Circumcision

In Gen. 17, God prescribes an odd procedure in establishing his covenant with Abraham. God said, "Now as for you, you shall keep My covenant, you and your descendants after you throughout their generations". "This is My covenant, which you shall keep, between Me and you and your descendants after you: every male among you shall be circumcised". "And you shall be circumcised in the flesh of your foreskin; and it shall be the sign of the covenant between Me and you".

Why did God choose this part of the anatomy to establish a covenant?

He chose something that was sensitive, something private, something that they never exposed, something that would be painful.

"And Ishmael his son was thirteen years old when he was circumcised in the flesh of his foreskin".

Ishmael was the 13 year old son of Abraham. They never exposed their bodies in those days. It was condemned by God. The conversation between Abraham and Ishmael may have sounded something like this, "Guess what I have to do to you, son, in order to establish our covenant with God". Ishmael, who was going through puberty, probably said, "You want to do what to my what"? "I don’t think so".

The mode of circumcision was with a flint knife. The procedure lent to cleanliness and prevented infections later in life. It was a sign of belief. It was to establish a covenant and whoever was not circumcised was cut off from God’s people.

We read in 1Cor 10:11, Now these things happened to them as an example, and they were written for our instruction, upon whom the ends of the ages have come.

Circumcision was an example for our instruction today.

Our application is circumcision of the flesh of our heart. "Circumcise yourselves to the Lord and remove the foreskins of your heart, Men of Judah and inhabitants of Jerusalem, Lest My wrath go forth like fire And burn with none to quench it, Because of the evil of your deeds." Jer. 4:4 It is to expose our heart. God wants us to expose the sensitive parts of our life. Open up. It is painful, sensitive, it is private, and it hurts. To circumcise the flesh of our heart is to establish a covenant with God.

The process of circumcising our heart is to "confess our sins to one another and pray for one another…" this is exposing those private, sensitive, painful hidden areas of our life.

This leads to cleanliness and prevents infection. Confessing our sins to one another is cathartic and prevents the infection of sin from consuming our life.

We do this to establish covenant. If we don’t, we become cut off from God’s people.

During the original Olympic Games, there was a process of restoring the foreskin once circumcised. One sought a surgical procedure to assimilate themselves to the heathen around them so that they not be known as Jews while in the games.

Have you circumcised your heart but now cover it up to look like the rest of the world?