Romans 12:1 “Urging”

 Here’s my fairly literal translation of these verses:

¹I am urging you, therefore, brothers, because of the sympathies of God, to present your (pl.) bodies [as] a living sacrifice, holy, [and] well-pleasing to God, [which is] your (pl.) logical/reasonable act of worship.

It seems, as I have been studying this verse, that almost every word is an atom bomb of truth. That should actually come as no surprise, following eleven chapters proclaiming the glorious Gospel of grace!

Clearly, Paul here moves to the natural question of, “How shall we then live?” This is especially imperative, having presented that Gospel of grace and, having emphatically stated, “We are not under law, but under grace.” Understanding what this means would be particularly important for Jewish Christians, used to living under the Law, with all its very specific rules. On the other hand, I would maintain it is critical for all of us to ponder, understand, and let God weave these thoughts into our souls.

What do I mean? It is very easy for us today to look at the people of Israel and see their legalism. The Hasidic Jews (modern counterparts to the Pharisees of Jesus’ day) are probably the most visible consequence of people supposedly pursuing a relationship with God, based on OT law. That approach to “religion” expresses the idea that knowing God is a matter of meticulous rule-keeping. Supposedly, if you try really hard to keep all of the rules, you can persuade others that you are a “religious” person and that God likes you.

Turning from the Jews and looking around, is that not what all “religion” is about – keeping some specific set of rules or ceremonies? Each “faith” is distinctive not only for the beliefs that they hold, but visibly for their unique practices. A prime example is “Seventh Day Adventists.” To join their company means you go to church on Saturday, not Sunday. To be any kind of Protestant means you go to church on Sunday, repeat the Lord’s Prayer and perhaps the Apostles’ Creed, maybe teach Sunday School, etc. What distinguishes every “religion” is their unique rituals and practices and standards.

That, I have come to understand, is because we are all obligate legalists. Our natural inclination all day every day is to think life is somehow about “keeping the rules.” Making people happy usually comes down to keeping (their) rules. and certainly, we think making God happy comes down to keeping His rules. Then Jesus comes along and tells us it all comes down simply to “love God/love others.”

We try to come to God with our obligate legalism, only for Him to slap it out of our hands! Actually, even for OT believers, what did He say is the sum of it all? “To do justly, to love mercy, and to walk humbly with thy God” (Mic. 6:8). I know it was true of me and also that it was so with others – that when we really came face to face with grace, it caused a strange nakedness as we stood before God. “But, but, but…if you take away all these things I’m ‘doing,’ what is my relationship with God???” Then one marvels to realize all the Lord ever really wanted was you. “Nothing in my hand I bring…”

If a person has read and truly understood the first eleven chapters of Romans, and if we have truly drunk deeply of the wonder of His grace, then as we come to Romans 12:1, Paul is answering the very question our hearts long to ask: “How shall we then live?” If I’m not under Law, but under grace, what will my life look like? What kind of person will I be?

“Ah,” Paul replies, “I’m so glad you asked!” Actually, the very simple answer to that question is Jesus. God saves us for the specific purpose of “transforming us into His image, from glory to glory” (II Cor. 3:18). As we stand together at this point, I believe we would see any direction the Lord gives us not as a “set of rules to keep,” but as the very heart of Jesus and this God of grace with whom we have fallen deeply in love.

So, then, the wording of Romans 12:1 should come as no surprise at all. Consider how it starts, “I urge you, brothers…” Urge? “But shouldn’t it be, ‘I command you, Christians…’” No, it shouldn’t. Born again hearts do not sit at the foot of Mt. Sinai hoping God will give them Ten Commandments. They don’t grovel peevishly shouting, “All the Lord commands us, we will do.” He doesn’t need to get out His whip for us. “Obedience” isn’t about keeping the rules. It’s about knowing His heart, wanting to please Him, about wanting to be like Him. So how would an Apostle speak to such people? “I urge you, brothers.”

