Bodies - Romans 12:1-3

Even though Romans is incredibly difficult for me to understand, I really feel like there are a couple of really powerful and clear portions that really speak to me. Chapter 8 is one of my favorites now, but I also really like chapter 12 as we move into it. Paul pleads with his fellow saints “that ye present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God.” Paul has focused a lot of these chapters on overcoming physical temptations and so it makes sense that he would use the physical body as an example of something that can be sacrificed to God. But unlike the Old Testament sacrifices, we aren’t being asked to necessarily die to the cause, but to live for it. Both ways are sacrifices, but one just lasts a lot longer.

I guess this begs the question, how do we present our bodies as a sacrifice to God, in a not dead kind of way? Well, I think that it would mean, first by keeping ourselves as healthy as we can. This is a tough one because not eating bad food is hard to do sometimes, ok most of the time. I guess it’s one of those things like knees worn out from praying, dirt under your fingernails from helping a neighbor pull weeds, peanut butter on your face from making sandwiches for kids who were hungry, wearing your garments, clear thinking mind, etc. The IM quotes Elder D. Todd Christofferson as teaching, “As our body is the instrument of our spirit, it is vital that we care for it as best we can. We should consecrate its power to serve and further the work of Christ.”
But this begs the further question, what if we’ve already used our bodies in “unclean” ways? What if we’ve already done some time in the dirt? Does that mean it’s too late for us? If that were the case, what would be the point of anyone ever repenting? It’s never too late, and there’s never anything that you can’t repent of. In deed, Paul tells us “be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind, that ye may prove what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect, will of God.” Paul recognizes that we are all in need of repentance and that we need to take our imperfect lives and change them to meet God’s requirements.
The IM quotes President Russell M. Nelson as teaching, “We are still commanded to sacrifice, but not by shedding blood of animals. Our highest sense of sacrifice is achieved as we make ourselves more sacred or holy. This we do by our obedience to the commandments of God. Thus, the laws of obedience and sacrifice are indelibly intertwined… As we comply with these and other commandments, something wonderful happens to us. We become disciplined! We become disciples! We become more sacred and holy- like our Lord!” There is a process to becoming disciples, and that is through changing our ways to match those that are commanded to us.
But everyone would be at different stages of progression, and that’s pretty much a perpetual universal truth. We all come from different backgrounds, we all have different experiences, and we all have different capacities, so we are all going to be at different levels, different places. Paul also recognizes this, and knows that we will grow faster and healthier if we strengthen each other instead of tearing each other down. And I mean, really, why do we judge, why do we put down? It is only from our own insecurity and our own lack of spiritual stability.
Paul warns us “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.” Someone pointed out to me the other day that when Christ was in mortality, he didn’t spend his time with the uber religious, he didn’t confine his interactions to those of the priestly state. Christ spent his time with the sick, the disabled, the poor, the outcast, the prostitutes, the tax collectors, etc. And we should too, I mean, we need to be safe, but we need to be open and accepting to all people, even if they make us uncomfortable because whatever it is about them that makes us uncomfortable is their reality and they need to be met where they are in order to feel Christ’s love. Like Jeffrey R. Holland said, “come as you are, but don’t expect to stay that way."