Presenting Our Body and Mind to God — Zac Poonen

Serving God From Gratitude Rather Than for Reward

Let's continue studying, seeing things from God's viewpoint. I want to turn to a verse in Romans in chapter 12. The reason we live for Christ and serve God is not because we're looking for a reward. Those who serve God, waiting for a reward, are trying to do business with God.

God's not a businessman. He's a father. We don't serve him for a salary, financial or even spiritual. You know, in a store, supposing a man is running a business and he's got workmen working in that store.

They've got fixed hours of work and they'll stop working if they don't get a salary. But if that businessman has got a son or a number of sons or daughters who are partners with him in that business and they're working in that store, they don't look at the watch and say, it's time to go home.

There is no time to go home because they are partners in the business. They don't ask their dad for a salary at the end of the month. They are partners because they are children. They are sons and daughters, not servants.

It's a more wonderful thing to be a son than to be a servant. In the Old Testament, they could never be sons. Not even Moses or Elijah could look up to heaven and call God, Dad, Father. But in the New Covenant, we are sons and daughters.

So, how do you serve God? I have been in full-time Christian work for 51 years. But I started serving God even before that when as soon as I was converted, when I was in the Navy. I was serving the Lord even then in my secular job.

But it was never for reward. I can't think that any time in my life I served God to get a reward. I served God out of gratitude for what he had done for me on Calvary, for saving me from an eternal hell, for showing me God is my father.

It was gratitude all the way. I mean, think of this. Supposing somebody has very lovingly given you a gift of a billion dollars, and you do some work for him. Would you go and ask him for a payment for that work that you did?

He's already given you a gift of a billion dollars. You'd be willing to spend all your life serving him and never expect any gift or salary. So that's how I saw Jesus' death for me on Calvary. What he gave me through Calvary was worth trillions and trillions of dollars and more.

And I cannot think, I cannot even think of serving God for a salary. I'm not waiting for any gift from him or from man or from anyone. The Lord's done so much for me that I can never finish repaying him for what he did for me on the cross.

If you serve the Lord like that, you'll be happy every day. I'm happy, I'm extremely happy. I don't have a complaint against a single human being, and that's my honest testimony. Cuz God's been so good to me.

And when you see how good God has been to you, it'll be very easy for you to be good to other people, even to those who are evil towards you. Cuz God was good to me when I was evil. So it's all a question of how we look at it.

Serving God the way Jesus served from God's viewpoint makes a world of difference, the motive behind our service. If you have complaints that other people didn't treat you properly, you're not serving God.

We, I remember once how the Lord showed me this many years ago. When somebody who we had served very much, young brother, we had helped a lot in our local church, and he grew up and got a good job and went elsewhere.

He never, for years and years, we never heard from him, and we wondered what happened. He never kept in touch with us or expressed any gratitude. For all the years, he even stayed in our house, etc. And the Lord told me, something's wrong with you, not with him.

I said, Lord, with me, we served him and took care of him in so many ways. And the Lord said, you're expecting gratitude from him. Is a sin. Now, I never knew that expecting somebody to say thank you was a sin.

If I did something for someone, was it wrong for me to expect him to say thank you? The Lord said, yes. You don't live by the standards of human beings. Human beings expect people to say thank you, but not you.

You're my servant. You're my son. And the reason was, the Lord said, remember that passage where it says, people say, Lord, when did we see you hungry? When did we see you in prison? When did we see you naked and clothed you and feed you?

And the Lord said, inasmuch as you did it to the least of these, my brothers, you did it unto me. And so what the Lord said to me from that passage was, whenever you serve my people, remember you're serving me, not serving them.

Even if you serve the least of my brothers, you are serving me. So when you serve that young brother, you were not serving him, but you were serving me, said the Lord. And if you want a thank you, expect it from me, not from that young brother.

Boy, was my eyes open that day. From that day, I stopped expecting gratitude from anybody. I can go and preach in a place for a whole week and be very happy if I go away from there and nobody says thank you, it's quite okay.

Because I didn't serve them, I served the Lord. What a liberation it brought into my life when I just began to see one little area from God's viewpoint. And that's just an example of how your whole outlook can change.

