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Winter Quarter 2023-2024: Faith That Pleases God
Unit 2: Learning About Faith
Sunday School Lesson for the week of January 28, 2024
By Jay Harris
Lesson Scripture: Romans 12:3-8
Key Verse: “We have gifts that differ according to the grace given to us.” (Romans 12:6a)
Lesson Aims
- To introduce our scripture and the relationship between faith and transformation
- To explore the value of a life where we do not think too highly of ourselves
- To connect sober judgment, obligations, and the gift of our faith story
- To lift up how each of us matters and how others matter
- To ponder how unity is achieved in the Body and how we become members of one another
- To reflect on the nature of the gifts given to us according to God’s grace
- To put these thoughts together understanding that using our gifts in the Body transforms us
Faith and Transformation
In this last lesson of the January unit, we are pairing faith and transformation together to further shed light on our Winter Quarter Theme, “Faith that Pleases God.” We are leaning into the idea that faith transforms people. Throughout January, we have paired faith with righteousness, then with trust, and then with encouragement. How fitting it is at this stage to reflect on the way that faith changes us as we live deeper and deeper into faith.
No doubt, many people started the month of January thinking about personal transformation. That is what most New Year’s resolutions are all about. The end of January is a good time reassess our desire and commitment toward the transformation we perhaps envisioned at the beginning of the month. It is good to get a biblical perspective on how transformation happens in the life of a believer.
Romans 12:3-8 is an interesting passage for us to study in this lesson on transformation. It is the two verses that begin this chapter (Romans 12:1-2) that we usually associate with transformation:
“I appeal to you therefore, brothers and sisters, on the basis of God’s mercy, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your reasonable act of worship. Do not be conformed to this age, but be transformed by the renewing of the mind, so that you may discern what is the will of God—what is good and acceptable and perfect.”
Verses 1 and 2 present a turning point in Paul’s letter to the Romans. Up until Chapter 12, Paul has been describing how we are justified by faith and how faith continues to work in us through the Holy Spirit. Verse one presents a really big “therefore” that sums up what Paul has been saying. It is the “so what” of the letter. All that we read in Chapters 1-11 has built up to the invitation in verse two to “be transformed” into a believer who discerns and does “the will of God” and ceases to “be conformed to the world.”
We are transformed into a new way of thinking, believing, and living by the
renewing of our mind. Because of the way I am wired, my mind has always gone straight to Christian study as the means for transformation. If Christian study was the only way that the mind is renewed, don’t you think that Paul would have talked about Christian study in the verses that immediately follow? Paul does not talk about Christian study. He talks about the way God transforms us by developing and using the gifts God has given us.
As you reflect on our culture, in what ways do you see the need to live differently than the culture? How does the culture pressure us to conform? What priority have you given to your own transformation as a follower of Christ? What is the most difficult part of transformation?
What If It’s Not All About Me (or You)?
If we are to be transformed into the image of Jesus and not conformed to this world, we need to make a break with the narcissistic culture that surrounds us.
3 For by the grace given to me I say to everyone among you not to think of yourself more highly than you ought to think, but to think with sober judgment, each according to the measure of faith that God has assigned.
Paul felt that he had an important word that was relevant to “everyone” in the church. He felt that this word of instruction was revealed by the grace given to him by the Lord. In other words, Paul felt divinely inspired to tell them not to think more highly of themselves than they ought to think. Paul hoped that they would receive this message in the spirit of that grace, love, and authority.
How do you judge the point that you begin thinking more highly of yourself than you ought to think? Paul addresses this subject in another of his letters:
“Do nothing from selfish ambition or empty conceit, but in humility regard others as better than yourselves. Let each of you look not to your own interests but to the interests of others. Let the same mind be in you that was in Christ Jesus…” (Philippians 2:3-5) Paul went on to describe the mind of Christ as demonstrated in the way Jesus emptied himself, became a servant, and gave his life for the world. The mind of Christ is different from the culture.
Paul is calling us to think. The emphasis is on how we “ought” to think of ourselves. The word “ought” recalls the fact that we live within a network of obligations. How are we obligated to think of ourselves? As believers, our obligations include moral obligations, obligations to our neighbor, obligations to the downtrodden, obligations to God’s creation, and obligations to God. We are not meant individually to be an island unto ourselves.
