Welcome to Reign of Grace. This
program is brought to you by Reign of Grace Media Ministries,
an outreach ministry of Eager Avenue Grace Church in Albany,
Georgia. It is our pleasure and privilege
to present to you the gospel message of the sovereign grace
and glory of God in the person and work of the Lord Jesus Christ. We pray that today's program
will be a blessing to you. Thank you for listening and now
for today's program. Welcome to our program. Now today's
message is the ninth message in a series that I'm doing that
is intended to accompany a new book that we're offering. The
new book is entitled, What is a Christian? A Biblical Study
of the One True Faith. And this book is intended to
be an exercise in self-examination for those who claim to be Christians. I claim to be a Christian. If
you claim to be a Christian, this book and these messages,
and the book goes into much more detail, much more in-depth than
the messages, but we offer both free of charge. And if you claim
to be a Christian, are you willing to test your claim by the Bible,
the Word of God? And that's the intention of this
series. That's the intention of the book.
The Bible says, examine yourselves whether you be in the faith. Prove your own selves, lest you
be reprobate, disqualified. I want to know that my claim
of being a Christian, a follower of the Lord Jesus Christ, one
who trusts Christ, one who believes in Him, one who loves Him, one
who follows him and his teachings. I want to know that that claim
is real. I want to know that that claim is correct, it's right,
that I'm not just fooling myself, that I'm not being deceived.
We live in a day of such deception. There is much counterfeit Christianity,
many counterfeit Christians, people who believe they are saved,
but they're not. And the only way we can know
for sure, have the assurance and comfort and peace of salvation
is as the Holy Spirit opens the Word of God to us and puts our
claim to the test. Test your faith. Don't be afraid
to have your faith challenged because that's a good thing for
self-examination. Now for those who do not claim
to be a Christian, or to be Christians, and who want to know the reality
of true Christianity, then this book and this series would be
good for them too. But now, here we are at the ninth
message, and what it is, it is, the next few messages are going
to be an exposition of one verse, Philippians, the book of Philippians
in the New Testament, chapter three, verse three. The idea,
the original idea for this book came from a series of messages
that I preached at our church, Eager Avenue Grace Church, on
this passage, Philippians chapter 3 and verse 3. And I entitled
this, True Christians Described in One Verse. Now there are many
passages of scripture that describe true Christians. There are many
ways in the Bible that true Christians are described and defined, but
there are certain verses that just struck me as being so concise
and so full in the way of defining what a true Christian is and
what a true Christian is not, and this is one of them. And
in this passage, let's read Philippians 3 and verse 3, it says, for we
are the circumcision, which worship God in the spirit and rejoice
in Christ Jesus and have no confidence in the flesh. Now, right there
in that verse, you have four phrases that are just tremendous
descriptions of what a true Christian is. And they all go together. This is what a true Christian
is described in this verse. And what I'm going to do is take
each phrase, I have a chapter in the book that takes each of
these phrases, we are the circumcision, which worship God in the spirit
and rejoice in Christ Jesus and have no confidence in the flesh,
and go through other scriptures that give us an idea of what
that means. So this is part one. And part
one says this, Christians are the true circumcision. Paul writes here by inspiration
of the Holy Spirit, for we are the circumcision. Now it's important
for us to understand what this term, the circumcision, means. And many times it can only be
defined within its context. Now, circumcision originally
was a physical sign that was put upon the male children of
Israel, the descendants of Abraham. It was a sign of the covenant
that God had made with Abraham. And that covenant, the main issue
of that covenant was the promise of the coming of the Messiah,
the Lord Jesus Christ, through Abraham's seed, Abraham's physical
seed. And then God commanded Abraham
to have the male children circumcised as a physical sign of the accomplishment
of that promise. for we are the circumcision.
So many times in the Bible, especially in the Old Testament, but many
times in the New, when you hear the term the circumcision, it's
talking about the physical nation of Israel, the physical descendants
of Abraham. But there's something interesting
about this passage here in Philippians chapter three and verse three.
When the Apostle Paul writes, for we are the circumcision,
he goes on to define it by the other phrases, we worship God
in the spirit, we rejoice in Christ Jesus, and we have no
confidence in the flesh. Now that doesn't describe all
the physical descendants of Abraham, the physical Jews, the nation
Israel, ethnic Jews. Because even though the males
in the Jewish nation were physically circumcised, they did not worship
God in the spirit, they did not rejoice in Christ Jesus, they
did not have no confidence in the flesh. So what we're seeing
here in this verse, it goes beyond the physical nation of Israel.