If you learn to allow the Holy Spirit to put his law into your mind and heart and you begin to see everything from God's viewpoint, the whole purpose of the gift of the Holy Spirit is to make us see things from God's viewpoint.

Gratitude for Salvation and the Call to Present the Body

So how do I show my gratitude to the Lord? That's what I was coming to. You know when, about, it's now 17, 24 years ago, I was driving my two-wheeler moped in India, coming back from a store to my house.

And I was going past a railway crossing. And in the railway crossings in India, it's quite primitive. They have a bar that it's manually operated with two bars on either side of the railway line and one man raises one up and then he raises the other one up and lowers one and lowers.

So what happened was I came, the first bar was up, both bars were up actually, and I was coming through in my moped and I'd crossed one. And this guy, without seeing that I hadn't crossed the other one, lowered it.

And I went bang into it, my chest, and I got knocked off and I fell on the railway line unconscious. And fortunately, somebody picked me up before the train came and my life was saved. Just a little crack on my skull.

That was okay, it wasn't serious. But I got up and I said, Lord, I have not finished saying thank you to you for dying for me. You can't take my life so soon. You gotta give me a few more years to say thank you to you for dying for me on the cross.

And he's answered that prayer. He's given me 24 years more, and I believe many more. But my life of service is saying thank you to Jesus for dying for me on the cross every day. It's a delight for me to serve God.

I don't expect gratitude, I don't expect money, I don't expect anything, because I already got trillions of dollars on the cross through his death and resurrection and what he's done for me and giving me the gift of the Holy Spirit.

What value do you put on that? You'll never again serve God for anything other than out of gratitude. But how do we show our gratitude? Let's turn to Romans 12. I urge you, brethren, by the mercies of God.

Now remember, this comes in Romans 12. Romans is the most complete description of the gospel that there is in any book of the Bible. And he's explaining how you start as a sinner in chapter one, chapter two, chapter three, all have sinned.

And how you're justified by faith, chapter four, chapter five. How you come to a life of overcoming sin, Romans 6, 14, sin will not rule over you. How you come to life free from the law, Romans 7, you're dead to the law.

And how you come to a life in the Holy Spirit, in Romans chapter 8. And in chapter 9, 10, and 11, he speaks of God's sovereignty, God's righteousness, and God's faithfulness. In those three chapters, and at the end of it all, from the example of Israel.

At the end of it all, he says, in view of such a wonderful gospel that you have experienced, and such a good God, how are you going to respond? How are you going to say thank you? Is it by putting 10 of your income into the offering box?

Tithing, the Old Covenant, and New Covenant Giving

Go back to the old covenant, if you want to do that. Do you know that tithing is never taught in the New Testament? I know that covetous pastors have taught you to tithe, but it's never taught in the New Testament.

They quote that dreadful verse, I will curse you if you don't tithe me. Tithe unto me, says the Lord, Malachi chapter 3, verse 10. I say, listen, please turn one page and come into the new covenant, and you'll never see that again.

Just turn one page, that's all. Why do you go back to the Old Testament? If you go back to the Old Testament to tithe, you've got to go back to the Old Testament to offer lambs and goats and everything else.

Why do you stop with just the tithe? You've got to go to Jerusalem three times a year, don't forget that. Yeah, that's how the Israelites had to do that. Why do people pick one thing out that covetous pastors do that?

Because they love money. Nowhere in the New Testament are you commanded to tithe. I remember somebody telling me, didn't Jesus say to the Pharisees that they must tithe? I said, yeah, because they were still under the old covenant.

The new covenant only started on the day of Pentecost. So naturally, Jesus even told the lepers to go and show themselves to the priests. Why was that? They were under the old covenant. So when you don't read the Bible carefully, you deserve to be deceived.

And you probably lose your money also to covetous pastors. But what I say is, you don't show your gratitude by giving money, because God's not a beggar. He owns the cattle on a thousand hills. All the silver and the gold are his.

He doesn't want your money. It's very, very important to understand that. I've served the Lord for 51 years, full time. I have never sent a report about my work anywhere. We have planted over 70 churches over the last 42 years.

