Embedded Files
“Mighty to Save”
Verse 1
Ev’ryone needs compassion
A love that's never failing
Let mercy fall on me
Ev’ryone needs forgiveness
The kindness of a Saviour
The hope of nations
Chorus
Saviour He can move the mountains
My God is mighty to save
He is mighty to save
Forever Author of salvation
He rose and conquered the grave
Jesus conquered the grave
Verse 2
So take me as You find me
All my fears and failures
Fill my life again
I give my life to follow
Ev’rything I believe in
Now I surrender
Chorus
Saviour He can move the mountains
My God is mighty to save
He is mighty to save
Forever Author of salvation
He rose and conquered the grave
Jesus conquered the grave
Bridge
Shine your light and let the whole world see
We're singing for the glory of the risen King
Jesus Shine your light and let the whole world see
We're singing for the glory of the risen King
Chorus
Saviour He can move the mountains
My God is mighty to save
He is mighty to save
Forever Author of salvation
He rose and conquered the grave
Jesus conquered the grave
Chorus
Saviour He can move the mountains
My God is mighty to save
He is mighty to save
Forever Author of salvation
He rose and conquered the grave
Jesus conquered the grave
“Who You Say I Am”
Verse 1
Who am I that the highest King
Would welcome me
I was lost but He brought me in
Oh His love for me
Oh His love for me
Chorus 1
Who the Son sets free
Oh is free indeed
I'm a child of God Yes I am
Verse 2
Free at last He has ransomed me
His grace runs deep
While I was a slave to sin Jesus died for me
Yes He died for me
Chorus 1
Who the Son sets free
Oh is free indeed
I'm a child of God Yes I am
In my Father's house
There's a place for me
I'm a child of God Yes I am
Bridge
I am chosen not forsaken
I am who You say I am
You are for me not against me
I am who You say I am
I am chosen not forsaken
I am who You say I am
You are for me not against me
I am who You say I am
I am who You say I am
Chorus 1
Who the Son sets free
Oh is free indeed
I'm a child of God Yes I am
In my Father's house
There's a place for me
I'm a child of God Yes I am
In my Father's house
There's a place for me
I'm a child of God Yes I am
“He is Lord”
He is Lord, he is Lord
He is risen from the dead and he is Lord
Every knee shall bow
Every tongue confess
That Jesus Christ is Lord
He is love, he is love
He has shown us by his life
that he is love
All his people sing
with one voice of joy
that Jesus Christ is love
He is life, he is life
He has died to set us free
and he is life
And he calls us all
to live evermore
for Jesus Christ is Life
“What the Lord has Done in Me”
Let the weak say I am strong
Let the poor say I am rich
Let the blind say I can see
It's what the Lord has done in me
Into the river I will wade
There my sins are washed away
From the heaven's mercy stream
Of the Saviour's love for me
Hosanna hosanna
To the Lamb that was slain
Hosanna hosanna
Jesus died and rose again
I will rise from waters deep
Into the saving arms of God
I will sing salvation songs
Jesus Christ has set me free
Hosanna hosanna
To the Lamb that was slain
Hosanna hosanna
Jesus died and rose again
Chorus
Hosanna hosanna
To the Lamb that was slain
Hosanna hosanna
Jesus died and rose again
In You is Gladness
1 In you is gladness amid all sadness,
Jesus, sunshine of my heart.
By you are given the gifts of heaven;
you the true Redeemer are.
Our hearts you waken, we're not forsaken;
who trusts you surely has built securely
and stands forever: Alleluia!
Our hearts are pleading, your presence needing,
living or dying, on Christ relying
now and forever: Alleluia!
2 If he is ours, we fear no powers
not of sin or death or night.
He knows our troubles, our pain and struggles;
he upholds us by his might.
Wherefore the story tell of his glory
with heart and voices; all heaven rejoices
in him forever: Alleluia!
We shout for gladness away, all sadness!
love him and praise him, and still shall raise him
glad hymns forever: Alleluia
Sermon for GEMS Sunday, April 27, 2025
Pastor George Holthof
Trenton Ebenezer CRC
Title: BEING TRANSFORMED ~ Based on text: Romans 12:1-2
A Living Sacrifice
12 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. 2 Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is—his good, pleasing and perfect will.
Introduction:
Have you ever pretended to be, or thought about becoming and / or being someone different than who you are? Apparently many people do – because they are dissatisfied with themselves and the content of their lives!
Back when I was a kid we didn't have video games and social media so we spent a lot of time playing with other neighbourhood kids – often playing roles of 'heroes' in things like hockey, baseball, soccer, we played war games, we played roles as cowboys and the other guys, cops and robbers → sometimes we had quite elaborate 'sets' and enacted complex strategies to 'win' our games.
