Swimming Upstream - Romans 12:2

Sermon 3 of 22 from the The Transformed Life (Romans 12-16) series

October 2006 - There are times when we need to see a familiar verse in a new way. The ESV translates the first part of Romans 12:2 this way: "Do not be conformed to this world." Simple, clear and concise. But what exactly does Paul mean? Other translations bring out various shades of meaning:

"Do not act like the sinful people of the world" (New Life).

"Do not change yourselves to be like the people of this world" (New Century Version).

"Don't become so well-adjusted to your culture that you fit into it without even thinking." (Amplified).

"Don't copy the behavior and customs of this world" (New Living Translation).

And then there is the justly-famous rendering by J. B. Phillips:

"Don't let the world around you squeeze you into its own mould."

The general meaning is clear if we take all the different translations and paraphrases together. We are not like the people around us, and we shouldn't act like them. We must not try so hard to fit in to the culture that we no longer think and act like Christians. And J. B. Phillips reminds us that the world around us actively works against us. So the warning is, As a Christian, you are constantly swimming upstream with the current of the world rushing against you. Don't be surprised and don't give in and don't get swept away.

Perhaps our greatest danger is to look at this command (which is entirely negative) and draw wrong inferences from it.

1) We might end up thinking that Paul means to warn us only against the external marks of the world. In another generation, preachers applied this verse to the "big four" sins:

Drinking
Smoking
Dancing
Card Playing

Or it might have been applied to women wearing lipstick or men with long hair or women with short skirts or listening to certain kinds of music or going to the movie theater. Sometimes the list of "Don'ts" became so long that a Christian was defined by what you didn't do. I should note in passing that it is easy to caricature that sort of preaching, but that would be quite unfair. While Christianity cannot be reduced to a set a rules, in most cases the warnings had some basis in fact. Most of us don't hear that sort of preaching these days, and while I am glad about that, I not sure that dropping the rules we used to follow has produced a new wave of holiness.

2) We might think that Christians should withdraw from the world around us and having nothing to do it with it at all. This might lead us into a monastery or to some isolated place in the wilderness or into a cave in the desert where we will not be tempted by the bright lights of big city. But clearly that cannot be what Paul meant because he himself ministered in all the big cities of his day. Whatever not being conformed to the world means, it can't be a call to run and hide. Having said that, we must equally add that God does call some people to withdraw from the world in order to be free of distractions. I have no quarrel with those who live in cloisters (in fact, I admire their discipline and their devotion) so long as they do not insist that everyone follow their example.

If this verse is not giving rules about outward behavior and if it is not calling us to retreat from the world, what exactly is Paul warning us against? Two words unlock this text:

1) World

The word "world" does not refer to this planet, as if Paul means to say, "Don't enjoy the creation God has made." He's not talking about physical things, such as the beauty of a sunset, the grandeur of Lake Tahoe, the intricate design of a single human cell, or the vastness of the universe. Still less is he speaking of enjoying a concert or a conversation with a friend or playing peek-a-boo with a two-year-old or riding a motorcycle from Tupelo to Alaska (I met someone who plans to do that) or riding your bicycle down the Natchez Trace (I met someone who did it in only four days, a mammoth feat in my book) or graduating from college and then spending a year serving aboard a Mercy Ship (I know several who have done that). Paul does not mean to say, "Don't enjoy life." He's not an ascetic who bids us to reject all the beauty and goodness that we see around us. Nor is he calling us to move away from the troubles of this world, hole up in a compound, build a fence, buy a shotgun, and dare anyone to bother us. If anything is clear from the New Testament, Paul plunged into the heart of the culture of his day. He focused on the major cities of the first century—Jerusalem, Antioch, Corinth, Athens, Rome—and fearlessly entered the synagogues, the marketplace, the lecture halls—all with the express purpose of proclaiming Christ where he was not yet known. Later on he will say, "Everything created by God is good," (1 Timothy 4:4) and God "richly provides us with everything to enjoy" (1 Timothy 6:17), which clinches the case for me. If he was no Epicurean simply reveling in excess, he was also no ascetic, withdrawing from the world. Paul evidently knew Greek, Hebrew, Latin and Aramaic. He read the secular poets and quoted them in his sermons and his letters. He knew the culture of his day so well that he could debate the pagan philosophers on Mars Hill (Acts 17:16-34). And he knew that God has revealed himself in creation to every person (Romans 1:19-20). I think he would agree with this hymn by Maltbie Babcock:

This is my Father's world, and to my listening ears

All nature sings, and round me rings the music of the spheres.

