ICS Daily Devotions
Same Same, but Different
Romans 12: 1-2 (NKJV) I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that you present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God, which is your reasonable service. And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God.
There is a great conflict between what the church stands for and what the world advocates. And well, there should be! The world’s values have progressively become self-centred; to chase what makes me happy, to do what feels good to me, to be the best version of myself. Me, myself, and I. A complete contrast to what the Bible calls dying to self and turning away from worldly preoccupations.
Thing is, we are called to be set apart, holy unto God. So, how?
In the natural, this is virtually impossible when there is an unrelenting onslaught of social media vying for our attention at every turn. This, coupled with baggage we carry from our pre-Christ life, we are invariably shaped by this cocoon of thought incubation we are in. Oftentimes, what we think is our stand on matters is nothing more than a sum of all that we have taken in consciously and unconsciously. How do we attain, or at a minimum, get on the way to attaining a transformed life?
As the author of Romans implores, we must present ourselves as a living sacrifice that is acceptable to God. Beginning with the renewing of our mind, by the mercies of God. Only by the mercies of God can we do this. With empowerment from the Holy Spirit, the same Spirit who raised Jesus from the dead, it is possible to have a renewed mind-set, a reordering of our loves, a setting of our sights on what is good. With this, our heart’s desire will begin aligning with His, and we will live lives that reflect His glory.
As we live this out, our lifestyle will set us apart. We are still in this world. There is simply no escape from that until we are called Home. Nonetheless, our ways should be decidedly different from world, from how we used to live, or even our past motives for doing things. We must increasingly become not of this world despite being in the world. People are supposed to see a marked change in us. In fact, people around us will be scrutinising us to see if whom we profess to believe in is real and evident in our lives. They are looking for that transformation in our lives that can only be made possible by God.
The phrase ‘same same, but different’ originated in Thai English or Tinglish. Market vendors use this vague phrase as a reply to queries of whether their products are genuine or imitations.
As we become transformed, we look the same outwardly but there has got to be a discernible difference in our lives. We have to be ‘same same, but different’. Definitively.
Sermon Series: A Great Start to 2021
