Ever wonder where I get my interpretation? Ever get confused
how I got my interpretation? Sometimes my literal interpretation agrees with a
plain reading of the text, while other times my interpretation does not sound
like the plain reading of the text, and yet I still insist it’s just as
literal. That’s because I consider myself a contextual literalist; I even named
my blog that. If you don’t know what it means, it’s right there in the blog
description: “The most literal reading of the Bible is to understand the Bible
in its original context: historical context, geographical context, cultural context
and literary context.” That’s a lot to talk about right now and discuss, so
what we’re going to do is just focus on one: the literary. I’m going to take a
passage that’s very familiar to you, so familiar that I wouldn’t be surprised
if some of you have it memorized, and I’m going to use the literary context to
give the verse new meaning to you, deeper meaning to you, and to give
application that will hit home, and perhaps you never thought about.
What is literary context? Literary context understands that
while the Bible is a divine book, a book inspired by God, it is a book
nonetheless. Therefore, it needs to be treated as such. What does literary
context consist? Literary context concerns itself with the genre of the book.
You don’t read a fictional novel like you read a non-fiction reference book.
Same goes for the Bible. All the Bible books have different genres: Law,
history, poetry, prophecy, Gospel, and epistles. These need to be read
differently, too. Romans, the book our passage is from, is an epistle. More
specially, it’s a Pauline epistle, which is a fancy way of saying it’s a letter
Paul wrote. This is key for so many reasons, but one I want you to focus on is
that Paul, as a very logical man, writes out all his epistles as a logical
argument. This leads into the second importance of literary context.
Literary context understands the author has arranged the
text in a manner that helps communicate his message. Literary arrangement can
be broken down into 3 subcategories. First, there’s immediate context.
Immediate context looks at how the sentences contribute to the paragraph. Does
the author write deductively, where he starts out the paragraph with his main
idea, and he spends the rest of the paragraph defending it with logic and
reason, proofs and evidence? Does the author write inductively, making
observations and then drawing a conclusion from the observations as his main
point? Second, there’s near context. Near context looks at how the paragraphs
and chapters contribute to the overall message and themes the author gives in
his book. Third, there’s far context. Far context considers how the Bible book
itself contributes to overall message and theology of the Bible. Let’s take a
look at each, starting backwards with the far context.
With the far context, we want to consider how the Bible
book, in this case, Romans, contributes to the overall message and theology of
the Bible. The Bible comes in 4 acts. First, there’s the creation, where God
creates the world and human beings. Second, the fall happens when sin enters
the world. Third, God redeems humankind from the fall. Fourth, God begins
re-creating or restoring the redeemed humanity. Now these 4 acts can be seen in
smaller stories, too, but simply and generally speaking in terms of the Bible
as a whole, the creation part happens in Genesis chapters 1 & 2, the Fall
happens in Genesis 3, the Gospels focus in on the redemption part and the
Epistles focus on the restoration part. So when we consider Romans in light of
the far context, these 4 acts tell us that Romans, as an epistle will heavily
talk about the restoration part of God’s plan for humanity. So we must ask
ourselves, “What is Romans trying to teach us about God restoring humanity?”
Keep that thought of restoration in the back of your head.
For the near context, how the paragraphs relate to each
other in the book of Romans, I want to outline the book of Romans. For those of
you who never read the whole book of Romans, this will be extremely helpful,
but even for those who have read the whole book of Romans, this will help keep
things in context. We Americans in this modern day like to dissect things to
analyze small parts. (I dissected a worm and a frog in 6
th grade;
did you?) The only problem with dissected is that it tends to make us forget
the bigger picture. This outline will serve to remind us of the big picture of
Romans, and how the little part, the verse, Romans 12:2, contributes to the
overall book. I see the book of Romans broken down into 5 sections. I will give
each section a one-word title.
The first section, chapters 1-3, can be summed up as
depravity. What is depravity? If you need a definition of depravity, look no
further than the famous Romans 3:23. “For all have sinned and fall short of the
glory of God.” Paul spends the first 3 chapters convincing his audience
everyone is a sinner. See, it’s easy if Paul’s audience was all Jewish. God
gave the Jews the Law, the Jews broke the Law, and thus they sinned. Paul
reiterates that in Romans. But Paul’s audience is a church mixed with Jews and
Gentiles. He can imagine his Gentile audience saying, “God can’t hold us
accountable for any sin or wrongdoing. He never gave us the Law. Therefore, it
would be unjust for God to hold us accountable.” But Paul would say it is just.
