Therefore, I urge you, brothers and sisters, in view of God’s mercy, to offer your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and pleasing to God – this is your true and proper worship. – Romans 12:1-2 (NIV)
In Romans, Paul writes to a group of people who are sharing in Christ’s sufferings. They are being persecuted just as He was – they are feeling the sting of the same lashes He did. He tells them to take joy in their afflictions and continue to lay down their bodies as literal, living sacrifices.
It’s as if Paul were saying, “You know that He provides. So give it all back. Lay everything down on the altar as an offering to God.”
There’s nothing like worship time in church on Sundays, but sometimes we limit our definition of worship too much. Worship is broader than a hymn. Our whole lives can be an act of worship. We can and should offer every moment of our lives, every thought in our heads, and every corner of our hearts back to the God who has given us everything.
In our particular time and place, we’re not being asked to die for Christ, but we’re being asked to live for Christ. Will we love who He loves? Will we go to the “least of these” – like the prisoner and his child – as His hands and feet? Will we give what He gave – our all?
This is true worship.