Colossians 2:11

Colossians chapter 2. I’m going to read verses 8 through 11. Our focus is on verse 11 this morning. Beware lest any man spoil you through philosophy and vain deceit after the tradition of men, after the rudiments of the world, and not after Christ. For in him dwelleth all the fullness of the Godhead bodily, and 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, putting off the body of the sins of the flesh by the circumcision of Christ. May God bless to us His holy and sacred word this morning. For 11 years, There was a Massachusetts man who went through the very same routine every evening. He would sit down with the newspaper every night after dinner and spend time going through it. No one suspected that anything was wrong, but actually the man was hiding a secret that he didn’t tell anyone. Not even his wife knew about it. Finally, after years of this routine, he finally let out the secret. He couldn’t read. He only pretended to be reading the newspaper every evening for all those years. In the spiritual realm, false teachers put on a deceptive front. Outwardly, they want to appear to be righteous, but inwardly they are full of hypocrisy and lawlessness. They act pious, and they try to make a good impression. They confidently tell them. you that they are proclaiming the truth when actually they are turning people away from Jesus Christ as their sole hope of salvation. Now, Paul has just demonstrated for us that you are complete in Christ. You don’t need anything in addition to Christ for the salvation of your soul. Verse 10. However, the false teachers that were troubling many of the churches that we find that Paul established claimed that, of course, you need Christ, but you need something else. You need to be circumcised as well. The Judaizers promoted this idea. We should always be on guard against those who teach that you’re not completing Christ, and they want to add some ritual or some works that are necessary, in addition to the work of Christ. salvation. Paul addresses this key objection of circumcision here in our text by explaining that in Christ you have a superior circumcision to that of the Old Testament physical ritual. Participating in the spiritual reality portrayed in this divine ordinance is what is essential. Let me begin by saying this this morning. You are circumcised by Christ as a believer. Can you be complete without circumcision? That’s the question that we’re addressing. Now, the recipients of this particular letter were mostly Gentiles. We’re dealing with a group of people in what we call Turkey, the area of Turkey today. And so the question was, do they need to be circumsons? as the Jews. Now the Jews, of course, would classify all Gentiles as uncircised people. The Judaizers not only wish to retain the Old Testament ordinance of circumcision, but, as I mentioned, they made it mandatory for salvation. Here’s what they said in Acts 15 in verse 1. Except you be circumcised after the manner of Moses, you can’t be saved. These Jewish teachers taught no circumcised persons go to hell, but all are saved, and God rejects uncircumcised people and casts them down to hell. So there it is. Either you get circumcised and go to heaven, or if you don’t, you’re going to go to hell. That was the simple explanation they have. Therefore, faith in Christ alone was not enough to be saved according to the Judaizers. Now, in submitting to the right of circumcision, according to the wishes of these false teachers, Gentile converts were in effect saying this, the blood and righteousness of Christ, apprehended by faith, are not sufficient to save. I need something else. Such a teaching renounces the truth of Christianity, with its leading doctrine, that Christ is all. In him you are justified, in him you are sanctified, in him you are redeemed. Yet how can you be a son of Abraham? How can you be an heir of the coveted promises? How can you belong to the issue of God unless you are circumcised? So can you be complete without circumcision? Well, what is the spiritual significance of circumcision? It’s clear if you read the Old Testament passages, a spiritual, a spiritual, especially the law of God, in particular it stands out, that it was not enough just to be physically circumcised. It required something else. I want you to look with me at a couple of passages of scripture here. And the first is found in Leviticus, chapter 26, and beginning with verse 38. And you shall perish among the even, and the land of your enemies shall eat you up. And they that are left of you shall pine away in their iniquity. in your enemy’s lands, and also in the iniquities of their fathers, they shall pine away with them. If they shall confess their iniquity and the iniquity of their fathers, with their trespass, which they trespassed against me, and that also they have walked contrary unto me, and that I have also walked contrary unto them and have brought them into the land of their enemies, if their uncircumcised hearts be humbled, and they then accept the punishment of their iniquity, then I will remember my covenant with Jacob and also my covenant with Isaac and also my covenant with Abraham will I remember, and I will remember the land. Now you’ll notice here, in dealing with Israel and their waywardness and the judgment that he’s going to bring upon them, what he requires of them is not just physical circumcision, their hearts are uncircumcised, he says. That’s a serious. problem, God says. And until they recognize this, he said, you’re going to be in the land of the enemy. And so there was a sense in which he’s saying this has to be recognized. You have to be circumcised of