In chapter 1, Paul argues that God has revealed himself (although not fully) in
nature and has revealed what is right and wrong in nature (although not fully).
By acting contrary to nature, the Gentiles have broken natural law and thus
have sinned, too. (If you ever have the chance, read Romans 1 and take a good
look at the examples Paul used to prove they acted against nature.
They are sins very relevant to the Roman
culture.) Therefore, in chapter 3, Paul concludes all have sinned, and no one
is righteous.
The second section, chapters 4-5, is about justification, as
highlighted in Romans 5:1. “Therefore, since we have been justified by faith,
we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ.” What is justification?
Simply put, the debt of your sin has been paid in full. Taking the faith Abraham had and updating
to the New Covenant and New Testament, Paul explains in chapters 4-5 Christians
have been justified by grace through faith, and their debt of sin has been paid
in full because of the work of Jesus Christ.
The third section, chapters 6-8, start off with 2 rhetorical
questions Paul imagines his audience asking. If grace is such a good thing,
should Christians continue sinning to get more grace? If Jesus pays the debt of
sin, are Christians now allowed to sin? Paul answers both questions, “By no
means!” Paul explains now that after Jesus paid the debt of sin, the Holy
Spirit began a process of sanctification, which simply means that the Christian
becomes less like the old, sinful self, but more like Jesus in righteousness
and holiness. To continue sinning would contradict the work of sanctification
the Holy Spirit has the Christian undergoing.
For the fourth section, Paul takes a break to talk about the
sovereignty of God. This answered an important question to the church, mainly
the Jews in the church. The Jews were always told they were the chosen people
of God. How come Gentiles are now entering the family of God? Paul does his
best to explain this, using illustrations like a tree grafted in. But even Paul
gets to a points where he has to say, “I’ve explained it the best I can, but I
know I can’t fully grasp it because God’s knowledge is greater than mine. But I
know God is sovereign, so he can will it to be this and still be righteous and just.
So I believe it and I will praise God for it.” Paul even ends this section with
a little psalm or hymn of praise.
For the final section, Paul teaches his audience how to
apply this teaching, or how to live it out. This brings right up to Romans 12,
the chapter our verse comes from. To transition from near context to immediate,
I’ll start at Romans 12:1.
Romans 12:1 (NIV 1984 ed.)-
"Therefore, I urge you, brothers, in view of God’s mercy, to
offer your bodies as living sacrifices,
holy and pleasing to God—this is your spiritual act of worship."
Let’s stop at “therefore.” Do you know what “therefore”
means? It means “Because of this…” or “Since this…” Because of what? Since
what? Everything we just discussed in the near context! See, I was going
somewhere with the near context. Because you were a depraved sinner. Because
you were justified by grace through faith in Jesus Christ. Because you were
sanctified by the Holy Spirit. Because God is sovereign. (By the way, did you
see the work of the Trinity in there? The justification of the Son, the
sanctification of the Holy Spirit, the sovereignty of the Father.) Because of
all this, this is how you are to respond: offer your bodies as
living sacrifices.
Notice I put in bold living
sacrifice. It brings us to our
third form of literary context: figures of speech. Literary context thinks
about the use of figures of speech. If you ever want a fun experiment, record
every time you say or you hear someone use a figure of speech, and imagine what
would happen if it was taken literally. Romans 12:1 is so famous among
Christians, I have a feeling we’ve read it so much we forgot it’s a figure of
speech, but it is. More specifically, it’s a paradox, which is an oxymoron
created to make a profound statement. Paul’s audience, both Jew and Gentile
Christians, would immediately recognized the paradox. In their old lives, both
Jews and Gentiles would perform sacrifices. In both sacrifices, the blood would
be completely drained from the animal. In no way could the animal live, except
by the power of God. For the Jews, it was even more provoking. They remember
the Law said God found human sacrifices detestable. How could Paul now call
Christian to become any kind of sacrifice? So Paul has to tell his audience what
a living sacrifice is. Paul does so in Romans 12:2, our verse.
Romans 12:2 (NIV 1984 ed.)-
“Do not conform any longer 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.”