We have never sent a report of our work anytime in these 42 years, anywhere. I'll tell you why. Because Jesus never sent a report of his work. Paul never sent a report of his work, and we are following Jesus and Paul, and the apostles.

This is all modern, the way Christianity is being operated in ways completely contrary to scripture. We decided to go according to scripture. Do you know that in the New Testament, there's not a single word which says, where Paul said, please support me or my ministry?

Never once, not even once. He always said, give money to the poor. That's the principle we have followed in our churches too. We help millions of rupees we have given to poor people who are in need, whose children need to be educated or need food, clothing, shelter, or houses washed away by a cyclone.

We take care of all that, but we never say, give money for us or our ministry. We're just following scripture. That is not the way we show our gratitude to the Lord. Romans 12 says, present your body.

That's the way we show our gratitude to God. You need to understand this. I urge you, in view of this wonderful salvation, in view of the tremendous mercies of God that I've explained in the previous 11 chapters, how are you going to respond?

Not pay your tithe. Present your body as a living sacrifice. Do you know the meaning of sacrifice? Holy sacrifice? A sacrifice is something where I have to deny myself something in order to do it. You know, if a person had to give a sacrifice in the Old Testament, it was expensive.

People who committed a sin, they had to bring a goat. How much does a goat cost? I don't know how much it costs here in terms of dollars, but think of if you had to bring a goat every time you sin, you'd stop sinning pretty quickly, I'll tell you that, because it'd be expensive.

So don't think it was cheap to commit sin in the Old Testament. Today, because you just had to say, Lord, forgive me. Sin has been conveyed, getting freedom from sin is so cheap, and that's why you keep committing sin.

But you read that in the book of Leviticus, they had to bring sacrifices. Sacrifices were costly. And here, it's not talking about money. It's talking about a more costly sacrifice, present your body.

The Body as a Living Sacrifice

I'll tell you, there was an offering in the Old Testament called the burnt offering. And the burnt offering, you read about it in Leviticus chapter one. And just by the way, a lot of people think Leviticus is a boring book.

It's not. It's a very interesting book. There's a little commentary of mine at the back called Through the Bible. I remember somebody who got a copy of it said, Brother Zach, all my life, I thought Leviticus was a boring book till I read your book Through the Bible.

And I saw it's so interesting. Every book of the Bible is interesting. In Leviticus chapter one, it says when you give a burnt offering to God, you can't just put the whole bullock on the altar. You must cut it into pieces and then put it on the altar.

And it's gonna be burnt up. You think that's crazy. Why should you cut it up if it's gonna be burnt up? You might as well put the whole thing there and burn it up. But there was a reason, because the meaning behind it was, it was a picture of what we read in Romans 12 .1.

Everything in the Old Testament was a picture of what is gonna be fulfilled in the New Testament. So here, when a man presents his body, you don't just say, Lord, here's my body. You gotta cut it up. And then it takes on meaning.

If I say to you, give your body to the Lord, you say, sure, here, Lord, take it. Hang on, let's cut it up. Lord, here are my eyes. I never, from today onwards, want to look at anything which you don't want me to look at, never.

I never want to read anything you don't want me to read. I don't want to watch television, anything that you cannot sit and watch with me. I never want to watch a movie which you will not be able to watch with me.

I never want to look at a billboard which you don't want me to see. I present my eyes to you completely. And I want to use my eyes to read what you want me to read, like the Bible. Okay, and that's just the eyes.

Now, Lord, I want to give you my tongue. We are cutting up the offering, right? Lord, I never want to say anything with my tongue, which I can't say if you were standing right in front of me. I always want to talk to my wife as if you're standing between me and my wife.

Boy, will there be a difference in the way you speak to your wife if you realize Jesus is there and you're giving your tongue to him? I never want to speak to my husband in any other way than with you there.

I present my tongue to you from today. This tongue is never going to sing a worldly song. It's going to sing songs for the glory of God. I present my tongue to you. And now, Lord, my hands. I'm cutting up my body slowly, little by little.

Here are my hands, Lord. I'm never going to write a letter or type something on the computer, which is going to hurt anyone. I'm going to bless people with the emails I write. And everything I do with my hands, it's going to be holy.

