the rite of circumcision

Faith Comes Before Faithfulness

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9 Is this blessing then only for the circumcised, or also for the uncircumcised? For we say that faith was counted to Abraham as righteousness. 10 How then was it counted to him? Was it before or after he had been circumcised? It was not after, but before he was circumcised. 11 He received the sign of circumcision as a seal of the righteousness that he had by faith while he was still uncircumcised. The purpose was to make him the father of all who believe without being circumcised, so that righteousness would be counted to them as well, 12 and to make him the father of the circumcised who are not merely circumcised but who also walk in the footsteps of the faith that our father Abraham had before he was circumcised. – Romans 4:9-12 ESV

The “blessing” Paul refers to is the one mentioned in the previous two verses, where he quoted directly from the Psalms.

Blessed is the one whose transgression is forgiven,
    whose sin is covered.
Blessed is the man against whom the Lord counts no iniquity,
    and in whose spirit there is no deceit. – Psalm 32:1-2 ESV 

This blessing includes the forgiveness of sin because of the atonement or payment for those sins by another, leaving the one forgiven with no guilt or further remnants of that sin. Paul says that this remarkable blessing is not just reserved for the Jews, those he refers to as “the circumcised.” This is because the blessing is available to everyone through faith, just as Abraham’s righteous standing was made possible by his faith.

Paul makes it clear that God declared Abraham righteous long before He commanded Abraham to be circumcised. Genesis 15 records Abraham’s encounter with God when he was informed about the divine plans for his future.

Then the Lord took Abram outside and said to him, “Look up into the sky and count the stars if you can. That’s how many descendants you will have!” – Genesis 15:5 NLT

Despite the fact that Abraham was in his mid-80s at the time and his wife Sarah was barren, the text states, “Abram believed the Lord, and the Lord counted him as righteous because of his faith” (Genesis 15:6 NLT).  It was nearly two decades later that Abraham received God’s command to practice the rite of circumcision.

When Abram was ninety-nine years old, the Lord appeared to him and said, “I am El-Shaddai—‘God Almighty.’ Serve me faithfully and live a blameless life. I will make a covenant with you, by which I will guarantee to give you countless descendants.” – Genesis 17:1-2 NLT

God agreed to confirm His covenant agreement with Abraham and his future descendants.

“I will confirm my covenant with you and your descendants after you, from generation to generation. This is the everlasting covenant: I will always be your God and the God of your descendants after you. And I will give the entire land of Canaan, where you now live as a foreigner, to you and your descendants. It will be their possession forever, and I will be their God.” – Genesis 17:7-8 NLT

But God informed Abraham that their confirmation of the covenant would come with a cost. Every male member of Abraham’s future family would be required to undergo circumcision.

“Your responsibility is to obey the terms of the covenant. You and all your descendants have this continual responsibility. This is the covenant that you and your descendants must keep: Each male among you must be circumcised. You must cut off the flesh of your foreskin as a sign of the covenant between me and you. From generation to generation, every male child must be circumcised on the eighth day after his birth. This applies not only to members of your family but also to the servants born in your household and the foreign-born servants whom you have purchased. All must be circumcised. Your bodies will bear the mark of my everlasting covenant.” – Genesis 17:9-13 NLT

Circumcision was to be a physical reminder of their covenant commitment to God. It was never intended to be guarantee their right standing before God. Paul emphasizes this point when he states, “He [Abraham] received the sign of circumcision as a seal of the righteousness that he had by faith while he was still uncircumcised” (Romans 4:11 ESV).

In other words, Abraham’s right standing before God had nothing to do with circumcision, but circumcision had everything to do with his right standing before God. It was to be a symbol of his unique relationship with God, rooted in his faith in God. The rite of circumcision did not justify anyone with God, any more than the rite of baptism makes someone right with God today. The descendants of Abraham were to practice circumcision as a sign that they believed in God’s covenant promises. It was an outward demonstration of their faith. Refusing to be circumcised was a demonstration of a lack of faith and would result in that individual’s expulsion from God’s covenant community.