We are to think with sober judgment. Sober judgment means judgment that is not clouded by the influence of an unrestrained ego. It means to be clearheaded. If we are not to be conformed to this world, it means that we must learn to notice how the world thinks and then decide to think differently according to the mind of Christ.
We are to think about ourselves according to the measure of faith that God has “assigned” to us. In the New Testament, faith is not just our human response to the action of God. Faith is also God’s action. It all begins with God’s action. Faith is assigned or given to us in terms of God’s action in our faith story. You have a unique faith story that includes how you came to faith, who your primary influences have been, and how your faith has melded with other aspects of your personal history. God shaped your life of faith as it was being formed. If faith is a gift, then we cannot brag about our faith. Knowing that faith is God’s gift to us humbles us.
The Christian ethic tells us that it’s not all about me or about you. There is a sense in which we need to break with the aspects of our culture that tell us that it is about me or about you. This is but one of the ways that God seeks to transform our lives by faith.
When are you tempted to think more highly of yourself than you ought to think? How do you check that tendency? What thoughts in verse 3 call out to you the most to curb the tendency to think too highly of yourself? How does it help to think of your faith as not just a human response, but also a gift of God?
What If I Matter, But Not the Only One Who Matters?
Keep in mind that Paul is usually building one point upon another. We are not to think too highly of ourselves, and we are to think with sober judgment and keep in mind that our faith is God’s gift to us. We are uniquely shaped by our faith for something bigger than ourselves.
4 For as in one body we have many members and not all the members have the same function, 5 so we, who are many, are one body in Christ, and individually we are members one of another.
The members of the Body of Christ are like the parts of the body which are all so wonderfully different from one another, but they are made to work together. No wonder that the human body serves as one of the most important biblical metaphors for the Church.
For this reason, the Church is called the Body of Christ. Collectively, we are meant to serve as the hands and feet of Jesus. You have no doubt heard this phrase before, but this should prompt us to think of more body parts than just hands and feet. We are also the legs, arms, eyes, ears, heart, voice, feelings, face, and countenance of Jesus. Through the Holy Spirit living in us collectively as the Body of Christ, we are meant to convey the physical presence of Jesus in the world.
Jesus told his disciples about this on the night he handed himself over to the authorities to be tried and crucified on the next day. In John’s gospel, Jesus began to help the disciples understand how they were to proceed when Jesus’ physical presence would no longer be with them in the world as it had been. He told his disciples that it was better for him to go to the Father, so he could send the Holy Spirit to believers. Jesus told them that after he sent the Holy Spirit, they would be able to do greater works than he did. (John 14:12)
Imagine you were a disciple and you were being told that you would be able to do greater works than Jesus. It would be difficult to believe. Jesus envisioned being reunited in heaven with the Father to reign together with him, so that the righteous rule of God would be lovingly planted across the world and made to grow and spread. To make real the reign of God on earth, Jesus envisioned the sending of the Holy Spirit to fill and empower believers, which happened on the Day of Pentecost, 50 days after Jesus’ resurrection, and 10 days after his ascension. Jesus envisioned believers all across the world being brought together and animated by the Holy Spirit to be the physical presence of Christ through the Church.
In all this, we are to imagine all the members of the Body of Christ being brought together. We each matter, but we also understand that we are not the only ones who matter. Each member matters. If you do not believe you matter, something is wrong with your faith. If you do not believe others matter equally, something is also wrong with your faith.
Paul also insisted that we are individually members of one another. In the body of Christ, where I end and another person begins overlaps in a sense. There must be an interconnectedness and interdependence. There is a give and take, like the give and take that exists between spouses in a healthy marriage. We are better together. It takes all of us, with our different functions, to be Christ’s Body in the world.
Why do you think the message gets lost that every member matters in the Body of Christ? What keeps the Church from living up to this ideal? Why do church members sit back and say that ministry is what we pay the preacher to do? What could you do reclaim the message that every member matters?
What If I Am Gifted in Ways that Are Activated by Grace?
What makes us so different from each other? How am I to make a difference? How can I become a living vessel of the Holy Spirit’s desire and miraculous power to transform lives and circumstances?
6 We have gifts that differ according to the grace given to us:
God intends that we make an impact on the world and in our community and church through the gifting that God imparts to us through the Holy Spirit living in us. It is through our gifting from God that we are empowered, equipped, and directed in our service to Christ and his mission through the Body of Christ.
