Friday
Friday
Transformed Relationships
Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind.
Romans 12:2
Paul now makes an eloquent appeal to his readers. He bases it on the mercies of God that he has been expounding, and he calls for both the consecration of our bodies and the renewal of our minds. He sets before us the stark alternative that has always and everywhere confronted the people of God, either to conform to the pattern of this world or to be transformed by renewed minds that discern God’s “good, pleasing and perfect will” (v. 2). The choice is between the world’s fashion and the Lord’s will.
In the chapters that follow, it becomes clear that God’s good will is concerned with all our relationships, which are radically changed by the gospel. Paul treats eight of them. For example, we are to cultivate a sober estimate of ourselves and to exercise our gifts for the benefit of the body of Christ. But the most challenging exhortation is the call to love our enemies (vv. 17–21). Echoing the teaching of Jesus, Paul writes that we are not to repay evil for evil but to be careful to do what is good. We are not to take revenge but rather to leave the punishment of evil to God.
It is important to keep together the two texts that both refer to the wrath of God. According to Romans 12:19 we are not to take revenge but “leave it to the wrath of God” (RSV). According to Romans 13:4 the magistrate “is God’s servant, an agent of wrath to bring punishment on the wrongdoer.” We human beings as private individuals are to love and serve our enemies. We are not authorized to take the law into our own hands and punish offenders. The punishment of evil is God’s prerogative, and during the present age he exercises it through the law courts.
For further reading: Romans 12:14–13:5