Depending on what we were 'playing' it wasn't at all unusual to adopt the persona of a favourite sports star, or actor, or a superhero – Superman – Wonder Woman – etc. → even wearing clothing and costumes to create the persona of our heros – maybe a hockey jersey with the number and name of a favourite player or maybe a superhero cape. And for the duration of the game we – at least in our own minds – would be transformed into that hero – at least for the time of the game.
Today, in our technologically advanced world of computers and smart TV's and such devices, we can 'become' someone – something else quite easily → we can even create a personal avatar or adopt a character already created in the game through whom we play the game. But sometimes people 'blur the lines' between fantasy and reality – and for some it becomes hard to differentiate between them!
I think part of that is a result of initiatives in our world that are oriented towards getting people to become something / someone different than who we actually are – attempting to 'make ourselves better' in some ways or other. Entire industries are built around convincing people that they can be 'improved' by simply transforming how we look – with fashion, makeup, medications, diet programs – even surgery! Girls and young women have dealt with that for a long time, but acco0rding to an article this past week in CBC news boys and young men are also facing increasing pressure to change how they look so they can be appealing to some standard of perceived physical perfection – a 'perfection' increasingly being designed by artificial intelligence – and the big reason why they want to be transformed is to be socially acceptable to one's peers – and perhaps – if they can be transformed through artificial means – they will be able to be whoever they want to be and have an attractive, perfect life wherein all their dreams will come true.
A. The Christian lives a life of worship – characterized by sacrifice
At that level, I believe – and you're not going to hear this from 'the world' – there is an ancient spiritual problem at the root of such desires to be someone else → a problem initiated with the advent of sin into the world. Part of what sin does with our created identity is that people who are dissatisfied with who they are ignore, deny, and / or set aside the truth that – as Genesis 1:26-27 declares – people are created in the “image” and “likeness” of God → and sin has distorted that in every one of us – and we tend to look at what an old saying posits – that 'the grass is always greener on the other side of the fence'. But God's Word challenges us to become who God intends for us to be – firmly within our created personal identity.
Now, I'm not saying that there aren't problems people struggle with – things like gender identity, physical and mental problems → those are all afflictions that result from the impacts of sin producing distortions in our world – as sin tampers with God's created structures and plans. And we who follow Jesus – following God's, as Romans 12:2 puts it, “good, pleasing and perfect will” must always deal with people in love and compassion.
Romans 12:1 lays out for us the spiritual truth that helps us 'settle' into living in such a way that we honour who we are as God has made us → and we discover who we really are as we live into who God would have us be – as girls and boys and women and men who are intended to be a blessing to our families and communities. That truth is that being a Christian means we live a life of worship. That means 'worship-full' living is the foundation upon which we construct our lives → and this way of living is characterized by sacrifice → sacrifice that means everything we do and say is intentionally intended to be “holy and pleasing to God.”
The point is, as Christians we understand that we're not here on planet Earth to please 'the world' – to please people → although, when we do live such a 'worship-full' life a lot of people will be pleased and we will have a positive impact on the world! Rather than live to please the world – seeking to please people – a sacrificial life of worship requires living in such a way that our orientation is always God first! And that requires acknowledging that we are all negatively impacted by sin - but we know sin is not in charge – and so we seek to be transformed into being God-loving, Jesus following disciples. So the 'sacrifice' required to live 'worship-fully' is turning away and rejecting the attractions of the world that draw our focus away from being – as said in verse 1 – “holy and pleasing to God.”
B. Key Words
1. Being Transformed
In Romans 12:2 the Apostle Paul tells us first of all that that happens when we set aside 'conformity' to the world – and that's not easy because we live in a world that seeks to influence us to ignore God in many, many ways – concealing our Christian identity.
Now, here I am going to get a little bit 'nature scientific' and talk about caterpillars and butterflies and tadpoles and frogs – and that's because the word translated 'transformed' in our text is the Greek word 'metamorphousthe' – which has an English equivalent – 'metamorphasis'. This word describes the natural biological process in which something dramatically changes form into something else – like a tadpole becoming a frog or a caterpillar changing into a beautiful butterfly. A frog or butterfly is what the tadpole or caterpillar is meant to be.
So when Paul is telling us to “be transformed” – metamorphasized – he is telling us that – like a tadpole or caterpillar is not yet what it is meant to be – we also – because of the impact of sin in us we also are not what we're meant to be – and we have to go through a process of dramatic change to get there.