When I was first introduced to the subject of spiritual gifts, I latched onto the idea that a gifting from God is always a supernatural gifting, and that there is a difference between a gift and a talent. Through the years, I have moved away from this idea. I still believe that God accomplishes the miraculous through our giftings, but who am I to call something supernatural or natural? To God, all that we call supernatural is natural. Talents are just as God-given as spiritual gifts.
It is common nowadays in speaking about our strengths to call them our superpowers. Our strengths feel like our superpowers when we are working through our strengths, and our work is aligned with our strengths, and our fellow team members know what our strengths are. When we can work within our strengths, we feel so much more empowered than trying to work through our weaknesses. I truly believe that God has wired us to have certain strengths. I am no longer bold enough to try to sort out what is natural and supernatural. It is all both natural and supernatural at the same time. God is able to work his miraculous power in us as God’s living vessels through our talents, gifts, and strengths.
What is necessary is that we live our lives according to the will of God and with a desire to please God. It is also very helpful to understand that our gifts come from the grace of God given to us. A gift, whether you call it a talent, strength, or spiritual gift, is gift of God’s grace. In other words, we do not deserve the gift, nor are we worthy of the gift God give us. Therefore, a gift from God should never be something we brag about or boast about. God deserves all the credit, and that humbles us and keeps us from thinking too highly of ourselves than we ought to think. In the original New Testament Greek, the word for grace is “charis” and the word for gifts is “charismata.” The grace of God, the undeserved favor of God, activates the gifts God gives us.
What do you think about the nature of the gifts God gives us? How would you describe to another person how gifts, talents, and strengths are to be manifested in a person’s life and the life of the Church? How have you seen your service in the Church improve when you discovered what you are supposed to do?
What If the Living Out of my Gifts Is What Transforms Me?
In Paul’s first letter to the Corinthians, he writes, “Now there are varieties of gifts but the same Spirit, and there are varieties of services but the same Lord, and there are varieties of activities, but it is the same God who activates all of them in everyone. To each is given the manifestation of the Spirit for the common good.” (1 Corinthians 12:4-7) If you multiply the varieties of gifts by the varieties of services, and multiply the varieties of services by the variety of activities, and you multiply that by the differences between us due to the grace given us, the total number of unique expressions of service and witness become limitless. All of these expressions are brought together through the Holy Spirit to contribute to the common good.
In these scriptures, we are being made to see how these gifts come together to form believers into Christ’s Body on earth. For the purpose of this lesson, however, we are also looking at all this with an eye toward the way we, ourselves, are being
transformed. We are transformed when we allow these gifts to be developed in our lives and then used in our service and our witness through the Body of Christ.
The development and deployment of our gifts is a part of our discipleship. Discipleship is central to our life as Christians. Discipleship is about how we become disciples of Jesus and how we become more Christ-like. Discipleship is also a holistic venture. It involves more than just study, meditation, and reflection, although these are essential means of grace to practice. There is much more “doing” involved in discipleship, in the development of our faith, and in the transformation of our lives. It is through the development and deployment of our gifts that we conform less and less with the world, and we are instead transformed into a believer who discerns and does the will of God.
In Romans 12:6-8, Paul begins to name some of the gifts that believers are given. Please know that this list is not intended to be exhaustive, but rather to be suggestive. This partial list is meant to tease the imagination into active thought. As we consider the gifts mentioned in Romans 12:6-8, try to imagine how the operations of these gifts in believers’ lives would contribute to their transformation as disciples of Jesus Christ.
“We have gifts that differ according to the grace given to us,…
6b prophecy, in proportion to faith;
Prophecy is the ability to speak for God. Remember that, on the Day of Pentecost, it is recorded in the Book of Acts (chapter 2) that the Holy Spirit was poured out and the vision of the prophet Joel was fulfilled, in which God said: “I will pour out my Spirit upon all flesh, and your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, and your young men shall see visions,and your old men shall dream dreams. Even upon my slaves, both men and women, in those days I will pour out my Spirit, and they shall prophesy.” The gift that was once reserved for a few was to be poured out upon many. Thank God for those who have gifts in the ministry of proclamation and witness, including both clergy and laity. Imagine how internalizing the Word of God and sharing that with others helps transform a believer into a more whole-hearted follower of Jesus Christ.
