Bud shares some transformative ideas gleaned during his long and interesting life. Bud has had a great variety of experiences, this has greatly enriched his spiritual understand ing of God’s Word. I found has analogy comparing programming a computer to “the renewing of your mind” most thought provoking. My readers would be well advised to invest some serious time in pondering this wise discourse. Don’t let the world make a monkey out of you.

Gibber! Gibber!

Chugley

Our Reasonable Service

By Bud Hancock

The love that is offered to every human being as a basis for choosing salvation was a personal choice of God when He sent His only Son to this Earth as His representative to the whole world, and to be the final sacrifice for sin, and becoming a Christian is a personal choice for anyone who decides to do so. All believers are likely familiar with the famous words of the Apostle John: “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).The “believing” on one’s part is the beginning of the changes that becoming a Christian will, and rightly should, make in one’s life.

For some new believers, especially as they grow and learn about God and His love, they might experience some dismay at the changes they are expected to make. And let’s face it, some very large changes are just ahead in the new believer’s walk. But, to be realistic, if one were not ready to make life changes, the choice to receive Jesus would likely NOT have been made at all. The first, and possibly greatest change is transitioning immediately from a dead spirit, totally disconnected from the Life of God, to a reborn spirit, one newly connected to God and the “agape love” that gave Jesus to be our sacrifice.

But again, to be realistic, the changes that one experiences when one accepts the Love of God, shown through the sacrifice of Jesus, are largely undetectable by the casual observer, and this is no mystery: the changes are spiritual in nature. The noticeable changes, those that CAN be seen by those who knew the believer when he was only another dead spirit, lost in sin and floundering about, needing and hoping for something that would bring true meaning to life, DO begin to show up as the “baby Christian” learns more about His new Father and His love, and how God expects him to behave.

The various “gospels” written by the original disciples Matthew, Mark, Luke and John provide the history every Christian needs in order to fully understand Who God is and why He formulated His plan of salvation. But the epistles, some written by the same disciples, but mostly by the Apostle Paul, who was NOT one of the original disciples of Christ, provide the basics of Christian living that every believer MUST read and understand in order to please God.

We know from the Old Testament that God instituted His own rules wherein He required strict obedience and loyalty, and true worship from His chosen people, the Jews. But while those rules were a matter of life and death for the Jews, they were only temporary, waiting for the arrival of the Messiah Who, after His sacrificial death, would establish a new Rule, or Law, the Law of Love. This new Law indicated that the Old Law was only a “schoolmaster” to guide all people toward the “New Law” that God would provide through Jesus Christ. The Old Testament Jews had many requirements from God that served as a means of instituting the proper worship of God. The proper approach to the Holiness of God was shown by the ceremonial “cleansing” they were required to do before they could even approach Him through their representative priests and the High Priest. The “ceremonial cleansing” was to be replaced by the “forever cleansing” through the application of the Blood of Jesus. All of the requirements of the Old Law were to be met before they could learn the will of God for them, both as a nation and individually. The failure of the people to meet these requirements were covered by the regular sacrifice of animals, whose blood was then sprinkled on the altar in the Holy of Holies, the Most Holy Place in the Jewish Temple, as an atonement for the sins of the people. This was a foreshadowing of the permanent cleansing of the sins of the people that would be accomplished through the application of the Blood of Messiah, Jesus Christ.
Because of all the great miracles performed by God on their behalf, because of all the protections He gave them and because of the blessings of peace and prosperity He had provided for them, fulfilling all the requirements of cleansing and worship was a reasonable service expected of the Jewish People by God.

Our Reasonable Service

But, that was Old Testament; what about today? Is there some reasonable service expected of all Christians? Absolutely!

Paul speaks of our “reasonable Service” in Romans 12:1-3:
“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. 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. 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”.

In that scripture passage, he is telling believers what they must do to know the will of God, and each point he presents is as important as the others.

First, we are to “present our bodies” a living sacrifice. This statement is critical to our correct thinking and is the proof that God wants us alive and able to function when and as He needs us to. For anyone to actually believe that God wants us to sacrifice ourselves in any way that ends in our deaths is absurd.
Second, we are to refuse to conform, in any way, to the World and its wrong thinking. Wow, with all the wrong thinking with which we are constantly bombarded, through the MSM, through multiple social media platforms and through constant communication with, possibly well-meaning, but absolutely wrong-thinking, family members and friends, this is a tough one. Such bombardment is one of Satan’s ways of getting into our hearts and spirits with thoughts and ideas that are totally opposed to God and the Word. This is why the Apostle Paul warned us in 1 Corinthians 15:33, “Be not deceived: evil communications (relationships) corrupt good manners (behavior).