The word translated “urge” means literally something like “to call beside.” It might refer to that kindly grandfather who puts his arm around you and says, “Here’s the way to do this,” or perhaps the kind coach who sits beside the struggling athlete and shows him he’s doing better than he thinks.

May we all be reminded that is the way of grace. Grace does not command. It draws. “Commands” tell us, “Do this and live.” Grace instead steps into our heart and says, “Live, and do this!” All of this brings us back to what we learned from Daniel – “the unassailable citadel of the human heart.” “Commands” are a power word. In this world, if you have enough power, you can basically get anyone to do anything.

Nebuchadnezzar could threaten people with a raging fiery furnace and get them all to bow down and worship his idol. Essentially, the entire Babylonian Empire would bow before his idol – except three young Hebrew fellows. However, think about all those other people. Was their bowing real? Was it not clearly forced upon them? Obviously, it was not real, and, in fact, it proved nothing except that Nebuchadnezzar was a brutal bully.

There again, you may have the power to threaten people into doing almost anything, but have you changed their heart? No. It has always been true of even the most powerful kings who ever lived, there is one thing they cannot do. They cannot change a human heart.

To “call beside,” to urge, to appeal are all words that communicate respect. They are words that woo, words that draw. That is how you can speak to people with “good” hearts, people you are confident want to do right, and that is what is true of every real believer. At this point in the book of Romans, if you have to command people, it only proves they haven’t really understood those first eleven chapters.

Now, I have to insert an excurses on this business of commands. Someone may object, “But what about all the commands in the NT? That word has not disappeared. What about Jesus’ words, ‘A new command I give you…?” First of all, yes, the word “command” is still clearly present in the NT. However, stop and consider that it appears in its various forms about 800x in the OT, but drops to only about 100 in the New. In this Church age and with the indwelling of the Holy Spirit, believers simply don’t need to be constantly “commanded.”

However, as we are all too aware, while I am indwelt by the Holy Spirit and sincerely want to do right, my Adamic sin nature is still quite present and ever longing to drag me back down to hell. Paul addressed this soundly in chapter 7. “So I find this law at work: Although I want to do good, evil is right there with me. For in my inner being I delight in God’s law; but I see another law at work in me, waging war against the law of my mind and making me a prisoner of the law of sin at work within me” (vv. 22,23)

Although we are born-again, we still have that sin nature. Personally I like to think of the “commands” of the NT as like guard-rails on the highway. Although I certainly want to stay in my lane, I am also keenly aware of how easily I can lose concentration or fall asleep at the wheel and plunge myself over a cliff. Those guard-rails are there to keep me on that “straight-and-narrow.” I want there to be guard-rails, and so it is in my Christian life. Precisely because I want to obey God, I actually appreciate the “guard-rails” of God’s commands.

So, yes, they are still there. To me, anyone who has ever been required to supervise people knows it’s true. You can have one very compliant student or worker who actually wants to please you and whom you can give a great deal of freedom, confident they want to do right. Then you can have another person who seems to have been born with what I would call a wanderlust. They take a lot of watching, a lot of commanding, but it is precisely because they don’t want to obey. If you and I are truly born-again, we have become that first person, and so the 800 commands drops to only 100. You and I only need “commands” as guard-rails, while those yet outside of Christ can only be commanded.

End of excursus. What I am saying is all supported by the very next phrase, “because of the mercies of God.” Paul can urge us “because of the mercies of God.” The “mercies of God” is basically those first eleven chapters of Romans -- because of the Gospel, because of grace, because, from the very bottom of our souls we thank God for our salvation, we need only urging, not someone standing over us with a whip.

There is much more to say, but I will stop here. I would suggest, if we should take away anything from these words, it would be to simply re-commit in our hearts to being submissive to our Lord’s will. Though that battle rages within us, and perhaps even because of that battle, we can look up to Jesus in the very deep gratitude of our hearts and say, “Yes, Lord, I do believe,” then add, “help my unbelief!”