“Any male who fails to be circumcised will be cut off from the covenant family for breaking the covenant.” – Genesis 17:14 NLT

Like baptism, circumcision was intended to be an outward sign of something that had taken place inwardly. However, the Jews had turned circumcision into the source of their righteousness when God had intended it as the sign of their righteousness. Circumcision without faith in God was worthless; it meant nothing. Paul stated this truth earlier when he wrote: “A true Jew is one whose heart is right with God. And true circumcision is not merely obeying the letter of the law; rather, it is a change of heart produced by the Spirit. And a person with a changed heart seeks praise from God, not from people.” (Romans 2:29 NLT).

In the book of Jeremiah, God prophetically declared, “Behold, the days are coming, declares the Lord, when I will punish all those who are circumcised merely in the flesh…all the house of Israel are uncircumcised in heart” (Jeremiah 9:25, 26 ESV).

Paul tells us that God declared Abraham righteous prior to the covenant of circumcision because He intended Abraham to be the father of all who believe “without being circumcised” (Romans 4:11 ESV). The righteousness God required was based on faith, not works; it was founded on belief, not on obedience to a command. Righteousness could be earned, and it was not a standard to be met.

…it is a change of heart produced by the Spirit. – Romans 2:29 NLT

In plain language, it was to be a work of God, not man, and was to be provided by God, not man. So that no man could boast or brag.

The book of Jeremiah records God’s pleas for His covenant people to return to Him.

“Plow up the hard ground of your hearts! Do not waste your good seed among thorns. O people of Judah and Jerusalem, surrender your pride and power. Change your hearts before the Lord, or my anger will burn like an unquenchable fire because of all your sins.” – Jeremiah 4:3-4 NLT

The people of Judah were guilty of unbelief, having failed to trust God and believe His promises concerning them. They had gone after other gods and made alliances with other nations. They had broken His commands and lived in the false security of their status as God’s chosen people. But what God was calling them to do was impossible for them. They would never be able to surrender their pride and power. They did not possess the capacity to change their hearts. As a result, God’s punishment was coming.

They would experience His wrath against their sin and rebellion, but God would not annihilate them. Instead, He would preserve them. And while He would allow them to fall into captivity among their enemies for 70 years, He would also restore them to their land and reestablish them as a people. Why? Because He had made a promise to Abraham. God had told Abraham, “In you all the families of the earth shall be blessed” (Genesis 12:3 ESV). He had also promised, “To your offspring I will give this land” (Genesis 12:7 ESV).

But in the book of Galatians, Paul makes a clarifying interpretation of these passages. “Now the promises were made to Abraham and to his offspring. It does not say, ‘And to offsprings,’ referring to many, but referring to one, ‘And to your offspring,’ who is Christ” (Galatians 3:16 ESV). In other words, God’s promise to bless the nations through Abraham would be fulfilled through one of his descendants – specifically, Jesus. God made His promise to Abraham long before He gave the law to the people of Israel. So Paul concludes: “The agreement God made with Abraham could not be canceled 430 years later when God gave the law to Moses. God would be breaking his promise. For if the inheritance could be received by keeping the law, then it would not be the result of accepting God’s promise. But God graciously gave it to Abraham as a promise” (Galatians 3:17-18 NLT).

Our righteousness is made possible by faith in the promise of God, just as it was for Abraham. I am not made right with God by trying to live up to His righteous standards. I am made right with Him when I recognize my complete inability to meet His criteria for righteousness and place my faith in His plan for my salvation: His Son’s death, burial, and resurrection.

Jesus died to pay the penalty for my sins, He rose again to prove that His sacrifice was acceptable to God, and He took on my sin and imparted to me His righteousness. All men are made right with God through faith in His Son. When we place our faith in God’s plan of salvation, we walk in the footsteps of the faith Abraham laid down all those years ago.

The righteous shall live by faith. – Romans 1:17 ESV

Father, thank You for the gift of faith. It is certainly not something we could have produced. Your Spirit makes faith in Your promises possible. If left to our own devices, we would refuse to believe. Like the Israelites, we would turn our backs on You and worship other gods. In fact, we all do it every day. We are prone to unfaithfulness.; it is built into our fallen DNA. But Your Spirit graciously regenerates those who are dead in their trespasses and sins, and opens their eyes to see the glory of Your grace-based gospel. And when we place our faith in the truth of Your Son’s death, burial, and resurrection, we receive new life. We are born again. Not based on our feeble attempts to keep a list of religious rules or regulations, but based solely on grace alone through faith alone in Christ alone. Amen

English Standard Version (ESV) The Holy Bible, English Standard Version. ESV® Permanent Text Edition® (2016). Copyright © 2001 by Crossway Bibles, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers.