I present my hands to you. Now, tell me, I've just gone to three parts of your body, right? I haven't come to the inner desires and longings and all that. Eyes, tongue, and hands. Okay, let's stop there.

Is it easier to pay 10 of your income or to give your eyes, tongue, and hands? If you're given an option, the person will say, Lord, here's the 10%. Just leave me alone and let me do what I like with my eyes, tongue, and hands.

This is the reason why people pay that tithe. They don't want to give the offering which God wants from them. They offer a cheap substitute. When God wants something costly, they give something cheap.

Here, Lord, take your 10 and leave me alone to do what I like with my eyes, to speak as I like with my tongue, to do what I like with my hands. Don't trouble me, I gave you your 10%. It's one of the greatest deceptions being practiced in Christianity today, and hardly anybody speaks against it, because they don't know the scriptures.

I beseech you, brethren, by the mercies of God, don't pay your tithe, present your body as a living sacrifice. A sacrifice means when you're tempted to do things with your parts of your body, you deny yourself.

When you're tempted to get angry, you die, and dead men don't get angry. I die to myself. When I'm tempted to lust, I die to myself. That is a living sacrifice. And then, it says that's the way you worship God.

Did you read that? The NASB is so clear, that is your spiritual worship, or worship in the spirit. How do you worship in the spirit? It's not by making a lot of noise. The priests of Baal made a lot of noise.

No fire came. It's a counterfeit. I believe in making noise. I believe in shouting the praises of God, hallelujah, and everything else, raising my hands, clapping my hands, provided I have presented my body.

But if I raise my hands and I haven't offered my hands to God every day of the week, it's a deception. You know what I preach in my church about worship? I say, when you sing on Sunday morning, God is not listening to how loud you sing, how beautifully you sing, whether it's melodious.

God's not seeing whether the instruments are all on tune. I'll tell you what God's listening to. How did you live the last six days of the week? Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday?

Did you yell at your wife or yell at your husband, and you come here and use that tongue to sing to God? He's not listening to you. How did you use your eyes to lust after women, and you come here to read the songs to sing?

God's not listening to you. It's not worship. It's just entertainment. And that's why some people go away from a time of Sunday morning and say, didn't we have a good time? The emphasis is on we. Didn't we have a good time singing today?

Were you singing to God, or were you singing to, was it some type of entertainment? There's not much difference between some rock concerts and Sunday morning services nowadays. So I say, on the other hand, if you lived a self-denying, sacrificial life the last six days, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday, and then came to sing, and you sang completely out of tune, and the music instruments are all out of tune as well, God will be delighted.

Not delighted because you're out of tune, and it's good to sing in tune. But my point is that your six days of your life, you don't have a gift of music. There are some people like that who just don't have a gift of music.

I know some brothers, they can't even sing two lines straight. It's out of tune. But if their life is right, God accepts their worship. That is spiritual worship. Romans 12 .1, your spiritual worship is if you have offered your body to God.

Worship Expressed Through Everyday Holiness

So some people ask me this question. Brother Zach, what's the difference between your church and other churches? I say, we don't claim to be more spiritual than other churches. We don't claim to be better.

We don't say we have got no hypocrites. We have got hypocrites in our church. Jesus had a hypocrite even in his church. So all churches have hypocrites. That's not the difference. But the difference is this.

In other churches, the important day is Sunday. In our church, the important day is Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday, and Sunday evening after you go home. But Sunday morning is a place where we get prepared to live a godly life the remaining days of the week.

I said that's the difference. In other words, to us the important thing is how you live at home, how you live in your place of work, how you drive the car when everybody's got road rage. Those are the places where you manifest your Christianity.

I said that is to us more important than how beautifully you sing on Sunday morning. Or what a wonderful sermon you preached on Sunday morning. It means nothing if you have not presented your body throughout the week as a living sacrifice.

Renewing the Mind According to Scripture

And not just that. If you go on from there, we are body and mind as well. So it says the other thing you show your gratitude to God by, first by giving your body, and the second is by being changed in your mind.

