A Living Sacrifice

Living Sacrifices

1Therefore I urge you, brothers, on account of God’s mercy, to offer your bodies as living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to God, which is your spiritual service of worship.2Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what is the good, pleasing, and perfect will of God.

3For by the grace given me I say to every one of you: Do not think of yourself more highly than you ought, but think of yourself with sober judgment, according to the measure of faith God has given you.4Just as each of us has one body with many members, and not all members have the same function,5so in Christ we who are many are one body, and each member belongs to one another.6We have different gifts according to the grace given us. If one’s gift is prophecy, let him use it in proportion to his faith;7if it is serving, let him serve; if it is teaching, let him teach;8if it is encouraging, let him encourage; if it is giving, let him give generously; if it is leading, let him lead with diligence; if it is showing mercy, let him do it cheerfully.

8For it is by grace you have been saved through faith, and this not from yourselves; it is the gift of God,9not by works, so that no one can boast.10For we are God’s workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance as our way of life.

The Body of Christ

12The body is a unit, though it is composed of many parts. And although its parts are many, they all form one body. So it is with Christ.13For in one Spirit we were all baptized into one body, whether Jews or Greeks, slave or free, and we were all given one Spirit to drink.

14For the body does not consist of one part, but of many.15If the foot should say, “Because I am not a hand, I do not belong to the body,” that would not make it any less a part of the body.16And if the ear should say, “Because I am not an eye, I do not belong to the body,” that would not make it any less a part of the body.17If the whole body were an eye, where would the sense of hearing be? If the whole body were an ear, where would the sense of smell be?18But in fact, God has arranged the members of the body, every one of them, according to His design.19If they were all one part, where would the body be?20As it is, there are many parts, but one body.21The eye cannot say to the hand, “I do not need you.” Nor can the head say to the feet, “I do not need you.”22On the contrary, the parts of the body that seem to be weaker are indispensable,23and the parts we consider less honorable, we treat with greater honor. And our unpresentable parts are treated with special modesty,24whereas our presentable parts have no such need. But God has composed the body and has given greater honor to the parts that lacked it,25so that there should be no division in the body, but that its members should have mutual concern for one another.26If one part suffers, every part suffers with it; if one part is honored, every part rejoices with it.

The Greater Gifts

27Now you are the body of Christ, and each of you is a member of it.

14For Christ’s love compels us, because we are convinced that One died for all, therefore all died.15And He died for all, that those who live should no longer live for themselves, but for Him who died for them and was raised again.