A Living Sacrifice

A Living Sacrifice

Dear brothers and sisters, I plead with you to give your bodies to God. Let them be a living and holy sacrifice—the kind he will accept. When you think of what he has done for you, is this too much to ask? Don’t copy the behavior and customs of this world, but let God transform you into a new person by changing the way you think. Then you will know what God wants you to do, and you will know how good and pleasing and perfect his will really is.Romans 12:1-2

Perhaps one of the most powerful and life-changing prayers we can pray is the prayer of surrender we read about in this verse: “Lord, I offer myself to you as a living sacrifice.” When we yield all of ourselves to God, he works and loves and thinks through us to accomplish his purposes, which are far more than we could ask or imagine. We experience enormous joy as God does his works through us. If we try to live life in our own strength, we become empty and depleted. But when we’re continually offering ourselves to the Lord, he continually fills us with his spirit of love, joy, peace, and patience.

Verse 2 is also an important part of the equation: we are to couple that surrender to God with seeking his transforming work in us. He makes us into new people from the inside out by changing the way we think as our minds are renewed with his Word. As this happens, we will know increasingly that good, pleasing, and complete will of God for our lives.

LORD, I don’t know what this day will hold, but I give myself to you as a living sacrifice. Renew and transform my mind with your truth. Make me a new person, and show me what you want me to do—the good work you’ve designed me to do, that task to accomplish, the one person you want me to minister to or encourage today. And may you get all the glory!

To pray is to change. Prayer is the central avenue God uses to transform us.Richard J. Foster (b. 1943)