A living sacrifice no longer conforms to the patterns of
this world, but is transformed by the renewing of the mind. Well, this in
general defines what a living sacrifice is, but it still needs to specifically
describe how it looks and how it acts. How does someone no longer conform to
the pattern of the world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind? To
complete our immediate context, Paul uses the rest of Romans chapter 12 to
provide clear, straightforward applications which would be obvious to the
Christian reader, like be loving, patient and joyful. To complete the near
context, Paul spends Romans chapters 13 to 16 describing in detail ways to
apply this that might not make clear sense to the reader. Romans 13 is the best
example. In Romans 13, Paul commands his readers to submit to the government
and pay taxes. His audience, especially his Jewish audience who believes the
Roman government is pure evil, might wonder, “Wait a minute, Paul, that sounds
more like conforming to the patterns of the world and less like being
transformed.” So Paul has to carefully explain how to submit to the government
in a way that’s not conforming to the world, but is transforming.
But I believe there’s a hint right in Romans 12:2 for how a
living sacrifice looks and acts. Did you notice bolded
transformed? This brings up our fourth part of literary context.
Literary context considers the original language of the text. To quote one of
Rob Bell’s more famous sermons, “Contrary to popular belief, the Bible was not
originally written in English.” Simply speaking, the Old Testament was written
in Hebrew, and the New Testament was written in Greek. To better understand the
context, sometimes we need to study a word in the original language. In the
case of Romans 12:2, let’s look at the Greek word for
transformed.
The Greek word for
transformed
is
μεταμορφόω. In an English
transliteration, which is putting the Greek word in English letters so you know
what sounds to make, it is
metamorphoo
(except in the case, the double o, oo, make a long O sound). When it comes
studying Greek words, we must first look to see if it is a compound. In
English, we use teeny tiny helping to connect our subjects and predicates, our
nouns and verbs. In Greek, they just tag them on the words as prefixes and
suffixes.
Metamorphoo is one of those
examples.
Metamorphoo is a compound
word. The prefix,
meta, is
preposition meaning “above” or “beyond.” The root word,
morphoo, is a verb meaning “to form.” Put it together,
metamorphoo literally means “to form
above and beyond,” That’s what English translations translate it as
“transformed” rather than merely “formed.”
When New Testament scholars want to better understand a
word, they look at how the word gets used in other New Testament passage. The
word
metamorphoo appears 4 times in
the New Testament in 4 different books, including this instance. 2 of those
instances happen in the same story, although in different books. You know that
means Gospels. The word
metamorphoo
appears in both Matthew and Mark’s telling of the Transfiguration. You remember
the story. Jesus takes Peter, James and John up to the Mount of Olives. Then,
all of a sudden, Jesus turns shiny glowy, next to Moses and Elijah. Both
Matthew and Mark record that Jesus was transformed, that he was
metamorphoo. When Jesus is transformed,
metamorphoo, the disciples see Jesus in
all his glory and splendor. I believe this has something to do with seeing
Jesus in his full holiness and righteousness. So already, being transformed,
being
metamorphoo, has something to
do with becoming more like Jesus, in his holiness and righteousness.
Something else we can also do to help understand Greek
words, although not always, is see how we use the Greek word in English. We
can’t do this always because English is not a Greek-based language, but English
did borrow a lot of words from Greek. If English did borrow the word from
Greek, we can look at the English use the get a better idea of the Greek word
as well.
Metamorphoo is one of those
words. So I will provide 2 illustrations of how
metamorphoo appears in the English language. Let me make a
disclaimer here: None of these 2 ideas are original. In fact, these are the 2
most popular illustrations I hear when someone preaches or teaches on Romans
12:2. But I believe the reason these 2 illustrations are so popular is because
they are relevant, they are applicable, and they hit home.
The first illustration is probably the most popular because
it appeals to nature.
Metamorphoo is
where we get the English word metamorphosis from. We commonly associate
metamorphosis as the process which the caterpillar turns into the butterfly.
It’s quite the process if you think about it. It’s not like the caterpillar
just sprouts wings. The insect goes from a fat, furry, multi-legged,
multi-segmented caterpillar to a butterfly with a sleek body and beautiful
wings. What’s going on in that cocoon? Scientists, more specifically,
biologists, were puzzled at this, too. So they did all kinds of experiments and
observations. They x-rays, infrared scans, ultraviolet scans, ultrasounds (like
it’s a baby), just to find out what’s going on in there. They discovered that
while in the cocoon, the animal becomes a mush, so mushy that even with a
little pin prick the creature would ooze out and die. What happens when this
animal becomes the mush is that its DNA is being rewritten, just as it was
written in the embryo. Ladies and gentlemen, this creature is literally being
reborn (or as close to literal as possible). So our first illustration informs
us that if we want to be transformed, we need to be born again.
