Romans Message #46 Romans 4:9-12

Circumcision & Religious Rites vrs. Faith
Romans 4:9-12

Have you ever wondered why people go to the lengths that they do in order to try to get rid of their guilt for their sin?

Why do people try to make up for their sin or pursue works in order to deal with the guilt of their sin and to try to make themselves acceptable to God?

I mean, why do many devout Muslims flagellate their backs with whips until their backs are nothing but a bloody pulp as a means of showing God that they are worthy of His forgiveness and thus His acceptance?

Why do many millions of faithful Hindus, every 12 years, go to the Festival of Maha Kumbh Mela, where they strip naked, sit on beds of upright nails, walk on broken glass, lay on red-hot coals, and then culminate the ceremony by taking a razor sharp knife or poker and either slicing or piercing their tongue so as to never speak clearly again—all in an attempt to show God they are worthy of His forgiveness and acceptance?

Why do some very remote and backward tribal groups continue to sacrifice children in their attempt to be free of their sins?

Why do Catholics continue to believe that all the grace of God in Christ’s death really does for us is give us the ability to perform the works that can make up for our sin and hopefully earn God’s forgiveness and acceptance?

And why do some groups in our own country insist that their people carry a certain kind of Bible, go to a certain kind of church, listen to a certain kind of music, wear and don’t wear certain kinds of clothing, keep their hair a certain length, never touch a drop of alcohol, and be in church every time the doors are open—so as to ensure that they earn God’s favor and continue to stay in His good graces so as to be acceptable to Him?

I mean why do people of all kinds of religious stripes feel this tremendous sense of having to do something-anything to get right with God and thus be forgiven and found acceptable to Him?

It is because they have never experienced the happiness that comes from having their sins forgiven and from knowing they are perfectly acceptable to God and indeed as accepted by God right now as they will ever or could ever possibly be.

Because, you see, once you have experienced the happiness and the peace of mind that comes with knowing your sins—all of them have already been dealt with and are removed from you and forgiven so that you are right with God and can now enjoy God instead of being afraid of God—you will do anything it takes to try and achieve that kind of happiness and relief.

Or you will, after having tried everything you know of to achieve it but failed—will simply retreat from God and everything that reminds you of God in an attempt to run and hide from God because you know you can’t please Him with all this sin on your back.

One of things we human beings all have in common is that whereas we enjoy sin—we hate the guilt that accompanies it.

Guilt wears us down. It steals our happiness, our ability to enjoy life, and eventually it robs us of our lives as we consume ourselves and fill our lives with empty activities or drown ourselves in alcohol or other drugs in an attempt to numb the guilt that is nagging us and continually reminding us that we are not right with God.

And this is why true Christians—true believers in the Lord Jesus Christ—people who have come to Him for the forgiveness of their sins and found Him to be gracious and gentle and loving and accepting and patient with them are so very happy.

They have finally been able to lay down their sin and their guilt and have it taken care of so that they can rest and come to enjoy the God they have been running from and hiding from all their lives.

Look with me at Matthew 11:28-30.

This rest that Jesus is promising to all who are tired and weary of their sin and their guilt and who will come to Him with it is the happiness of knowing your sins are forgiven and that you are now fully acceptable to God and accepted by God and able to finally enjoy God.

Listen—there is no happiness or joy or peace like that of knowing all is right and good between you and your creator.

And this is why Paul in Romans 4:6-8 quotes David, the man who had committed the great sin of forsaking God as his greatest treasure and pleasure in life by replacing God with lust, adultery, and finally murder—when he had finally come to God for forgiveness.

And look at what David found—the happiness that comes when you know for a fact and without a doubt that your sins are forgiven and that you are now acceptable to God.

Wow—what great happiness is available to those who come to God for the forgiveness of their sins—

But how do they need to come? And who can come?

