Blessed are the poor in spirit,
Who their sinful nature see. They are taught they have no
merit, To the Savior they all flee. Self-renouncing, grace-admiring,
made unto salvation wise, sovereign love their hearts rejoicing,
from His cross their hopes arise. Those who find themselves polluted
Feel their hearts so prone to sin They shall have by God imputed
Righteousness so pure and clean At his throne their hearts confessing,
praise our God of sovereign grace. Weeping, loving, praising, blessing,
on his head the crown they place. Be seated. I'd like to open your Bibles
again to the book of Colossians. We're going to be in chapter
2, Colossians chapter 2. When the world speaks of a subject
being deep, what they generally mean by that is that it's complicated
and very hard to understand. We are going to be swimming in some very deep waters
this morning. But when God speaks of something
being deep, his ways are not our ways and his thoughts are
not our thoughts. For in fact, the depth of the
gospel, the profoundness of the gospel, is only seen in its simplicity. It's not complicated. It's impossible
for the natural man to understand, which is the reason why men won't
believe they're looking for something much more complicated, something
that will allow them to participate in their salvation. These waters are infinitely deep
in that we will never plunge the depth of them, but they are
shallow in that they are simple. Simple. In one place we read,
I fear, lest as Eve was drawn away by the deceitfulness of
Satan, that you might be drawn from the simplicity that is in
Christ. The Lord Jesus Christ himself
and our union with him is the hope of our salvation. And, And
so we read in verse nine, for in him, in the Lord Jesus Christ,
dwelleth all the fullness of the Godhead. Everything that there is to know
about God and all the needs that we have from God are in Christ. And you, by virtue of God-given faith,
union with Christ, are complete in Him. Complete. Everything that God requires
is complete in the person and the work of the Lord Jesus Christ. That, my friend and my brethren,
is the simplicity of the gospel. completeness in the Lord Jesus
Christ. Nothing can be taken from Him,
nothing can be added to Him. Christ who is our life. Notice over a page in chapter
3, where Ryan was just reading from down in verse 11, where
there is neither Greek nor Jew, circumcision nor uncircumcision,
barbarian, Scythian, bond nor free, but Christ is all and in
all. The Lord said, you will not come
unto me that you might have life. Men by nature will not come to
Christ. Verse 10, you are complete in
Him, which is the head. The Lord Jesus Christ is the
head of all principalities. Now that word principalities
means first things. So we normally think of first
things as being the head of things. And here the Lord's telling us
that Christ is the head of all first things. Saul, he's the
head of all kings. He's the head of all salvation. He is before all things. And
by him, all things exist. Verse 11 is our text for this
morning. In whom? In the Lord Jesus Christ. Also, you are circumcised. with the circumcision made without
hands and putting off the body of the sins of the flesh by the
circumcision of Christ. I've titled this message, The
Body of Sins. The Body of Sins. And we'll get to that in a few
moments. Let's begin by looking at this
thing called circumcision. The Lord gave it to Abraham as
a token of the covenant that God had promised to Abraham and
to his descendants. Particularly, he had promised
it to Abraham and to his seed. Not seeds, but seed, and that
seed being Christ. So the fulfillment of all the
promises that God made to Abraham were not in the blessings that
he gave to Old Testament Israel, but they are spiritual in the
blessings that he gives to Christ and his church. And that's what
the Lord's saying here. that this circumcision that was
made by hands in the Old Testament as a token of a covenant that
God made with national Israel really had a forward meaning. It really had a purpose in salvation
only that could be seen in the fulfillment of the circumcision
of Christ. Circumcision was the cutting
off of the flesh. And here, we're not looking at
circumcision that was made by the hands of men. Whatever man's
hand touches, he defiles. The first reference made to the
hand in the Bible is the scripture says in Genesis chapter 3, and