Let me quickly remind you what it means to be born again.
I’m going to throw some more Greek in here, and even a little bit of Hebrew. If
it’s too much, you can ignore it, but I really think it adds something that we
can easily forgot. First, to be reborn, you must repent of your sin. The Greek
verb for repent,
metanoeō (μετανοέω),
comes from a Greek military term. The military command told the soldiers to
immediately turn 180 degrees and flee. Pretty much, it’s the Greek equivalent
of retreat. Both John the Baptist (Matthew 3:2) and Jesus (Matthew 4:17) both
began their ministries with this command. Jesus commands us to retreat from
sin. To be born again, you must turn 180 degrees, completely turning away from
your sin, and flee from all possibilities of sinning. The old self lived in sin;
the born again self turns from sin.
Second, to be reborn, you must believe, and I mean really
believe. I notice a generation gap when talking about believing. Older
generations define believing as an intellectual pursuit – it’s how you think.
Younger generations understand believing to be an emotional pursuit – it’s how
you feel. For the Old Testament Hebrew word,
aman (
אָמַן),
and the Greek New Testament word
pisteuo
(πιστεύω), believing was both intellectual and emotional…and a third thing. It
was also how you acted. As Christian author Dennis Hollinger would put it,
believing is head, heart and hands. Believing isn’t just acknowledging a bunch
of historical facts or doctrine about Jesus and believing is not just feeling
Jesus in your heart; it’s both, and then some. It’s acting out what we think
and feel. Believing is praying for rain and then leaving the house with an
umbrella, even though the sun is shining. To truly be born again, you must
believe, and believing affects how you think, how you feel and how you act.
Third, to be born again, you must choose to call on Jesus as
your Lord. Sometimes American Christians have a habit of making the name “Lord”
just an interchangeable name for “God.” But the Old Testament Hebrew word,
Adonai (אֲדֹנָ֤), and the New Testament
Greek word
kurios (κύριος) not only
can be translated “Lord” but also “master,” as in what servants and slaves
called their master. Slaves and servants did not have their own will. Their
will was the will of the master; they made their will the will of the master.
Therefore, the master’s will and the slaves’ will was one. To be born again,
you must make your will God’s will. Too often I have seen Christians do the
opposite. They try to make God’s will their own, and they expect God to bless
it. How much shock they receive when they don’t get what they want. Instead, if
you want to be born again, you must your will God’s will. It goes back to the
first point. The heart of most sin is selfishness. If you surrender your will,
and the selfishness that goes with it, to God’s will, you will find it easier
to repent from sin. It goes back to our second point. If you make God’s will
your will, you will think like God thinks, feel like God feels, and act like
God acts. You will truly believe. You aren’t completely born again until you
have made Jesus your Lord and made Christ’s will your will.
But I know some of you are thinking, “I am born again. I
have repented of my sin. I have believed with my head, heart and hands. I have
made Jesus Lord and surrendered my will to his will. What does this passage
mean for me?” Well, that brings us up to our second illustration. This
illustration is probably the second most popular because it appeals to pop
culture, more specifically 90’s pop culture.
Metamorphoo, or more specifically, the
morphoo part of
metamorphoo
is where we get the English term “morphing” as in the Mighty Morphin Power
Rangers!
If during the 90’s you were too busy deciding if the better
boy band was N*SYNC or the Backstreet boys, if you were too busy deciding if
the better female singer was Brittany Spears or Christina Aguilera, if you were
too busy deciding if the Super Nintendo was truly the best video game system,
or if the Sega Genesis could truly do what Ninten-don’t, let me fill you in on
the Mighty Morphin Power Rangers. The premise of show was that after 10,000
years the evil Rita Repulsa was free, and she had one thing in mind: time to
conquer earth. That’s a big problem for Earth, for Zordon, the being who put
her in her prison, is stuck in an interdimensional wormhole. So Zordon calls 5
teenagers, and not any 5 teenagers, but 5 teenagers with attitude, to become
the Mighty Morphin Power Rangers.