This is my Father's world: I rest me in the thought

Of rocks and trees, of skies and seas;

His hand the wonders wrought.

This is my Father's world, the birds their carols raise,

The morning light, the lily white, declare their Maker's praise.

This is my Father's world: He shines in all that's fair;

In the rustling grass I hear Him pass;

He speaks to me everywhere.

So what "world" is Paul warning us against? The New Testament uses two key words when it talks about the world. One is the word kosmos, from which we get the word "cosmetic." That's the word John uses in 1 John 2:15-17 to warn us against loving the world. It refers to the organized system of life that leaves God out. The second word is the one Paul uses in our text—the word aion, usually translated as "age." In the New Testament, there are two main "ages"—this present age of sinful darkness (Ephesians 2:2, Galatians 1:4), from which we have been rescued by the Lord Jesus Christ, and the age to come when the Lord Jesus Christ will reign on the earth (Revelation 11:15). The text literally reads, "Don't be conformed to this age." Why? Because this "age" is coming to an end soon, and when it does everything about this age will crumble to the dust.

Here is the paradox and the challenge of Romans 12:2:

We live in this present age.

But this present age will not last forever.

We know there is a better age to come when Christ will reign on the earth.

We must live today by the values of tomorrow.

We must live in this present age, but this present age must not live in us.

2) Conform

The word "conform" translates a complex Greek word from which we get the English word "scheme," which in its negative sense has the idea of a trap, like those email scams from someone in Nigeria promising you $10,000 if you will just send them your bank account number. Since the devil is the god of this world (2 Corinthians 4:4), we should not be surprised, indeed we should expect that he will set traps for us on every hand. Most of the traps he sets are very subtle, a way of squeezing us into the mold of the world so that like that proverbial frog in the kettle that does not realize the water temperature is rising and is paralyzed by the boiling water, we find ourselves being sucked in little by little into the world's way of thinking. The word also means "to fashion." A.T. Robertson offers this version, "Do not take the world as your fashion plate."

Now why does Paul say that we are not to follow the fashions of this world, a reference less to clothing than to a whole way of thinking? We are not to think or act or otherwise fashion ourselves after the schemes of this age. What's wrong with that?

This world is dying.

This age will end soon.

The essence of worldliness, then, is to live as if this age will last forever. True worldliness means to buy into the notion that this world is the only world there is or ever will be. Years ago a certain beer advertised, "You go around in life once. Grab all the gusto you can." On one level, that happens to be good advice. Life isn't a dress rehearsal. You won't get a second chance or a "re-do" if you mess up your short time on planet earth. But underlying the commercial was the unstated premise: "This life is the only life there is so do whatever you want, indulge yourself, throw aside the restraints."

Last week my wife and I flew through Las Vegas on our way to Reno for a Bible conference. As the plane descended into Las Vegas, we could see the famous "strip" with all the casinos lined up next to each other: the Luxor, the MGM Grand, the Mirage (an apt name for a casino), the Wynn, Caesars Palace, and the Stratosphere with its tower rising almost 1000 feet above the desert floor. When we got off the plane and walked through the terminal, we saw slot machines everywhere. And signs advertising the big stars who were coming to Las Vegas. And other signs inviting us to go to this club or that club. Las Vegas is an entire city built upon the premise that you can come here and do whatever you want, any time you want, with whomever you want because "what happens in Vegas stays in Vegas." You can eat more than you should, drink until you are drunk, gamble until you are broke, and you can indulge your flesh in every way your mind can imagine. Evidently business is good these days because the plane was filled with people coming to "sin city" to have some fun and maybe "get lucky" one way or the other.

