The True Circumcision of God - PH66-02

Advanced Bible Doctrine - Philippians 3:3-6

One of the favorite legalisms which was imposed upon the New Testament Christians was the act of circumcision. Circumcision was one of those acts that they could really crystallize as far as putting people back under the Mosaic system, and to the position that the Law of Moses was applicable and was in force over Christians. Paul described this for the believers in the city of Philippi as an act of mutilation. The kind of circumcision that they were performing in the age of grace, where it is out of place, is simply an act of physical mutilation.

The ritual had deep spiritual significance under the Mosaic Law for the Jews, and it was a thing which was properly practiced. But once the era of grace began, the act of physical circumcision was out, as far as religious significance. It may have, and does have, medical values even today, but as far as its religious significance, that was a thing of the past.

Circumcision represents simply a case study of this whole concept of legalism that I can make progress with God through certain human efforts and human capacities. So while we are studying this specifically that Paul refers to, please remember that this could apply to any number of things that are constantly foisted upon Christians as ways to make progress with God. This is done in a local church in any number of ways. Someone gets up in a large audience in which there are a mixed congregation of believers and unbelievers, and he explains the gospel of the grace of God. He explains how you may be born again. Then he comes to the end of the service. What does he do?

He interjects an act of legalism. He doesn't ask them to go out and be circumcised in order to be saved, but he says, "Those of you who want to be saved, walk down this aisle." He might just as well have said, "If you want to be saved, go out and perform the act of circumcision." Instead, he has asked them in our day to walk down the aisle; to raise a hand; or, to come forward to the mourners' bench and to sit there and mourn, or to kneel there and cry. All of this is "Bah humbug" stuff which is imposed upon believers in the age of grace. You should know to refer and to react to that sort of thing with just plain, "Bah humbug." That's because that's what the apostle Paul is trying to say, that that's what legalism was.

So while we are studying the specifics of this act of circumcision, you just keep thinking in your mind of all the things that you may have even become acclimated to through your church relationships, which are pure, unadulterated, coldblooded acts of legalism which have been imposed upon believers in one way or another.

So in verse 3, the apostle Paul points out that there is today a real and genuine circumcision. It was pictured by the Mosaic circumcision. But today there is a genuine circumcision for Christians in which they are indeed participants. Verse 3 says, "For we are the circumcision who worship God in the Spirit, and rejoice in Christ Jesus, and have no confidence in the flesh." The word "for" that introduces this verse is the Greek word "gar." "Gar" indicates that an explanation is now coming. This is to explain why Paul has spoken so severely against the legalists in verse 2: calling them dogs; calling them evil workers; and, calling them butchers. Now he says, "I'm going to explain why I'm using such strong language against these people who are seeking to bring you into the trap, into the bondage, of legalism.

Circumcision

"We are the circumcision." The word circumcision is the word "peritome." "Peritome" means "cutting around." It is, as you remember, as we previously pointed out in this chapter, in contrast to another word that he uses–the "katatome." "Katatome" means concision or cutting down or mutilation. Paul says, "I've been talking to you about the mutilators, these who are trying to practice this Mosaic right in the age of grace. Now, I'm going to talk to you about the true circumcision–the genuine quality (the genuine act) that God has been speaking about, and that God has been making reference to. It, in the Old Testament, had a purpose, but in the New Testament it does not.

So what is really the circumcision of the Old Testament? If we get that clearly in mind, it will help us to understand what Paul is talking about here. If you'll turn with me to Genesis 17, we have the first reference–the introduction of this whole rite. This act of circumcision was indeed practiced by heathen people on occasion, and it was a totally meaningless practice. They had other reasons for it, but it was brought into the life of the Jewish people here in Genesis 17 with a very distinct significance. In Genesis 17:9, circumcision began with Abraham, the father of the Jewish people:

"And God said unto Abraham, 'You shall keep my covenant therefore, you and your seed after you in their generations. This is my covenant which you shall keep between Me and you and your seed after you. Every male child among you shall be circumcised. You shall circumcise the flesh of your foreskin, and it shall be a sign of the covenant between Me and you; he that is eight days old shall be circumcised among you, every male child in your generations; he that was born in the house, or bought with money of any foreigner who is not of your seed; he that is born in your house, and he that is bought with your money must be circumcised. And my covenant shall be in your flesh for an everlasting covenant. The uncircumcised male child, whose flesh of his foreskin is not circumcised, that soul shall be cut off from his people. He has broken my covenant.'"

