Circumcision in the New Covenant

[aahavaa]

The Christian fulfillment of circumcision is the spiritual removal of sin from the heart.

Col 2:11 In whom also you are circumcised with the circumcision made without hands, in putting off the body of the sins of the flesh by the circumcision of Christ:
Col 2:12 Buried with him in baptism, in which also you are risen with him through the faith of the working of God, who has raised him from the dead.
Col 2:13 And you, being dead in your sins and the uncircumcision of your flesh, has he made alive together with him, having forgiven you all trespasses

Isn't the point of physical circumcision, the circumcision of the heart?

Deut 10:16 Circumcise therefore the foreskin of your heart, and be no more stiff-necked.

Doesn’t the uncircumcision of our flesh represent the heart full of sin and isn’t the physical uncircumcision in the Old Covenant symbolizing being dead in sin and estranged from the covenant of God?

The change of heart that Paul describes in the image of the heart circumcision is the work of the Holy Spirit, not the result of external obedience to the Law.

Actually in Isaiah 1:10-18

Isa 1:11 To what purpose is the multitude of your sacrifices unto me? says the LORD: I am full of the burnt offerings of rams, and the fat of fed beasts; and I delight not in the blood of bullocks, or of lambs, or of male goats.
Isa 1:12 When you come to appear before me, who has required this at your hand, to trample my courts?
Isa 1:13 Bring no more vain offerings; incense is an abomination unto me; the new moons and sabbaths, the calling of assemblies, I cannot endure; it is iniquity, even the solemn meeting.
Isa 1:14 Your new moons and your appointed feasts my soul hates: they are a trouble unto me; I am weary of bearing them.
Isa 1:15 And when you spread forth your hands, I will hide my eyes from you: yea, when you make many prayers, I will not hear: your hands are full of blood.
Isa 1:16 Wash you, make yourself clean; put away the evil of your doings from before my eyes; cease to do evil;
Isa 1:17 Learn to do good; seek justice, relieve the oppressed, judge the fatherless, plead for the widow.

we see that God condemns external obedience if not the product of, or accompanied by a righteous heart.


Rom 2:25 For circumcision verily profits, if you keep the law: but if you are a breaker of the law, your circumcision is made uncircumcision.
Rom 2:26 Therefore if the uncircumcision keeps the righteousness of the law, shall not his uncircumcision be counted for circumcision?
Rom 2:27 And shall not uncircumcision which is by nature, if it fulfills the law, judge you, who by the letter and circumcision do transgress the law?
Rom 2:28 For he is not a Jew, who is one outwardly; neither is that circumcision, which is outward in the flesh:
Rom 2:29 But he is a Jew, who is one inwardly; and circumcision is that of the heart, in the spirit, and not in the letter; whose praise is not of men, but of God.

David knew this when he prayed "create a clean heart in me O Lord" and

Psa 51:16 For you desire not sacrifice; else would I give it: you delight not in burnt offering.
Psa 51:17 The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit: a broken and a contrite heart, O God, you will not despise.

Adherence to the letter of the Law without a clean heart is an abomination to God,

Psa 40:6 Sacrifice and offering you did not desire; my ears have you opened: burnt offering and sin offering have you not required.
Psa 40:7 Then said I, Lo, I come: in the volume of the book it is written of me,
Psa 40:8 I delight to do your will, O my God: yea, your law is within my heart.


that’s why Jesus had such issue with the Pharisees, because they loved to boast in their keeping of the letter but their hearts were far from clean.They were rigorously adhering to the externals yet inside in their hearts all was not well

Psa 78:36 Nevertheless they did flatter him with their mouth, and they lied unto him with their tongues.
Psa 78:37 For their heart was not right with him, neither were they steadfast in his covenant.


Jesus calls us to work on our hearts. Nowhere do we see him commending external observance but countless times he draws attention to the internal heart attitude.
God isn’t interested in the outward observance for its own sake but what it points to or symbolizes, the reality that it represents.The shadow of what was to come which was Jesus and the New Covenant.
I see that HR or messianics that call for going back to Mosaic law-keeping miss these vital points and don’t realize that what they are doing may actually be offensive to God

Isa 1:13 Bring no more vain offerings; incense is an abomination unto me; the new moons and sabbaths, the calling of assemblies, I cannot endure; it is iniquity, even the solemn meeting
Isa 1:14 Your new moons and your appointed feasts my soul hates: they are a trouble unto me; I am weary of bearing them.

