Homily 20 — Romans 12, verses 1 to 3

“I beg you therefore, brothers and sisters, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God, which is your rational service.” [a]

He has spoken at length about God’s love for humankind, and has shown his care for us, which is beyond words, and his goodness, which cannot be told and cannot even be searched out. Now he puts this forward to persuade those who have received the benefit to show a way of life worthy of the gift. And though he is so great and so good a man, he does not shrink from begging them — and not for any enjoyment he himself was likely to get, but for what they would gain. And why wonder that he does not shrink from begging, when he even sets God’s mercies before them? What he means is this: “Since it is from this that you have those countless blessings — from the mercies of God — show them reverence, be moved by them to pity. For they themselves take the posture of suppliants, asking you to show no conduct unworthy of them. I beg you, then, by the very things through which you were saved.” It is as if someone who wanted a man who had received great kindnesses to show some regard were to bring the benefactor himself to him as a suppliant.

And what are you begging for? Let me hear. “That you present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God, which is your rational service.” When he had said “sacrifice,” to keep anyone from thinking he was telling them to kill themselves, he immediately added “living.” Then, to set it apart from the Jewish sacrifice, he calls it “holy, acceptable to God, your rational service.” For theirs was a material one, and not very acceptable either. For God says, “Who has required this at your hands?” (Isaiah 1, verse 12). And in various other passages he plainly casts them aside. It was not this that he looked to have offered, but this together with the other. That is why he says, “The sacrifice of praise will glorify me.” And again, “I will praise the name of my God with a song, and this will please him more than a young bull that puts forth horns and hoofs” (Psalm 50, verse 23; Psalm 69, verses 30 and 31). And so in another place he rejects it and says, “Will I eat the flesh of bulls, or drink the blood of goats?” (Psalm 50, verse 13), and goes on, “Offer to God a sacrifice of praise, and pay your vows to the Most High” (Psalm 50, verse 14). So Paul too tells us here to “present our bodies a living sacrifice.”

Someone may ask: “And how is the body to become a sacrifice?” Let the eye look at nothing evil, and it has become a sacrifice. Let your tongue speak nothing filthy, and it has become an offering. Let your hand do nothing lawless, and it has become a whole burnt offering. Or rather, this is not enough; we must have good works too. Let the hand give alms, the mouth bless those who oppose us, and the ears be always free to listen to the readings of Scripture. For a sacrifice allows nothing unclean; a sacrifice is the firstfruits of all our other actions. So let us yield firstfruits to God from our hands and feet and mouth and all our other members.

Such a sacrifice is well pleasing, whereas that of the Jews was even unclean; for “their sacrifices,” it says, “are to them like the bread of mourning” (Hosea 9, verse 4). Ours is not like that. That sacrifice presented the victim dead; this one makes the victim living. For when we have put our members to death, then we will be able to live. The law of this sacrifice is new, and so its fire is a marvelous kind of fire. It needs no wood or fuel laid under it. Our fire lives of itself; it does not burn up the victim, but rather gives it life. This was the sacrifice that God was looking for long ago. That is why the prophet says, “The sacrifice of God is a broken spirit” (Psalm 51, verse 17). And the three young men offer this when they say, “At this time there is no prince, or prophet, or leader, or burnt offering, or place to sacrifice before you and to find mercy. Nevertheless, in a crushed heart and a humble spirit let us be accepted” (Song of the Three Young Men, verses 15 and 16).

And notice how exactly he uses each word. He does not say, “Offer your bodies as a sacrifice,” but “present” them, as if he had said, “From now on have nothing more to do with them. You have handed them over to another.” Those who supply war-horses for the army have no further claim on them either. And you too have presented your members for the war against the devil, for that fearful battle line. Do not lower them to your own selfish uses. He also shows another thing by this word: that if one means to present them, one must make them fit to be approved. For it is not to any mortal being that we present them, but to God, the King of the universe — and not for war only, but to carry the King himself seated on them.

For he does not refuse even to be seated on our members; he greatly desires it. What no king who is only our fellow servant would choose to do, the Lord of angels chooses. Since, then, the body is both presented, as for a king’s use, and is a sacrifice, rid it of every blemish; for if it has a blemish, it will no longer be a sacrifice. The eye that looks with lust cannot be sacrificed; the hand that is grasping and greedy for plunder cannot be presented; nor can the feet that limp and walk to the theaters; nor the belly that is the slave of self-indulgence and kindles cravings for pleasures; nor the heart that harbors rage and a love of prostitutes; nor the tongue that speaks filthy things. So we must search out the blemishes on our body on every side. For if those who offered the sacrifices of old were told to look on every side, and were not allowed to offer an animal “that has anything extra or anything missing, or has an itch or scabs”