The covenant that is referred to here is that specific agreement which was established by God with Abraham concerning a people who were to be descended from him, who were to have eternal blessings and eternal land and eternal kingdom. The acceptance and faith in God concerning this covenant, and the entering into the blessings of these promises, was signified by this physical act upon the males of circumcision. Physical circumcision, in effect then, marked the male Jew as a beneficiary of the Abrahamic covenant. Without this, he was outside of the blessings of this covenant. You may read about the details of this in Genesis 17:8-11, Acts 7:8, and Romans 4:11.

The Abrahamic Covenant

1. First God said, "I'm going to give you a land." That land we know today is the land of Palestine. The Jew today does not possess that land in its complete boundaries that God promised to give to the Jewish people. They will yet possess that entire land from the Euphrates River down to the Nile River. The promise of land was amplified in the Palestinian Covenant which we have previously studied.
   
   
2. Secondly, God promised, in Genesis 12:2-3, a seed. That is, that a great nation would result from Abraham; that this nation would be a kingdom; and, that this kingdom would last forever. This promise was amplified later in what we call the Davidic Covenant–that there would always be a nation; there would always be a king; and, there would always be a throne upon which to rule. Of course, God does not use the word "forever" in a careless way. Covenant Theology, in effect, says that God did–that God was not speaking literally. Therefore, they say that God didn't really mean that the Jewish people, as a nation, would last forever. They are one of these strange phenomena of history, that for all the thousands of years that the Jewish people have existed, they have indeed existed as the Jewish people. They are clearly identifiable and clearly distinguished from all the people of the world, and this is true today. Obviously, God is in this to make that such a distinctive people.

   The Covenant Theologian says, "No, God didn't really mean that there would be a throne here on this earth; that there would be a kingdom here on this earth; and, that Jesus Christ is going to be sitting at Jerusalem ruling the world. But the truth of the matter is, that's exactly what he meant. The Abrahamic Covenant nails that down in just so many words. The only way you can escape this is to ignore the plain meaning of the language of Scripture. So there was indeed to be a nation. That nation is in existence today, and growing daily.

3. Thirdly, the Abrahamic covenant promised a blessing. This is the blessing of the indwelling Holy Spirit, which would enable them to please God and to do all the things they could not do under the legalistic system of the Mosaic Law. This blessing was to be shared by all nations. God the Holy Spirit was to become available as a personal power to every human being. This was amplified in the Old Testament in what is called the New Covenant.

The ritual itself, of course, did not do this, any more than water baptism brings you and me into a relationship with the Holy Spirit. Water baptism simply is a declaration. It's a symbolic representation of an act of faith on the part of the individual. That's exactly what circumcision was. It was a symbolic demonstration of an act of faith on the part of those parents later to be confirmed by the individual male child himself.

So the rite of circumcision was very important to the Jewish people. It was a significant rite, and it had a very proper place among the Jewish people. The rite applied, as you see from this Scripture we read, to all the male descendants of Abraham. It also applied to all the male slaves, whether they were born in the home of Abraham or whether they were purchased from foreigners (Genesis 17:12-13). And it applied also to gentiles who decided that they wanted to become proselytes–they wanted to become converts to Judaism.

A gentile in the Old Testament could receive the missionary activity of the Jewish people. They could explain to a gentile about the living God, and the gentile could say, "I want to believe in this God." The Jew would say, "Therefore, you are welcome to enter the covenant of Abraham. You may come as a gentile and enter under the blessings of the promises to our people, but you must become part of our people." As a male, the sign of that was the act of circumcision.

If you wanted to marry a Jewish girl, and you were a gentile, you were not permitted to marry that girl unless you came into the Jewish faith. The act of circumcision was prerequisite to marriage to a Jewish girl. By the same token, a gentile woman could enter the Jewish nation. For example, one of the ancestors of Jesus Christ was Ruth, who was a gentile, as you know–a Moabite. But she came into the Jewish nation, without the act of circumcision in the case of a female, but nevertheless entering in with complete faith and complete acceptance under these same covenant promises. So Ruth was actually in the line of the ancestry of the Lord Jesus Christ, though she is a gentile.

So the act of circumcision was a key feature, for without it, you were marked to separation from all of the covenant promises, and you were, in effect, marked for eternal doom in hell–not because you did not have the physical act of circumcision, but because that represented unbelief toward God in your soul. This was because those who would believe would conform to the ritual. Those who did not would not conform to it. So any male who was not circumcised was cut off from the promises of the Abrahamic covenant, as Genesis 17:14 declares.

