How To Find Satisfaction: Romans 12:1-8

Have you ever thought about rhinos and their limitations. You see, rhinos can run thirty miles an hour, which is pretty fast when you consider how much weight they’re pulling. They’re actually faster than squirrels, which can run up to twenty-six miles an hour. And even then who’s worried about a charging squirrel!

Just one problem with this phenomenon, Rhinos can see only thirty feet in front of them. Can you imagine something that large moving in concert as a group, plowing ahead at thirty miles an hour with no idea what’s at thirty-one feet? You would think that they would be far too timid to pick up full steam, that their inability to see far enough ahead would paralyze them to immobility. But with that horn pointing the way, rhinos run forward full steam ahead without apprehension, which leads us to their name.

Rhinos moving together at full speed are known as a crash. Even when they’re just hanging around enjoying the watershed, they’re called a crash because of their potential. You’ve got to love that!

I think that’s what we’re supposed to be. When the church becomes a crash we become an unstoppable force. We don’t have to pretend we know the future. Who cares that we can see only thirty feet ahead? Whatever’s at thirty-one feet needs to care that we’re coming and better get out of the way.

Even with their limitations, Rhinos live a pretty satisfied life.

Every one of us desires satisfaction in life and God also wants us to be satisfied but not if the price of satisfaction is too high. Have you ever heard someone say that they were determined to be happy, even if it cost them everything? God wants me to be satisfied and fulfilled but satisfaction should not be my primary goal in life.

Fulfillment, or satisfaction is a by-product of doing what does matter most.

If I will do what matters most in my life, fulfillment will follow.

Today we’re going to see three ways that God says I need to adapt my thinking if I’m going to enjoy satisfaction.

1. I must change the way I think about God.

Look at what Paul to write to the believers in Rome.

Romans 12:1-2 READ

The process of teamwork satisfaction begins when I give my body to God because of all He has done for me. Furthermore, I let Him transform me into a new person by changing the way I think.

The Old Testament believers brought animal sacrifices to the Temple and the lives of those animals were given as an act of worship, and the animal’s blood was spilled as an example of the coming sacrifice of Jesus who shed His blood for our sins on the cross. But New Testament believers are taught to bring a different sacrifice to worship God. This sacrifice has two qualifications. It is to be “living” and it is to be “holy.”

The Greek word for “transform” is where we get our English word “metamorphosis” [describe the caterpillar]

We need to be transformed from the inside out.

This is a change in the way we think because first of all “living sacrifice” is an oxymoron, where two words are used together that seem to contradict each other. Like, “Pretty ugly;” or “working vacation;” or “jumbo shrimp.”

When we think of sacrifices we usually think of them as being killed.

Christ rose from the dead, changing the concept of true worship of God, which calls for the worshipper to offer up his/her body without killing the person

Not only is my body to be a “living” sacrifice. It is to be a “holy” sacrifice. The word holy means to be set apart for the specific purpose. It’s setting my life, my body apart from the things of this world, to be used as God sees fit.

My body becomes a “holy” sacrifice when I yield my mouth, my eyes, my hands, my feet, etc., to doing the will of God instead of doing the selfish and sinful things they are inclined to do without God’s influence.

When I give my self as a living and holy sacrifice to God I’m saying I trust Him. I believe that His rules are for my own good.

Jesus said in Matthew 10:39NLT “If you cling to your life, you will lose it; but if you give up your life for me, you will find it.”

The big problem with offering my body as a sacrifice is that I want to take it back and I do, from time to time.

So what do we do? We have to offer it every day. That could be part of what Paul meant when he said, in

1 Corinthians 15:31aNCV “I die every day.”

Every day I have to remember that this body has been sacrificed to God. And once I’ve changed my mind about God I see that offering myself to Him every day is not a bad thing. It’s really a good thing! I find real satisfaction when I do.