Third, we are to be transformed by the renewing of our minds. The word translated as “transformed” is from the Greek word, Metamorphosis (Strong’s 3339, pronounced met-am-or-pho’-o) and it literally means to be changed, or transfigured into a different form. This is the same word used by Matthew when he described the change shown when Jesus was “transfigured” in the presence of Peter, James and John:

“And after six days Jesus taketh Peter, James, and John his brother, and bringeth them up into an high mountain apart, And was transfigured before them: and his face did shine as the sun, and his raiment was white as the light”.

Jesus was not changed into a different person, but the glory of God on and around Him presented Him in a different LIGHT.

The renewing of our minds is very interesting. The English word, “renewing” is a translation of the Greek word, “anakainosis” (Strong’s 342, pronounced an-ak-ahee-no’-sis) from the Greek word “anakainoo”, (Strong’s 341, pronounced an-ak-ahee-no’-o) and it means “the restoring, or renovation” of something. I like to compare it to a computer which has been programmed with certain data that, when requested by the user, will display exactly what was programmed into it, and if the data is bad, it is commonly called GIGO, “garbage in, garbage out”. Until that computer is reprogrammed with new data, the same old garbage will be displayed every time a request is made of it.

In much the same way, we MUST reprogram our minds with new data, taken directly from God’s word. While reprogramming a computer with new data either erases or overwrites the old data, making it difficult to get it back, our brains are much more complicated and adding new data to it does not necessarily remove the old data. Unless we, as a specific decision made by the human spirit, direct the mind to conform to the new data received from God’s word, the old data (from the World’s system) will always try to impose itself into our daily lives, possibly making us unfit for God’s use.

Fourth, we must not allow any pride or ego to cause us to think that we are something more than we truly are: creatures who once were filthy and corrupt, but who are now saved and made clean by the Grace of God, through our faith in the cleansing blood of Jesus. This we must do BY FAITH; it is NOT automatic. God may allow us to see ourselves as He sees us when we err or sin and that vision of ourselves should quickly bring us back to a place of humility, realizing just where and what we would be had not God loved us enough to save us. The word translated “soberly” is from the Greek word “sophroneo” (Strong’s 4993, pronounced so-fron-eh’-o) and it means sanely, moderately and in one’s right mind. This cannot be accomplished without following the first three steps outlined above.
Of great interest to me is the word “reasonable” used by Paul in Romans 12:1. It is translated from the Greek word “logikos” (Strong’s 3050, pronounced log-ik-os’) and is only used in Romans 12:1. It is from the base word logos (Strong’s 3056, pronounced log’os) and it refers to “something said (including the thought), reasoning or motive, a computation”. In the gospel of John chapter 1, logos is used with the article “the” describing Jesus as “the Logos of God”, meaning He is the Divine Expression of God, of everything that God says and thinks.

In an age when logic, reason and rationality, and indeed sanity, have been all but discarded, we can be assured that the very epitome of sanity, reason and logic, the Logos of God, Jesus Christ has, through the words of Paul in Romans 12:1-3, given us the means of knowing His will for our lives and being able to serve and please Him.

To conclude, when we follow the words of Paul in Romans 12, we are transformed into a more usable vessel so that we can present the Divine Expression of God, Jesus Christ, to people who neither know God, nor in some cases, know OF Him. This is the reasonable service to which we commit by allowing God’s word, the Logos of God, to enable us to present our bodies to Him alive and ready to serve Him. It should be the highest priority of every believer.

Blessings and Maranatha!

Bud Hancock

Born and raised in a small textile town in North Carolina, Bud’s family moved to Michigan in the hope of finding better employment with General Motors.  After graduating from high school, Bud began an apprenticeship with General Motors to become a Metal Modelmaker.  Retiring after a 30 year career, which included an eight year stint as a Metrologist (Science of high precision measurement), he and his wife moved back to North Carolina to be near his elderly parents.  Shortly thereafter, with both of his parents having passed, he began a new career in the bank security/ATM business, advancing from an entry level technician to one of two North Carolina customer service managers for his employer.  Retiring again after 13 years, he and his wife of 51 years relocated to Tennessee where Bud began writing articles emphasizing Biblical teaching and geopolitical issues.  At age 75, he and his wife relocated to South Carolina with their Miniature Schnauzer, Baxter.  Bud continues to study God’s word and write articles on Christian living and geopolitical issues from the Biblical end times  perspective.