heart. Look at Deuteronomy chapter 30 and verse 6. And the Lord thy God will circumcise thine heart and the heart of thy seed to love the Lord thy God with all thy heart and with all thy soul that thou mayest live. Isn’t it one of the great commandments? It isn’t that really the great commandment of the law that we should love the Lord our God with our heart, our mind, our soul, our strength, and so forth? How are we going to do that? Well, he says you have to have your heart circumcised to do that. And God has to do it. If God doesn’t do it, how could we love God as we are required? Then if you would, Jeremiah, look at Jeremiah also. chapter 9 verses 25 and 26. I’m just going to give you a sampling. You go through the Old Testament. You’ll find this repeatedly stated. Jeremiah says, Behold, the days come, saith the Lord, that I will punish all them that are circumcised with the uncircumcised. Egypt and Judah and Edom and the children of Ammon and Moab and all that are in the uttermost corners that dwell in the wilderness for all these nations are uncircumcised and all the house of Israel are uncircumcised in the heart. I put you in the same category as everybody else. Because you might have outward circumcision, but you don’t have inward circumcision. Here’s what we see from the Old Testament very clearly. Unless your heart is circumcised, that cutting off of your foreskin doesn’t benefit you. Abraham submitted the circumcision as a sign which he declared. his faith in the seed that was to come, Jesus Christ, that God promised would come through him. Here’s what the New Testament in Romans 411 says. And he received the sign of circumcision, a seal the righteousness of the faith which he had yet being uncircised. That he might be the father of all them that believe, though they be not circumcised, that righteousness might be imputed to them also. Circumcision was an indisputed to them. of man’s uncleanness spiritually and the need of the coming seed, Jesus Christ, the Messiah, who would provide the inward circumcision and take away sin? Paul declares that believers have been circumcised by Christ, not externally, but internally. Internal circumcision, that of the heart, is what he’s talking about in our text. This is regeneration, you see. He takes away your sin so that you’re not spiritually unclean in God’s sight, but made acceptable to God and can be part of the Israel of God. Here’s what the scripture says in Philippians 3.3. We are the circumcision. He’s writing the Gentiles, for the most part, in Philippians. We are the circumcision. We are the circumcision. which worship God in the spirit and rejoice in Jesus Christ and have no confidence in the flesh. We’re not putting our confidence in some cutting off of the flesh. Our confidence is in the fact that we are the true circumcision because we rejoice in Christ who has circumcised us. Thus Galatians 615 says, for in Christ Jesus, neither circumcision availeth anything nor uncircumcision, but a new creature. You need spirit. heart circumcision, you see. That’s what is needed. The being made a new creature is what is important. Turn with me to Romans chapter 2, verses 28 and 29. For he is not a Jew which is one outwardly, neither is that circumcision which is outward in the flesh, but he is a Jew which is one inwardly and circumcision, true circumcision, you see, is that of the heart in the spirit and not in the letter whose praise is not of men, but of God. So true circumcision here, which Christ provides, is what is necessary. So here is the spiritual significance here of this. Now, I want you to notice something, and this is very important, as an observation here. All ordinances are empty without Jesus Christ. There is no religious ceremony. I don’t care where you talk about, circumcision in the Old Testament, the Lord’s Supper, or baptism in the New Testament, it doesn’t matter. None of these things can benefit you unless you see Christ in them. All ceremonies are empty show and they lose their significance if Christ is forgotten. There are many people who are anxious to take the Lord’s Supper who don’t understand the significance of the Lord’s supper. Some people believe that they just take the cup and the bread somehow or going to benefit them. It’s going to do them good. As if there’s some type of favor of God attached to these material things that we eat or drink, doesn’t God’s condemnation rest upon those who partake of the Lord’s supper, not discerning the Lord’s body? If we don’t understand what’s being portrayed in that meal, we’re not doing ourselves any good partaking of the Lord’s supper. Did not Jesus say, do this in remembrance of me? If we don’t, we don’t see Christ in the supper portrayed symbolically, then what good does it do us to partake of the supper? Are you trusting in some physical bread and grape juice to benefit your soul? Your soul must exercise faith in the Christ that is portrayed. There are many people who are baptized and rest their hopes upon this particular church ordinance. Does water, have the power to actually take away your sins? Can it regenerate your soul? Where is Christ in that belief? Did you have your eyes upon Christ when you were baptized? Know you not that so many of us, as were baptized into Jesus Christ, were baptized into His death, that like as Christ was raised up from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we should also walk in newness of life? baptism portrays a union with Christ and his death and his burial and his resurrection. How can we miss this? Friends, the scripture says whatsoever is not a faith is sin. We have to look beyond these activities of ordinances and see