I mean can anybody really come or is this happiness only for a certain few religious and churchy type of people who sing in the choir and have perfect kids and never cuss when they pound their thumb with a hammer and never pop open a beer and have been baptized and take communion regularly?

Well, you see, that is the question which Paul now addresses in Romans 4:9-16.

Because after telling people about the great and unbelievable happiness that is available to those whose sins are forgiven by God—the next most obvious question is—who are these people and what do they need to do or be doing to possess and enjoy this happiness?

It is the same question that was raised in Acts 15:1 by teachers in the early church who began teaching that unless a man was circumcised according to the custom of Moses—he could not be saved and thus he could not have this happiness of having his sins forgiven.

Now, In our day, circumcision is something parents choose to have done to their baby boys, more for health and cultural reasons than religious reasons.

In fact, if you were to go to Dr. Ma’s office here in Edgewood and ask parents who have chosen to have their little boys’ circumcised—if there was any religious significance to that decision, most, if not all, would say no.

Now, if the parents’ were orthodox Jews, it would be another matter altogether because then the act of circumcision does indeed have great religious and even ethnic significance.

You see, orthodox Jews see circumcision the same way as the Jews of the Old and New Testaments saw circumcision—as a prerequisite to be accepted by God.

The Jews of Jesus’ and Paul’s day saw circumcision as necessary for salvation because they believed it guaranteed one’s salvation from hell and thus certain happiness.

One Rabbi writing on circumcision sates: “No circumcised man will ever see hell.”

The Midrash Millim, a Jewish commentary on the Old Testament states that the Jews believed that “God swore to Abraham that no one who was circumcised should be sent to hell.”

And yet another, the Akedath Jizehak writes, “Abraham sits before the gate of hell and does not allow that any circumcised Israelite should enter there.”

Even the Jewish apocryphal Book of Jubilees states that the man who is not circumcised cannot prove “that he is Lord’s [and] is destined to be destroyed”, speaking of eternal destruction in hell.

In other words, this external religious rite of circumcision was in the Jewish mind not only the act that made one a Jew—it was the one act that secured a person’s salvation from hell as well because it was the one act that made a man acceptable to God.

Now interestingly enough, there was no such religious and national rite for women and this is significant because this fact in and of itself reveals that the Jews had misinterpreted the whole rite of circumcision from its inception.

You see, if circumcision was what made one acceptable to God and if only boys were circumcised—how did girls become acceptable to God?

Well, they couldn’t if this understanding of circumcision was held to.

And again this reveals that there was a misunderstanding of the meaning of circumcision from its very beginning.

You see, circumcision was not the sign or the seal that determined whether a person belonged to God and was accepted by God but rather a sign and a seal that pointed back to what was required to belong to God and be accepted by Him—which was and still is faith in Christ Jesus alone.

But because of this misunderstanding and because people thing that what makes them acceptable to God and thus will bring them the happiness and joy they desire is being religious and fulfilling religious ceremonies and traditions—

Paul, in Romans 4:9-12 makes two very important points about the happiness that God promises to all those who come to Him through Jesus Christ for forgiveness of their sins--


1. This happiness that results from being forgiven by God of all one’s sins is available to those who have been circumcised as well as those who have not been circumcised. (9)

In other words, whether you have been circumcised and are thus a Jew or in our context, “a good religious person” or whether you have not been circumcised and thus are not a Jew or in our context, “not a good religious person” has no bearing on this happiness—

Because whether you are a religious or nonreligious person has no bearing upon whether you can be forgiven of your sins.

And then in the last phrase of verse 9 Paul tells us what does matter and it is not circumcision or any other religious rite, ceremony, tradition, or practice—it is simply “Faith in God”.

In other words, people are not given the happiness of having their sins forgiven and knowing they are accepted by God and thus can now enjoy God through being religious but rather through believing God—the same way that Abraham did.

