Conforming vs Transforming
In Romans 12 the apostle Paul instructs us on how to know the good and acceptable, and perfect will of our Father God.
He instructs us to not conform to the world, rather to be transformed, specifically by the renewing of our minds,
My Question Here Is?
Has Christianity, generally speaking, followed Paul's instruction?
Within the Greek there are two words that have been translated into the English word world:
1) κόσμος - kosmos - orderly arrangement, that is, decoration; by implication the world (in a wide or narrow sense, including its inhabitants. (in other words the physical world and everything within it)
2) αἰών - aiōn - properly an age; by extension perpetuity (also past); by implication the world; specifically (Jewish) a Messianic period (present or future); of or relating to the Messiah, his awaited deliverance of the Jews, or the new age of peace expected to follow.
Conformed - συσχηματίζω - suschēmatizō - to fashion alike, that is, conform to the same pattern. From the words σύν - sun (a primary preposition denoting union with (or together), and the word σχῆμα - schēma (a figure as a mode or circumstance that is by implication an external condition)
What Paul was saying was not to have union with those who did not receive Jesus Christ as their awaited Messiah, nor those who did not recognize the outpouring of the Holy Spirit upon the people as the beginning of the prophesied Messianic age.
He was saying not to let the Jews pressure them into their way of thinking because they were in error. Jesus IS The Messiah who came onto the lost sheep of the house of Israel to make their paths straight He came to prepare them for the new world and the new kingdom that they have been awaiting and the people rejected Him!
What Was The External Condition of the Jews according to Jesus?
Ye blind guides, which strain at a gnat, and swallow a camel woe unto you scribes and Pharisees hypocrites for ye make clean the outside of the cup and of the platter but within they are full of extortion and excess.
You see the Jews, just like rest of the secular world and many Christians, believe that to change your nature you must first change your behavior. This error is the reason why, in-spite of their adherence to the law, the Jewish people or did not change. Which is why Jesus came unto the lost sheep of the house of Israel and called them to repentance.
They did the workings of the law their way not God's way. They lived by the letter of the law which brings death rather than by the spirit of the law that gives life.
FIRST Change The Behavior - a change in desires and behavior will follow. THIS IS THE WAY OF PHARISEES!
The Way of God
The God of heaven and earth is not now nor has He ever been concerned with the external condition of things, Therefore His way is not conforming from the outside in, as many pharisaic Christians believe. His way is transforming from the inside out!
Pharisaic Christians believe that if you conform to the law your nature will change and they do so without a shred of scriptural evidence. In fact, if scriptures prove anything they prove the exact opposite.
If doing the law really changed ones nature it stands to reason that after a time the Jewish people would sin less. But this didn't happen. In fact the sin business was so BIG in Jesus's time that He had to cleanse the temple by casting out the money changers and the merchants selling sacrificial animals within it's boundaries.
In-spite of the law and the people doing the law there was no real repentance because it was external and subsequently there could be no real transformation.
What is God's Way?
FIRST Change Our Nature to change our desires and subsequently our actions!
(Eze 36:25) Then will I sprinkle clean water upon you, and ye shall be clean: from all your filthiness, and from all your idols, will I cleanse you.
(Eze 36:26) A new heart also will I give you, and a new spirit will I put within you: and I will take away the stony heart out of your flesh, and I will give you an heart of flesh.
(Eze 36:27) And I will put my spirit within you, and cause you to walk in my statutes, and ye shall keep my judgments, and do them.
(Eze 36:28) And ye shall dwell in the land that I gave to your fathers; and ye shall be my people, and I will be your God.
(Eze 36:29) I will also save you from all your uncleannesses: and I will call for the corn, and will increase it, and lay no famine upon you.
(Eze 36:30) And I will multiply the fruit of the tree, and the increase of the field, that ye shall receive no more reproach of famine among the heathen.
All of the above is transformative, not acts of conforming, because we have no real part in it other than simply being the clay and receiving what our Father has done for us with thanks and praise.
Externally conforming to the letter of the law, be you a Jew or a Christian, does not change your nature nor does it cause you to walk in God's statutes or keep His judgments any more than circumcision did.
God said that He Will do these things. He said that He is the one who will cleanse us and change us. He said that He is doing the work and is the one causing us to walk in His will.
Why does God do these things for those who receive His Son?
For the same reason He gave the law onto the Jews! For His Own Glory!
I do not this for your sakes, O house of Israel, but for mine holy name's sake, which ye have profaned among the heathen, whither ye went and I will sanctify my great name, which was profaned among the heathen, which ye have profaned in the midst of them; and the heathen shall know that I am the LORD, saith the Lord GOD, when I shall be sanctified in you before their eyes. (vs 22-23)
Stay Tuned for Part 2
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