Now, when I say the physical nation of Israel did not do these
things, I'm not talking about every individual Jew. Paul himself
was a physically circumcised, physical descendant of Abraham. Another thing you need to understand
about this verse is that when Paul says we are the circumcision,
he's talking to both believing Jews and believing Gentiles. This is the church at Philippi,
and it was a mixed group. It was made up of sinners saved
by the grace of God, sinners who have been born again by the
Spirit, brought to faith in the Lord Jesus Christ, and repentants
of their dead works, both Jew and Gentile. So when Paul is
talking about the circumcision here, what he's talking about
is those who had been circumcised, not necessarily physically, but
those who had been circumcised spiritually, and that is what
the Bible calls circumcision of the heart. If you look back
in the book of Romans, chapter two, the apostle Paul defines
this beautifully. as he's inspired by the Holy
Spirit to write these words. In Romans chapter 2 and verse
28 he makes this statement. He says, For he is not a Jew
which is one outwardly, neither is that circumcision which is
outward in the flesh. Now is that clear to you? What
is clear to me, he's not a Jew, which is one outwardly, neither
is that circumcision, which is outward in the flesh. But verse
29, he defines it. But he is a Jew, which is one
inwardly, and listen to this, and circumcision is that of the
heart, in the spirit, and not in the letter, that is not according
to the law, whose praise is not of men, but of God. Do you understand
that? That circumcision of the heart.
What is circumcision of the heart? It's the new birth. It's the
cutting away of the filth of the flesh. Physically, that's
what circumcision was for the male children, the cutting away
of the filth of the flesh. Well, spiritual circumcision
of the heart is the cutting away of the flesh in the sense that
when God brings his people to the Lord Jesus Christ, He shows
them, He convinces them that all their sins are cleansed by
the blood. The blood of Jesus Christ washes
me clean from all sin. What can wash away my sin? Nothing
but the blood of Jesus. And He shows them that righteousness
can only be attained by Jesus Christ, the merit of His work,
His goodness, the value and power of his obedience unto death,
imputed, charged, accounted to his people so that they have
no confidence in anything they do or don't do or anything they
decide. It's all Christ. We repent of
dead works. That's the cutting away of the
filth of the flesh. So there is a significant difference
that you need to see if you're going to understand what a true
Christian is. and what a true Christian is
not. A true Christian is one who has been spiritually circumcised
in his heart by the Holy Spirit. The Bible says it this way, He'll
give us a new heart. A heart of flesh in the sense
not of sin but pliable, submissive, obedient, meek, contrite, broken
over sin. A heart of faith. A heart and
a conscience, a mind, affections and will that have been cleansed
by the blood of Jesus Christ. So there's a difference. So anytime
you read the Bible, you have to look at the context and determine,
is he talking about spiritual circumcision of the heart? Is
he talking about spiritual Israel, spiritual Jews? Or is he talking
about national Israel, physical circumcision? For example, back
in the book of Acts chapter 7, The evangelist Stephen recognized
the need for spiritual circumcision in unbelieving Jews. When they
rejected the message of the gospel of God's free and sovereign grace
in Christ Jesus the Lord, he preached the gospel to them at
Jerusalem in Acts chapter 7 verse 51. Here's what he said. He said,
You stiff-necked and uncircumcised in heart and ears You do always
resist the Holy Ghost as your fathers did, so do ye. Now you
understand who he's talking to there. Many of those who he's
talking to were physically circumcised Jews, physical Jews. But he calls
them stiff-necked, that means proud, self-righteous, unsubmissive,
disobedient, unbelieving. And uncircumcised, how? In heart. and ears. They didn't believe
the gospel. They didn't repent of dead works.
And they resisted the Holy Ghost, because he's talking about the
general call of the gospel there, not the invincible call where
the Holy Spirit, invincibly, irresistibly, gives life, gives
a new heart, new spirit, and causes people to come to Christ.
Now, understanding this distinction between physical circumcision
meaning the physical Jews, and sometimes that was a way of referring
to the whole nation, physical nation, the circumcision, understanding
that distinction between the physical circumcision and the
spiritual circumcision, meaning true believers in the Lord Jesus
Christ, those who were chosen, By God, before the foundation
of the world, those who were redeemed by the blood of Jesus
Christ on the cross of Calvary, and those who are circumcised
in heart, they've been born again, regenerated by the Holy Spirit.
We must therefore recognize how the term, the circumcision, in
many passages of Scripture does not refer to national ethnic
Jews. Always remember that the meaning
of this term can only be understood by its usage and from the context
in which it's found. Consider, for example, how Luke
describes Jewish believers in this way. Over in Acts chapter
10, in verse 45, it says, and they of the circumcision which
believed were astonished as many as came with Peter because that
on the Gentiles also was poured out the gift of the Holy Ghost.
