”Do not be conformed to this world but be transformed”, Romans 12:1-8

Some key points in today’s passage:

• (vs. 1) The idea of “sacrifice” is still very much an important aspect of our Christian faith;
  
• (vs. 1) Our entire person—body and soul—is our personal share in the daily sacrifice of the Body of Christ; “what we do in the body” daily, as St. Paul say elsewhere, is how we “suffer with Christ”; (Col 1:24; Rom 8:17; Phil 1:29);
  
• (vs. 2) This requires a transformed state of mind, living out the Our Father;
  
• (vs. 2) By doing this, our conscience is formed by the indwelling Holy Spirit;
  
• (vs. 3-5) Behind these verses, is St. Paul assumption of the Mystical Body of Christ: through baptism believers become united with Christ and one another in the Church;
  
• (vs. 3-5) Living together in the Body requires living out the Beatitudes: detachment from world, sin, self;
  
• (vs. 6-8) This also requires that we recognize the importance of being a faithful individual in the Body of Christ, yet using our individual gifts to work together for the building up of the Body (Eph 4)
  

Email: Dear Ken & Marcus, last week you discussed Rom 12:2, “Do not be conformed to this world but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that you may prove what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect.” In your discussion you didn’t address what Paul meant by being able to “prove” “what is the will of God, and “what is good and acceptable and perfect.” This term, “prove”, would seem to imply that this process would help one “know” clearly what God’s will is. Yet, in my experience, I’ve known many many faithful Christians—Catholic or non—who have dedicated their lives to doing this very thing, yet they can’t seem to agree on what God’s will is for lots of things. What does Paul mean here?