Adam reached forth his hand and he took of the fruit of the tree
of life, of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. And the second reference to the
hand in the Bible is found in the next chapter when God says
to Cain, your brother's blood cries out from the ground against
you, which you spilled by your hand. And so we see in these
first two references to our hands being our sinful nature, the
things that we do, The works that we try to perform, Cain
tried to bring by his bloody hands, his hands were already
bloody or they were going to be bloody. He tried to bring
by his hands an offering to God by the things that he gave to
God. He didn't bring a blood sacrifice
like his brother did. Who shall stand? Who shall? They
that have clean hands and a pure heart, they're the only ones
that are gonna be able to stand before God. So, as proud as the Jews
were of their circumcision in the Old Testament that was performed
by the hands of men, the Lord's telling you and I right now that
that circumcision was not the circumcision that we need. We need a circumcision that's
performed not by hands. We need a spiritual circumcision,
a circumcision of the heart. Turn with me to Romans chapter
two, Romans chapter two. Circumcision of the flesh performed
by the hands of men will never make those hands pure and that
heart clean. Romans chapter two. And we'll
read a verse 28. For he is not a Jew, which is
one outwardly. What is it that distinguished
the Jews from all the other Middle Eastern tribes? If you looked
at them, you wouldn't be able to tell the difference. It was
circumcision. It was circumcision. That's what
distinguished the Jewish nation. 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 that is of the heart in the spirit
and not in the letter of the law, whose praise is not of men,
but of God." So as proud as men were of this physical circumcision
that God had given, and the Jews were. You remember when David
said of Goliath, who is this uncircumcised Philistine? And
even in the New Testament, the Gentiles are referred to as the
uncircumcised. They're the ones who have not
been brought in to the covenant and the promises of God. They're
aliens and strangers. And now the Lord's telling us,
don't worry about that circumcision performed by hand. In the flesh,
you need the circumcision of the heart. performed by that
circumcision of Christ when his flesh was cut off on Calvary's
cross. Circumcision made by hands. Turn
with me to Galatians chapter five. Galatians chapter five. Look with me at verse one. Stand
fast therefore in the liberty wherewith Christ has made us
free. Now there were, if you go to
Acts chapter 15, there were some Jews that said they believed
that Jesus was the Christ. but they insisted in order to
be saved, not only did you have to believe that Jesus was the
Christ, but that you had to be circumcised and you had to fulfill
the law of Moses. And the disciples got together,
the apostles got together, it's called the Jerusalem Council
in Acts chapter 15, and they prayed about and talked about
this matter of circumcision and came to the conclusion that no,
no. circumcision of the flesh, it
was not required that the Gentiles be circumcised in order to be
saved. And I love what Peter says, he said at the end of the
council, his conclusion of the argument was that we shall be
saved in the same way in which they are. He didn't say the Gentiles
are going to be saved the same way we are. He said, we circumcised
Jews are going to be saved the same way those uncircumcised
Gentiles are going to be saved. Through faith, by grace, the
only way we're going to be saved and nothing we lay our hands
to. and nothing we perform in the flesh and no cutting away
of fleshly things is going to earn us favor with God. And so these same Jews now have
gone to Galatia and they are calling into question the gospel
that Paul is preaching about the simplicity of Christ. And
they are saying that, no, no, there's other things you have
to do in order to be saved. Nothing's changed. This is still
the message we hear today. Yes, Jesus is the Christ. He's
the son of the living God. He's the Messiah. But there's
something you have to do in order to make what he did work for
you. And you just fill in the blank, whatever it is. You have
to pray this prayer. You have to make this decision.