Let me describe a typical episode, and trust me, this won’t
take long, for unless the story arc took more than one episode, all the
episodes. The show would usually start out one of the teenagers dealing with an
inner conflict that would cause angst. They were typical inner conflicts that
would cause teenagers angst in the 90’s: fear of spiders, fear of heights,
pleasing the family, winning the martial arts competition, getting good grades,
finding a date for the dance, etc. Rita Repulsa would take this inner conflict
and turn into an external conflict by having her monster making minion Finster
create a monster that would personify the conflict. Meanwhile, Rita would send
her Putty Patrol to keep the Power Rangers occupied. The Putties were supposed
to weaken the Power Rangers, but they always just served as warm up. When the
Putties all fell defeated, then Rita’s monster was finally ready. No way could
the Power Rangers defeat this monster; this monster has explosive attacks. At
this time, one of the Power Rangers would yell it, “It’s Morphin time!” That’s
when the teenagers would become the Mighty Morphin Power Rangers! Now they are
prepared to take down the monster. Their suits defend them from the attacks of
the monster, and their weapons give them the power destroy the monster. At this
time, when morphed, that one Power Ranger dealing with the inner conflict
discovers how to deal with the inner conflict, which in turn provides the
solution to defeating the monster. Of course, Rita wasn’t giving up there. She
would throw her wand down to earth, yelling, “Magic wand, make my monster grow!”
The monster would grow as huge as a giant, smashing buildings. At that time,
one of the Power Rangers would yell, “We need zord power!” Then Zordon would
send the zords that corresponded with each Ranger’s power. Individually, these
zords were pretty good, but together, they formed the megazord, and the
megazord was great. It was usually when the Power Rangers came together and
formed the megazord that they could take the monster down.
My brothers and sisters in Christ, it is Morphin time! Too
often have too many Christians trudged through life, living and acting as if
they stand alone in their faith walk. No lie, sometimes the life of a Christian
can get difficult. That repenting thing I talked about earlier can get tough.
Your sinful nature wants you to follow the selfish desires that lead to sin,
and it can get difficult to fight that off. On top of that, you got Satan and
his demons attacking you from the outside, bringing in temptations to turn from
God. Truth is, Christians, God has not left you on your own to deal with it
yourself. God has equipped you with every spiritual gift that you could need.
Just as Zordon gave the Power Rangers their protective suits, God has given the
every Christian the armor of God to protect them from evil forces. Just as
Zordan gave the Power Rangers their weapons to destroy the monster, so God has
given Christian spiritual gifts to demolish the temptations and sins they face.
If you, as a Christian, don’t know how to use or activate those gifts, don’t
worry, for you are not alone. If you are born again, God the Holy Spirit is
living within you. He will show you how to use them and give you the knowledge,
wisdom and power to use them. But perhaps some of you still feel alone. Even with
the Holy Spirit alive in you, sometimes it’s still hard to feel God. Don’t
worry, God knows, that’s why God provided the church. God has provided the
church as another to see the Lord working in your life. Just like the Power
Rangers could finally defeat the monster when they came together in the
megazord, sometimes the solutions to the problems and needs in your life is
someone in the church. I truly believe that if evil brings conflict or angst
into your life, and God has not gifted you the solution, then that means God
has gifted someone in your church with the solution, and God wants you two to
work together to fight that evil. Heck, I believe it so much that if you have
spiritual gift, it is less likely you have it to solve your problems (although
if it does, good for you), and more likely to solve someone else’s problem.
This doesn’t mean we go tell other people how to live their lives. Rather, the
next time you hear a prayer request or a need in the church, not only pray that
God would answer that prayer, but pray, “God, am I that answer to prayer?"
I hope the literary context gave you a new, deeper
understanding of Romans 12:2. If you are not born again, I pray that you make
that decision to repent of your sin, believe with all your head, heart and hands,
and you make Jesus Lord, surrendering your will to his, so you can truly be
born again. If you are born again, I pray that you morph, accepting the power
the Holy Spirit has given you and using it when in need. Don’t worry when
things get tough. You’re not alone. You have the Holy Spirit in you, and you
have the Holy Spirit living in the church. Look toward the church when you have
problems and needs, and in turn, look to help those in the church with needs
when you have the solution. You weren’t meant to be a 90’s teenager with attitude;
you were meant to be a Power Ranger. You weren’t meant to be a caterpillar; you
were meant to be a butterfly. It’s morphing time! Now morph and become what God
intended you to be.