Metamorphosis – whether Greek or English – is a compound word – it's created out of 2 other words.
The first one is meta – and it means 'of the same kind'. In the analogy of a tadpole becoming a frog – the tadpole is of the same kind as the frog it turns into – everything of the frog is present in the tadpole – the tadpole will not become a bird because a bird is of a different kind.
The second word is 'morph' and it first of all reinforces what meta means – but it adds that there is a dramatic change in form or character that takes place in the process. We, of course, are people – we're not going to 'morph' into some other 'form'. But as God is telling us through Paul in this text we who come to know Jesus as Saviour and Lord are to 'morph' into a different person in our character – being transformed from a person of the world who follows and lives according to its ways – to becoming a person who follows the way of God.
To use the analogy of a caterpillar becoming a butterfly – where the butterfly is the beautiful completion illustrating the metamorphosis of a caterpillar – the transformation Paul is talking about sees us become the truly beautiful person God intends for us to be – a person who loves and serves God – worshipping Him with our entire lives!
Being Renewed
Now, how does that happen? Its not like a tadpole to frog or caterpillar to butterfly process where the process is designed and built into the creature. A caterpillar is going to become a butterfly! But a person isn't going to become the kind of person whose character is totally focused on worshipping and pleasing God without supernatural intervention in our lives – because this is about internal change – change from the inside out – and that begins with changing our minds – renewing them to transform our characters.
The Bible explains that this remarkable process all begins with God's incredible love and amazing grace for the people He chooses for salvation. That love and grace is revealed most profoundly in Jesus – the Saviour sent to die for our sins – His death wipes them all away and sets us free to be transformed – which happens in our cooperation with the work of the Holy Spirit – who – as said in texts like Ezekiel 36:27 and Romans 8:9-11 – comes and 'indwells' us and changes us from the inside out! That is what “being renewed” is all about!
And this is a lifetime process. It requires us to participate in helping God's Spirit transform us! The first thing we need to do is to trust in Jesus for our salvation and 'renewal'. That's simply because without trusting in Jesus we'll never see the need to be transformed and renewed to be who God wants us to be. And, trusting in Jesus is part of the 'sacrifice' we do to grow in faith.
The second is to submit to the Holy Spirit who comes to be present within our hearts and minds and soul – we let Him in to guide us and teach us – like John 16:13 says to us. Submission is also part of the 'sacrifice' required to be transformed – because it means rejecting completely our 'sin-driven and controlled' self.
3. → so that: we can know and live according to God's perfect will!
The third thing is to pick up and engage with the 'tools' God has provided for us to be able to trust and submit and grow in understanding and acceptance of God's true ways – so that, as written in Romans 12:2, we “will be able to test and approve what God’s will is—his good, pleasing and perfect will.” That's God's goal – and so that should also be our goal! And the reason – as I'm fond of saying – so we can be the blessing our world needs.
Now, as I already said, this is a process – and a good way to illustrate process is to think about the transformation – metamorphosis – of a person from baby to an old person. We all go through it. When I was a baby – nearly 70 years ago – I already was the same person I am now – but throughout that life journey I – we all – transform. Babies are cute and helpless and don't know much. Toddlers learn – from experiences and instruction – and bodies physically change – and so does mind power. Ditto for adolescent kids – and teenagers, and young adults – always processing into more maturity – knowing more, understanding more, able to do more. And then, someday, before we realize it, we're suddenly counted among the old in years – changes taking place all along the way.
But what will we be remembered and appreciated for? Physical prowess? Intellectual ability? Character → who we really are?
Tena and I enjoy the TV show Survivor. In this past week's episode one of the guys – Joe – a physically fit, socially capable man – was challenged by another guy about a perceived 'back-stabbing' possibility. Joe was upset because, as he proudly declared, he would never do what he was being accused of doing – because his honesty and integrity meant everything to him and he was always a man of his word. And when Joe did that he was declaring to a very broad audience that a person's character is important and worth being defended and upheld.
Concluding Application
That's kinda illustrative of what the GEMS theme and text about being transformed is getting at – its about developing a quality of character within these girls – one another – ourselves – a quality that reveals love for God love – a loving character that propels us into serving and worshipping God – reflected in what we do and how we do it all. And this transformation and renewal happens when we use the number 1 tool we've got – God's Word, the Bible. You see, when we take what God is saying to us in this book seriously and as the 'textbook' for our lives – and we cooperate with the Holy Spirit's work to transform us with it's message, then we will be changed from the inside out – transformed for the glory of God and the beauty of being part of what He is doing to bless our world through our 'worship-full' lives.
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