They make people feel guilty that they are not obeying God by doing the Mosiac commandments and they themselves don’t learn the lessons of the OT.-In the new God has dispensed with the shadows, the tutor.
In the OT God used the physical to teach us about the spiritual. And as teaching, the OT is essential but we are not called to continue practicing the rituals contained within these shadows, that were proclaimed since the time of Moshe. We are called to circumcise our hearts, not our bodies now. That's why Paul found it so abhorrent that some judiasers or whatever we want to call them, were teaching that gentiles had to be circumcised and keep the law. He used strong language condemning them and rightly so, since the physical rite had no value whatsoever in the new covenant. It was what it pointed to that now takes prominence.




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[Emjesown]

Isa 1:14 Your new moons and your appointed feasts my soul hates: they are a trouble unto me; I am weary of bearing them.

Is there a possibility (however small) that God really ment THEYRE feasts, that he is not talking of His moadims?
Or mabey the way they did HIS feasts.....

Reading this now it seems a bit silly, for God to judge theyre feasts while he is the one who gave them the feasts.

EMJE

[Rose of Shushan]

Hey Emje
I'm not sure I understand your question too well.
In
Isa 1:14 Your new moons and your appointed feasts my soul hates: they are a trouble unto me; I am weary of bearing them.
the word for appointed feasts there is מוֹעֲדֵיכֶם which is moedim in possessive plural ie their feasts /appointed times

bearing that in mind ,I am finding it hard to understand what you were asking.Maybe you can clarify

thank you

[Emjesown]

Okay i try to clarify
God gave them the feasts right to do 7 a year.
it was a comandment.

Then He sais:

Isa 1:14 Your new moons and your appointed feasts my soul hates: they are a trouble unto me; I am weary of bearing them.

As if it where theyre feast and not His.
Theyre feasts means they made them up and he hated them.
See what i mean, could he have been talking about diff feast then he gave them?

EMJE

[Rose of Shushan]

Thanks for clarifying emje now I understand what you were asking.

I don’t see where the feasts are different feasts than to the ones God commanded.

Isa 1:11 To what purpose is the multitude of your sacrifices unto me? says the LORD: I am full of the burnt offerings of rams, and the fat of fed beasts; and I delight not in the blood of bullocks, or of lambs, or of male goats.
Isa 1:12 When you come to appear before me, who has required this at your hand, to trample my courts?
Isa 1:13 Bring no more vain offerings; incense is an abomination unto me; the new moons and sabbaths, the calling of assemblies, I cannot endure; it is iniquity, even the solemn meeting.
Isa 1:14 Your new moons and your appointed feasts my soul hates: they are a trouble unto me; I am weary of bearing them.

The sacrifices referred to where the ones demanded by Mosaic law as were the New Moons (Num.28:11-15), Sabbaths (Ex.31:14-17) and Appointed Feasts (Ex. 23:14-17).
It seems to me that God is speaking sarcastically there when He says "your feasts" as opposed to "my". Or alternatively, one could argue that they were given to Israel to keep so they were hers so to speak.
What is clear is that God is condemning these feasts but it was because they were not celebrating and keeping them out of love or with the right heart attitude.Look instead what he says to them in verse 17

Isa 1:16 Wash you, make yourself clean; put away the evil of your doings from before my eyes; cease to do evil;
Isa 1:17 Learn to do good; seek justice, relieve the oppressed, judge the fatherless, plead for the widow.

God did prescribe sacrifices and the appointed feasts but not from people who mistreated others, neglected justice and disobeyed the "weightier matters " of the Law.
One has to remember that when we in modern times think of the word feast we think celebration but that is not what the word moedim really means. Just think of Yom Kippur and afflicting yourself the whole day, that is not our modern idea of a "feast". The "feasts involved sacrifice as well as obviously having celebratory aspects.
So emje to answer your question ,I see it as being the same feasts he gave them to do but that they had become vain and empty since, as mentioned in the previous post also, adhering to the outward practices and rituals without the accompanying heart attitude was a waste of time.

[Emjesown]

It seems to me that God is speaking sarcastically there when He says "your feasts" as opposed to "my". Or alternatively, one could argue that they were given to Israel to keep so they were hers so to speak.


Okay ty, in this remark i can see same thing as i thought.....and yes i see the feasts as a foreshadow, and now a memorial to look back.

EMJE

[Rose of Shushan]

Haggai was a prophet who despite his short ministry, made the Israelites look at the heart issue. He prophesied to the Israelites returning from Babylon, being a contemporary of Zechariah.
The prophet is called to address the luke-warmness of the people in rebuilding the temple. The people were suffering from indifference and complacency and this was making them suffer as it says


Hag 1:6 You have sown much, and bring in little; you eat, but you have not enough; you drink, but you are not filled with drink; you clothe yourselves, but no one is warm; and he that earns wages earns wages to put it into a bag with holes.

