Good morning. It's good to be here this morning for a lot of different reasons. One that was already mentioned was I'm a covenant child of this church. We moved away when I was six years old, so I don't have a ton of memories of this place, but I do know that God used this church in great ways in my family's life, in my parents' life, and so I'm very thankful for you just to come and be here with you again. I'm also thankful to be here as the campus minister with RUF at Mississippi State, and that this is a church that has supported that work, that helped start that work so many years ago. And so I love to be on the thank you tour, to just say thank you for your love and prayers for college students. The college year has been off and running. We're five weeks in, if you can believe it, into the semester, and things are a little more normal, which as a campus minister who does a lot of big events, It's just, I'm thankful for that, to feel a little more normal and a lot of excitement on campus despite the football game yesterday that we won't talk about for the rest of the morning. Um, and another reason I'm just excited to be here is I love to open God's word with people and that's what we get to do together as the church. And so this morning we're gonna be in Romans chapter 12. Romans 12, and the first two verses. I know that y'all have sort of been looking at different parts of scripture, and it seems sort of random. We kind of are plopping into the middle of this book, but just to set some context for where we're going, Romans is Paul's longest letter in the New Testament, 16 chapters in total, but it really is divided into two parts. Romans 1 through 11 is the gospel explained, where Paul unpacks the beauty and glory of the gospel of Jesus and what he's done to reconcile a sinful people to their God. But then in chapter 12 to the end of the book, his focus shifts to not gospel explained, but gospel applied. How does this good news change our lives? And these two verses are the transitional verses where Paul will tell us that the gospel that saves us is the gospel that changes us. And the word that he uses for that change is transformed. We are a transformed people. So with that in mind, let me read the text, just two verses. Romans 12, starting in verse one. 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 renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect. This is the word of the Lord. Thanks be to God. Let me pray one more time and ask for God's help. This is your word, Lord, and we're your people, and we need it. We are thirsty for truth. Our souls pant for you. And so, Lord, speak to us. Mold and shape our hearts. Jesus, may we find you more beautiful and see you more clearly. In Jesus' name we pray, amen. And it was a couple years ago that something happened in my house that changed everything about our family, everything about our house, everything about the culture of our house. And it was when one of my children learned one word. It's a very powerful word. It's a word of control. And the word that she learned was Alexa. That my daughter knew how to control Alexa, which meant that she knew how to control the music of the house. We play music all the time. My wife and I love all kinds of different music. We love it on in the background. We love dance parties as a family. And we love a variety of music. But the last two years, two albums have played 90% of the time in our home. And it is Frozen 1 and Frozen 2. I start with that, it has nothing to do with the text, I just start with that because I'm about to use a Frozen illustration, and I wanted you to know why I'm going to use it. I wish I had a New York Times bestseller, I wish I had some Cambridge professor to quote, but I have Frozen for you, that's just where I am in life. But in Frozen 1, the soundtrack, there is a song called Fixer Upper. Not one of the famous ones, it's later on in the movie, and it's trying to convince two characters to get together that he's a bit of a fixer-upper, but that's okay. And the song has always stuck out to me, it's a very funny song, but there's a line in it that always stuck out to me about what they think change looks like in a person. or actually more accurately, how change doesn't happen in a person. So this is a little strange, but I'm gonna read the part that always sticks out to me. This is the bridge of the song. We're not saying you can change him because people don't really change. We're only saying that love is a force that's powerful and strange. People make bad choices when they're mad or scared or stressed, but throw a little love their way and you'll bring out their best. True love brings out their best. Everyone's a bit of a fixer-upper. That's what it's all about. Father, sister, brother, we need each other to raise us up and round us out. Everyone's a bit of a fixer-upper. But when push comes to shove, the only fixer-upper fixer that will fix a fixer-upper is true love. Amen. You can go in peace. You've been blessed by the movie Frozen. I love this movie. We'll watch it again this week. But there is something