You have to commit yourself. You have to wear this particular
hairstyle or eat these particular, uh, this particular diet. You
see the list goes on and on and on, doesn't it? And so circumcision
represents all those things. Whatever men say you have to
do in order to make what Christ did work for you, that is circumcision. Verse one of Galatians chapter
five. Stand fast, therefore, in the
liberty wherewith Christ has made us free, and be not entangled
again with the yoke of bondage. Behold, I, Paul, say unto you,
that if you be circumcised, Christ shall profit you nothing. If
you add to the finished work of the Lord Jesus Christ by something
you put your hands to, then Christ shall profit you nothing, nothing. That's what circumcision is a
picture of. Let's read on. For I testify
again to every man that is circumcised, that he is a debtor to do the
whole law. If you think there's something
that you have to do in order to make what Christ did, effectual in your salvation by
itself, then you've just made yourself a debtor to the whole
law. You're going to be saved by something you do. You have
to do it all. You have to keep the whole law
with all of your heart and all of your mind and all of your
soul all of the time. And the truth is that you and
I have never kept a single part of God's law in that regard. Not for a moment. not to the
standard which God requires. But men go about trying to establish
their own righteousness, pretending to be law-keeping. And that's
what circumcision is. Verse four, Christ has become
of no effect unto you. Whosoever you are justified by
the law, you are fallen from grace. For we, through the Spirit,
wait for the hope of righteousness by faith. For in Jesus Christ,
neither circumcision availeth anything nor uncircumcision,
but faith which worketh by love. You did run well. Who did hinder
you that you should not obey the truth? This persuasion, nay,
came not of him that calleth you. A little leaven leveth the
whole lump." He said, well, just a little bit of works. No, a
little leaven destroys the whole gospel. Either Christ did it
all, all by himself, or it won't be done. So now the Lord is telling us,
back to our text, in whom? By virtue of our union with Christ,
he is the fullness of the Godhead bodily. You are complete in him,
found in Christ, not having my own righteousness, which is of
the law, but that righteousness, which is by the faith of the
Lord Jesus Christ. You are complete in him for he
is the head over all first things and over all powers. I mentioned Sunday night when
I preached from this passage, We in no way blame God for our
debt. Somebody blamed God for their
sin the other day to me. You know, we do it, I guess. He said he was a believer, lives
locally. He said, well, if God leads me to come to church, I
will. You're blaming God for not, for forsaking the assembling
of yourself together as some manner of some men are? If God
wills, I'll be there. God's already spoken on that.
Don't blame God for that. You know, we often say, well,
you know, the people that were supposed to be there were there,
and that's true, but that doesn't relieve the responsibility of
those who don't come. We're responsible for our own
sin. That having been said, The first sin was created by
our father Adam. When he took up his hand and
he reached and he took up the forbidden fruit from the tree
of the knowledge of good and evil, the Lord Jesus Christ was
the head over that principality. He ordained that. He purposed
that. Adam bears the full responsibility
for his sin just like you and I do. But the Lord Jesus Christ
is the head over all first things and over all powers. And he uses
it for his glory. You see, it was the fall that
reveals the full glory of our Lord in salvation. Now people say, well, he allowed
it. Well, the scripture says he's the head over it. He's the
head over it. When we talk about God allowing
something, we're not suggesting that our God looks at something
and says, well, that's really not my plan, but I'll let it
go. I'll allow it to be. No. Our God purposed everything
that is. So by virtue of our complete
union with Christ, who is himself the head over all principalities
and power, in him you are circumcised with the circumcision not made
without hands. Now that's the new birth. That's
the new birth. That's what the Lord was saying
to Nicodemus. Nicodemus, you must be born from above. You've
got to have You've got to have the heart of stone taken out
and a heart of flesh put in. This is the circumcision of the
heart through faith in Christ by God's grace. How can I return
to my mother's womb and be born again? Oh, Nicodemus, you don't
understand. That which is of the flesh, that which is performed
by the hand, That circumcision which is performed by the hand,
those works that men look to for the hope of their salvation,
that is of flesh, and the flesh profiteth nothing. But that which
is of the spirit is spirit, and the spirit giveth life. The spirit
giveth life. You've got to be circumcised
in the spirit of God, in the heart. Someone asked, how do I know
if I've been If I've been circumcised by the
Spirit of God in my heart, how do I know if God's taken out
my heart of stone and put in a heart of flesh? What is the
evidence of that circumcision in my life? And now am I going
to turn you back to your works to try to find some hope of your
circumcision by the way in which you live? That would just be
adding circumcision again, would it not? Would it not? You see, it doesn't matter if
you look into your works at the beginning or your works at the
end. Those things are not the evidences of our circumcision.