Remember that Jesus did not say in Matthew 11:28-10,

Come to me all you that are circumcised and religious and go to church every Sunday and have been baptized and read your Bibles everyday and don’t ever cuss when you hit your thumb with a hammer and I will give you rest . . . . or—

Come to me to be circumcised and made religious and I will give you rest.

No—Jesus said: “Come to Me, all who are weary and heavy-laden with your sin and your guilt because you are not right with Me and I will give you rest.”

And the person that simply believes that Jesus meant what he is saying here and does indeed come to Him to be forgiven of their sins and relieved of their guilt and made right with Him an thus God will find this rest—does!


The second thing Paul wants us to know in this passage is that

2. Abraham was made right with God and thus made acceptable to God so as to be saved from His wrath and thus given this great happiness while he was an uncircumcised and thus an unreligious man?
You see, Abraham was saved, that is declared righteous in God’s sight before he was ever circumcised, therefore the religious rite of circumcision had nothing to do with his salvation.

And if the greatest of all Jewish religious rites and ceremonies had nothing to do with Abraham’s salvation—no religious rite or ceremony has anything to do with anyone’s salvation.

Look at Romans 4:10-11.

Abraham was declared righteous by God when he placed his faith in God before he was circumcised.

In other words, he was for all practical purposes an uncircumcised, irreligious, heathen Gentile when God saved him.

And the fact of the matter is that since he was circumcised in Genesis 17 and was actually saved in Genesis 15:6—he was saved for at least 14 years before he was ever circumcised.

Thus circumcision’s purpose was never to save anyone but rather to act as a teaching tool that reminded people of God’s means of salvation and pointed them back to it.

That is essentially what verse 11 is saying. Abraham received the “sign” of circumcision—thus it was something that pointed people to something else other than itself.

And in the case of salvation, it pointed people back to the fact that Abraham was saved not by a religious rite but by faith in God.

Note too, that circumcision was a “seal”—that it acted as something that authenticated something else as real and genuine.

In the case of circumcision, it was what God used to authenticate to Abraham as an outward act what God had already accomplished in him in declaring him righteous and saving him.

In other words, circumcision was never intended to save anyone and in fact could not save anyone—it was merely intended to act as a sign that pointed people back to what could and would save them—simple faith in God.

Paul then goes on to teach that while Abraham is the physical father of all Jews, spiritually speaking, he is also the father of all who place saving faith in God, whether they be Jews—circumcised or Gentiles—uncircumcised.

CONCLUSION

Paul’s argument is clear in this passage. Circumcision or any other external religious rite or ceremony has no bearing upon a person’s salvation.

No one is more acceptable to God or belongs more intimately to God because he or she has been or not been circumcised. It simply has no bearing upon our relationship with God in any way.

Likewise, no one is more acceptable or belongs to God more intimately because they have been baptized, or baptized by a certain mode of baptism, or because they have taken communion, or fast, or pray five times a day or whatever the case may be.

Our acceptance with God is based upon faith in Jesus Christ alone for salvation from the penalty of our sins.

And even though most of us here have no problem believing this—we are still often tempted to think that if we just involve ourselves in this spiritual exercise or that churchy activity that God will find us even more acceptable.

Or we are sometimes tempted to think that we can make up for our sin by working harder and longer for the Lord and thus earn back our acceptance with Him.

Well, the message of Romans 4:9-12 is that we can’t do anything to make ourselves acceptable to God or more acceptable to God—all we can do is believe God and trust Him to make us as acceptable to Him as we can ever and will ever possibly be.

You see, the truth of the matter is that you as a believer in the Lord Jesus Christ are as acceptable to God right now as you will ever be—you can never be less acceptable or more acceptable than you are right now—because you in Christ Jesus are as absolutely, perfectly, and completely acceptable to God as Jesus is.

Our faith in Christ needs nothing else to make it complete.

And for unbelievers here today—the message of Romans 4:9-12 is that if you want the happiness of knowing your sins are forgiven and that you are right with God—don’t come to religion—come to Jesus!