How do we present our bodies as a living sacrifice?

Paul describes the worship of the Lord that entails serving him with your whole mind as a sacrifice that one must bring with your whole heart and your whole body. The word sacrifice fits the word worship both in Israel and among the Gentiles.

What was particularly special about Israel’s worship of the Lord is the fact that it not only entailed sacrifices in the temple, but that the law also concerned itself with the entire bodily existence of people, providing many directives for it, including laws about food, cleanliness, safety, marriage, etc. In this regard Israel’s worship of God radically differed from the Gentiles’ worship of idols. The Lord gave his people an all-encompassing law, so that they learned to serve him with all their heart, all their mind, and all their bodily strength. God intends the same for the returning Gentiles. They must present themselves as a sacrifice. Paul uses the Greek word soma, i.e. body here to highlight that worship involves not only the mind but the entire bodily and earthly existence of people. They must properly consider all their relationships and functions and devote them to the Creator, thereby providing a sacrifice that is living, holy, and pleasing to God. In Romans 1:18 Paul began to write about the threatening destruction of the world. Its destruction is the result of its denial of the Creator and the failure to dedicate their lives to him. When people properly consider what the worship of the Creator entails, their return will entail acknowledging and praising him in and through all of their bodily existence. They return to the rule that people must be holy because God is holy.

Paul’s audience in Rome are not circumcised and are not being subjected to the law like the Jews were, yet the law of sanctification still applies to them just as much as it did to Israel. And just like the Jews had to examine the law of Moses to discover what is pleasing to the Lord in a later period of time and in their own circumstances, so the converted Gentiles must now do the same. After all, by God’s grace they are being engrafted into the old stem of Israel. Although their incorporation into Israel does not take place through circumcision, but rather through Jesus Christ and the Holy Spirit, their membership in Israel is no less valid. The Lord’s holiness, reflected in the temple with its Holy of Holies, also becomes normative and directive for the Gentile Christians. They must consider how they, with body and soul, can live as Godfearing people. To that end, Paul proceeds to examine and apply the lessons of the Old Testament to them in what follows (see, for example Romans 12:19–20).¹