New Living Translation (NLT) Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers Inc., Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.22

The Cost of Commitment

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9 And God said to Abraham, “As for you, you shall keep my covenant, you and your offspring after you throughout their generations. 10 This is my covenant, which you shall keep, between me and you and your offspring after you: Every male among you shall be circumcised. 11 You shall be circumcised in the flesh of your foreskins, and it shall be a sign of the covenant between me and you. 12 He who is eight days old among you shall be circumcised. Every male throughout your generations, whether born in your house or bought with your money from any foreigner who is not of your offspring, 13 both he who is born in your house and he who is bought with your money, shall surely be circumcised. So shall my covenant be in your flesh an everlasting covenant. 14 Any uncircumcised male who is not circumcised in the flesh of his foreskin shall be cut off from his people; he has broken my covenant.” – Genesis 17:9-14 ESV

Up to this point in the story, the covenant between God and Abram had been non-binding. The agreement had been unilateral in nature, obligating God to keep all that He had promised to Abram. Even when God had ordered Abram to sacrifice and divide the animals, God had walked through the midst of them alone (Genesis 16:1-21). He had not required Abram to join him in this covenant ratification ceremony. God, in the form of a smoking pot and a flaming torch, passed through the midst of the dismembered animals, signifying His commitment to keep all the promises He had made to Abram. In a sense, God was saying, “May what happened to these animals be my own fate should I fail to honor my word.” This action by God ratified or sealed the agreement, but nothing was required of Abram. Until now.

Thirteen years after Ishmael’s birth, God visited Abram again and revisited the covenant agreement between them. But this time, God revealed to Abram that he could no longer be a non-participant in the covenant. He too would have a binding and costly obligation to uphold. Gone were the days of simply waiting on God to fulfill His commitment. Other than delay and possible disappointment, Abram had no skin in the game (excuse the pun). So, God upped the ante and placed upon Abram a sobering obligation.

“…walk before me, and be blameless, that I may make my covenant between me and you, and may multiply you greatly.” – Genesis 17:1-2 ESV

God had already committed Himself to shower this obscure individual from Ur of the Chaldees with blessings beyond his wildest imaginations.

“I will make of you a great nation, and I will bless you and make your name great, so that you will be a blessing. I will bless those who bless you, and him who dishonors you I will curse, and in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed.” – Genesis 12:2-3 ESV

But now, decades later, Abram was still waiting for a son so that this amazing future might come to fruition. And as Abram waited and wondered about the future, God called him to live his life in the present with a soldout commitment to and trust in the trustworthiness of El Shaddai, God Almighty. Abram had been set apart by God for a divine purpose and God wanted Abram to conduct his life in keeping with His calling.

But this call to a committed life was going to be far more costly than Abram could have imagined, and it would be perpetual in nature, being passed down to Abram’s descendants. While Abram was still waiting for an heir, God had already confirmed His covenant commitment to Abram’s progeny.

“I will establish my covenant between me and you and your offspring after you throughout their generations for an everlasting covenant, to be God to you and to your offspring after you.” – Genesis 17:7 ESV

God’s promise was unconditional. He would do what He said He would do. But, as His chosen people, the descendants of Abram were to walk before Him and be blameless. They were to conduct their lives in keeping with their calling and set-apart status – just like Abram. They would belong to God. And as a reminder of their status as His prized possession, God provided them with a sign, a very intimate and extremely painful sign: The rite of circumcision.

This latest directive from God must have left Abram slack-jawed and a bit confused. It had to have sounded strange and unnecessary. As far as can be discerned from the text, this was an unprecedented command from God. There is no indication that this rite was practiced by any other people group at the time. But God had made it a non-negotiable requirement for Abram and all his male descendants.

“As for you, you must keep the covenantal requirement I am imposing on you and your descendants after you throughout their generations.” – Genesis 17:9 NET

This was an addendum to the original covenant agreement. But it did nothing to alter God’s previous commitment to fulfill His covenantal obligations. In other words, God was not attempting to move the goal post or change the rules in the middle of the game. He would still do what He had promised to do. But He was placing a binding requirement on Abram and his descendants.