I do not mention that to condemn anyone, not even the people who own those large casinos. They couldn't stay in business if people didn't want what they offer. Las Vegas simply provides an extreme example of what "this age" is all about. It's the ultimate, unvarnished appeal to live as if there were no tomorrow.

That's worldliness. Living today as if tomorrow will never come.

"I Want a Passion"

Not long ago a young man sent me something he had written that speaks to the emptiness of this age and his yearning for something better:

I want a passion. I want something to throw myself into. I don't want to have a platform before I can do ministry. I want that fire that Jeremiah speaks of. I want to sear people with my life. I want a ministry that consumes my every thought and action. I want to know the infinite joy of serving my Creator. I want to serve with an unyielding fury. I want to love the Father with such reckless abandon that it borders on insanity. I want to find out what it's like to live unselfishly. I want to know what it means to love unselfishly. I want to know and love the people I piously give money to so I can assuage my guilt. I want to experience the love Christ has for his pauper population. I want to awaken the "sleeping giant" of the American church. I want to, for once, be proud of the generosity and activism of my church. I want my church to be humbled by how their brothers with nothing sacrifice family, job, and wealth for the same God. Mostly, I just want my church to feel His passion for the lost sheep of this world.

I want a life of discomfort. I want a life devoid of Ikea, Target and Wal-Mart. I want to know persecution. I want to see him in pain and suffering. I want to understand the joy of a monastic life of deprivation. I want to see a community that gives and gives and gives. I want to be a part of a community where complacency is treated the same way adultery is. I want to be a part of a community whose passion for Love is visible to a blind man, audible to a deaf man, gives words to the muted, and burns those who can't feel. I want a community that has no political, social or religious agenda. I want a community whose motive for love is Love. I want to live a life that looks like a revolution but inspires reformation.

He goes on to speak of the sort of leaders we need today:

What we need are men who will challenge the establishment. What we need are men who won't pull their punches. We need men whose leadership inspires vision and dreams of bigger and better things for our church. We need men whose love for God and adherence to his Word is their foremost thought. We need men whose tolerance is guided by God's Word and not by culture and its words. We need men governed by humility and grace. We need men who speak the truth with fire to ignite passion and burn away tradition. We need men who can wake up our church and its comfort-induced coma. We need men who at the cost of their pastorates, positions, and pride speak truth boldly and loudly. We need men who have been abused, used, and discarded by their Churches. We need men who were martyred by their church in the name of tradition and tolerance. Those men know the pain and sacrifice of speaking truth. We need a reformation of leadership in our Church. We need leadership that breaks us out of our ethnocentric faith. We need leaders whose budgets are so weighted on sending and supporting those that go, that the church lives "paycheck to paycheck". We need leaders who, in model of the ministry of Christ, get dirty with the homeless, prostitutes, prisoners and deviants of society. We need leaders who are never comfortable with the status quo. We need leaders whose words only serve as a reminder of their actions.

It's time for a change. It's time for the generation gap to be closed. It's time for the young and old to dream dreams and cast vision together. It's time to awaken the giant of the American church. It's time to stop allowing ourselves to medicate our guilt by paying lip service to the poor, tired, homeless, and degenerates. It's time to stop just throwing money at our brothers and sisters in China, North Korea, Laos, Cambodia, Iraq, Iran, Egypt, and Saudi Arabia. It's time to go after governments that viscously beat and persecute our brothers and sisters. It's time to use our money and resources to aid our brothers and sisters who are battling day in and day out. It's time to use our political clout to free our brothers and sisters in chains.

We've consumed so much spiritual and cultural junk food that we have became morbidly obese and non-functional. It's time for some massive weight loss. Exercise and proper eating habits will help, but we need some drastic liposuction. We need to beat our body. We need to make the body work for us again. It's time for us to root out leaders who have accepted complacency and the status quo for the sake of job security.