I hope as I wander through the rest of the book of Romans, I can constantly keep in mind, every word that is written is written for people who want to obey. Although the Spirit within in me makes me one of those people, I am also keenly aware my sin nature is alive and well. And so I hear the Lord calling to me, “Do not be like the horse or the mule, which must be controlled by bit and bridle or they will not come to you,” rather, “Let me guide you by My eye” (Ps. 32:8,9).

Yes, Lord, help me not be a stubborn mule You have to constantly command. Help me to be that person you can guide simply by Your eye. May I only require of You urging.

 

Daniel 12:13 “Rest”

Here’s my fairly literal translation of these verses:

¹³And you go to the end and you will rest and you will stand to your lot to the end of the days. 

And so, here we are. Daniel 12:13, the last verse of this wonderful book, the Lord’s last recorded words to our friend Daniel. I have been trying to simply ruminate on these words, to let them sink deeply into my soul. That is in part because I am so loathe to end my study of this book. I’m loathe to end these frequent visits with this man who has taught me so much and who I have come to admire deeply. If I seem to babble on, it might be because I simply don’t want this all to end. 

It’s interesting to me to note that the Lord used this very man Daniel the first time He ever “touched” me. I know I’ve related this before, but, since I’m deliberately procrastinating my conclusion, I’ll relate it again. The very first time I remember the Lord’s “touch,” I couldn’t have been more than 4 years old. My brothers and I were attending a Vacation Bible School in our little bitty town.

I clearly remember a lady had out her flannel graph and was telling us the story of “Daniel in the Lions’ Den.” All I remember is that I liked the little cut-out picture of Daniel and just being told the story. But, what struck me most was the lady herself. There was a kindness and gentleness and love about her that just seemed to glow in my little heart. I know now what it was. It was Jesus. She was a real born-again woman who sincerely loved us, who loved me, and that day, Jesus reached out through her, and through this Daniel, and touched my heart.

As I sit here today, Jesus is that exact same glow in my heart. I like Him. He makes my heart happy. I want to know Him, for Him and this same gentle kindness to be a part of my life. Even as I think of our Daniel, he still lights that same glow, that exact same happy feeling in my heart. I like him. I want to be like him—just like that lady.

Little could I have ever imagined that, near the end of my life, I would spend some ten years studying Daniel’s book, very slowly enjoying every verse, every word, sometimes even every letter! At this point, there is no doubt in my mind that he has been the single greatest influence in my life -- on who I am, on the kind of believer I am, on how I see God Himself -- than any other single person (besides my parents, of course).

Looking at this final verse, it strikes me that (as usual) it is packed with meaning. First, it starts with the Hebrew word “you” – second person singular pronoun. As I have pointed out before, in Hebrew they seldom ever speak pronouns like this. The pronouns get absorbed into their verbs. When they are expressed, it is for emphasis. So when the Lord says to him, “You…,” He is clearly and deliberately speaking to Daniel himself,

This reminds us all that a relationship with God is personal. He is not the Deist’s god who lives out there somewhere and is just sort of everyone’s god in general. No. He is your God. He is my God. He is, at the exact same time, the God who knows and cares for every single living thing in this world. “The Lord is good to all and His tender mercies are over all His works. He opens His hand and satisfies the desires of every living thing.”

As this elderly Daniel stands here beside the river, his God is the God who has known him his whole life, who has walked beside him, helped him, taught him, used him in ministry to others. The two of them know each other well. Daniel is a man whose own eyes have seen angels, talked to them, heard and seen for himself incredible visions of human history right down to the end. He’s been a man who has spent his entire adult life faithfully meeting the Lord in prayer and studying diligently in the Word. He’s asked many questions, right down to verse 8 just above us: “I heard but I did not understand, so I asked, ‘My Lord, what will the outcome of all this be?’”

