Genesis 17:9-14
In what sounds a very bizarre instruction to our modern ears, God now told Abraham that he and all the other males in his household should undergo circumcision – the cutting away of the foreskin – as a sign of their covenant with Him. Circumcision would demonstrate that they were set apart from all the other nations to belong to God. It was intended to be an outward sign of their inner consecration. Sadly, later generations of Abraham’s descendants would come to depend on the physical ritual alone which, as the apostle Paul later pointed out, rendered it meaningless.
Romans 2:25, 28-29 “For circumcision is indeed profitable if you keep the law; but if you are a breaker of the law, your circumcision has become uncircumcision… [28] For he is not a Jew who is one outwardly, nor is circumcision that which is outward in the flesh; [29] but he is a Jew who is one inwardly; and circumcision is that of the heart, in the Spirit, not in the letter; whose praise is not from men but from God.”
Thankfully, we no longer live under the Old Covenant but under the New Covenant, which has abolished the need for external rituals. As those who have been born again through Christ, we have been circumcised inwardly, signifying our new identity as children of God.
Colossians 2:11 (NLT) “When you came to Christ, you were ‘circumcised’, but not by a physical procedure. Christ performed a spiritual circumcision – the cutting away of your sinful nature.”
In Christ we have been cut off from our old fallen nature. That means that we are no longer earthly creatures having spiritual experiences from time to time, but spiritual creatures who live in the realm of the Spirit. Philippians 3:3 explains what that looks like…
Philippians 3:3 (NLT) “For we who worship by the Spirit of God are the ones who are truly circumcised. We rely on what Christ Jesus has done for us. We put no confidence in human effort…”
As those who have been cut off from the flesh we are able to worship God in the Spirit, entering into His presence by faith and having intimate communion with Him. We recognise that our acceptance by God is through Christ so our dependence is no longer on ourselves but on His righteousness. We are freed from the striving to earn God’s approval by our own works in the knowledge that there is nothing good in our flesh.
This is our new position in Christ. Sometimes we do still fall back into our old ways and live as though we were natural, fleshly beings but, as Galatians 5:25 reminds us, “If we live in the Spirit, let us also walk in the Spirit”. That means cultivating our relationship with God daily, through prayer and His Word, and consistently choosing to live according to the leading of the Holy Spirit rather than the desires of our flesh.
Prayer
Lord God,
Thank You for all that You have accomplished for me through Christ. Thank You that I do not have to earn Your approval by means of my own works but, instead, I can rest in His righteousness. Thank You that my old sinful nature has been cut off and I can now live a new kind of life in the Spirit. Thank you for the privilege of being restored to intimate spiritual relationship with You. Help me not to live any longer as though I still belong to this world and its ways but to live out of my spirit, manifesting the new nature you have given me.
Amen.
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