What’s Therefore There For? – The text begins with "therefore," which recollects Paul’s story of the gospel generally in the first eight chapters and chapters 9-11 in particular. "Therefore," invites the listening community to look backward to recall God’s general and specific mercies, but it also points forward to the impact that such mercies will have on us.

• Offering God Worship – Another meaning-laden word is worship. But what kind of worship?

. . . the opening verse indicates that the foundation of all Christian obedience is that those in Christ, indwelt by the Spirit, are to offer to God the true sacrificial worship to which the cult of the Jerusalem Temple had all along pointed. [1]

• The Medium Through Which We Offer God Worship – The gifts listed in vs. 6-8 are charismata, or spiritual gifts which overlap with other gifts listings. The list is just that—a list. Seven charismata form this list, though that list differs from others. The main point: God gives the church grace for its multiple tasks—and it is reflected in uniqueness and extraordinary variety. [2]

 

Paul warns us not to conform to this world (v. 2); in what areas is the Christian community conforming where perhaps we shouldn’t?

• How does the renewing of the mind happen?
• Wayne Codeiro asks the gifts/ministry question in a fresh way: what is it you do that when you’re doing it, provides maximum effectiveness and minimum weariness? What do you do that is like Christmas all over again?

 

See DPS’s homily for this Sunday based on this passage, entitled, Round Pegs in Square Holes?

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[1] New Interpreter’s Bible X (Nashville: Abingdon Press, 2002), page 704.
[2] Ibid., page 694.