And what are these final words to this Daniel? “As for you, go [your way] until the end. You will rest, and then at the end of the days you will rise to [receive] your allotted inheritance.” In Hebrew He says simply to Daniel, “Go.” From verse 9 to 13, the Lord does not answer his question, rather just throws in more mysterious prophecies, then tells him, “Go.” If you and I would pause to ponder that single word, we’ll realize this is simply a part of knowing God. Deut. 29:29 says, “The secret things belong to the Lord our God, but the things revealed belong to us and to our children forever, that we may follow all the words of this Law.” The plain simple fact is that His thoughts are not our thoughts. “As the heavens are high above the earth, so are His thoughts above our thoughts.”

To know God is to know much. Jesus promised us, “You shall know the truth, and the truth shall set you free.” As I’ve studied the book of Daniel and all his prophecies, it has amazed me what a blessing it is for us believers – to actually know the flow of human history right down to the end of this world we live in. From the Bible, we know much about even our own personal lives, what is right, what is wrong, what we should do and what we shouldn’t. However, there is always much we don’t know!

Part of walking with God for a lifetime is to accept that simple little truth, “The secret things belong to the Lord our God.” I can pray and study and ask and ask and ask, but there will always be things I just don’t understand. As I face those things, what does the Lord tell me? “Go.” I have to give up and just do what I do know.

It was massively helpful to me when I learned that Jesus really did mean it when He said the two Great Commands are to love God and love people, that all of the law and prophets comes down to those simple commands. Paul had learned that and told the Galatians, “All that matters is faith expressing itself through love” (5:6). Where that is massively liberating to me is precisely when I’m confused, when I feel like I really don’t know “what’s up.” I can always come back to reminding myself, no matter how much I don’t know, if I make it my goal, to the best of my ability, today to simply love God and others, then when I lay my head down at night, I can know I succeeded.

Sometimes I feel so confused, I almost don’t know what to do. The Lord says, “Go.” I’m personally stuck right now in this awful murky world, hanging between my entire life of full-time work and this strange, scary, uncertain world called retirement. Part of me so wishes I could just give it all up and stay home. However, work is really all I’ve ever known. I love my job. I love the people I work with. It seems like to me that my engineering is the main place the Lord has used me all down through the years. How can I give that up? What am I giving it up to? I want Him to use me. I want to do all the good I can for other people for as long as I remain here on earth. If I do retire, where am I going?

All those questions frankly terrify me right now. I feel horridly confused and uncertain what to do. So what am I to do today? “Go.” “Love God, love others.” “Whatever you do, wherever you are, whoever you’re with, just make it your goal to love God and others.” I have to believe, as I do that, somehow He will make it all clear. I just don’t get to know “it all” ahead of time. I simply have to “Go.” That is what Daniel was told and that is what the Lord tells you and me. Daniel didn’t get all his questions answered and neither will you and I. That is simply part of serving and knowing this mysterious, infinite God we call Jesus! And note again, Daniel is an old man. He’s been walking with God for something on the order of 90 years! And what does he still have to accept as his answer from the Lord? “Go.”

Note again, though, the Lord’s kindness. For this very elderly man, what else does the Lord tell him? “…You will rest, and then at the end of the days you will rise to [receive] your allotted inheritance.” “You will rest.” You see we are still listening to a very personal relationship. The Lord tells him, “You will rest.” Daniel has heard the Lord’s plans for the human race far into the future. But what about him? The Lord tells him, “You will rest.” He is going to die. The older we get, the more inviting that thought becomes, however, for each of us, it isn’t just “You will die.” The Lord says, “You will rest.”

What an incredible kindness! As it says in Job 18:14, for the human race, death is “the king of terrors.” Hebrews 2:15 describes humans as “those who all their lives were held in slavery by their fear of death.” As I pause and ponder on the Lord’s words, “You will rest,” I’m struck by the thought that I take this for granted. After some fifty years knowing the Lord, I have come to take it for granted that I don’t fear death! I’ve got to live my entire adult life seeing my own death as actually something good. It isn’t “death;” it’s rest.