(Leviticus 22, verses 22 and 23), how much more must we, who offer not animals without reason but ourselves, show greater strictness and be pure in every respect, so that we too may be able to say as Paul did, “I am now ready to be offered, and the time of my departure is at hand” (Second Timothy 4, verse 6). For he was purer than any sacrifice, and that is why he speaks of himself as “ready to be offered.” But this will come about if we kill the old man, if we put to death our members that are on the earth, if we crucify the world to ourselves. [f]

In this way we will not need the knife any more, nor altar, nor fire. Or rather, we will need all these, but not made with hands: all of them will come to us from above — fire from above, and the knife too — and our altar will be the breadth of heaven. For if, when Elijah offered the visible sacrifice, a flame came down from above and consumed the whole of it, water, wood and stones, much more will this be done for you. And if you have anything in you that is slack and worldly, and yet you offer the sacrifice with a good intention, the fire of the Spirit will come down, and it will both wear away that worldliness and complete the whole sacrifice.

But what is “rational service”? It means spiritual ministry, a way of life lived according to Christ. Just as a man who serves in the house of God and carries out its rites, whatever sort of man he may be, draws himself together and becomes more dignified, so we ought to be minded our whole life long, as people who are serving and ministering. And this will be so if every day you bring him sacrifices and become the priest of your own body and of the virtue of your soul — as, for example, when you offer sober living, when you offer almsgiving, when you offer goodness and forbearance. For in doing this you offer “a rational service,” that is, one with nothing bodily, coarse or visible about it.

So, having lifted the hearer up by the names he has given, and having shown that each person, by the way he lives, is a priest of his own flesh, he also tells the way by which we may accomplish all this. What, then, is the way?

Verse 2: “And do not be fashioned after this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind.” [i]

For the fashion of this world is groveling and worthless and lasts only for a time. It has nothing lofty or lasting or straight about it; it is wholly twisted. So if you want to walk upright, do not shape yourself after the fashion of this present life. For there is nothing abiding or stable in it. That is why he calls it a fashion; and so in another passage, “the fashion of this world is passing away” (First Corinthians 7, verse 31). It has no durability or fixedness; everything in it lasts only for a season. And so he calls it “this age,” to show how liable it is to misfortune, and by the word “fashion” he shows how unsubstantial it is. Speak of riches, or glory, or physical beauty, or luxury, or any other of its seemingly great things you like: it is only a fashion, not reality; a show and a mask, not any lasting substance. “But do not be fashioned after this,” he says, “but be transformed by the renewing of your mind.”

He does not say, “Change the fashion,” but “Be transformed,” to show that the world’s ways are a fashion, but virtue is not a fashion; it is a real form, with a natural beauty of its own. It needs none of the trickeries and fashions of outward things, which no sooner appear than they come to nothing. For all these things are dissolving even before they come to light. So if you throw the fashion aside, you will quickly come to the form. For nothing is weaker than vice; nothing wears old so easily.

Then, since it was likely that, being human, they would sin every day, he comforts his hearer by saying, “Renew yourself” from day to day. This is what we do with houses: we keep repairing them as they grow old. Do the same with yourself. Have you sinned today? Have you made your soul old? Do not despair, do not lose heart, but renew it by repentance and tears and confession and by doing good things. And never fail to do this. And how are we to do it?

“That you may prove what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect will of God.” [j]

Either he means this: be renewed so that you may learn what is to your advantage and what the will of God is. Or rather this: that you can be renewed in this way if you learn what is to your advantage and what God wills. For if you see this, and know how to tell apart the nature of things, you have the whole way of virtue in your hands.

Someone may say: “But who does not know what is to his advantage, and what the will of God is?” Those who are flustered by the things of this world; those who think riches something to be envied; those who look down on poverty; those who chase after power; those who gape after outward glory; those who think themselves great men when they put up fine houses and buy costly tombs and keep herds of slaves and carry a great swarm of eunuchs around with them. These do not know what is to their advantage, or what the will of God is. For the two are one and the same thing: God wills what is to our advantage, and what God wills is also to our advantage.

What, then, are the things God wills? To live in poverty, in humility, in contempt of glory; in self-control, not in self-indulgence; in distress, not in ease; in sorrow, not in loose living and laughter; and in all the other things about which he has given us laws. But most people even think these things bad omens, so far are they from thinking them to their advantage and the will of God. That is why they can never come near even the labors that virtue asks. People who do not know even so much as what virtue is, but honor vice in its place, and take the prostitute to their bed instead of the modest wife — how are they to be able to stand apart from the present world?