It's time stop being lukewarm.

It's time for a change.

If it doesn't happen now, it won't at all.

I will leave you with this final thought. Christians don't fit in, and we never will. We are fools if we make conformity the goal of our lives. I ran across an amazing quote from legendary shock rocker Alice Cooper. Though you may not have heard the news, Alice Cooper became a Christian some years ago. Here's the quote I found:

Drinking beer is easy. Trashing your hotel room is easy. But being a Christian, that's a tough call. That's rebellion.

He's right on all counts. It's a lot easier to get drunk and fool around than it is to follow Jesus Christ. You want to be a true rebel against the status quo? Become a disciple of Christ. Make him the Lord of your life. You'll be going against the flow every single day.

If you think this world will last forever, then live by the world's rules. But if you think that there is a better world coming, then live today in light of tomorrow. Your friends probably won't understand you, and it won't always be easy, and you'll often feel squeezed, but at least you won't wake up with a hangover that comes from getting drunk on the ways of the world.

Some people get drunk on alcohol.

Others get drunk on sexual pleasure.

Others get drunk on building an empire.

Others get drunk on fame.

Others get drunk on money.

Others get drunk on power.

Others get drunk on ambition.

Others get drunk on revenge.

That's okay as long as this age lasts forever. In fact, living like that makes sense if tomorrow never comes. Why not grab all the gusto, indulge your passions, and trample on others if you really think you're going to live forever and this present age will never end?

Remember what worldliness is. It's living as if tomorrow will never come.

The Paths of Glory

In the end everything that man builds collapses before his eyes. A friend sent me an email containing these lines from a poem called "Gray's Elegy" written in a country churchyard in England:

The boast of heraldry, the pomp of power

And all that beauty, all that wealth e'er gave

Awaits alike the inevitable hour

The paths of glory lead but to the grave.

According to 1 John 2:17, "The world is passing away along with its desires." Indeed, the best and brightest of us will someday die. All that we do will eventually be forgotten. Consider these next two sentences carefully:

Those who look to this world for approval will eventually be disappointed because the best things of this world must one day disappear.

Those who look to the God who created the world will find safety and security that will last forever.

What a revelation the judgment day will be for all of us. The things we thought were so important, so crucial, so vital, the things we included on our personal résumé, the degrees we earned, the money we made, the deals we closed, the classes we taught, the friends we cultivated in high places, the buildings we built, the organizations we managed, the budgets we balanced, the books we wrote, the songs we sang, the records we made, the trips we took, the portfolios we built, the fortunes we amassed, the positions we finally attained so that the people of the world and even our Christian friends would know that we didn't just sit on the couch watching the Simpsons every night, all that stuff that we take such pride in, the things that in themselves are not evil or wrong or bad, but are the "stuff" of life in this world, all of it, every single last bit of it, every part of it, considered singularly and then combined together to give us our reputation, our standing, our place in the world, even our place in the Christian world, our name in the lights, our claim to fame, our reason for existence, our bragging rights, if you will, the proof that we were here and made a name for ourselves in the short 50 or 60 or 70 or even 80 or 90 years that we have on planet earth, think of it!, all of it added together means nothing, zip, zero, nada, vanity of vanities, all is vanity, and I think I've heard that somewhere before. That's a very long sentence, isn't it? I wrote it that way to emphasize how easy it is for us to get sucked into the world's way of thinking, how quickly it happens, and on so many different levels. All of it will someday amount to nothing.

It is precisely at this point that the message of the gospel becomes so powerful. Jesus Christ came to bring God to us and us to God. He is the very fullness of God in bodily form. He came to save us, and he lives now to help us. Ask the Lord to fill you with the fullness of who he is. Ask the Lord to show you the truth about yourself. Pray that he might break your addiction to the schemes of this dying age.

This world is passing away. Don't be swept away with it. Keep swimming upstream with Jesus. Amen.