Moses

So he takes his family, his wife Zipporah and the two sons, and he begins traveling back from Midian to Egypt. One night they stop at a resting place–Zipporah, and the two sons. One of the sons had been circumcised–probably the elder. The other son, probably the younger, for some reason had not been circumcised. We suspect that the reason was that this was a repugnant act to Moses's Midianite wife, and that in a moment of weakness, as spiritual leader in the family, he gave in to his wife's objections. So the younger son was not circumcised. The critical rite of circumcision had been ignored.

Moses has been called to carry out a very tremendous plan. Remember that part of what is inherent in the act of circumcision was the fact that they would be a nation. God gave this to Abraham as a sign of these three specific promises. God is going to fulfill the next major step of that national promise. They have now grown to a nation of something like a million-and-a-half or two million people, from the 70 people who came into Egypt. They are indeed, relative to population, a nation. Moses is now going to take this nation out of Egypt and transplant them back to the promised land of Palestine.

However, Moses himself had failed to respect the sign of nationhood. He had failed to respect, in one son, this act of circumcision. This was an insult to God. Here's the spiritual leader who's going to perform the next major step of fulfilling a promise of God to his earthly people. The spiritual leader himself has been insulting God by neglecting the very sign that indicated nationhood. Genesis 17:14 says, "If you do this, you are cut off from the nation. You are doomed." So that, in effect, here was Moses, the spiritual leader, bringing one of his sons under divine judgment.

So while they're at the resting place, Moses suddenly begins to die. The Bible doesn't tell us how: whether he had some kind of a seizure; whether it was suddenly a disease that broke out in him; or, whether just the hand of God came upon him and began squeezing the life out of him. But suddenly Moses was aware of the fact that he was dying, and his wife was also aware of the fact that he was dying. She knew immediately why. We wish the Bible gave us more details on this, but it doesn't tell us why. But somehow, she knew. Perhaps it was Moses who knew. Perhaps Moses said, "I know why. It's because I have neglected the act of circumcision. Circumcise the boy."

In any case, his wife quickly circumcised the son with a stone knife. She may have objected, and apparently recoiled from this previously. But when she rejected the act of circumcision, she was rejecting nationhood for the Jews, and she was rejecting all that the cross stood for. For the act of circumcision was a symbolic act of rejecting the flesh–the old sin nature–all that God condemns in us. For her to reject that was to reject what Jesus Christ was to come to do upon the cross. So she was holding in contempt the very gift of the son of God. Moses had neglected his spiritual duty as a father, and God could not ignore this failure in the leader of Israel.

So the passage says, "And it came to pass, by the way in the inn (the resting place), that the Lord met him and sought to kill him. Then Zipporah took a sharp stone and cut off the foreskin of her son, and cast it at his feet, and said, "Surely a bloody husband are you to me." This probably meant that she realized that she had almost lost her husband in death, and that he had been salvaged only by this act of performing the serious ritual of circumcision. She had saved her husband's life, in effect, once more, and had secured him as a bridegroom, in effect, once more, by this act of bloodletting.

So that in that moment, the Bible tells us, he let him go. Verse 26: "So he (God) let him (Moses) go." Then she said, "A bloody husband are you," because of the circumcision; that is, a blood bridegroom purchased for me through this act of circumcision. Had she not done this, it would have been all over for Moses. He would have died on the spot because he was insulting God, having, as a father, rejected the act of circumcision, with all that this connoted in God's thinking.

So this was no small thing. This was a very grave thing in God's eyes. But the Jews of the New Testament did not understand that all of this had terminated. The sign of circumcision was, of course, later incorporated into the Mosaic Law. We have this in Leviticus 12:3 and in John 7:22-23. But with the Jews of the New Testament, circumcision became a point of pride. They viewed with utter contempt those who did not practice it. They viewed themselves, not as those who were more enlightened and happy to share their divine viewpoint enlightenment with others, but as those who simply viewed themselves as spiritually superior, and above all others, the uncircumcised, whom they viewed with the utmost contempt. We have this in Judges 14:3, Judges 15:18, and 1 Samuel 14:6.

