Conformity

The author of 2/3rds of the New Testament details some very complete information concerning God's will. Paul writes Romans 12:1-2 ¶ I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that ye present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service. And be not conformed to this world: but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind, that ye may prove what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect, will of God.

1381 dokimazw dokimazo dok-im-ad’-zo

from 1384; TDNT-2:255,181; v

AV-prove 10, try 4, approve 3, discern 2, allow 2, like 1, examine 1; 23

1) to test, examine, prove, scrutinise (to see whether a thing is genuine or not), as metals
2) to recognise as genuine after examination, to approve, deem worthy

The Romans are shown how to recognize God's will, how to know what His will is, how to prove His will, how to test circumstances and know His will. Paul writes to the Romans information that allows a person to know the will of God, to know the will of God is good, and acceptable, and perfect. It has been wrongfully taught, and I confess sadly by myself for many years, that God has two wills, permissive, and perfect. It has also been taught by many that God has a "good" will, He has an "acceptable" will, and He has a "perfect" will which is also very false teaching. If it isn't God's will, then whose will is it? It is either my will, another person's will, the devil's will, or it is God's will. However, if it isn't God's will, then if it is my will, and it is my will or another's will or the devil's will, it is the devil's will because there are only two wills, God's will or the devil's will. This is why the article is titled Conformity.

When Adam rejected his responsibility to refuse Eve's offer in the forbidden fruit, sin entered the world through him (Gen 3, 1 Cor 15). Since that event in history, God removed man from the Garden of Eden, and the world become a possession of the "new" god, the devil (2 Cor 4). Since we have read the Word we know the Lord Yashua will come in triumph on That Day, and retake His people, and the world and set up His kingdom for 1000 years, and then the devil will be loosed for a short time and then following his defeat and sentence to eternal damnation and condemnation, we will live with the Godhead forever (Revelation, Ezekiel, Zechariah, Daniel, Micah, Obadiah, and many other passages). It was NOT the Lord's will for man to sin, but His foreknowledge planned for sin because He knew what man would do with His final details being the Parousia of His Son, His second coming. At this point in eternity, the "new" god becomes the vanquished Lucifer, and sentenced to eternal damnation in the Lake of Fire (Rev 20) where the beast and the false prophet already reside, and after the white throne judgment all those who never repented of their sins in a commitment of their lives to Yashua haMashiach will then be sentenced as well (Rev 21). Conformity is a neutral resource and is good when we are fashioning our lives after men and women of God and ultimately the Lord Jesus, but is very bad when after the world because the scheme of this world is the devil's will.

Romans 12:1-2 ¶ I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that ye present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service. And be not conformed to this world: but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind, that ye may prove what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect, will of God. The Greek word here is suschmatizw /syschematizo from the root word, schma/schema which is our English word, scheme (actually we took the Greek and merely used the alphabet of our language, it is called a transliterated word, NOT a translated word).

4964 suschmatizw suschematizo soos-khay-mat-id’-zo

from 4862 and a derivative of 4976; ; v

AV-conform to 1, fashion (one’s) self according to 1; 2

1) to conform one’s self (i.e. one’s mind and character) to another’s pattern, (fashion one’s self according to)

For Synonyms see entry 5873

The reality is quite simple in thought, the god of this age or world is the devil, and his will is his scheme for the world. Therefore when we follow the pattern or scheme of the world, we are in actuality conforming to his scheme, engaging in his will which is contrary to the will of God and the reason why we can not know the will of God when we are following or conforming to the devil's will. The devil is the god of this age, and his plan is for man to live with him in the Lake of Fire whereas the Lord's will is for none to perish, but all to repent ans spend eternity with Him (2 Peter 3) which is why Yashua died on Calvary for all the sins of mankind paying a debt He did not owe and a debt we could never pay. Conformity is a bad thing and far worse than we see in peer pressure although the principles are the same, the results have eternal consequences whereas peer pressure will produce a wrong decision, but that decision may be repented, and Conformity in theory may be repented of, yet it will not happen in practice as seen in Revelation 2, 9 & 16. Conformity is a sin that hardens the heart of a man, and it affects those around us because of its disguise.

