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. Rom. 12:2.

Conformity to the world has a great attraction for a vast number of people. Conformity will reach its maximum when the two-horned beast of Revelation 13 comes to power. "He causeth all, both small and great, rich and poor, free and bond, to receive a mark in their right hand, or in their foreheads: and that no man might buy or sell, save he that had the mark, or the name of the beast, or the number of his name" (Rev. 13:16, 17).

Men's minds are being conditioned. This trend is already greatly advanced in the world. One of the prices we pay for the complexity of modern life is the production of mediocre personalities and mediocre minds. The trend is to conformity in everything, from our clothing to our thinking. The development of an independent personality is difficult to achieve.

Conformity is dangerous when it is of the worldly kind and is applied to the church and the Christian. The world is ever seeking to bring people to its ways of living. It has little or no concern for the individual. The world offers a great deal of success provided we allow ourselves to be enslaved by its ways.

Let us not underestimate the seriousness of the Christian adventure and the cost thereof. It is quite possible to become passive subordinates in a religious environment we take for granted. All but one of the twelve apostles were killed because of their stand for Christ against the crowd. John, the last of them, was exiled to a concentration camp on the Isle of Patmos. Almost all of the martyrs of the early centuries were slain for just one reason: they would not conform to the imperial pattern.

We must not be afraid to stand alone. Let us not call compromise diplomacy when it is cowardice. We are to be transformed by the renewing of the mind. We are not different just to be different. We are different where the choice is between truth and error, between Christ and the world, between the Lordship of Christ and the rule of the world, the flesh, and the devil.