sad about those words, isn't there? that people don't really change. You can't expect people to change, you can't expect people to grow, but the best you can hope for is to love them and maybe the best of them comes out. And I sometimes wonder if we think of Christianity like that. that deep heart change, deep growth in this life really is something that we shouldn't expect, but that Christianity can just be something that brings out your best, that makes us a little bit better, that rounds out our rough edges. Because if you're anything like me, I wonder when you look at your life, you see a lack of change that leads to discouragement. I actually heard John Piper say one time at a conference that the thing that leads to doubt in his heart the most is not some argument against the existence of God, and it's not some trial or suffering that enters into his life. What leads him to the most doubt in his heart regarding his faith is actually when he looks at his life, he sees a lack of sanctification, a lack of growth, a lack of change, and I wonder if we're all in that boat together. That we look at our life and wonder, I have been struggling with these same sins for decades. Shouldn't I be better by now? Or we look at our anger and think, shouldn't I have more control over this and yet I don't and I feel more angry than I was before? or we look at our anxiety, no matter how many times we read that passage where Jesus tells us in the Sermon on the Mount, don't be anxious about tomorrow, we find ourselves growing in anxiety that maybe it's actually getting worse. Well, I wonder if looking at this passage, we can find a great deal of hope that Paul tells us that the gospel that saves us does not leave us there, but that gospel changes us. that Jesus desires to see his people transformed, but that transformation looks different than we expect it to look. We want it like that, but actually the work that Jesus does in his people's hearts is slow, because it's deep, because he's concerned about the heart. So what does gospel change look like? All of us want to change, all of us have things about our life we would love to change, What does gospel, true change, look like? And as we walk through this text, I want us to see three things about gospel change. First, it's all about grace. Gospel change is all about grace. Second, gospel change encompasses all of our life. And third, gospel change is a slow and a deep work. So first, gospel change is all about grace. Back to the text. These are transitional verses. Paul going from part one of Romans to part two, where he's going from gospel explain what Jesus has done to now a bunch of imperatives about how the gospel applies to our life. But what he's not doing is saying, okay, we've talked about Jesus, now we're gonna talk about how you are to fix your life. He's not separating the two. Actually, what he's going to do is all of these imperatives, all of these applications that are coming, he roots it in what Jesus has done for his people. He roots the imperatives in the indicatives, and we know that by the simple word therefore. I appeal to you therefore brothers. that since Jesus has done all this, since Jesus has closed you in a righteousness that's not your own, since grace is real, since he has united himself with you in life and in death, since now there is the life of the spirit that is for the Christians, since now there is no condemnation for those that are in Christ, since that's true, you are now a new person. Therefore, you are a new creation, able to live a different and new life, but it's all rooted in the grace of God. But it's not just because of the word therefore, it's also in this beautiful prepositional phrase. I appeal to you, therefore, brothers, by the mercies of God. I love that Paul includes this here because it's so unnecessary. He doesn't need that phrase. Why? because he's just talked about the mercies of God for 11 chapters on and on about what Jesus has done, on and on about his righteousness, his hope, his grace for his people, but it's as if, Paul, before getting to all of these imperatives, all of these commands, all of these applications, it's as if he can't help himself but to appeal to the mercy and grace of God one more time. That this is not about you, this is about his life-changing grace for his people who don't deserve it. Because isn't that the posture of a Christian? By the mercies of God. That by the mercy of God, we're here today as his church. That by the mercy of God, we have breath today. By the mercy of God, we have our families. By the mercy of God, we sing and laugh and eat. By the mercy of God. That every day on this side of hell is pure and utter grace. And that's the beginning of gospel change for his people. It's the need of grace. It's the dependency of his mercy. It's actually to acknowledge that we can't do anything about our sin on our own. We can't do anything about our anxiety or our anger or our worries about our family. We can't do anything about that on our own. But in Jesus, by the mercy of God, there's hope. We all want to reverse