“This is my requirement that you and your descendants after you must keep: Every male among you must be circumcised.  You must circumcise the flesh of your foreskins. This will be a reminder of the covenant between me and you.” – Genesis 17:10-11 NET

Even to the modern mind, this rite or ritual sounds strange and difficult to rationalize. Why was God demanding such a painful and personal “sacrifice” on the part of Abram’s male descendants? What possible reason could God have for commanding the removal of the foreskin of every male’s sexual organ? How would that be a “sign,” when no one would ever see it?

The key to understanding this rite is found within the nature of God’s promise to Abram. God had told Abram that he would be a father and that he would fruitful. He would produce seed or offspring. Just as God had commanded Adam to be fruitful, multiply, and fill the earth, so too, He was expecting Abram to obey the divine mandate to procreate and populate the earth with more of his kind. And the male genitalia would play a vital role in the fulfillment of that command to be fruitful.

In commanding the circumcision of the flesh of their foreskin, God was providing a very personal and intimate sign to each and every male descendant of Abram and Adam. This sign would be invisible to the rest of the world. But those who bore it would have an unavoidable and daily reminder of its meaning. Even when fulfilling their divine mandate to “be fruitful,” they would be forced to recognize the set-apart nature of their relationship with God.

And it’s important to recognize that this ritual was not reserved for Abram’s blood descendants alone. He was told to circumcise every male in his household.

“This applies not only to members of your family but also to the servants born in your household and the foreign-born servants whom you have purchased.” – Genesis 17:12 NLT

This would have included Abram’s man-servant, Eliezer of Damascus, as well as Ishmael, the son of Hagar, the Egyptian handmade to Sarai. Every male associated with Abram was to undergo this “surgical” procedure. No one was exempt. Their bodies were to bear the mark of God’s everlasting covenant.

And God makes it clear that anyone who fails to be “cut” will be “cut off” from His people.

“Any male who fails to be circumcised will be cut off from the covenant family for breaking the covenant.” – Genesis 17:14 NLT

There is a rather subtle but obvious wordplay going on here. In Hebrew, the word for “circumcised” is מוּל (mûl) and it literally means “to cut” or “to cut off.” God is declaring that those who refuse to cut off their foreskins will face equally painful consequences. They will be “cut off” (כָּרַת – kāraṯ) from the household of Abram. In other words, failure to be circumcised will result in their physical expulsion from the covenant community. They were to be excommunicated. Some Old Testament scholars speculate that this punishment may have included execution, not just expulsion. Whatever the case, it was intended as a strong incentive to obey God’s command and submit to the sign of the covenant. The fact that God decreed that this rite take place on the eighth day of an infant’s life, ensures that it was adhered to without the risk of refusal. It was mandatory and not optional. One can only imagine what went through the mind of a grown man like Eliezer when Abram informed him of this new requirement. It would be easy to see how someone might want to avoid this painful and humiliating ritual. But, as the text will reveal, Abram obeyed and command of God and the men of his household complied.

It is essential to understand that this caveat or condition to the covenant in no way altered God’s commitment. If a man refused to undergo circumcision, he would be forfeit his right to the blessings of the covenant. But God would remain fully committed to keeping the promises He had made to Abram. He would make of Abram a great nation, and that nation would enjoy the blessings of God. And through that nation, God would raise up an offspring of Abram who would one day bestow divine blessings on all the nations of the earth – even upon the uncircumcised. And the apostle Paul points out the staggering implications of God’s commitment to His covenant promises.

Don’t forget that you Gentiles used to be outsiders. You were called “uncircumcised heathens” by the Jews, who were proud of their circumcision, even though it affected only their bodies and not their hearts. In those days you were living apart from Christ. You were excluded from citizenship among the people of Israel, and you did not know the covenant promises God had made to them. You lived in this world without God and without hope. But now you have been united with Christ Jesus. Once you were far away from God, but now you have been brought near to him through the blood of Christ. – Ephesians 2:11-13 NLT

English Standard Version (ESV) The Holy Bible, English Standard Version. ESV® Permanent Text Edition® (2016). Copyright © 2001 by Crossway Bibles, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers.

New Living Translation (NLT) Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers Inc., Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.

New English Translation (NET)NET Bible® copyright ©1996-2017 by Biblical Studies Press, L.L.C. http://netbible.com All rights reserved.