Some have debated foolish issues found in Scripture without considering the holiness and love of God, one such debate is the children of Israel moving to Egypt and becoming slaves to the Egyptians. Some would argue that it was God's will for them to be slaves, yet all I find in Scripture is that it is never God's will for a man to be slave to another man, but it is His will for us to be slaves to Him because in His righteous love and direction He wants the very best for His people, it is only when we have Conformity to the world that we can not see His will, and walk away from Him all the while thinking we are alright with Him.

Look at Joseph as an example of Conformity. Yes, the Lord wanted to use him to deliver the world from famine, so He allowed his brothers to use their envy and jealousy to sell Joseph into slavery which came as a result of Joseph's pride because the Lord started revealing insight and dreams that would come to pass. God used all these things in order to reveal Himself to Egyptians who didn't know Him.

Let's look at how far Joseph went in Conformity. Genesis 42:7 ¶ And Joseph saw his brethren, and he knew them, but made himself strange unto them, and spake roughly unto them; and he said unto them, Whence come ye? And they said, From the land of Canaan to buy food. Joseph treats his family rather badly and perhaps even mean-spirited. But look closer to the Word. vs 8 And Joseph knew his brethren, but they knew not him. His own brothers didn't even know him. Why would his brothers not recognize him? Think for a moment about this because it reveals the Conformity of Joseph. Joseph look like he is Egyptian, he is not wearing the clothes of Israel, he isn't speaking the same language as Israel, he isn't doing anything like Israel, he is totally conformed to the Egyptian culture, so even his brothers could not tell this man before whom they stood was their brother Joseph.

Look at the behavior of Joseph, it wasn't just his clothing, it was the beginning, but he goes further. Genesis 44:1-5 ¶ And he commanded the steward of his house, saying, Fill the men’s sacks with food, as much as they can carry, and put every man’s money in his sack’s mouth. And put my cup, the silver cup, in the sack’s mouth of the youngest, and his corn money. And he did according to the word that Joseph had spoken. As soon as the morning was light, the men were sent away, they and their asses. And when they were gone out of the city, and not yet far off, Joseph said unto his steward, Up, follow after the men; and when thou dost overtake them, say unto them, Wherefore have ye rewarded evil for good? Is not this it in which my lord drinketh, and whereby indeed he divineth? ye have done evil in so doing. Please note that the Word is clear that divining is evil. Balaam became cursed and walked away from the Lord because he went from being a prophet to a soothsayer and diviner. Joseph has gone from looking like an Egyptian to become a diviner who used a divining cup, and probably because of the way he interacted and treated his own brothers to serving the Egyptian idols, after all this is where he lives in Egypt, and when you live in Egypt you act like an Egyptian (This is tongue and cheek.).

The principle of conformity is realized in Joseph. The word, suschmatizw /syschematizo, gives us our word, scheme, and Joseph actualizes the definition, and allows us to see the reality of following the devil's scheme, and NOT the will of God because sin hardens the heart and makes it impossible to discern His will. Joseph later brings all the relatives of Israel including Israel (formerly called Jacob) to live in Egypt. This isn't the Lord's will, but Joseph doesn't realize this until he is on his deathbed and asks for his bones to be buried in Canaan when they returned to the Promise Land.

The children of Israel would have had a different upbringing should Joseph had told Pharaoh that he and his family would return to Israel, the Promised Land after he had obeyed the Lord in saving Egypt from desolation brought on by severe famine. Imagine their children not being born into an idolatrous world. Imagine their children not being raised in Egyptian society. Imagine the active grace of God surrounding the children of Israel in a positive way being used to mature them in Yahweh, not Isis or Osiris (several Egyptian gods). Imagine just a few years later when another Pharaoh came to power, BUT there would be no Isaelites to enslave because they lived in the Promised Land. Perhaps too often we glamorize sin by stating that it was good for it to correct us because the Lord has delivered us and made us stronger as a result of His mercy. As much as it is true that God delivers because He is merciful, how much greater should we have a testimony of His protection from ever having that sin in our lives. Israel could have been serving Yahweh those 400 years they were in Egypt, the Lord who delivered them could have been the Lord who established them and blessed them in Israel. Rather than having to cry out in torment and pain of slavery to Yahweh, they could be rejoicing in His protection and blessings in serving Him in spirit and in truth.