what Sinclair Ferguson calls the grammar of the gospel. We all want to put imperative before indicative. What do I do to help Jesus love me? But that's not the way the gospel works. It begins with our need for a perfect savior and what he has done for us. It's grace that changes us. But this is deeply uncomfortable because we hate to admit our need. I hate to admit my need. It was actually two and a half years ago that I, as a person in his 30s, was trying to keep up with an 18-year-old college student and broke a bone in my knee. And it wasn't the worst thing in the world, I'm not saying, that it was some crazy trial or suffering, but we also had a six-week-old at the time. and it was the first day of summer for our family. And so for 12 weeks, I couldn't walk. I had no surgery, but could not put weight on it for 12 weeks, on crutches, on the couch. And during that 12 weeks, it was not the pain that caused me the most suffering. It was having to be in need and ask for help. It goes against every part of who I am. I don't wanna ask for help, but I couldn't mow my yard, so I had to ask my neighbor. Our family was drowning with a new baby and a husband who couldn't do anything and so the church brought us food over and that made me deeply uncomfortable. I would walk into restaurants and old ladies would hold the door open for me. That made me deeply uncomfortable. My wife who just had a baby would have to run upstairs to my office to grab books so I can keep working. That made me uncomfortable because in life I am really good at hiding need. But for 12 weeks I couldn't. but that actually part of the Christian life, the beginning of the Christian life is actually all about saying, I can't do anything to save myself, but by the mercy of God, there's hope. What do we need to bring to Jesus even today to say, Jesus, there's nothing I can do about this? There's nothing I can do about this sin. There's nothing I can do to fix this, but in you there's hope for even a sinner such as I. It's all about grace, the Christian life, from beginning to end. Gospel change begins with throwing ourselves at the mercy of God. But then second, gospel change also encompasses all of life. Paul finally gets to an imperative, and we've been waiting for this. Paul, tell us what to do. All of us listen to sermons, waiting for the pastor, just tell me to do something. How does this apply to my life? And Paul finally gets to it, but it's not what we want him to say. Verse one again, 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. What we want Paul to say here is make sacrifices. What we want him to say is to bring sacrifices. What we want him to say is give 10% of your money to the church, give this amount of time to the work of ministry, start doing these activities, stop doing these activities. What we want him is to get specific, but he doesn't say make sacrifices. What does he tell us to do? To be a sacrifice. to present our bodies, the physical manifestation of who we are in this world as a living sacrifice to Jesus. That actually what I think Paul has in mind here is what Leviticus calls a whole burnt offering. An offering in the Old Testament sacrificial system where a gift was offered to God and it was wholly consumed in fire, nothing left. that what he's asking for here is for all of us to be yielded up as a sacrifice for King Jesus. Everything we do and everything we are, every conversation that we have, everything that we do, from changing diapers, to going to work, to tying our shoe, to every interaction we have with someone else, to all the food that we put into our bodies, every word that comes out, that all of it is to be yielded up as a sacrifice for King Jesus. How do we do that? And how can he ask for that? All of us are pretty tired. It's been a crazy couple years and we've all sacrificed. How can we be asked for more here? How is this a good thing? Because we have to see that Jesus never asked us to do something that he hasn't already done for us. That for us to be asked to be a living sacrifice for Jesus is empowered by the fact that Jesus was our dying sacrifice. That the second person of the Trinity gave all of himself for his people. That God became man, 100% man, 100% God, impossible to comprehend, absolutely true. And that He was here dining with His people, laughing with His people, living with His people, loving His people, then to go to the cross and the altar of God to offer Himself, all of Himself, to pay for their sins. Then to raise again to new life, to bring resurrection hope for His people, that He's united with us not just in life but also in death. And then to raise to the right hand of the Father. To do what? to intercede on behalf of his people, which he's doing right now for his church. That in the gospel, Jesus gives all of himself to his people. And so when he looks at us, he's not just concerned about a part of you. He's not just concerned about little bits of you. He wants all of you, your whole heart, your whole life. And here's why this is actually good news. because Paul calls this our spiritual worship. And the