So above all we ought to have a correct judgment of things. Even if we do not pursue virtue, we should praise virtue; even if we do not avoid vice, we should condemn vice; so that at least our judgments may remain uncorrupted. For in this way, as we go forward on our road, we will be able to lay hold of the realities. That, then, is why he tells you to be renewed, “that you may prove what is the will of God.”

But here he seems to me to be attacking the Jews as well, who cling to the law. For the old covenant was a will of God, yet not his final purpose; it was allowed because of their weakness. But the will that is perfect and well pleasing is the new way of life. So too, when he called it “a rational service,” it was to set it against that other service that he gave it this name.

Verse 3: “For I say, through the grace given to me, to everyone among you, not to think of himself more highly than he ought to think, but to think soberly, according as God has dealt to each one the measure of faith.” [l]

Having said above, “I beg you by the mercies,” here again he says, “through the grace.” Notice the teacher’s humility; notice how thoroughly subdued his spirit is! He means that he is in no way worthy to be trusted when he gives such exhortation and counsel. But at one time he takes the mercies of God along with him, at another God’s grace. He would say: “It is not my own word that I am speaking, but one from God.” And he does not say, “For I say to you by the wisdom of God,” or, “For I say to you by the law given by God,” but “through the grace.” In this way he reminds them continually of the benefits done them, to make them more willing to submit, and to show that on this account too they were bound to obey what is said here.

“To everyone among you.” Not to this person or that one only, but to the ruler and the ruled, to the slave and the free, to the unlearned and the wise, to the woman and the man, to the young and the old. For the law is common to all, since it is the Lord’s. By this he also makes his words give no offense, setting the lessons he gives before everyone, even before those they do not touch, so that those they do touch may accept the rebuke and correction more willingly. And what do you say? Let me hear. “Not to think more highly than he ought to think.” Here he brings before us the mother of good deeds, which is humility, imitating his own Teacher.

For when the Lord went up the mountain and was about to give a whole fabric of moral teaching, he took this as his first beginning and made it the foundation, in the words, “Blessed are the poor in spirit” (Matthew 5, verse 3). So Paul too, now that he has passed from the doctrinal parts of the letter to those of a more practical kind, has taught us virtue in general terms by requiring of us that admirable sacrifice. And as he is about to give a more detailed portrait of it, he begins from humility as from the head, and tells us “not to think more highly of oneself than one ought to think” — for this is his will — “but to think soberly.” What he means is roughly this: we have received wisdom, not to use it to make us haughty, but to make us sober-minded. [m]

And he does not say “so as to be humble,” but “so as to be sober-minded.” By sober-mindedness he means here not the virtue that is the opposite of lewdness, nor freedom from lack of self-control, but being sober and healthy in mind. The Greek name for it means keeping the mind safe.

He wants to show that the one who does not think modestly of himself cannot be sober-minded either — that is, cannot be steady and healthy in mind, because such a person is bewildered and out of his wits, and more crazed than any madman. That is why he calls humility sober-mindedness. [o]

“According as God has dealt to each one the measure of faith.” Having gifts given to them had made many unreasonably proud, both among these people and among the Corinthians. So see how he lays bare the cause of the disease and removes it little by little. After saying that we should think soberly, he goes on, “according as God has dealt to each one the measure of faith,” meaning here the gift that comes by faith. And by using the word “dealt,” he comforts the one who had less, and humbles the one who had the greater share. For if God dealt it, and it is no achievement of yours, why think highly of yourself?

But if anyone says that “faith” here does not mean the gift, that would only show all the more that he was humbling the empty boasters. For if the faith by which miracles are worked, which is the cause of the gift, is itself from God, on what ground do you think highly of yourself? If he had not come, or taken flesh, the things of faith would not have gone well either.

And it is from here that all good things take their rise. But if it is he who gives it, he knows how he is dealing it out. For he made all, and he takes the same care of all. And as his giving came from his love for humankind, so does the amount he gives. He had shown his goodness in the main point, which is the giving of the gift; was he likely to neglect you in the matter of its measure? If he had wanted to dishonor you, he would not have given the gifts at all. But if saving you and honoring you was what he had in view — and it was for this that he came and handed out such great blessings — why are you thrown into confusion and upset? Why do you misuse your wisdom to make yourself foolish, and make yourself more disgraceful than someone who is foolish by nature? For being foolish by nature is no ground for blame. But being foolish through wisdom is at once to rob oneself of every excuse and to run into a greater punishment. [q]

Such, then, are those who pride themselves on their wisdom and fall into the extreme of arrogance. For arrogance in all things makes a person a fool. That is why the prophet calls the barbarian by this name: “The fool,” he says, “will speak folly” (Isaiah 32, verse 6). And so that you may see his folly from his own words, hear what he says: “Above the stars of heaven I will set my throne, and I will be like the Most High.”

