Read: Romans 12:2 NRSV
Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your minds, so that you may discern what is the will of God—what is good and acceptable and perfect.
Paul acknowledges the disparities that may exist between the believers to whom he writes, but believes that it is by their gifts being used in communal obedience and worship that God’s will can be performed. This obedience, which seems against human reason, comes through faith in him. From what must their minds be transformed? From what must the audience avoid conforming? Romans 12 calls for an end to the divisions that were so ingrained in the culture of the Ancient Near East. “This world,” is the world in which the disciples were living, and the patterns of this world which are division and disunity were seeping into the Church. In Romans 12 Paul addressed various matters relating to Christian identity and intrachurch relationships, but he is particularly concerned to extinguish congregational disputes fueled by differences in ethnicity and social status. Paul is exhorting the Church in Rome to change their worldview and to begin building the kingdom of God by first overthrowing the pagan worldview that has them enslaved.
In Christ we are unified into a body with many members. Therefore, we are to be in communion with all of God’s people. The sin that divides God’s people is pride, and a member of one body cannot be prideful or value itself greater than another member of the same body. Pride divides the Jews from the Gentiles and further subdivisions of class and culture. Paul is writing to a Roman audience, but his message of unity in Christ is meant for both Jews and Gentiles. Israel is not defined by the flesh, nor is it defined by the observance of Torah. Rather, in fulfillment of the promises the Covenant God made to Abraham, Israel, which was chosen by grace and justified by faith, shall all be saved in the way that he has described throughout the letter to the Romans. The Gentiles and the remnant are “Israel.” The whole process is God’s way of saving his covenant people.