Now what Luke is talking about there in Acts chapter 10 historically
has to do with Jewish believers. There are Jewish believers who
were circumcised physically according to the covenant made with Abraham.
But these, the ones that Luke's talking about, they were also
believers. They were circumcised in heart.
And that's why he makes that distinction. And what he's showing
there is it's an amazing thing. The ones who were among the Jews,
the physical Jews, who had been circumcised in heart, who were
believers in the Lord Jesus Christ, were astonished that God would
bring Gentiles into the kingdom to faith in Christ. They were
circumcised in heart. Both Luke and Paul described
unbelieving Jews this way. In Acts chapter 11 in verse two,
it says, and when Peter come up to Jerusalem, they that were
of the circumcision contended, argued, debated with him. That's
talking about unbelieving Jews who had only been circumcised
physically. In verse three says, saying,
thou wentest into men uncircumcised and did eat with them. You ate
with Gentiles, Peter, that's wrong. Well, it wasn't wrong. But under the Old Covenant, they
were forbidden to sit down and eat the food of the Gentiles.
Over in the book of Titus chapter 1 verse 10, it says, for there
are many unruly and vain talkers and deceivers, especially they
of the circumcision. Now that's referring to those
who had only been circumcised in the flesh, but not in heart.
They were false believers. You know, there were many Jews
who claimed to have been converted to Christianity in the New Testament.
but who insisted on retaining the right of physical circumcision
and certain elements of the Old Covenant law, insisting on these
things as being part of the ground of a sinner's salvation, as part
of that which makes up a sinner's righteousness before God. And
they contended especially, they argued, they debated especially
with Paul, the Apostle Paul, over the salvation of the Gentiles
who had not been circumcised physically, And that debate appeared
first in Jerusalem. It's one of the first debates
in the church. It's recorded in the book of
Acts chapter 15. Look at verse one. You would
do well to read this whole chapter, Acts chapter 15. But it says,
and certain men which came down from Judea taught the brethren
and said, except you be circumcised after the manner of Moses, you
cannot be saved. In other words, these were Jews,
physically circumcised, who claimed that in order for a person to
be saved, they had to be physically circumcised. And as recorded
here, it was settled in the mind of the apostles and of all true
Christians that God saves both Jew and Gentile in the exact
same way. Not by physical circumcision,
not by keeping the law, not by following ceremonies and days
and months, but by God's free and sovereign grace in Christ
Jesus and based on His righteousness alone. which, born again, spiritually
circumcised sinners are brought to receive by God-given faith.
In the book of Romans chapter 3, Paul concludes that great
exposition and explanation of how God justifies the ungodly
in verse 30 by saying this, he says, seeing it as one God which
shall justify the circumcision by faith, and uncircumcision
through faith. In other words, what Paul was
saying is whether you're a Jew circumcised physically or an
uncircumcised Gentile, the only way God justifies a sinner is
through faith. Now, what that means is that
God declares that person not guilty and declares that person
righteous in the Lord Jesus Christ based upon the merits of his
obedience unto death, his righteousness imputed. And the Apostle Paul
was inspired by the Holy Spirit to use Abraham, through whom
the covenant of circumcision came to the Jews, as the prime
example of how God justifies sinners. God justifies both Jew
and Gentile, based on the righteousness of Christ, freely imputed. That means charged to them, accounted
to them, reckoned to them. Christ paid the debt. and that
was put to their account. And it results in God-given faith
which is the product of spiritual circumcision. So physical circumcision
has absolutely no part in this salvation. Paul wrote in Romans
chapter 4 and verse 9 talking about the blessedness of salvation
that came on Abraham. He asked this question in Romans
4 and verse 9, cometh this blessedness then upon the circumcision only?
Is this just for the Jews who had been physically circumcised?
Or upon the uncircumcision also? What about Gentiles? He says,
for we say that faith was reckoned to Abraham for righteousness. Now, what is that faith? That
faith refers to the promise that God had given Abraham of righteousness
to come in the Lord Jesus Christ. And verse 10 shows it. He says,
how was it then reckoned? How was it accounted? How was
it imputed? When Abraham was in circumcision or in uncircumcision. In other words, when Abraham
was counted righteous before God, was he already physically
circumcised or was he not? Well, he was not. In verse 11
says, he received the sign of circumcision, physical circumcision,
a seal of the righteousness of the faith, which he had yet been
uncircumcised, that he might be the father of all them that
believe, though they be not circumcised, that righteousness might be imputed
unto them also. In other words, it had nothing
to do. Abraham's justification before
God had absolutely nothing to do with being physically circumcised. The physical circumcision was
just an outward sign of something Abraham already had. And what
was that? The righteousness of the promised
Messiah to come already imputed, accounted, charged to Abraham.
