Romans 12:1

Romans 12:1 says, I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that ye present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service.  This has always been the passage that I come back to when life is seemingly out of control.  God, through Paul, is asking us to give ourselves to God.  It is by the mercy of God that this is even possible, so it is certainly not an unreasonable request.  We are to be a living sacrifice.  Once we accept Christ and become His followers, we are to daily sacrifice ourselves to His service.  We are not called to death, but to life everlasting.  Too often we live as though once we accept Christ we have to sacrifice so much, but we are not called to sacrifice anything that we really need.  We are to live by God's plan for our lives.  Paul says this is a reasonable service.  God gives us everlasting life, so it is only reasonable that we would want to live our lives for Him.  Verse two adds, And be not conformed to this world: but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind, that ye may prove what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect, will of God.  Paul says that we are not to be conformed to the world.  I believe this is more than in the way we look and talk, though those are certainly aspects of not conforming. When we want to look and act like everyone else in the world so that people will not think we are different, this is not what God says to us.  We are to be different, and not just in outward appearances, but in an inward change.  We are to be transformed by the renewing of our minds.  We are no longer to think as the world thinks, but are to follow God's leadership in all things.  A transformer can take something small and make it larger, or it can take something large and make it smaller.  I believe too often we feel that when we accept Christ that our lives have somehow been made smaller.  We dwell on what we have given up for God, instead of seeing how much He has improved our lives.  We cannot be His followers without being transformed into something better. Our very thought processes are to be changed.  We need to remember that God looks to the reason for actions and not just the actions themselves.  Verse three continues, For I say, through the grace given unto me, to every man that is among you, not to think of himself more highly than he ought to think; but to think soberly, according as God hath dealt to every man the measure of faith.  Paul was speaking to them through the grace God had shown him, not through the status he had achieved by birth and education. He called on us to do the same, relating to people through the grace God has bestowed on us.  When we do, we cannot think to highly of ourselves.  Instead of being boastful, we are to be sober, because we owe everything to God through faith. Since God has freely provided salvation for all, it is a small thing that He calls on us to do to willing submit to Him through faith.