7 ministry, in ministering;
Thank God for those who have gifts for service and the ability to translate love and faith into action on behalf of others. These are able to serve within the Body of Christ and beyond the walls of the church into the community and world. These people demonstrate and model a true servant spirit for the whole church. These people are taking the lead in the “Matthew 25 ministries” of feeding the hungry, digging wells and providing water to the thirsty, welcoming and caring for the stranger, clothing and sheltering the naked and homeless, providing healing ministry to the sick, and visiting prisoners. Imagine how these ministries not only transform the lives of the people on the receiving end of these ministries—these ministries also transform the lives of the ones who are doing the ministering.
the teacher, in teaching;
Thank God for teachers who help the Body connect with God’s Word. These are the ones who dedicate themselves first to study and then sharing the fruit of their labor on behalf of God’s people. They follow Paul’s admonition to “do your best to present yourself to God as one approved by him, a worker who has no need to be ashamed, rightly explaining the word of truth.” (2 Timothy 2:15) Those with the gift of teaching are always seeking the best ways to present the truth of God to believers. Teachers engage in study and teaching for the benefit of those who are seeking to grow in their faith. Any teacher of biblical truth knows, however, that the ones who get the most out of all this are the teachers themselves. They are transformed by the development and deployment of their gift.
8 the encourager, in encouragement;
Thank God for encouragers. My role in the Church is to help shepherd men and women through the process of responding to God’s call to full-time and part-time ministry. I hear all the time about the encouragers who helped people realize that God was calling them into ministry. In a world of discouragers and people who only want to tear down, encouragers stand out. Encouragers help believers persevere in their journey of faith. They raise the morale of the Church. Being an encourager cannot but help the encourager stayed encouraged. Being one whose spiritual gift is to be an encourager will transform that person’s life in immeasurable ways as he or she develops and uses that gift on behalf of others.
the giver, in sincerity;
Thank God for those who have the gift of generosity. Givers help resource the Church’s mission. They have learned how to manage money well and how to invest in sustainable ways in ministry. Often, very few people know the impact they make on a regular basis, and that is by design. To give in sincerity means to give without thought of what one will get in return. Giving is an essential part of discipleship for every believer. For those for whom giving is a spiritual gift, their acts of generosity and joyful sacrifice transform and deepen their lives.
the leader, in diligence;
Thank God for leaders who have gifts for organization and promoting ministry so that the services people render are maximized and brought into focus. Leaders are often out in front leading people, but they are also stepping back and supporting others so others get to step out and make a difference. Leaders make sure the mission is moving forward which requires a winsome character and requires diligence. Those who have the gift of leadership will necessarily be servant leaders. Being a servant leader transforms the life of the servant leader.
the compassionate, in cheerfulness.
Thank God for those who have the ministry of compassion, justice, and mercy. They help alleviate suffering, lift burdens, and address injustices. They must often enter the misery of others, but they do so while remaining cheerful with an eye toward bringing people into a state of peace and joy. Those who have the spiritual gift of compassion and mercy contribute on a regular basis to the redemption of lives and circumstances. They are in the life-transformation business. The development and deployment of their gift also transforms their own lives because they get an inside view of the heart of Jesus.
I think we would all agree that Paul provided good examples for how gifts are to be used for the building up of the Body of Christ. We should keep in mind, however, that this list is by no means exhaustive. Yet, it gives us an idea of what discovering, developing, and using our gifts looks like in the Body of Christ.
How do you see the development and deployment of your gifts contributing to the development of your faith? How do you see this way of developing your faith leading to transformation? How are you looking at discipleship differently as a result of this lesson? What goals might you set for your transformation as a person of faith? How do you see this contributing to a faith that pleases God?
Prayer
Gracious and loving God, You distribute your gifts among us through the Holy Spirit for service in the Body of Christ. Help us discover, develop, and deploy these gifts, so that we might become a more fully devoted disciple of Jesus and experience the transformation that conforms us to the image of your Son instead of the culture, through our Savior, Jesus Christ, who reigns with You and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever, Amen.
Dr. Jay Harris serves as the Superintendent of Clergy and District Services for the South Georgia Conference. Email him at jharris@sgaumc.com. Find his plot-driven guide to reading the Bible, the “Layered Bible Journey,” at www.layeredbiblejourney.com.