(Isaiah 14, verse 14.) “I will seize the world like a nest, and like abandoned eggs I will carry them off” (Isaiah 10, verse 14). What could be more foolish than these words? Every instance of haughty language at once draws this reproach on itself. If I were to set before you every saying of the arrogant, you would not be able to tell whether the words were those of an arrogant man or of a fool, so completely is this failing the same as that one. [s]

Another, of a foreign nation, says again, “I am God and not man” (Ezekiel 28, verse 2); and another again, “Can God save you, or rescue you out of my hand?” (Daniel 3, verse 15). And the Egyptian too: “I do not know the Lord, and I will not let Israel go” (Exodus 5, verse 2). And the fool in the psalm is of this kind, who “has said in his heart, There is no God” (Psalm 14, verse 1). And Cain: “Am I my brother’s keeper?” (Genesis 4, verse 9). Can you now tell whether these words are those of the arrogant or of the fool?

For arrogance goes beyond due bounds and departs from reason — which is where its Greek name comes from — and it makes people both fools and full of empty glory. Just as “the beginning of wisdom is the fear of the Lord” (Proverbs 9, verse 10), so the beginning of folly is surely not knowing the Lord. If, then, knowing him is wisdom, and not knowing him is folly, and this ignorance comes from pride — for the beginning of pride is not knowing the Lord — then pride is the extreme of folly. Such was Nabal: if not toward God, at least toward man, he became senseless from his arrogance. But afterward he died of fear.

For when anyone falls from the measure of wisdom, he at once becomes both a coward and brazen, since his soul has been made feeble. As the body, when it loses its proper tone and falls out of condition, is a prey to any disease, so too the soul, when it has lost its greatness of nature and its humility and taken on some feeble habit, becomes fearful as well as brazen and unreasonable, and loses its power of knowing itself. And one who has lost that — how is he to know the things above himself? A man seized with frenzy, once he has lost these powers, does not know even what is right in front of him; and the eye, when it is dimmed, darkens all the other members. So it happens with this arrogance.

That is why these people are more miserable than the mad, or than those who are simple by nature. Like them they stir laughter, and like them they are ill-tempered. They are out of their wits as the others are, but they are not pitied as the others are. They are beside themselves, as these are, but they are not excused as these are; they are only hated. And while they have the failings of both, they are robbed of the excuse of both, being ridiculous not only because of their words but because of their whole bearing as well.

For why, tell me, do you stiffen your neck? Why walk on tiptoe? Why knit your brows? Why stick out your chest? You cannot make one hair white or black (Matthew 5, verse 36), and you walk with as lofty a stride as if you could command everything. No doubt you would like to have wings and not walk on the earth at all! No doubt you would like to be a marvel of nature! Have you not made yourself a freak of nature already, when you, a man, try to fly — or rather, when you are flying on the inside, and bloated in every limb?

What shall I call you, to rid you of your arrogance? Shall I call you ashes, and dust, and smoke, and swirling haze? I have described your worthlessness, certainly, but I have still not caught the exact image I wanted. For I want to set before myself their swollen state and all its emptiness. What image, then, am I to find that will fit all this? To me it seems like tow in a blaze.

For it seems to swell and lift itself up when it is lit, but at a slight touch of the hand it all collapses and turns out to be more worthless than the flimsiest ashes. The souls of these men are of this sort: even the most ordinary attack can humble that empty puffed-up state of theirs and bring it down. For the one who behaves arrogantly must of necessity be a thoroughly feeble person, since the height he has is not a sound one. Just as bubbles are easily burst, so these men are easily undone. If you do not believe it, give me a brazen, arrogant man, and you will find him more cowardly than a hare at the most trivial event. The flame that rises from dry sticks turns to dust as soon as it is lit, while solid logs do not easily catch, by their nature, but once lit keep their flame burning a long time. In the same way, souls that are stern and firm are not easily kindled or put out; but these men go through both in a single moment. [w]

Since, then, we know this, let us practice humility. For nothing is as powerful as humility. It is stronger even than a rock and harder than diamond, and it places us in a safety greater than that of towers and cities and walls, being too high for any of the devil’s siege engines. Arrogance, by contrast, makes people an easy prey even to ordinary happenings; it is, as I was saying, more easily broken than a bubble, torn more quickly than a spider’s web, and dissolved faster than smoke. So, that we may walk on the solid rock, let us leave that and take hold of this. For in this way we will find rest in this present life, and in the world to come we will have every blessing, by the grace and love for humankind of our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom and with whom be glory to the Father, with the Holy Spirit, forever and ever. Amen.