Christ in them. What’s portrayed by these things. In the Old Testament, this is true as well as in anew. So all the ordinances there. empty if we don’t see Christ in them. But let me ask you this morning, have you been circumcised by Christ? Do you know what Paul is talking about here in this text of Scripture? Have you experienced this circumcision? Has your heart been circumcised? Have you been regenerated by the Lord? You recall that famous passage in John’s Gospel where Jesus told Nicodemus, verily, verily I say unto you, unless you accept a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God. Nicodemus was a religious leader of the Jews, man who was circumcised, man who supposedly knew the law well, at least the letter of it, he was highly respected by the people. Jesus said he lacked something. It wasn’t that he wasn’t religious, it wasn’t that he didn’t go to church, so to speak. He wasn’t born again. He never was circumcised by Christ. He doesn’t know about this spiritual circumcision. You know, George Whitfield, at the age of 16, became deeply convicted of his sin. And like a lot of people, he said, I did everything I could think of in religious activity to try to relieve the guilt that I had. He regularly attended church. He tried to please God. He said, I fasted 36 hours twice a week. Imagine someone doing that today. I prayed formal prayer several times a day. I almost starve myself to death, he said, during Lent. But I only felt more miserable. It wasn’t that he wasn’t trying to be religious. He was religious all right. But he said, one day, someone gave him a book that talked about the new birth, about regeneration, about the fact that you must be born again. And by God’s grace, he was saved. He was granted a spiritual birth. When he became a preacher, he preached over a thousand times on the subject of regeneration or the new birth. In 1752, he wrote this letter to Benjamin Franklin in which he said this. As I find you growing more and more famous in the world of letters, I recommend to your unprejudiced study, the mystery of the new birth. It is a most important study, and if mastered will abundantly repay you, I bid you, dear friend, remember that he before whose bar we must both soon appear has solemnly declared that without it, we shall in no way see his kingdom. Friends, just being religious, just engaging in activities of the church is not how we find relief from the burden of our sins. You need the circumcision of Christ, and only he can provide it, and you must go to him. You’re in a state of spiritual deadness. What you need is for the Holy Spirit to give you spiritual life. That’s what the scripture teaches. Ezekiel talks about this spirit taking away a heart of stone and giving you a heart of flesh, one that’s take the hardness away, give you something pliable, so that you may effectively be drawn to Christ. What do you know about this? Have you recognized your need of this? These are the things that we should gather from this. So you are circumcised by Christ as a believer. And my friends, let me say this. If you have the spiritual reality, you don’t need to be physically circumcised. This is his point. You don’t need to be circumcised. Christ has circumcised you. You have the reality of what the physical circumcision was all about. I’m here. He’s here now, Christ. Secondly, this morning, you should realize the superiority of Christ’s circumcision. Notice you have a superior administrator. We have God versus man. Being circumcised by man, regardless of his religious credentials. I don’t care if he was a high priest of Israel at the time. cannot compare with being circumcised by Christ. The force of this argument will become clear. Just think back upon what the Apostles said about Christ so far in this epistle. Christ is the son of God. He is the head of the church. He’s the grantor of all grace. He is the creator and preserver of all things. In him dwells all the fullness of the fullness of the Godhead bodily in him are hid all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge. My friends, it would be a reproach to Christ. Christ. If anyone being circumcised by Christ should desire to be circumcised by someone else, a human being. This would indicate that there was something defective about his circumcision. It wasn’t good enough to be circumcised by Christ. Really? My friend, any time we think we can add something to what Christ does, we’re in effect saying his work isn’t good enough. Content yourself in the completeness that you have. In Christ, that’s what he’s telling these people. It is disgraceful to think you need to look beyond him. Let me add, if Christ is the administrator’s spiritual circumcision or the new birth, then you’re going to have to seek to change directly from him. Go to Christ. Played with him for spiritual life, because no man can do this for you. No man can give you this spiritual circumcision. A superior administrator. You have a superior manner. It’s spiritual versus physical. This is a circumcision. He tells us in our tax tier that’s made without hands. It’s not physical in nature, but rather inward, spiritual. Now, the mosaic circumcision consisted of taking a knife and cutting off the foreskin of the male organ. Making these sharp. and circumcised the children of Israel, Joshua 5.2. It was done with hands. The circumcision of Christ, because it’s on the heart, you see, uses the sword of the Spirit, which is the Word of God. For the Bible says, we’re born again, not of corruptible seed, but of incorruptible by the Word of God. That’s the sword Christ uses when he circumcises you. As Paul argues, he is not a Jew, which is one