“THE CIRCUMCISION FOR YOU”
Eve of The Circumcision and Name of Jesus: 31 December Anno Domini 2015
Father Jay Watson SSP
Modern medical science and various UN human rights commissions aside, the act of circumcision was instituted and commanded by The Lord Himself: “And when Abram was ninety years old and nine, The Lord appeared to Abram, and said unto him, I am the almighty God; walk before Me, and be thou perfect…I will make My covenant between Me and thee, and will multiply thee exceedingly…neither shall thy name any more be called Abram, but thy name shall be Abraham; for a father of many nations have I made thee…I will establish My covenant between Me and Thee…and to thy seed after thee…every man child among you shall be circumcised…and ye shall circumcise the flesh of your foreskin; and it shall be a token of the covenant betwixt Me and you…and he that is eight days old shall be circumcised among you…and my covenant shall be in your flesh for an everlasting covenant…the uncircumcised soul…shall be cut off from his people…in the selfsame day was Abraham circumcised, and Ishmael his son…and all the men of his house.” [Gen. 17]
Permanent? Yes. Physically painful? Yes. Intimate, direct, and touching the reproductive means that The Creator had established? Yes. Strange and demanding to modern sensibilities, especially if those views are agnostic or godless? Most definitely. But, The Word of The Lord.
Why? Jesus. Jesus, The Christ of God is His Covenant, The Covenant of The Trinity. Not the ark containing tablets, manna, and a rod that bloomed almonds, but The Body and Blood born of Mary; true God and true Man subsisting in one Jesus united in His Person.
Why circumcise all those Hebrews? Was it to literally mark them as God’s peculiar people—to make them true Israelites, sons of EL, of God? Well, yes, to be sure. Circumcision was a confession of The Faith, of The Lord, not with words on scrolls or sermons from lips but with physical action and permanent, concrete, physical testimony. But why would the same God who prohibited, at that time, tattoos, and strange hair & beard cuttings, allow for circumcision? Circumcision would not be seen or “known” by anyone but ones nuclear family, and then later by one’s spouse if one married. It would be known by God and by God’s representatives. It was Law. It was a command. It bespoke not just a mark on the flesh but also on the inner spirit, as The Lord spoke in Deuteronomy: “circumcise therefore the foreskin of your heart, and be no more stiff-necked.” [Dt. 10.16] It was to prepare sinners for the only One Who could fulfill God’s stone covenant by ushering in the true Blood Covenant—The Cross.
Even as the Israelites disobeyed God’s 10 Commandments in the desert, and everywhere else, they also disobeyed, delayed, or messed up Circumcision (and all other Levitical mandates). Even Moses himself, who before he could deliver to Pharaoh warnings of the final plague, the death of all first-born heathen Egyptian sons, delayed obeying God’s Law. He had to have his wife hastily, in an emergency, circumcise his own son whom he had failed to circumcise. His wife in a bloody, and very upset, act, threw the evidence at Moses’ feet crying out “a bloody husband art thou to me.” [Ex. 4] All this points to Jesus. The blood splashed on Moses’ feet points to your true “Groom of Gore and Blood.” It directs you to both the blood of the Lambs slain which was painted on the door frames and lintels, causing God to pass-over, and also to the Bloody feet of Christ, nailed to the cross where He circumcised all your sins and punishment, and hell itself, by being cut, and cut, and cut—circumcised from life itself.
There is no life but in the blood. There is no saving without a Savior. The Savior isn’t a savior because He teaches well, heals sick people, feeds hungry crowds, and is of a kindly and friendly persuasion; though to be sure Christ did heal and teach and shows a tender heart of mercy towards the repentant and down-trodden. He is named Jesus because of His Blood obedience and Blood Sacrifice. The latter during Passion Week and on the Cross. The former, in His obedient Commandment keeping—starting at the beginning. Think and meditate; pray and confess this Gospel the next time (which will be any second) you cavalierly sin with presumptuous arrogance and “old-Adam” pride. A baby cut and mutilated for you—for your trespasses.
But salvation, blood-atonement is not of the Law, not of Moses and not of Abraham. Redemption is not your keeping any precept or doing any work, it is of Grace through faith in The Christ Who is your Work, your Sacrifice, your Circumcision and Sabbath…your new Name. You may as men be circumcised or not. But you are all circumcised with all of your believing sisters in Christ, in your Holy + Washings, your New Testament circumcisions of the sinful heart by The Physician Christ Jesus. “Ye are complete in Him, which is The Head of all principality and power; in Whom also ye are circumcised with the circumcision made without hands, in putting off the body of the sins of the flesh by the circumcision of Christ; buried with Him in Baptism, wherein also ye are risen with Him through the faith of the operation of God, Who hath raised Him from the dead.” [Col. 2]
You are loved that much dear brethren. You are forgiven that much fellow Saints. His Name is now your Name: Savior and saved; Christ and Christians, because of His Gospel: “when eight days were accomplished for the circumcising of the Child, His Name was called Jesus.” [Lk. 2.21]
In the Name of The Father and of + The Son and of The Holy Ghost
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