We are encouraged to follow Yashua, to take up our cross, deny ourselves, to walk as He walked in the Spirit. If being delivered from sin for maturity and growth was so important, then Yashua would not be our Example because He never sinned. There are too many passages that tell us to follow Jesus because He never sinned, so in logic, having sin in our lives is not a blessing, it means what Scripture says, "Death!" We are far ahead in walking with the Lord when we choose to not sin, to not conform to the world and the people in this world. Joseph isn't the only man of God who fell into conformity of the devil's scheme. Adults talk of peer pressure, they talk of rape and murder and drugs and sex in schools, and even confess shock when it is in grade schools, yet it is these same adults who have conformed to the scheme of societyto fit in, to be like the Jones next door, to stab coworkers in the back to climb the ladder of success. These adults vote into leadership based upon lusts and money, not the Word of God. These adults set the tone of society by their living and their voting, then complain because Iran looks at the USA calling it The Great Satan.

Our society has become degraded and debased before our very eyes on account of our choices to conform to this world. I moved from Maine to Antigua in 1960, I left able to pray in school, and I returned unable to pray in school. We blame one woman, yet who voted ungodly men and women into office who would suggest ungodly people as judges who would be the selection at some point as Supreme Court justices? Madelaine Murray was evil, but it was not her fault that prayer was removed from school, that rests on people who voted for people to be leaders who did not follow Yashua. If you go back to Joesph for a moment, consider one of the things he does in Egypt, he buys all the land from people who owned land in Egypt so that Pharaoh now owned all the land! Now when the state owns all the land and takes back as rent from the individual's use of it, we call that communism, yet that is what Joseph did! Because we have conformed to the world, we voted into office wrong people who in turn selected wrong people as judges who would later disect our Constitution determining things that affect our lives such as removing prayer from school because it offended an atheist. When I left the States, a person was disciplined when he spoke in the bathroom or chewed gum, but when I returned we then had rapes and murders and beatings to deal with on a daily basis, guns and drugs and fanatical and violent behavoral problems that were now needing to be disciplined.

Our society has evolved into a masochistic and decadent world, and that is the scheme of the devil. So, why do I want to conform to it in any way? I can't understand it! Why do I allow the scheme of the devil to determine what I think, where I go, and who I select as friends? Why do I so desire to fit in? I ask or invite a person into my house, that sounds nice, it even sounds friendly even perhaps compassionate, but then I allow this person to tell me how to live, to direct my actions, to decide what is right. Consider this, our fathers escaped religious persecution and came to this land to rid themselves of that bondage because they didn't want to conform to European society. Since that time our borders have been open to those seeking a better life, a life of freedom to live for the Lord, but we have allowed aliens to dictate out thoughts, our actions, direct our court system, to live in our house and tell us why we can't live in our own house anymore with this freedom to serve and love the Lord. Our chief justices have allowed pressure to change laws to influence their application of the Constitution that we all conform to the world as dictated by these aliens. No wonder we are where we are spiritually, lukewarm adherents that are neither hot nor cold (Rev 3).

Instead of being able to see God's will, I have no clue that I can acknowledge the Lord and even if I had this idea, I feel pressured to obey the law of the land and separate church and state. Rather than living for Yashua 24 hours a day, I have convinced myself that I am doing the best I can, and I have no desire for Him as a result, trapped by my ignorance because of conformity. Consider this, another word for conformity could be tradition, and the Lord taught clearly that tradition will void His Word (Matthew 15). Marl 7:7-8 Howbeit in vain do they worship me, teaching for doctrines the commandments of men. For laying aside the commandment of God, ye hold the tradition of men, as the washing of pots and cups: and many other such like things ye do. Tradition is taught as law, and tradition destroys the Word, and man wants to conform to others, therefore tradition and conformity are essentially the same thing, and God's will is voided. Is it any wonder why we find ourselves wondering where God is, even if He does exist? We belittle those who would go outside the country and then state that those in thrid world countries are hungry for the Lord. We have left common sense and embraced devil sense. We have fallen into alignment with the devil's scheme and we have forsaken the Lord's will.