Be transformed. Don't be conformed to this world in your way of thinking. But be transformed by the renewing of your mind or your way of thinking. Because then you'll be able to prove what is the perfect, acceptable will of God.

What that means is the world has got a way of thinking. And we've all grown up with that way of thinking from childhood. What we have learned in school is to compete with others and come first. First in the class, first in the athletic field, first in sports.

And always come first. We learn in school how to be, push other people down and come up on top. And how to be jealous and compete and all types of things which are wrong things. We get the mindset of the world as we grow up.

We get a job and in the corporate world is the same type of competition and pushing people down and trying to get on top and compete and one who's made the most money is the most successful. We've got all this mindset and then we are born again.

And if your mind has not changed after many years of being born again, you have not shown your gratitude to God at all. In view of the mercies of God, don't keep thinking like the world thinks. That's the meaning of Romans 12, to be transformed so that you begin to think like God thinks.

That's the meaning of Romans 12, too. So how in the world can I change my human way of thinking to God's way of thinking? Very simple. There's one book God has given us, the Bible, that tells us his way of thinking.

And if I soak my mind in scripture, my mind will be conformed to God's way of thinking. You know this paraphrase I spoke to you about. This verse is paraphrased like this. Don't let the world squeeze you into its mold.

You know how they make plastics in a certain shape. They put it into a mold. And that mold, you pour the plastic in and it comes out in that shape. The world has got a mold, a particular way of thinking.

You get your own back on people who harm you. Money is very important. The honor of people is very important. That's a mold. And the world has shaped people in that mold. And we have been shaped like that from the time we were children, as we have grown up.

And it says, don't let the world shape you into that mold. Get out of that and see the mold of scripture, the way God thinks, and be poured into that mold. And if I want to come out the way God thinks and to be poured into God's mold, I have to read the scriptures and change my way of thinking that is how I show my gratitude to God.

By allowing the Holy Spirit with the word of God to show me how God thinks in the new covenant. I'll give you an example. In the Old Testament, we read of Miriam once criticizing Moses. Miriam is Moses' elder sister who looked after him when he was a baby, saved him when Pharaoh picked him up.

And as an elder sister who was probably 12 years older than him, one day she questioned Mary. You read about it in Numbers chapter 12. Why did you marry a non-Israelite woman? Now Moses married the daughter of Jethro, who was not an Israelite.

And Miriam just questioned this prophet of God like that. You know what she got for that? You remember? Leprosy. Moses didn't give her leprosy. Don't misunderstand. Who gave her leprosy? Moses has no power to give leprosy.

Who gave it? God. How dare you question my prophet? Okay, you read in Second Kings about Elijah. Elisha, sorry. Elijah had just been taken up to heaven. And Elisha came away from there and there were some young men Elisha was a bald man, by the way.

And he said, you bald, baldy, go up like your master. They made fun of his head and they made fun of the rapture of Elijah going up. Do you know what happened to those young men? Some bears came out of the wood and ate them up.

Does Elijah, Elisha have the power to call bears? No. Who sent the bears? God said, how dare you make fun of my servant, Moses and Elisha. Okay, now we come to the New Testament, to the greatest servant of God, Jesus Christ.

Old Covenant Retribution and New Covenant Forgiveness

You know what they called him? Bill Zibub, Prince of Devils. That's how you're casting out demons. You know what they got? Forgiveness. You read it, Matthew chapter 12. This man is casting out demons by the Prince of Devils and Jesus said, if you speak against the Son of Man, you are forgiven.

That is the difference between old covenant and new covenant. A completely different way of thinking. Have you heard pastors and preachers quote this Old Testament verse? Touch not my anointed and do my prophets no harm.

That's a verse from the Psalms, by the way. And all insecure preachers will quote that verse to scare people. Don't you dare speak against me. I'm greater than Jesus Christ. If you speak against him, you get forgiveness, but if you speak against me, you'll get, I don't know what, cancer or something.

These are not servants of God. These are deceived people who are deceived because they don't study the Bible. It's wonderful to be in the new covenant. I don't want anybody to get leprosy. I want them to get forgiveness.

