A sacrifice that is acceptable unto God
Romans 12:1 (J.B. Phillips)”With eyes wide open to the mercies of God, I beg you, my brothers, as an act of intelligent worship, to give him your bodies, as a living sacrifice, consecrated to him and acceptable by him
The meaning of acceptable is “well pleasing.”
Galatians 5:25 (NIV) “Since we live by the Spirit, let us keep in step with the Spirit”
When I’m choosing to live according to my “flesh,” I’m choosing thoughts and activities that do not please God. A mind governed by the Spirit is life and peace but that the mind governed by the flesh is death.
Romans 8:6 (NIV) “The mind governed by the flesh is death, but the mind governed by the Spirit is life and peace.”
Proverbs 14:12 (NIV) “There is a way that appears to be right, but in the end it leads to death.”
Galatians 6:8 (NIV) “Whoever sows to please their flesh, from the flesh will reap destruction; whoever sows to please the Spirit, from the Spirit will reap eternal life”
Psalm 86:11 (AMP) “Teach me Your way, O Lord, I will walk and live in Your truth; Direct my heart to fear Your name [with awe-inspired reverence and submissive wonder].
Just having a relationship does not preclude the idea that we are pleasing to God. This is made abundantly clear by the following verses – all of which attach God’s pleasure to our actions in relationship and not in the existence of the relationship alone.
Philippians 2:13 (AMP) “For it is [not your strength, but it is] God who is effectively at work in you, both to will and to work [that is, strengthening, energizing, and creating in you the longing and the ability to fulfil your purpose] for His good pleasure.
God supports the believer, but it is the believer’s responsibility to do what he has been called by God to do. What creates pleasure in our relationship with God is our heart attitudes and our actions.
Philippians 2:14-16 (AMP) “Do everything without murmuring or questioning [the providence of God], 15 so that you may prove yourselves to be blameless and guileless, innocent and uncontaminated, children of God without blemish in the midst of a [morally] crooked and [spiritually] perverted generation, among whom you are seen as bright lights [beacons shining out clearly] in the world [of darkness], 16 holding out and offering to everyone the word of life, so that in the day of Christ I will have reason to rejoice greatly because I did not run [my race] in vain nor labour without result.”