So what is? What is? Well, turn with me to
Hebrews chapter eight. Hebrews chapter eight. How do
I know if a circumcision done without hands has been performed
by the Spirit of God in my heart? Now the children of Israel, the
Jews of the Old Testament, the vast majority of them were unbelievers. They died in unbelief and they
spent eternity separated from God. There was but a remnant
in Israel that was saved. And so this outward circumcision
performed by the hands of men in the flesh of the man, was
only an outward sign of a nation who was made up mostly of unbelievers. And in Jeremiah chapter 31, the
Lord tells us, I will make a new covenant with Israel. I looked
at sermon audio for some sermons preached from Galatians, from
Colossians 2.11 and several of them said why, there was the
title of the message, why we must baptize babies. There is a large group of people
who call themselves Christians who believe that baptism is the
New Testament fulfillment of Old Testament circumcision. And
so they baptize their babies as members of the covenant of
grace. And they say, well, it doesn't
save them, but why do you baptize them then? You see, baptism is
not the fulfillment of Old Testament circumcision. Circumcision of
the heart is. The Old Testament rite of circumcision
is fulfilled in the New Testament circumcision of the heart. Let
me show you that. You have your Bibles open to
Hebrews chapter 8, verse 10. For this is the covenant that
I will make with the house of Israel after those days, saith
the Lord, I will put my laws in their mind and write them
in their hearts, and I will be to them a God, and they shall
be to me a people. And they shall not teach every
man his neighbor and every man his brother, saying, know the
Lord, for they shall all know me from the least of them into
the greatest. This is why we don't baptize
babies. Baptism is an outward sign of an inward work of grace. Circumcision of the heart must
be performed by the Spirit of God before a person can confess
their faith in Christ in baptism. And here's the difference between
the New Testament Israel and Old Testament Israel. They look
to their circumcision as the hope of their salvation. And
we see that carried on through the New Testament. And even to
this day, men look to what they put their hands to for the hope
of their salvation. God says, no, I'm going to make
a new covenant. I'm going to circumcise their
hearts. And the evidence of that circumcision is that I'm going
to write my laws upon their heart and impress them upon their minds. What does that mean? What does that mean? Romans 1 makes it absolutely
clear that the law of God has been written on the hearts of
all men from birth. The moral law, the Ten Commandments,
is impressed by God in the nature of man's conscience from birth. Let me show you that. Look at
Romans chapter 1 at verse 18. Does God say, here's the evidence
of this circumcision of the heart. It's not gonna be like the Old
Testament Israel, where the believers were having to say to the unbelievers
in Israel, you need to know the Lord. No, in the New Testament
Israel, they shall all know me, from the least of them, even
to the greatest. From the, the evidence will be
the circumcision of the heart. And here's, I'll write my laws
upon their heart. What does that mean? Does it mean that we just have
a different view of the law of God now? Look at verse 18. For the wrath of God is revealed
from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men. who
hold the truth and unrighteousness because that which may be known
of God is manifest in them for God hath showed it unto them. Now all of Romans chapter one
is talking about those uncircumcised Gentiles who were strangers from
the revelation of God and God saying, they know, they know. Now turn over just one page to
Romans chapter 2 to verse 14. For when the Gentiles, which
have not the law, they don't have the moral code, they don't
have the Ten Commandments as they were given by Moses. They don't have them. When those
uncircumcised Gentiles which have not the law, do by nature
the things contained in the law, these having not the law, are
a law unto themselves, which show the work of the law written
in their hearts, their conscience also bearing their witness and
their thoughts, the meanwhile, accusing or excusing them. You
see, a man never has to read the Bible. He never has to hear
the gospel. He never has to go to church. to know the difference between
right and wrong. You come into this world knowing that murder's
wrong, lying's wrong, stealing's wrong, adultery's wrong, that
there is a God in heaven and that he requires your absolute
allegiance. All men know that. Everything
that's recorded in the code of God's moral law is written in
the hearts of all men who come into this world. So when God says in Romans chapter
eight, Hebrews chapter 8, I'm going to make a new covenant
with the house of Israel. This is going to be a spiritual covenant.