Do you know that people have called me all types of names. Jesus said, if they've called the head of the house Beelzebub, Matthew chapter 10, how much more the members of his family. Have you read that verse?

Am I quoting it right? Yes, I am. Matthew chapter 10, if they called the head of the house Beelzebub, how much more the members of his household, Matthew 10, 25. I'm getting old. I remember the chapter.

I don't always remember the verse. How much more the members of his family. They called the head of the house Beelzebub, prince of devils. How much more the members of his family. I want to ask you, are you a member of Jesus' family?

You'll say yes. Tell me some of the names people have called you. You want names of honor and prestige and respect. The head of your family was called Beelzebul. What sort of name are you looking for?

I'll tell you some of the names I've been called. Devil, son of a devil, head of the serpent, spiritual terrorist, it's an honor. I am a member of Jesus' family. False teacher, heretic, cult leader. I am a member of Jesus' family.

I hope you are. Jesus said in Matthew chapter 5, woe unto you when men speak well of you, because that's how they spoke about the false prophets. Blessed are you when men call you all types of names, because that's how they treated the true prophets in the Old Testament.

It's always like that. Have you read those verses? Do you understand that? So when you allow your mind to think like God thinks, you'll be very different from the average Christian, because the average Christian is living under the old covenant.

They keep saying, touch not my anointed, do my prophets no harm. I say, you can do any amount of harm you like. They treated the apostles so badly, they killed them. And they said what Jesus said, Father, forgive them.

They don't know what they're doing. That's the spirit of the New Testament. Let me show you in Hebrews in chapter 12. In Hebrews chapter 12, it says, we have now come to Jesus and to God, the judge of all men.

Hebrews chapter 12, it's speaking about who we have come to. Verse 24, to Jesus, the mediator of a new covenant, Hebrews 12, 24. And one mark of the new covenant is mentioned here. And that is, his blood speaks better things than the blood of Abel.

He's contrasting old covenant with new covenant. When Cain killed Abel, smashed his head and his blood fell on the ground. Do you know what God said to Cain? Your brother's blood is crying out to me from the ground.

The blood was crying out. You read that in Genesis 4. You know what it was crying out to God? God, take vengeance on this man who killed me. It was crying out to God. And God took vengeance as Abel's blood was crying out.

It's exactly what it's written in Genesis 4. His blood was crying out. And in the new covenant, you read that Jesus shed his blood on Calvary, which also fell on the ground. And do you know what that blood was crying out for?

Forgive them. Okay. When people harm you and hurt you, what does your inner being cry out for? In that moment, you'll discover whether you're an old covenant Christian or a new covenant Christian, whether you're following Abel or Jesus Christ.

I tell you, the vast majority of so-called believers I've met are in the old covenant. They seek that some harm will come to the person who hurt them. For a moment, right now. I want to give you a little homework while you're sitting on your chair.

Can you think of someone who hurt you, or did some harm to you, or to your family, or to your children, or to you personally? I'm sure there are many people. But think of the one who did the maximum harm to you, or spoke the maximum evil about you, or caused you such problems.

Maybe a non-Christian, maybe a Christian sometimes. Tell me honestly, or tell God, or tell yourself, what do you wish for him? Supposing you heard today that he got cancer, would you feel secretly delighted?

Supposing you heard that he got an inheritance of a million dollars, how would you feel then? Sad, disturbed? In that moment, you discover whether you have forgiven that person or not. You can say I've forgiven him, but when you hear bad news about him and you are secretly happy, it shows you have not forgiven him.

That's what the Lord showed me. I sincerely decide to forgive every single person who hurt me, and I did that. But once when something bad happened to one of them and I was inwardly a little happy, the Lord said, see, you have not forgiven him.

I said, thank you, Lord, for showing me the deception of my own heart. Every sin I speak about, inward sin, I've discovered in myself. That's why I can speak about it, and I've cleansed myself. I've seen, because your flesh is the same as mine.

I know exactly how you think, because I know how I think. We are all children of Adam, and there's no special sin that you are doing which you can have in your thoughts which I don't have in mine. But we can cleanse ourselves, and I can prevent the world from squeezing my thoughts into its mold, and see the mold of Jesus.