Phil.3:2,3 – “Beware of dogs, beware of evil workers, beware of the mutilation! For we are the circumcision, who worship God in the Spirit, rejoice in Christ Jesus, and have no confidence in the flesh”,
This is quite a shocking statement for a Pharisee to be making to a congregation of gentiles! “We are the circumcision!” Really Paul? Couldn’t you have found a more respectable way to get your point across? Paul was obviously at the end of his patience with the legalistic religious teachers who preyed on the churches Paul had started. He was determined to drive home his message of salvation by grace alone through faith alone. Of course in the Old Covenant circumcision was the mark of the covenant. Paul taught that the gentiles who converted to Christianity had no need to be circumcised. He believed that circumcision was done by the work of God in our hearts. That’s why he said, “we are the circumcision”. We worship God not by rules and systems but we worship Him in the Spirit. Here is how Matthew Henry describes this passage:
“He describes true Christians. We are the circumcision, who worship God in the spirit, and rejoice in Christ Jesus, and have no confidence in the flesh. Here are three characteristics:
1. They worshiped in the spirit, in opposition to the external regulations of the Old Testament. Christianity teaches us to be internal, to have a heart relationship with God in all the duties of religious worship. The work of religion is futile if the heart is not employed in it.
2. They rejoiced in Christ Jesus. Now that the substance has come, the shadows are done away with, and we are to rejoice only in Jesus Christ.
3. They had no confidence in the flesh, in those external regulations and actions. Our confidence, as well as our joy, is all in him.”
I love what Matthew Henry says about this passage. He emphasized worshipping God in the Spirit, this is the source of our life. Henry describes rejoicing as an integral part of our faith. Christianity is not a new set of rules imposed on us but a new love that is demonstrated in joyful worship. Finally, Henry said, “We have no confidence in the flesh. Our confidence is in Christ; who lives and reigns inside of each of us”.