They're not going to be circumcised in the flesh by the works of
a man's hand. They're going to be circumcised in the heart by
the spirit of God. And here will be the evidence.
I will write my law upon their hearts. Child of God, what law
do you have written on your heart that you didn't have written
on your heart before? Well, there's several. You don't
have to turn to these passages. There's too many to deal with.
I want to deal with them quickly. Malachi chapter two, verse three,
the Lord says of Levi. Now you remember who Levi was?
Levi was the priestly tribe. And the scripture refers to the
church as a nation of priest. A priest has access to God. We have a high priest, the Lord
Jesus Christ, and we are priests. We don't look for any other mediator
between us and God. There's one mediator between
God and man, the God-man, the Lord Jesus Christ. And we, as
sons of Levi, have direct access into his presence. And here's
what the scripture says in Malachi chapter two, verse three of Levi,
the law of truth. The law of truth was in His mouth. Here's what the law is. When
God writes the law upon your heart, you know the truth from
error. You know what I'm speaking to
you right now from God's Word is true. You know that any works
in salvation will damn your soul. That Christ He finished the work of redemption.
He's the end of the law for righteousness. He's everything in your salvation. You know that. You know that
He is the truth. You don't have to be convinced
of why. Because as a son of Levi, you have the law of truth written
on your heart. You didn't have that before.
You were willy-nilly about what truth was and what truth wasn't
and you would have said with pilot truth truth Is that what
this is all about? Don't you know there's no such
thing as truth? Don't you know that everything's absolute? That
nothing's absolute, that everything's relative? That we get to decide
for ourselves what's true and what's not true? You know what
Pilate said? When the Lord Jesus Christ said
to Pilate, for this cause was I born and for this reason came
I into the world, to bear witness unto the truth. And they that
are of the truth hear my voice and they follow me. And Pilate
said, truth! You see, the world was just as
relative 2,000 years ago as it is today. Men do not believe
that there's any such thing as an absolute truth. If you're
a child of Levi, you've had the law of God written on your heart.
You know that there's truth. And you know that all that truth
is bound up in the person of the Lord Jesus Christ, who is
Himself the truth. Have you had that law written
on your heart? This is the circumcision of the
heart. This is what's required if we're to be saved. The spirit
of God must circumcise the flesh of our hearts. Secondly, in Romans
chapter three, verse 27, justified by the law, the law of works,
nay, nay, but by the law of faith, by the law of faith. Child of
God, if you've had your heart circumcised and the law of God
has been written upon your heart, you can not not believe. If God has given you faith, that
faith is permanent. It's immutable. You can't do anything about it.
You're a believer. You believe everything that God
said. You believe on Christ. You say with the disciples, Lord,
to whom shall we go? For you alone have the words
of eternal life. We know that you are the Christ,
the son of the living God. We're sure of it. We're sure
of it. You've made us to believe on
you. Has that law been written on your heart? You see, though
the unbeliever has the moral law written on their heart, they
don't have the law of truth and the law of faith written on their
heart. That comes only by the circumcision of the spirit of
God. Romans chapter seven, verse 23
speaks of the law of sin, which is in your members. Here's the
law that's written on the believer's heart. God's made you. aware that you're
a sinner. And by that, I don't mean what
the unbeliever thinks, who has the moral code written on their
heart, who knows that they've not been perfect in keeping it,
but they're doing their best, which is never good enough. You
know, as a sinner, the law of sin has been written on your
heart that everything that you do is sinful. If you did it,
it's sin. If you put your hands to it,
it's sin. That your sinful nature infects
everything that you do. You, just like you can't not
believe, you can't not sin. And I use that double negative
for a purpose of emphasis. You can't not sin. Paul said, to perform that which is good,
I would. How to perform it? I find it
not. My sin is ever before me, David
said. Has the law of sin been written
on your heart? This is the circumcision of the spirit. This is what it
means to be found complete in Christ. You are the circumcision, not
the circumcision that's performed by the hands of men, not the
rites and ceremonies and actions that men perform in order to
try to earn favor with God. This is a work of the spirit
of God. The law of truth, the law of
faith, the law of sin. And fourthly, Romans chapter
eight, verse two, speaks of the law of the spirit of life in
Christ. There is now therefore no condemnation
to them that are in Christ Jesus who walk not after the flesh,
but after the spirit. For the law, the law of life
and the law of the spirit in Christ has made me free from
the law of sin and death. Christ who is my life. Oh, set
your affections on things above where Christ is seated at the
right hand of God. Here's the, men are not set free
from the law of sin and death because they haven't had the
circumcision of the heart performed for them. Romans chapter 9 verse 31 speaks
of the law of righteousness, the law of righteousness. Now,
a law, looking at Aaron, police officer,
the law, the letter of the law, and we might find some flexibility
in our laws. And I'm sure that police officers
have to, you know, use some judgment as to how much to enforce the
law in certain circumstances. But God's law is inflexible.