They were content to live in their nicely panelled houses while the Temple lay in ruins, saying that the time to build wasn’t yet. It seems that materialistic comforts had dulled them somewhat.
Although, once Haggai had shaken them out of their apathy the people started work to rebuild the new temple, God was not pleased with the indifferent and lukewarm state of their hearts.
In the second chapter of Haggai we see the prophet warns the people that their worship in the new temple will be unacceptable if they don’t change their hearts.
Their indifferent attitude would pollute everything they came into contact with. This attitude made the work of their hands unacceptable to God and left them unclean. It also made unclean everything they came into contact with as is shown here :

Hag 2:11 Thus says the LORD of hosts; Ask now the priests concerning the law, saying,
Hag 2:12 If one bears holy flesh in the skirt of his garment, and with his skirt does touch bread, or pottage, or wine, or oil, or any food, shall it be holy? And the priests answered and said, No.
Hag 2:13 Then said Haggai, If one that is unclean because of a dead body touches any of these, shall it be unclean? And the priests answered and said, It shall be unclean.
Hag 2:14 Then answered Haggai, and said, So is this people, and so is this nation before me, says the LORD; and so is every work of their hands; and that which they offer there is unclean.


We see there that although God wanted the Temple rebuilt and sacrifices reinstituted, He was more concerned at what was going on in their hearts than just merely enacting the physical requirements of what the Law demanded. The state of their hearts would cause the whole temple and sacrificial system to be an empty sham or set of rituals if not accompanied by the correct heart attitude.

Malachi is another prophet who focuses on the heart issue .By the time of Malachi (around 420 bc), conditions had deteriorated such that the priests had become lax

Mal 1:7 You offer polluted bread upon my altar; and you say, How have we polluted you? In that you say, The table of the LORD is contemptible.
Mal 1:8 And if you offer the blind for a sacrifice, is it not evil? and if you offer the lame and sick, is it not evil? offer it now unto your governor; will he be pleased with you, or accept your person? says the LORD of hosts.
Mal 1:9 And now, I pray you, beseech God that he will be gracious unto us: This has been by your gift: will he regard your persons? says the LORD of hosts.
Mal 1:10 Who is there even among you that would shut the doors for nothing? neither do you kindle fire on my altar for nothing. I have no pleasure in you, says the LORD of hosts, neither will I accept an offering at your hand.


It seems that they weren’t even bothering to sacrifice according to the law anymore. The law demanded that the very best should be offered as a sacrifice yet it seems the priests were offering up any old animal, the sick, maimed or even stolen. The bread and the table on which it was prepared were holy, yet the priests were treating it as common.
The really sad thing about the book of Malachi is that when the prophet confronts the people about their indifference they responded with a series of questions that showed their true heart condition.

As believers we have much to learn from this. Our attitudes can taint even those things we do for "Gods service". Do we offer him the equivalent of vain sacrifices or the lame and defective. Do we treat with indifference or lack of respect the things of God?
Sometimes we can do things out of a sense of duty or because it’s the Christian thing to do but not because we really want to. Our indifferent attitudes can then spill over tainting our outlook, our witness and the way we interact with those around us.

[strefanash]

(12-21-2008 03:03 PM)Emjesown Wrote:  Isa 1:14 Your new moons and your appointed feasts my soul hates: they are a trouble unto me; I am weary of bearing them.

Is there a possibility (however small) that God really ment THEYRE feasts, that he is not talking of His moadims?
Or mabey the way they did HIS feasts.....

Reading this now it seems a bit silly, for God to judge theyre feasts while he is the one who gave them the feasts.

EMJE

If I may say so I posted on this very issue myself. Somewhere . . . . .

namely their motive in obeying him here made a complete mockery of what the fetivals were for

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(12-21-2008 10:22 PM)Rose of Shushan Wrote:  
Sometimes we can do things out of a sense of duty or because it’s the Christian thing to do but not because we really want to. Our indifferent attitudes can then spill over tainting our outlook, our witness and the way we interact with those around us.

Which is why I have nothing to offer Him. If He does not offer me something I will go down to perdition. But he does offer me something: grace - not the reified energy which i can manipulate ( I have heard it preached on like this too many times). That does not exist, but he speaks to me in person, daily. His grace is not a THING, but a name for his continuiing personal intervention. (I do think this distinction very, very important. . . .

Years ago He told me by His Spirit "I do not want so much as a penny piece from you, child (his favoured form of address to me) "LEST YOU THINK YOU BOUGHT YOUR HEALING"

My motive for tithing was guilt and fear. He did not want it. That suits me fine

The continuing grace I have received since that time in 1983 confirms that I did not quench the Spirit in this