalem would be trampled over by Gentiles. The nation of Israel as a unified body would cease to exist just 13 years after this letter was inspired by the Holy Spirit and written by Paul.

God was getting ahead of the coming emotional, physical and spiritual pain that was coming by giving the remnant of Israel hope. Hope that one day soon, God’s judgment would be turned and He would revert to dealing with the Jews and restoring the nation. Satan has done all in His power to eradicate the Jews. In fact, it is his work to kill off the Jews that reminds us that God is not done. The Jews have been hated, hunted and slaughtered everywhere they went. I had the unfortunate opportunity to watch one of the anti-Jewish hatred propagandas from the Third Reich. They were called dirty; it was implied that they did not care about Poland and that they were almost not human. We know that story of the concentration camps in World War 2.

I saw a man the other day talking about how his mom was in the concentration camps as a Jewish girl in her 20s. He came to the USA when he was 9 with his mom; she was a survivor. One can still travel to Europe and see the camps, see the millions of shoes, the wall of suitcases and see the machines of death that killed some 6,000,000 Jews. But in all that, Satan could not win; you see, God had millions of Jews hidden elsewhere.

I spoke to a man this weekend past from Ethiopia, and he told me of the very large Jewish population in Ethiopia. He knew many Jews, many of them dark-skinned, as he grew up. Well, in our time, shortly after this massive assassination of these millions of Jews, God allowed the nation to resurrect from the grave. It has never happened before that a nation that had been ‘dead’ for almost 2,000 years had come back to life. But Israel did. On May 14, 1948, the nation formed again and was immediately recognized as a nation by the USA. To this day, Israel is surrounded by her enemies, from the Muslims in Iraq, those in Iran, those in the PLA, those in Syria and elsewhere. But, as we come to the end of the age, another enemy has arisen, posing as conservative Bible scholars. They proclaim in complete opposition to God, the Bible and the writings here of the apostle Paul that God is done with Israel. This is hogwash.

Paul lays out his case in these verses we will look at – sorry, more accurately, God lays out His case and His promise here to help Jewish believers, some of whom will be alive to see Israel destroyed and Jerusalem burnt to the ground. They will see 100,000 of their countrymen slaughtered by the Romans and another 40,000 taken into captivity. The Jewish believers will have these three chapters in this Roman letter to hold on to. Here are the things that God gave them and us; don’t ever forget that salvation comes by and through the Jews. God called Abraham. God preserved Jacob in Egypt. God brought them to the Promised land. God gave them David. God preserved the lineage of David even in Babylonian captivity; don’t forget that God sent Jesus to be born, live, die on the cross and then resurrect in Israel.

Salvation is a Jewish story. Jesus is a Jew. The first Christians were Jews, the Bible was mostly written by Jews, and the entire book of Revelation, once we get past chapter 4, is about Israel. Jesus is a Jewish Messiah, a Jewish King, and the world we are waiting for is going to be centered in Jerusalem. Everything about salvation is Jewish.

The next thing is that God is the one who graciously and miraculously brought in the Gentiles. It was not normal that we Gentiles, called the wild olive branches (see verse 17), could be brought in to the Kingdom. BUT GOD, in His loving kindness and gracious goodness, miraculously grafted us in and brought us into His family through the Jewish Saviour, Jesus. In normal farming it is impossible to graft a wild olive branch to the cultivated one; it was and is truly a miracle that God has done for us.

There will come a time, maybe soon, that the ‘fullness of the Gentiles,’ the number that God knows will be redeemed is done, and then He will return to working with Israel. Paul warns that we should not become arrogant and forget where our salvation came from. We tell a Jewish story, about a Jewish man/God, who died just outside Jerusalem; He was even executed as the King of the Jews, was buried in a Jewish grave and was resurrected as the Jewish Saviour.

Lastly, God does not owe us an explanation. He is God. If He wants to deal with the Jews who rejected Him, it is His business and His alone. He also will keep the promises that He made to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. In verse 29, we are told that the calling and gifts of God are irrevocable. Thank God!!! If God could lie to the Jews and break promises to the Jews, then He could do the same to us, and eternal life would not exist. But God cannot lie. God cannot break a promise, and He cannot go against His expressed will. Soon, very soon, in fact, we see the groundwork, as like many presidents before him, President Trump has orchestrated a treaty between the UAE and Israel. These little treaties are tests and precursors to the one that will change the world.

One day soon, a man, an unknown seemingly insignificant leader, will broker a treaty between Israel and her enemies; this treaty will signal the beginning of the Tribulation. Notice that the treaty is between the rival Jewish brothers: the pretenders, the Arabs like Iraq, Iran and Turkey, a lot of the Muslim world, the descendants of Ishmael; and rightful heirs of Israel, the descendants of Abraham through Jacob. It is the Gentile age that will come to an end. The Jews have been put on hold for 2,000 years for our sake, but the time is running out, and the day, that day, is coming.

My Gentile friend, I too am one, have you trusted in the Jewish Messiah? Have you confessed your sinfulness, recognized your impossible situation, that you cannot please God or attain to God’s holiness on your own? Then if you have come to that point, I can tell you that is in the right place to call on Jesus, the Jewish Saviour, who will save you and cleanse you from all your sins, washing you in His blood and giving you His righteous perfection via sending the Holy Spirit to live in you. Then you will be saved forever. God can never revoke your salvation because, like He keeps His promises to the Jews; He will keep His promises to you.

“For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in Him, should not perish, but have everlasting life” (John 3:16).

God bless you,

Dr. Sean Gooding

Pastor of Mississauga Missionary Baptist Church

How to Connect With Us

On Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/MississaugaMissionaryBaptistChurch

Online: https://www.mississaugamissionarybaptistchurch.com/ (under construction)

Email: missionarybaptistchurch76@yahoo.ca