So circumcision in the Old Testament was strictly a sign of faith in God unto salvation. It was not the means to salvation. That's what was happening in the New Testament church as the Judaizers who followed Paul were leading people to believe that this physical act was part of salvation. Remember, again, circumcision was a test case (an example type of thing), as we have people today who follow around grace teachers and say, "You must have water baptism to be saved." Or they say, "You must join a church to be saved." Or they say, "If you are going to be spiritual, you must give a certain amount of money to God's work," and so on and on.

Circumcision was a point of pride with the Jews, but in truth, it was a sign of faith in God as testifying to salvation, but not as the means of salvation. Romans 4:9 says, "Is this blessing then upon the circumcision only, or upon the uncircumcision also? For we see that faith was reckoned to Abraham for righteousness. How is it then reckoned? When he was in circumcision, or uncircumcision? Not in circumcision, but in circumcision." In other words, Abraham was born again before circumcision. "And he received the sign of circumcision as a seal of the righteousness of the faith which he had (the sign of imputed righteousness), yet being uncircumcised; that he might be the father of all them that believe, though they be not circumcised." The righteousness might be imputed unto them also.

The point being that even we today, as Gentiles, are indeed the children of Abraham, though we no longer come under this rite. What this symbolized was simply regeneration. In Colossians 2:11-13, Paul says, "In whom also you are circumcised with the circumcision made without hands." There is a circumcision today, but it's not made with hands. "In putting off the body of the flesh." Cross out the words, "the sins of" which are not in the Greek. "By the circumcision of Christ, buried with him in baptism, in which also you are risen with Him through the faith of the operation of God who has raised Him from the dead. You, being dead in your sins, and the uncircumcision of your flesh, has He made alive together with Him, having forgiven you all trespasses." So even the uncircumcised are nevertheless born again.

So the keeping of the 613 laws of Moses could never secure salvation, including the act of circumcision. Galatians 2:16 says, "Knowing that a man is not justified by the works of the law, but by faith of Jesus Christ. Even we have believed in Jesus Christ that we might be justified by the faith of Christ, and not by the works of the law, for by the works of the law shall no flesh be justified?"

So you're not going to make any progress, the Bible says, practicing the physical rite of circumcision or anything of an updated nature of that sort. It is simply symbolizing God's imputation of righteousness to you–the delivery of the righteousness of Christ to your account. So under the law, the principle of circumcision of the heart was the important thing, though many of the people who practiced Mosaic circumcision missed this. Even in the Old Testament, circumcision was not just a ritual.

For example, Moses tried to make this clear in his last book, in Deuteronomy 10:16, when he says, "Circumcise, therefore the foreskin of your heart, and be no more stiff-necked." Again, in Deuteronomy 30:6, Moses says, "And the Lord your God will circumcise your heart and the heart of your seed to love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul, that you may live." Moses says a change is needed on your mind (your heart). A change is needed to remove the death of the old sin nature that dominates your thinking. So it was important in the Old Testament that circumcision was understood as reflecting something that had taken place in the person's thinking.

In Jeremiah 4:4, the prophet says, "Circumcise yourself to the Lord, and take away the foreskins of your heart, you men of Judah and inhabitants of Jerusalem, lest my fury come forth like fire and burn that none can quench it because of the evil of your doings." Here was the nation of Israel, deep in apostasy. Every male was very religiously and ritualistically circumcised. God says, "Now you have done the ritual. Now get back to the thing that the ritual is supposed to represent, and get yourself spiritually straightened out, or I'm going to burn you to a crisp." Most of them did not believe Him, and that's exactly what happened to the nation. They went down in flames. They performed the ritual, but the significance of the ritual they had forgotten and ignored.

So there's a difference between circumcision of the heart and circumcision of the flesh. In Ezekiel 44:7, we read, "In that you have brought into My sanctuary foreigners, uncircumcised in heart, and uncircumcised in flesh." There are two kinds of circumcisions. "To be in My sanctuary (to pollute it), even my house, when you offer My bread, the fat of the blood, and they have broken My covenant because of all your abominations."

So there wasn't any excuse, even for the legalists of the New Testament, not to understand that circumcision in itself was not a significant act. It was what it represented, and a person's faith and acceptance in what it represented. That was the thing that was meaningful with God. When they forgot the significance of the act, then the act was meaningless. The same thing is true about water baptism today.

Circumcision is declared to be made without hands, for those of us who believe in Christ, and we are declared thereby to be complete in Him. Colossians 2:10 says, "And you are complete in Him, who is the head of all principality and power, in whom also you are circumcised with the circumcision made without hands." So today, we do experience a circumcision. This is a circumcision through Christ made without hands that makes us complete and perfect in the sight of God. Therefore, you see how ludicrous and gross legalism is. This is because legalism always says, "I can add something to what God has done. I can add something to improve my situation with God."