outwardly, but he is a Jew which is one inwardly, and circumcision is that of the heart in the spirit and not in the letter. Now, the Jews were very careful. You read through down through their history. There were times they elapsed, but for the most part, they were very particular about circumcising the boy, babies on the eighth day, and yet many of them failed to realize the need for the circumcision of heart. This by the fact, the fact that God condemned those who had this defect. So here lies the secret between merely formally worshipping God, going through the motions of worship and true heartfelt worship of God out of love. The Lord thy God will circumcise thine heart to love the Lord thy God with all thine heart and with all thy soul. That’s how it’s done. That’s how it can be done. The heart must be changed. then we can truly worship God as he deserves to be worshipped. Then we can do it with the right heart and the right spirit. People can draw near to God with their lips, but their hearts be far from him. You have to have a circumcised heart to draw near the Lord. You have to have the circumcision of Christ. It’s hypocritical for us to think we can attempt to draw near God, draw near God by ceremonies, by ordinances, God looks at the heart, and your heart is never acceptable unless God circumcises it. It’s a superior manner, spiritual versus physical. That’s a superior effect. The whole body of sin versus the foreskin. Physical circumcision was a sign of the Abrahamic covenant, which certainly promised the coming of the Messiah through Abraham. Those uncircumcised were called unclean in God’s sight in words, were excluded from fellowship with God in the Old Testament, as we know. There was a purifying of one member of the body, the reproductive member, by circumcision, in preparation for the coming seed, Jesus Christ, through Abraham’s line. Spiritual circumcision, however, involved the putting off of the whole body of the sins of the flesh. By the flesh. He means that corrupt, fallen nature, the old man that you have in Adam. That’s the source of all sin, both inward and outward. Now, the outward actions of your sins require the various members of your body, and thus we could talk about the eyes, lusting, or we could talk about the feet, straying into areas we shouldn’t go, or the hands stealing something, or touching something they shouldn’t touch. or the ears hearing profane things, or the tongue speaking evil and so forth. The circumcision of Christ, however, purifies the heart from which all sin ultimately proceeds, and therefore it brings in the line, the hands and the legs, and the eyes, the ears, and the tongue, and so forth. Thus, there’s a sense in which all the members of your body gets purified when Christ circumcised the heart. Not just, just cut it. off a piece of flesh of one part of the body, one member, all the members now are brought in line and dedicated to serving Christ. So physical circumcision cut off a little bit of skin, while spiritual circumcision mortifies the whole body of the flesh. One focuses on one member of the body, the other on all the members of your body. One wounds the outward flesh, the other, purifies the cures the heart itself. One allowed you to associate with Israel after the flesh. The other made you a member of the Israel of God, the spiritual nation of God’s people. With the coming of the Messiah, one fades away, whereas the other continues and will continue until Christ comes again. My observation is this. It’s not sufficient to cut off one member of this body of corruption. You have to cut off a whole body of sin. You have to cut off a whole body of sin. you’ll notice here this text of scripture is concerned not with just a small amount of cutting away of things talks about the whole body of your sin being cut away here we’ll talk about this more in chapter 3 your ears your tongue your mind your arms your legs your feet must all be in a sense circumcised by Christ every member of your body must be dedicated to glorifying God we can’t be partial in this can’t when we. Now many try to get rid of sin like they get rid of a spider web. They never kill the spider. They just tear down the web. Well, the truth of the matter is we have to get to the problem area. You treat the symptoms rather than the root cause. God would treat the heart that he may take care of all the symptoms that flow through the body. Sometimes we focus on some members while letting other members go on. It would be like a fireman that sees a fire in a house and goes in, puts the fire out in the living room packs up and goes back to the fire station and the rest of the house burn time. What what God is concerned here with is the whole man here inward and outward being purified by his work. And we’ll talk about this more later, Lord willing. Well, for 11 years that Massachusetts man pretended to read the newspaper every morning, but in reality he couldn’t read. People go through all sorts of religious ceremonies, such as circumcision or a Lord’s Supper or baptism, whatever, without the reality, the spiritual reality behind them being known. Don’t fail to see Christ in the church ordinances. Do not be satisfied with outward ritual and ceremony when you lack what’s most important, and that is your heart being made right with the Lord. You see, people would be satisfied just to be circumcised physically. Paul says, that’s not what you really need. You need heart circumcision. That is the essence of what it’s all about anyhow. Get the reality, that’s what he says. So let us remember that when we engage in the ordinances of the Lord ourselves. Let’s close with the word here.