Interesting. Rest. Yes, that is exactly what my heart sees. Life is hard. It is very hard. Yet, as a believer, from the very bottom of my soul, I see death as simply a transfer – a transfer from this world of constant stress and worries and frankly unbearable workloads, into a world of perfect beauty and all things good. Of course that’s what I see. That’s what the Bible teaches us. Our souls hang on those words, “They will be His people, and God Himself will be with them and be their God. He will wipe away every tear from their eyes, There will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain…” (Rev. 21:3,4).

In fact, I feel exactly what Paul describes in Phil. 1:22-24, “Yet what shall I choose? I am torn between the two: I desire to depart and be with Christ, which is better by far; but it is more necessary for you that I remain in the body.” In our minds, like Paul, the only thing “bad” about death is the people we leave behind. I love being a husband and a father and a grandfather. I love all the people I work with. I live to do them all good. Yet death takes all of that from me.

As I sit here typing, if the Lord were to suddenly appear and say, “Okay, Don, you’re done here. Time to come home,” that would be a glorious relief. Yet, my first thought would be, “But, but, but…what about Joan? She needs me. What about my kids and grandkids? I really don’t want them to have to sit through a funeral! What about all my family and friends who might not know the Lord? I was hoping maybe somehow, someway, Jesus could use this confused, bungling idiot to touch them.” Huh. It seems I’m also “torn between the two!”

Just so it’s said, the one thing I’m sure we all still “fear” about death is the pain. We’d all like to just die quietly in our sleep and slip away to meet the Lord, but we’re also aware we could die of cancer or get creamed by a semi. For that, we just have to trust the Lord. He said, “Precious in the sight of the Lord is the death of His saints” (Ps. 116:15). Who knows? Maybe believers don’t feel pain when they die. Wouldn’t surprise me—even if we’re creamed by a semi!

All of that aside, yes, I take it for granted that I actually see death as “rest.” Where do I get that from? The Bible. Just like Daniel, what the Lord calls me to is not “death,” but rather rest. What an incredible kindness! In my heart of hearts, I need to not take that for granted. It’s just one more thing I can thank our wonderful Lord for. I’m so glad my friend Daniel got to go to his rest. He suffered so much. His whole life he suffered, torn from his family and forced to serve as “head of the warlocks” under the wicked kings of Babylon and Persia! His faithfulness through all of that inspires me. Yet, I’m glad it ended for him and he got to go to his rest.

One last thing to note is the Lord promising Daniel, “…and then at the end of the days you will rise to [receive] your allotted inheritance.” Remember Daniel was a Jew. It was enormously important to them that they had an inheritance in the Promised Land. As a boy, Daniel would have just assumed he was going to marry one of those cute Jewish girls, have a family, and live out their lives on their “allotted inheritance” there in Israel. Yet at probably about 15, he was ripped away from it all and forced to live out his earthly life in the epicenter of evil – Babylon.

We probably utterly fail to realize how painful that was for our Daniel. Yet, what are the Lord’s last recorded words to him? “…and then at the end of the days you will rise to [receive] your allotted inheritance.”

“No, Daniel. You’ve not lost everything. In fact, the very things you wanted most are at this very moment awaiting you in glory!”

So what are we to do? “Go.” Live our lives. Take care of our people. Pray. Do all the good we can for all the people we can for as long as we can. And then what? “You will rest, and you will rise to live out all your wildest dreams…forever.”

Daniel’s life (and death) are recorded for us “upon whom the end of the ages has come” that we might be encouraged to love and worship and serve the same wonderful God, and do it all in the comfort of knowing, no matter what, there is a beautiful future in store for each of us!

Daniel 12:12 “Waiting”

Here’s my fairly literal translation of these verses:

¹²Blessed [is] the one waiting and he will arrive at days of one thousand three hundred thirty and five.” 

The NIV translates this “Blessed is the one who waits for and reaches the end of the 1,335 days.” What a delicious little cordial is this verse! It’s one to pop in your mouth and just let it swirl around while it slowly releases its delectable sweetness!

