Here is the real drama, the central dramatic foundation from which all other story is derived. It is the drama that occurs within the most secret crevice of the human heart, where the deadliest battle is being fought. We are pulled to conform to the present world in its present age of sin. And we are pulled to be transformed into the image of Christ, set free from sin. How aware are we of the forces that tug on us and try to claim our hearts and minds?
Honor, status, glory, and the love of these things: that is the way of the world in its present age of sin. The world wants us to climb from one achievement to the next, to obtain validation from one source after the next, and will celebrate us when we do. The world is doing everything it can to charm us into its way of thinking, so much that we don’t even stop to wonder if our values and priorities are even really ours or if they have been implanted within us. Do not let the world do this to you, says Paul in Romans 12:1-2. Do not be conformed. Do not be charmed by the things promising you glory.
Instead, sacrifice. The lived reality of sacrifice slices right through everything the world does to conform us to itself. The world wants us to hunger to be bigger and better and more glorified. But God has his pull on us, too, to take our ambitions and priorities – and lay them on the altar as an ever-active sacrifice. The lived reality of sacrifice is God’s way of making us smaller. It is good news to be smaller, to let God’s glory be the only glory, to sacrifice everything that would try and compete with God’s will.
This is our true act of worship. Worship is so much more than the singing we do on Sundays. Everything we can possibly offer to God is worship. Worship happens here on Sundays. Worship happens in the workday. Worship is how we speak to our neighbors and friends and spouses and children. Worship is what we do when no one is watching. It all belongs on the altar, a fragrant offering to God.
God is calling us to be something completely new, something the world in its present age of sin has no claim on. And yet, this transformation is something that happens to us. Paul calls it, simply, the mercy of God. It is not by our own efforts that we escape the corrupting pull of the present age. It is only when the mercy of God is allowed to dwell uninterrupted within us that a change will take place from the inside out. Paul’s word is not to transform but to be transformed. It’s one of the beautiful mysteries of our faith, that real spiritual formation is happening when the line between our efforts and God’s mercy gets blurry. Paul’s prayer is that we would resist everything that glorifies us instead of God. But it’s all preceded by who God is and what God is doing. God’s mercy showed up first. And every step we take toward greater union with Christ is actually divine mercy taking that step in us.
Whatever magnetic pull the world has on us, the mercy of God is cutting right through it. God in his mercy is crawling into the deepest and most secret crevice of the human heart and making us new, changing the way we think and feel about everything. And we will be active to offer and sacrifice and worship. We will show up for this work of transformation. But mercy showed up first.
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