Circumcision’s Pluses
All of us parents have had to make the decision – or at least consider making such a decision – when we were expecting children. Do you circumcise your son or not? Nationwide, the practice is actually becoming less frequent.
The American Academy of Pediatrics, while not endorsing the procedure, does claim that it helps reduce the possibility of certain infections, like urinary tract infections. Some extremists in San Francisco last year wanted to ban circumcision, taking the decision out of the hands of parents.
Circumcision was instituted by God to Abraham in Genesis 17. It was a physical sign to remind Abraham of the covenant which God had made with him. Abraham was circumcised when he was 99 years old; Ishmael at 13 and Isaac at eight days. The Israelites developed the mentality that circumcision by itself was basically a ticket to heaven, regardless how you behaved.
But God told the Israelites several times: “Circumcise therefore the foreskin of your heart, and be no longer stubborn” (Deuteronomy 10:16) or “Circumcise yourselves to the LORD; remove the foreskin of your hearts” (Jeremiah 4:4). God had always wanted a spiritual, heart-felt, relationship with His people.
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Under the law of Moses, not being circumcised would expel you from the Jewish community. Under the law of Christ, commanding circumcision for spiritual reasons, would expel you from the Christian community! God has the prerogative to change His laws under a new covenant.
But there is a circumcision that we undergo in order to become Christians. It is not a physical circumcision but a spiritual circumcision. Paul tells us about it in Colossians 2:11-12: “In him also you were circumcised with a circumcision made without hands, by putting off the body of the flesh, by the circumcision of Christ, having been buried with him in baptism, in which you were also raised with him through faith in the powerful working of God, who raised him from the dead” (Colossians 2:11-12).
Baptism in water is the moment when the sins are “cut away” (circumcised) from our hearts and we become new people.
Have you been circumcised?
–Paul Holland