It's inflexible. It has to be fulfilled to the
T. Every I has to be dotted. The
Lord Jesus Christ said, I did not come to destroy the law.
I came to fulfill it. And this is what the law of righteousness
is. The law of righteousness is the
fulfillment of the law of God. Child of God, if you've had the
circumcision of the spirit done in your heart, You know that all of your righteousness
is in Christ. You have no righteousness outside
of him. All of your righteousness is
all the things that you try to do that are good. And we do,
we wanna, you know, we wanna do right. But as soon as we do
them, we know that they're filthy rags. All our righteousness are
filthy rags before God. The Lord Jesus Christ. If you've
had the law of God written on your heart, the law of righteousness
has been written on your heart. The law of truth, the law of
faith, the law of sin, the law of the spirit of life in Christ
Jesus, the law of righteousness. Galatians chapter six, If a brother's been overtaken
in a fault, you that are spiritual, restore such a one in the spirit
of meekness. Be careful, lest you also fall,
bearing your brother's burden. Bearing your brother's burden.
In other words, when we help a brother who has been overtaken
in a fault, we do it humbly and we bear his burden, knowing that
we're subject to the same exact thing. And so you fulfill the
law of Christ. Here's the law. This is the law
that's written on the heart. This is the circumcision of the
heart. You see, the self-righteous, oh, they look down their nose
at someone who's been overtaken in a fall and say, well, I would
never do that. The one who's had his heart circumcised by
the Spirit of God knows, oh, brother, I could be just as easily
overtaken in that same fault. Let me pray with you. Let me
tell you about a Savior who's able to forgive and restore. And so you fulfill the law of
Christ. This one's very closely united
to that. In James chapter two, verse eight,
it speaks of the royal law of love on which hangs all the law
and the prophets. It's the law of love. Child of
God, if you've had the spirit of God do a work of grace in
your heart, you've circumcised your heart, not done by hands,
but done by the spirit of God, you love God. You love his gospel,
you love his people, you love his word. Oh, not as you ought. We love ourselves way too much,
don't we? But we do love him. And we do
love a gospel that depends upon him for everything. And we hate
a gospel A message of salvation that looks to us for anything.
Amen. James chapter two, verse 12 speaks
of the law of liberty. These are the laws, the law of
truth. You see the moral code, the moral law is written on all
men's heart. Everybody knows the difference between right
and wrong. People talk to me, I get people
tell me sometimes, you know, you need to tell us how to live.