And verse 12 of Romans 4 says, And he's the father of circumcision
to them who are not of the circumcision only, but who also walk in the
steps that faith of our father Abraham, which he had yet been
uncircumcised. In other words, what he's saying
there is the same thing he says over in Galatians 3. that the
true children of Abraham, spiritual children of Abraham, are those
who believe, who've been circumcised in heart. It was also established
that those who claim to be Christian, but who preach circumcision as
part of the ground of salvation or justification before God,
or as part of the righteousness by which sinners are justified,
were not true Christians at all. They preach what Paul called
another gospel over in the book of Galatians chapter 1 verse
6 he says marvel not that you're so soon I marvel that you're
so soon removed from him that called you into the grace of
Christ unto another gospel which is not another but there be some
that trouble you and would pervert the gospel of Christ They were
preaching that you had to believe in Christ, but then you had to
be circumcised to be saved. In verse eight, he says, but
though we are an angel from heaven, preach any other gospel unto
you than that which we have preached unto you. He said, let him be
accursed. As we said before, so say I now
again, if any man preach any other gospel unto you than that
you have received, let him be accursed. So back in Philippians
chapter three, the text, Why then does Paul write, we are
the circumcision? To understand this text, we have
to make that distinction between what the Bible calls physical
circumcision and what the Bible calls spiritual circumcision. I'll refer you back to Romans
2.28 that I read in the beginning of this message. where Paul said
in Romans 2, 28, 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 is
that of the heart in the spirit, not in the letter, whose praise
is not of men, but of God. Just as the circumcision of the
male Jews was an identification of their citizenship in that
physical nation Israel, spiritual circumcision, the new birth,
spiritual circumcision of the heart, is an identification of
the believers, the born-again persons' citizenship in the spiritual
nation Israel, the kingdom of God, the true church. And therefore,
when the apostle wrote, we are the circumcision, which includes
believing Gentiles as well as believing Jews, the true Israel
of God, his point was to show how that all who have come to
faith in Jesus Christ for salvation are the true spiritual seed of
Abraham. Just like we've read before in
Galatians 3, 26, where Paul wrote, for you are all the children
of God by faith in Christ Jesus. For as many of you as have been
baptized, placed into Christ, united with Christ, have put
on Christ, which means to believe in Him, there's neither Jew nor
Greek, there's neither bond nor free, there's neither male nor
female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus, and if you belong
to Christ, then are you Abraham's seed and heirs according to the
promise. We are the circumcision, which
worship God in spirit, and who rejoice in Christ Jesus and have
absolutely no confidence in the flesh. Now that's describing
the newborn again. That's a true Christian has been
circumcised in heart and in ears, as Stephen said. He's been given
new eyes to see. He's been given new ears to hear
spiritually. He's been raised from the dead
spiritually, ruined by the fall, redeemed by the blood, regenerated
by the spirit. And that regeneration by the
Spirit is the new birth. That regeneration by the Spirit
is spiritual circumcision, the cutting away of the filth of
the flesh, so that we who are true Christians can honestly
say, we're spiritual Israel. We are those who have been circumcised
in heart. And that's the issue of circumcision.
That's the issue of what it is to be a true Christian. I mentioned
in one of the programs that back in the 70s, people were commonly
using the term born again Christian. Well, in the Bible, there's no
other kind of Christian. If you are a true Christian,
if I am a true Christian, we have been born again by the Spirit
of God. We have experienced by the power,
the grace, and the will of God, circumcision of the heart. And
we are spiritual Jews, we are spiritual Israel, we are the
spiritual children of Abraham. That's what citizens of the kingdom
of God, citizens of heaven. Many people call that replacement
theology, but it is not. It's fulfillment theology. Because everything that the Jews
symbolized and represented under that old covenant as sinners
was a type of the church. Not everything they did now,
because their unbelief, that represents our unbelief by nature. And in order to be saved, we
have to be circumcised in heart. We have to be born again. Christ
said, except you be born again, you cannot see the kingdom of
heaven, the kingdom of God. So understand, we are the circumcision. All right, I hope you'll join
us next week for another message from God's word. We are glad you could join us
for another edition of Reign of Grace. This program is brought
to you by Reign of Grace Media Ministries, an outreach ministry
of Eager Avenue Grace Church in Albany, Georgia. To receive
a copy of today's program or to learn more about Reign of
Grace Media Ministries or Eager Avenue Grace Church, write us
at 1102 Eager Drive, Albany, Georgia, 31707. contact us by phone at 229-432-6969
or email us through our website at www.theletterofgrace.com. Thank you again for listening
today and may the Lord be with you.