This would be comparable to saying that if you had been out there when God was creating the world, and after God finished his creation on the sixth day, and God looked at it and said that all that He had created was very good, that you would step in and say, "God, this could be a little better if You would do it this way." You would say, "Well, that's inane. Who would say (after God said, 'It's very good'), God, this would be a little better if You would do it this way, before we turn creation loose?" That's what you're saying. God says, "You are complete in Christ, in your relationship to Me. Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and you shall be saved." Now you're complete. You have absolute imputed righteousness. And some legalist comes along and says, "Now I'm going to tell you how you can make it really big with God. I'm going to tell you how you can really make forward progress with God. Give this offering. Remember this holy day. Observe this rite. Perform this ritual." Of course, that's utterly anti-grace, and what it will do is deny you the blessings of the grace of God.

So the sign of circumcision is very important. It marked you as one who is under the blessings of the covenant. It marked imputed righteousness. It marked the fact that you were in fellowship with God. All the years, those 40 years that they wandered in the wilderness, the act of circumcision was neglected. So we read in Joshua 5 that the first thing Joshua had to do, as they were about ready now to enter the land and take possession of it, was to get back into temporal fellowship with God. The way it was done was by circumcising all those males who had been born during those years in the wandering out in the wilderness when they were out of fellowship with God.

That's interesting. Interestingly enough, they were out of fellowship with God. That's why they were out there in the wilderness. What were their parents doing? Their parents, who had refused to go into the land at Kadeshbarnea, reflecting their negative volition toward God, were dying off one-by-one out in the wilderness. You would have thought that after what they saw was happening to them, these dying parents would have said, "I'm going to be very careful to get my son going in the right way. We're going to be very careful that we perform this act which identifies him with the blessings of God, that he be not cut off from the people, and that he not come into the sad past that we have come to." But no.

If you read the story in Joshua 5, you discover that all of those born in those wilderness wanderings reflected the negative attitude of their parents, and they were not circumcised. So with one blow, in one day, Joshua had to take care of the matter before they could enter into the land. That was their way of using 1 John 1:9 in the Old Testament–to be restored to temporal fellowship. Circumcision was treated by some Jews as the means to salvation, and that's legalism. Any number of things are used today as a means to salvation. That's legalism.

Well, the rite of physical circumcision is not required for males in the church age. In Acts 15:1, we have the declaration of the early church as this problem was faced. After the gentiles came into the body of Christ, into the church structure, it was necessary to determine their relationship to the Jewish Christians who had been going on with many of their customs. So Acts 15:1 says, "And certain men who came down from Judea, taught the brethren and said, 'Except you be circumcised after the manner of Moses, you cannot be saved.'" They put it in point-blank so many words: "If you want to go to heaven, you better be circumcised, or else."

Verse 5: "But there rose up certain of the sect of the Pharisees who believed." These are Christians who once were Pharisees. Therefore, they're conservatives. They know the Word of God. They know the Mosaic Law. They are faithful to it. These former Pharisees, now born again believers, were saying that it was needed to circumcise them, and to command them to keep the Law of Moses.

In verses 23-24, here was the decision: "And they wrote letters by them after this manner: the apostles and elders and brethren sent greeting to the brethren who are of the gentiles in Antioch and Syria and Cilicia. Forasmuch as we as we have heard, that certain who went out from us have troubled you with words, subverting their souls, saying, 'You must be circumcised and keep the law,' to whom we gave no such commandment." Then he goes on and tells them what was really true.

So there were people going out from Jerusalem and saying, "We have just come from the apostles, and the apostles say that you should be circumcised or you'll never go to heaven." That's how bad the legalism had become in the New Testament church, which will give you some appreciation for why Paul came down so hard upon it.

In 1 Corinthians 7:18-19, the apostle Paul, to the gentile believers of this metropolitan center, taught the same point: "Is any man called being circumcised (that is, called to salvation)? Let him not become uncircumcised. Is any called in uncircumcision? Let him not be circumcised. Circumcision is nothing, and uncircumcision is nothing, but the keeping of the commandments of God. Paul said, "Some of you have been circumcised. As Jews, you have accepted the Greek way of life. You have become Hellenists."