You know how to live. You know what you ought to be
doing, what you ought not to be doing. I'm going to tell you about Christ,
who is our life. He does a work of grace in the
heart. Puts the law of truth, the law
of faith, the law of sin, the law of life of Christ, the law
of righteousness, and the law of Christ, the royal law of love,
and the law of liberty. The law of liberty. You've been
made free from the law of sin and death. You've been made free
from the carnal requirements of the moral law. You've been
made free to thinking that you can bring something to God with
the works of your hands that are somehow going to satisfy
his demands for righteousness. You've been made free of that
and you cannot listen to a message of salvation that takes away
your liberty. Stand fast in the liberty wherewith
Christ has made you free. The law of liberty has been written
on your heart. Philippians chapter three. Turn with me there. Philippians
chapter three. Verse one. Finally, my brethren,
rejoice in the Lord to write the same things to you. To me,
indeed, is not grievous. I'm preaching the same thing
I preach every time, it's not grievous. But for you to say,
and that word safe is the word sure and certain, I want you
to be safe. I want to be I want to be sure
I want to be certain that I'm saved. And this message is the
message that gives that certainty. If my salvation
is dependent upon anything that I do with the works of my hands,
I've got no surety. I've got no certainty. I don't
know if I've done it right. I don't know if I've done enough
of it. But if my salvation is determined by Christ and His
work and what He performed, then I can be sure. Beware of dogs. Beware of the
concision. That's circumcision. Beware of
those who would tell you there's something you have to do. For we are the circumcision. Circumcised not by the hands
of men, but by the Spirit of God. Not in the flesh, but in
the heart. Having these new laws written
upon our hearts, we are the circumcision, which worship God in the spirit. A child of God, you come to worship
and you know if the spirit of God does not enable you to worship,
you will never be able to enter into worship. You've sat under
the sound of the gospel enough, and you've been around God's
people enough, and you've been to church enough to know what
it means to sit here and not worship God. And you cry out. That's why the
Lord said, if you being evil know how to give good gifts unto
your children, how much more would God give the Holy Spirit
to them that ask Him, Lord, enable me to worship you in spirit.
Now what the Lord said to the woman at the well, they that
worship God must worship him in spirit and in truth. Lord, I depend upon your spirit
to enable my spirit to enter into a spirit of worship. You don't come here presuming
that you're gonna worship God because you've made a decision
to go to church. And you don't say to your unbelieving
friends, come worship with us, they can't. Come hear a man who
told me everything that I ever did. Come hear the message of
salvation. And perhaps God will give you
the ability to worship him. We are the circumcision, circumcised
in the heart, put to have these new laws written on our heart,
which worship God in the spirit, rejoice in Christ Jesus. Here's
the hope that we have. Here's our joy. that the Lord
Jesus Christ is all that God requires, and He's all that I
need. And I rejoice in Him, rejoice
in His finished work of redemption. I rejoice in the fact that I
have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ, the righteous one,
whoever lives to make intercession for me. I rejoice in Christ. I have nothing outside of Him
to rejoice in. And notice the last phrase, and
have no confidence in the flesh. I cannot look to anything that
I've done with my hands in performing a circumcision of my flesh, in
cutting off fleshly works. Here's what we're talking about
now. You see, men think, well, I quit doing that. I quit doing
the other. I cut these things out of my life, and that's my
hope of salvation. I cannot look to any of that. I have no confidence in the flesh. Rejoicing Christ Jesus. What a Savior. Now, to get to
the title of my message in closing, look with me to our text. Colossians
chapter two. Colossians chapter two. Verse
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. Notice that it does not say in
putting off the sins of the flesh committed in the body. There's plenty of those. There's
plenty of those. And there's some things that
we ought to put off. Does that make us less sinful? No, we're
just as much sinful as believers want to honor God with their
lives. We don't have to say that You know that this doesn't give
a license for sin, not to a child of God. A child of God is not
looking for a license for their sin. They're looking for Christ. Putting off the body of the sins. Now the word body is used in
two different senses in the Bible. It's used to describe this fleshly
body, which is sinful, but it's also used in the same sense that
we might say the student body or a body of water, meaning the
