“Bragging rights”
By Rev. Michael Stonhouse
Quiet Time – Thursday, September 14, 2023
Galatians 6:14-18 (Forward, p. 46) CEV p. 1220
Here it is: such fuss over such a seemingly small or insignificant matter, at least to us today. It revolves over the ancient and age-old question of being circumcised vs. not being circumcised. For those brought up in traditional, orthodox Judaism at the time of Jesus and St. Paul, it was a mark of being Jewish, an outward sign of belonging to God’s covenant people, the Jews. Indeed, in the Hebrew Scriptures there were parts that stipulated, that ordered, this practice. Indeed, if you were not circumcised as a male, you did not belong to God’s people and were excluded from the community.
So, what was St. Paul’s issue with it, as here mentioned in his letter to the church at Galatia? It was that those of this ‘school’, who insisted on it, were Jews in form only, in externals only. They ‘sported’ the outward signs but didn’t really practice the faith. They didn’t really obey the Law of Moses, so in some ways, all the outward ‘show’ was for naught.
Indeed, this stress on the faith having to do with more than just ‘externals’ goes right back to the Hebrew Scriptures. In Deuteronomy 30:6, Moses says, “And the Lord your God will circumcise your heart and the heart of your offspring, so that you will love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul.”
Paul himself picks up this notion of the circumcism of the heart in his letter to the Romans: “For circumcision indeed is of value if you obey the law, but if you break the law, your circumcism becomes uncircumcision. So, if those who are uncircumcised keep the requirements of the law, will not their uncircumcision be regarded as circumcision? Then those who are physically uncircumcised but keep the law will condemn you that have the written code and circumcision but break the law. For a person is not a Jew who is one outwardly, not is true circumcision something external and physical. Rather a person is a Jew who is one inwardly, and real circumcision is a matter of the heart—it is spiritual and not literal. Such a person receives praise not from others but from God” (Romans 2:25-29).
As one commentator put it, ‘Circumcision of the heart’, not ‘circumcision of the flesh’, therefore serves as the ultimate identity marker of a ‘true Israelite.’
“Jewish circumcision is only an outward sign of being set apart to God. However, if the heart is sinful, then physical circumcision is of no avail. A circumcised body and a sinful heart are at odds with each other. Rather than focus on external rites, Paul focuses on the condition of the heart. Using circumcision as a metaphor, he says that only the Holy Spirit can purify the heart and set us apart fo God. Ultimately, circumcision cannot make a person right with God; the Law is not enough. A person’s heart must change. Paul calls this change ‘circumcision of the heart’”.
“God has always wanted more from His people than just external conformity to a set of rules. He has always wanted them to possess a heart to love, know, and follow Him. But Testaments focus on the need for repentance and inward change in order to be right with God. In Jesus, the Law has been fulfilled. Through Him, a person can be made right with God and receive eternal life.”
To be more particular: Circumcision of heart implies humility, faith, hope, and charity. Humility, a right judgment of ourselves, cleanses our minds from those high conceits of our own perfection, from that undue opinion of our own abilities and attainments, which are the genuine fruit of a corrupted nature.
And this is exactly what the Cross, together with the Resurrection, are all about: they constitute a death to one’s self and one’s old ways, one’s old motivations and goals, a death to sin in all its forms, and an embracing of the new life that comes only in Christ Jesus. They are vivid metaphors to describe what repentance and faith, the ‘about face’, that are the essential core of the Christian life, are all about. So, being this new person, this new person that the Cross achieves, is well worth being proud of, even to the point of boasting about. But then, it needs to be more than just a once and for all sort of thing. The repentance and faith that are symbolized and represented by the Cross need to be an every-day, moment by moment, kind of decision, which indeed are quite possible, but only by the help and grace of God. Thanks be to God.
Forward notes: “May I never boast of anything except the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by which the world has been crucified to me and I to the world” (verse 14).
“I have longed for meaning in inscrutable and senseless events. I have tried to build coherent explanations for the unexplainable because I don’t want heartache, suffering, or loss to be an abrupt ending to a story that can’t be finished.
“But Paul’s words express more than a desire to make meaning of an inexplicable situation. Paul proclaims Jesus’s cross as a site where both the imperial world’s constructions of meaning and his own have been put to death. He refuses to accept that ‘Christ died for nothing,’ as he says in Galatians 2:21, because Jesus’s death transformed meaning and instigated ‘a new creation’ for everyone—including Paul. Jesus changed Paul forever. Jesus enables Jews and Gentiles to become ‘one’ (Galatians 3:28). His cross is more than any empire, more than the world, can handle.”
Moving Forward: “Today is Holy Cross Day, one of the major feasts in the Episcopal [Anglican] Church. If you can, attend a worship service today and reflect on the lessons of the cross.”