One of the things that the Greeks had as a viewpoint was that the human body was a spectacularly beautiful thing. Therefore, when they came into a room, the last thing a Greek would think of is wearing his clothes. If you were to walk into an auditorium, everybody was running around stark naked in the exercise (the games and all the activities) they were doing, because they viewed the body as being a very beautiful thing. Some of these had formerly been Jews. Some of them had experienced the rite of circumcision. Some of them had entered the Hellenistic culture and had been accepted by the Greek world, and were in standing. But when they came to the auditorium, and they were without their clothes, it was evident what had happened to them–that the rite of circumcision had been performed, and some of them actually then sought operations in order to restore and to remove the circumcision that had been placed upon them by their Jewish parents and heritage.

That's what Paul means here when he says, "Is any men called being circumcised? Let him not become uncircumcised." Don't go trying to find an operation to correct this thing. "Is any man called in uncircumcision? Let him not be circumcised," as far as coming to salvation. That is not the issue. "Circumcision is nothing, and uncircumcision is nothing, but the keeping of the commandments of God."

Paul is not talking relative to this issue under the Mosaic system, as you saw by Moses' example and experience. It was very important. But now Paul is saying, "Forget it. Whatever your condition is, when you're born again, that's OK with God. The act of circumcision is no longer in effect, because the Abrahamic covenant is no longer currently being applied to the Jewish people. They are out from under the blessing of God.

So the circumcision was treated by some as a means to salvation, but it is not required at all in the church age. Jewish Christians are referred to in the New Testament as "the circumcision," in contrast to all others as the "uncircumcision." We have Acts 10:45, Acts 11:2-3, and Colossians 4:11 that speak about "the circumcision," but it means Christians who are pushing this issue of circumcision. Some Jewish Christians wanted to force gentile Christians to observe the Law of Moses thus as a way of life. This is called the "Jews' religion" in Galatians 1:13-14. We referred to it as Judaism. These Jewish Christians, not Jewish unbelievers, but Jewish Christians were the Judaizers (Galatians 2:12, Titus 1:10). Judaism became a legalism among the Christian community itself.

Circumcision of Christianity

Putting off the body of the flesh is positional truth retroactive–going back to the cross when you were placed in Christ. Colossians 2:12 says, "Buried with Him in baptism, raised with Him through faith," and so on. We have been connected back with Him. The circumcision of Christ is His death on the cross for the sins of the world (Romans 6:10, Romans 8:3). You and I, as believers, entered this circumcision by faith.

So physical circumcision symbolically removed the control of the old sin nature over a believer, while spiritual circumcision actually does so. There was a spiritual circumcision in the Old Testament, as you have seen, and that was also entered in by faith in God and His promises. But there was also an act to symbolize it in the Old Testament. In the New Testament, we also have spiritual circumcision, but we do not have an act to symbolize it.

So spiritual circumcision is what is referred to here where we started. Philippians 3:3 says, "For we are the circumcision. We Christians, in the age of grace, are indeed the circumcision. This is what makes possible our progress from the point of salvation to a completed spiritual maturity structure in the soul. Legalism hinders your progress in spiritual maturity because it makes you dependent on the energies of the old sin nature. Legalism is an act of spiritual reversionism–human good to gain divine favor. Jewish circumcision often was an empty ritual, devoid of faith in God. That made it an act of legalism. Abraham is the father of both physical and spiritual circumcision, as we read in Romans 4:9-12.

So placing some spiritual value today upon circumcision as a physical act will completely deny you the benefits of the blessings of the grace of God. So Galatians 5:2 says, "Behold, I Paul say unto you that if you be circumcised, Christ shall profit you nothing."

So in the case of Moses, he almost died for not having done this. In your case and mine, if we do this with the idea that it will gain us favor with God and secure us salvation and spirituality, we too will find that what we have done is brought spiritual death upon ourselves. Legalism is a dangerous thing. Now maybe you'll appreciate a little more why Paul called the Judaizers dogs; evil workers; and, butchers, because what they were doing was not only a physical act that was monstrous, but they were giving it significance that had on it the judgment and the spiritual death of God.

There is a spiritual circumcision today, and if you don't have it, then you are cut off from the promise of eternal life, just as the Jew who did not have it in the Old Testament was cut off from the promise of the Abrahamic covenant, and the eternal life that was inherent in it, in the bringing of the Spirit of God into the experience of the Jew. Spiritual circumcision is the circumcision of Christ on the cross applied to your life by faith in His death for you. If have not received that, now is the time to do it.

Dr. John E. Danish, 1973

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