translation there, maybe more accurately, would be reasonable worship, true worship. The reason we were created was to be with Jesus, King Jesus, to give our whole lives to him. But we'll only begin to do that when we actually find Jesus worthy of our sacrifices. My favorite thing about being a campus minister, there's a lot, I love my job a lot, but my favorite thing is to watch students get engaged to be married. And it's not for the reason you think, though I love doing weddings and doing premarital and being excited for them. I'm most entertained by what happens in a college guy when he gets engaged. The transformation is immediate. He goes from a guy who may or may not be going to class, who may or may not be changing his bed sheets once a year, to a guy who gets a job and who saves money for the first time in his life and doesn't spend it on himself. Takes all that money that he's saved up to go to a jewelry store, which he's never been before, to buy this little thing that he cares nothing about, to then have a very vulnerable and scary conversation with the father of this girl, to then go in the vulnerable position of being on one knee and orchestrating these proposals that involve parties and photographers and all of this stuff, to then give that ring away with no financial return on that investment whatsoever. That's a lot of sacrifice. Why does he do it? We all know. Because that's what you do when you find something of infinite value. You'll give anything to get it. Those aren't sacrifices to him. He does them with a smile on his face because he found something he can't live without. When we begin to see the true glory and beauty of Jesus, to be astounded by his grace that's offered for even for people like us. All of a sudden, being and living as a living sacrifice for Jesus really is our reasonable and true worship. It was the reason we were created. It's what our hearts desire. It's the actual good life that we all long for. But it's hard. My pastor in college, Sinclair Ferguson, used to say that what God does in our lives a lot is he pokes and prods our hearts, looking for the sore spots. And he's not doing it to hurt us, he's doing it because he loves us. He's looking for the spots that he touches that we say, Jesus, you can have anything else, but you can't have that. What is that for you? What is it that we need to come to the Lord even today with an open hand to say, Jesus, I love this thing, but really it's yours. Do with it as you will. I love my family, but they're yours. Help me be a living sacrifice for you in that. I love my job, I love my money, I love my time, but they're really yours. Do with them as you please, and if I'm to become vulnerable for a second, I love my ministry, and I want it to look a certain way, but really, I'm serving King Jesus on that campus, and it's really his ministry. Do with it as you please. We are called to be living sacrifices, and that's actually good news. So gospel change is all about grace. It also encompasses all of our life, every part of who we are. But then lastly, and most frustratingly, gospel change is a slow and a deep work. Paul here ends in verse two with a few more details about what this change looks like. Verse two. Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect. Do not be conformed, but be transformed. Two commands, one positive, one negative, but I wonder if you noticed both passive. In other words, these things are happening to us. So what Paul is describing here is that every person on earth is going through a change. Every person on earth is either looking more like the world or more like Jesus. And we all know what it feels like to be conformed to this world, conformed to sort of being molded in shape, being forced into a mold for the world to tell us what's true about ourselves, for the world to tell us what the standard of success and beauty is, to feel the pressure to sort of assimilate into this world, to look more and more like it, to live up to its standards upon us. And it's exhausting. And it's hopeless. So Paul warns us, don't let it happen, fight against it. But there's another option, there's another force at work, and what does he say? Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed. Now the grammar here is kind of strange, and it's actually kind of hard to understand. It's a command, but it's a passive command. But the question you have to ask is, Paul, how do we do something that's happening to us? Well, he tells us that this transformation takes place by the renewal of your mind. And what does that mean? It means for Jesus's people, we are in a world full of lies to give ourselves over to the truth. We are to look to see that our God is not a God who remains silent, but a God who has spoken to us through his word, his living and active word that's able to mold us and shape us more than the world can, that we are here as his church, Main Street Presbyterian, gathering to hear the word sung, prayed, read, preached, and to go to the table together in both sacrament and word because we believe that it's this word, it's his word