sum total of something. Let me show you that. Turn with
me to Exodus chapter 24. This is the first time that the
word body is used in the Bible. Moses and Aaron and Nadab and
Abihu and 70 elders have gone to Mount Sinai. Now Moses ultimately
will go up on Mount Sinai himself, a picture of Christ, receive
the law of God. And by the time he comes back
down, the children of Israel have already broken God's law. But here, when he's standing
at the foot of Mount Sinai, The Lord Jesus Christ appears to
them, reveals himself to them. And look what it says in verse
10. And they saw the God of Israel,
and there was under his feet, as it were, paved work of a sapphire
stone, and as it were, the body of heaven in his purity and in
his cleanness. The body of heaven, the wholeness
of heaven was in him. Go back with me to our text. Look at verse 17, verse 16 of
Colossians chapter 2. Let no man therefore judge you
in meat or in drink or in respect of the holy days or of new moons
or Sabbath days, which are a shadow of the things to come. This handmade
circumcision and all these celebrations of the Old Testament were but
a shadow, but the body was Christ. The whole substance of those
shadows is in the person of the Lord Jesus Christ. He's not talking
about the physical body of Christ. He's saying that the body here
is a picture of the sum total of something. Just like we would
say, as I said, a body of water or the student body. He's not
saying you put off the sins of the body. He's saying you put
off the body of the sins. One more passage, Romans chapter
six. Romans chapter six. Look at me, verse six. Knowing this, that the old man
is crucified with him that the body of sin might be destroyed. That henceforth
you should not serve sin, serve God. You see, the strength of
sin is the law. You put men under the law, you
say to men, you know, you need to put away the sins of your
body. Yeah, we do. And believers, oh,
they desire that. They long for that. They'd never
sin again if they could. But if I say that to you, all
I'm doing is putting you under the law. Now you're going to
start inspecting the sins of your body. The body of sin. The same meaning
of this word is used in Jude when Michael the archangel contends
with the devil over the body of Moses. He's not talking about
the physical body of Moses. He's talking about the summation
of Moses, which is the law. And Michael says to the devil,
he says, you go talk to my father about that. The law has already
been satisfied. The body of the law, the whole
law has already been fulfilled. Now with those passages of scripture
as our evidence, go back with me one more time. And I'll close
this to verse 11, in whom you are circumcised with the circumcision
made without hands, made by the Spirit of God in putting off
the body of the sins of the flesh by the circumcision of Christ. When was Christ circumcised?
On Calvary's cross. That's when his flesh was cut
away. What is the Lord saying to us?
Here's the evidence of our circumcision. You ever had somebody keys you
something that they were guilty of and you said this, don't put
that off on me. That's all on you. Maybe you
didn't say that. Maybe you felt that. The Lord
Jesus Christ is saying just the opposite. Yeah, you're guilty. You did it. Put off on me the
whole body of your sins. Everything. Past, present, future. Don't try to atone for one of
your sins. Don't try to satisfy the demands
of God by doing something that you think is going to make up
for any of your sins. Put off on me the whole body
of your sins by the circumcision of Christ. Isn't that glorious? Can you do that? By God's grace,
by God's grace, and by the circumcision of the heart, performed by the
Spirit, the Lord saying, put everything. He bore in his body
our sins on the tree and curses every man that hangeth upon the
tree. There wasn't a single sin he didn't atone for. All the
sins of all of God's people were piled up on the Lord Jesus Christ. And in one moment, He hung his
head and he said, it is finished. The body of sins by the circumcision
of Christ have been atoned for once and for all. Amen. Adam. 235. 205 in the hard back teminal. Let's
stand together. 205. So, Free from the law, O happy condition,
Jesus hath bled and there is remission. Cursed by the law
and bruised by the fall, Christ hath redeemed us once for all. Once for all, O sinner, receive
it. Once for all, O brother, believe
it. Cling to the cross, the burden
will fall. Christ hath redeemed us once
for all. Now are we free, there's no condemnation. Jesus provides a perfect salvation. Come unto me, oh, hear his sweet
call. Come and he saves us once for
all. Once for all, O sinner, receive
it. Once for all, O brother, believe
it. Cling to the cross, the burden
will fall, Christ hath redeemed us once for all. Children of God, O glorious calling,
surely His grace will keep us from falling, passing from death
to life at his call, blessed salvation once for all. Once for all, O sinner, receive
it. Once for all, O brother, believe
it. Cling to the cross, the burden
will fall. Christ hath redeemed us once
for all.