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Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.com | DownloadWilliam Burkitt Notes and Observations - Romans 12:1 - 12:1
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Observe here, 1. The apostle's loving and courteous compellation, brethren: so he calls the believing Romans. They were brethren by place and nation, and brethren by religion and profession: eodem sanguine Christi conglutinati, cemented together by the blood of Christ, and by the bands of love.
Observe, 2. The manner of the apostle's exhortation: it is by way of obsecration and entreaty, I beseech you, brethren. It imports great lenity and meekness. The apostle did not want authority to command, but uses such humility as to entreat. The minister's work and office is not only to be a teacher, but a beseecher. He must not barely propound and recommend the doctrines of the gospel to his people's understanding, but must endeavour to work upon their wills and affections to embrace and entertain them. The understanding is the leading, but the will the commanding, faculty.
Observe, 3. The exhortation itself: Present your bodies a living sacrifice. Present your bodies, that is, dedicate your persons, devote yourselves, your whole man, soul and body, to the service of God and his glory. Christians are priests, or a royal priesthood; they offer up themselves in sacrifice unto God, as a whole burnt-offering.
Observe, 4. The properties of the Christian sacrifice: it must be voluntary; present yourselves. It must be a living sacrifice, an holy sacrifice, a reasonable sacrifice; otherwise it will find no acceptance with God.
Observe, 5. The argument or motive which the apostle makes use of, to persuade persons to present and give up themselves to God and his service, and that is drawn from the mercies of God; I beseech you, brethren, by the mercies of God.
Learn thence, That the mercies of God, revealed in the gospel, are the most proper, powerful, and effectual argument, to persuade with, and prevail upon, sinners, that have not given up and devoted themselves to God, to do it; and those that have done it, to do it more and more: I beseech you, by the mercies of God, that ye present yourselves, &c.