that can mold and shape our hearts and can transform our minds. the renewal of our minds, that we may slowly see us becoming more like him, loving what he loves, hating what he hates, desiring what he desires, that God is not satisfied by superficial change. He wants deep work in your heart for it to look more like him, for us to flourish as his people, desiring his will in this world. but it's hard, and it's slow. We want it to happen like this, but God wants a deeper work in us. So what does this look like in the real world? My professor in seminary used to tell this story, that he was overseas getting his PhD in Scotland, but he was working in a church outside of town. and a small rural community, agricultural community. And the church had a woman in it, it was an elderly woman who was very devout, very loving, like a pillar of the church, loved Jesus, loved the church. But her husband never came to church with her. Actually, he was not a Christian and known as a very angry and harsh man that people really wanted to avoid. But one night, the church, this small church, had an evangelistic event. where she did the most loving thing she could ever do for her husband, she forced him to come. And he sat there through it. And it was that night that Jesus actually rescued this man. That he was converted, was baptized into the church, began following Jesus, began being discipled by other men, and it was a little while into being a Christian that he comes home from work and slams the door. And his wife turns around and says, what's wrong? And he says, what's wrong? What's wrong is I've been angry all day. I've been angry from the moment I got up to the moment right now. I am angry at you. I'm angry at myself. I'm angry at the church. I'm angry with everyone I worked with. I'm angry at the work itself. I am mad. And I don't know what Christianity is supposed to be like, but I think I'm more angry today than I've ever been in my life. I don't think it's working. And his wife smiles at him. and then says, I have seen you come home every day of our marriage angry, but I have never seen you come home upset that you're angry. I've never even seen you notice that you're angry. Maybe that's how Jesus works. What this renewal of our mind might look like is all of a sudden having a sensitivity towards sin that we've really never felt before. to be in a pattern of sin our entire lives and then all of a sudden guilt begins to conjure up in our heart over that? That actually we begin to hate that thing and to want to get out of that thing? That's not you. That's the spirit at work renewing your mind, helping you love what God loves and hate what God hates. That maybe you've never thought of yourself as an evangelist, you've never really thought twice about evangelism, but all of a sudden that person in your life that doesn't know Jesus, that kind of bothers you. and you wanna see them know Jesus, you have no idea how to have that conversation, but you think about them more. That's not you, that's the renewal of your mind, helping you love what God loves and hate what God hates. That maybe there's that neighbor, or that person, that you just can't stand, and that you wanna avoid them, and you hate those conversations, and all of a sudden you begin to feel this compassion towards them. this little inkling that maybe they actually need a friend, that maybe I actually should go talk to them, and that over time, that little inkling of compassion turns into love. That's not you. That's the renewal of your mind helping you love what God loves and hate what God hates. And I'm not lowering the bar of sanctification here. There are sin patterns that we need to get out of to repent of quickly, but I wonder if you will be encouraged when you look at your life that you are actually seeing this renewal happen. You are seeing this rewiring happen. That you're giving yourself over to the truth that is molding and shaping you and transforming you. Because the same Paul who wrote this also says that Jesus is transforming us from one degree of the glory to next, together. And that he who began a good work in you will bring it to completion. The amazing thing about the Christian life, the amazing thing about a church like this, is that you get to go through this transformation together, to look more and more like him, and to be a transformed people. Let me pray. Father in heaven, we desire change, and yet we admit that we go about it wrong so often, to pull ourselves up by our own bootstraps, to live a sort of Christless Christianity, but help us to be people who are astounded by grace, your grace. Help us to be a people who long to see our whole lives given to you, and help us to be a people who lean in to the slow and deep work that you are already doing in our hearts, to resist sin, to love holiness, and to love life with you forever. We pray that we can dream of the day where one day, someday, the transformation is done, that we are made perfect in new heavens and new earth with you, and that we can celebrate the finishing of your work. We pray this in Jesus' name, amen.