Day 1 — Real Life

“Therefore I urge you, brothers, on account of God’s mercy, to offer your bodies as living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to God, which is your spiritual service of worship.”

— Romans 12:1 (BSB)

Think about yesterday. Not the highlights, the whole thing. You woke up, maybe too late. You ate something, or didn’t. You sat through lessons, walked or rode somewhere, did a chore you didn’t choose, scrolled, laughed at something in the group chat, argued with someone, did some homework, lay awake for a while. Maybe you fetched water, helped in a family shop, minded a younger cousin or trained until your legs ached.

Now a question: how much of yesterday had anything to do with God?

If your honest answer is “the ten minutes I prayed” or “nothing much,” you’re not alone. Lots of Christians quietly split their lives in two. On one side are the “spiritual” things: church, the Bible, prayer, youth group. On the other side is everything else, which is most of life. And because “everything else” takes up nearly all of the day, it’s easy to feel that you’re only really a Christian for a few minutes a week.

Paul won’t let us live like that. Look at what he asks for in Romans 12:1. Not your soul, not your feelings, not your Sunday mornings: your body. The body that gets out of bed and goes to school. The hands that wash dishes and type messages. The feet that walk to practice. Offer all of that to God, he says, and it becomes “your spiritual service of worship.”

That’s a startling idea. Worship isn’t only singing. It’s an ordinary Tuesday handed over to God. Elsewhere Paul says the same thing just as plainly: “So whether you eat or drink or whatever you do, do it all to the glory of God.” And again: “whatever you do, in word or deed, do it all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through Him.” Eating and drinking. Whatever you do. There isn’t a corner of life left out.

Remember that Jesus Himself spent most of His years on earth doing ordinary work. When He began to preach, the people of His hometown were offended: “Isn’t this the carpenter?” For roughly thirty years before His public ministry, the Son of God made things out of wood, ate meals with His family and lived in a small town most people had never heard of. And at the end of those hidden years, the Father said from heaven, “This is My beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased!” Nothing had happened yet that would make the headlines. The ordinary years pleased God.

Notice, too, why Paul says to do this: “on account of God’s mercy.” This isn’t a demand to try harder so that God will accept you. It’s a response to a God who has already shown you mercy in Jesus. You don’t offer Him your life to earn His love. You offer it because you already have it.

That’s what this whole book is about. Your mind, your screens, your heart, your family, your pain: real life. Not a separate spiritual life tucked off to one side, but the actual life you live, handed over to God one ordinary day at a time.

Think about it: Which part of your day feels furthest from God? What would it look like to offer that part to Him too?

Try this: Pick three ordinary moments in your day tomorrow, such as brushing your teeth, the walk to school and a chore. At each one, pray one silent sentence: Lord, this is Yours too.

Go deeper: The Key Teachings of A. W. Tozer — Tozer argued that most Christians cut their lives in two, sacred and secular, and so feel that most of their hours are spent away from God; but Jesus prayed on the mountain and worked at a carpenter’s bench in the same unbroken fellowship with His Father, and so can we. Start with chapter 15, “The Sacrament of Living”.

Lord, I don’t want to keep You in a small corner of my life. Thank You for the mercy You have shown me in Jesus. Here is my body, my time and my ordinary day: the lessons, the chores, the messages and the walk home. Teach me to do all of it in Your name, with thanks. In Jesus’ name, Amen.