“Blessed is the one…” Perhaps we read those words so often in the Bible, we lose sight of their enormity? They are recorded again and again from cover to cover and, remember, perhaps the most famous sermon of all, the “Sermon on the Mount,” begins with Jesus telling us over and over, “Blessed are the…”

Our God is a God of blessing! Our faith is not about slavish rituals, worshiping a far-away god you’re not sure you can trust. It’s about blessing. It’s no mistake, one of the most basic songs of the Christian faith is “Jesus loves me; this I know…” Jesus loves me. And what’s another one? How about, “Count your many blessings, name them one by one…”

Blessing. Our God is about blessing. Even as I sit here typing, these thoughts just swirl in my head and I find I don’t want to leave them! I’m hearing Steven Tyler singing, “I just wanna hold you close, feel your heart so close to mine; And just stay here in this moment, For all the rest of time…!” Where are the words? How can I say what it means to literally swim in this love-life we call “knowing God?” Sitting here in this glow, enjoying this inexpressible sweetness, nothing else really matters.

David exclaimed, “Because Thy lovingkindness is better than life, my lips shall praise Thee!” “One thing I ask from the Lord, this only do I seek: that I may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life, to gaze on the beauty of the Lord and to seek him in his temple.”

Blessing. And then…in what do we find all this blessing? “Blessed is the one who waits…” Waits. Waiting. As I’ve been pondering on this little verse, I’ve been thinking a lot about this “waiting” business. “Blessed is the one who waits…” If we back up a second, I think we’d all have to admit, we don’t like waiting. Maybe that is primarily an American problem? We always want everything right now. We pray, “Lord, give me patience,” then add, “And I want it NOW!”

However, with the Lord, as is so often the case, we find ourselves waiting. Someone once said, “Whatever the Lord does, He seems to do it slowly.” There in the Garden, He told Adam and Eve He would send “the seed of the woman” to “crush the head of the serpent.” If the two of them were anything like us, they probably thought their firstborn son would be that Messiah to save their now broken world. Little could they have imagined that some 6,000 years later, we would still be praying, “Maranatha! Come, Lord Jesus!” We’re still waiting!

How many times have we each prayed urgently for things, only to find ourselves having to remember Jesus told us, “Men ought always to pray, and not give up!” Probably like anyone else readying these words, I have prayers I’ve been praying for 40 years and still waiting for God’s answer. It’s wonderful when we pray for things and see the Lord answer almost immediately. He does do that…just not usually.

But notice – the blessing is in the waiting. “Blessed is the one who waits…” I even like the fact that, in Hebrew, “the one who waits” is an articular Qal participle. You could translate it “the waiting one.” I need to ask myself, am I a “waiting one?” As the Lord watches me and listens to my prayers, does He see a “waiting one,” or does He see an impatient, discontent man who, in truth, will not be happy until he gets what he wants?

Even concerning things I see as urgent, can I simply content myself to express those matters to God, then wait for Him to answer – as the song says, “In His time”? What this verse in Daniel would teach us is that the real blessing is not always having our prayers answered, but rather in the waiting for it! Daniel has been teaching us throughout His book that “the Most High rules in the nations of men.” Even as I sit here typing, it is making perfect sense. If, as we’re waiting, we’re also trusting (and learning to trust), we are in reality finding one of the greatest blessings of all – just to be confident in God and leave it all in His infinitely wise and loving hands. We’re learning to be still.

All of these thoughts even flow right into the rest of the verse. In this specific case, what are we “waiting” for? To reach the end of the “1,335 days.” What on earth is that? We don’t know. So, not only are we waiting for something from the Lord…we don’t even know what we’re waiting for! Now that’s TRUST. And what does that trust mean for us? Back to the start of the verse – blessing. It is the blessing of that wonderful, quiet, joyful confidence that our Father has it all under control. We can just sit in His big, loving lap and watch our world go by. The faith of a child.

Blessing in waiting. Daniel learned it, then wrote it down in hopes you and I might learn it too! God give us hearts to hear.