Ephesians, 2:11-13

All right, well, by God's providence and Bob's sense of humor or the schedule or whatever else, I get to talk about circumcision this morning. If there's one topic that every teacher just pretty much hopes they don't get to teach on, it's probably that one.

I can think of a few other ones, but that one's really high on the list. So if you'll turn with me to Ephesians chapter 2, we'll take a look at verses 11 through 13. I was doing some preparation for this on the airplane on Thursday night, and I thought, man, there's nothing more exciting than having a total stranger sit next to you and see circumcision in bold print.

Yeah, that often prompts an interesting discussion, not circumcision. Well, it could have. Yeah, it could have, but I think she saw that and decided to steer clear. Which is, you know, what it is. With the topic of circumcision, I've heard a few lessons on circumcision or uncircumcision and how does that relate to the believer.

And one of the things that I honestly think about most regularly when it comes to dealing with circumcision is God's first use of circumcision with Abraham. In Genesis chapter 17, and I'm going to turn there. You don't have to, but I will turn there. In Genesis chapter 17, God tells Abraham that he and all his descendants should be circumcised. And we could go into the technical details of circumcision, but I do believe that everyone here is completely competent in that area, so we won't go into that. If you have any questions, ask your parents. That's the running joke, I guess. Starting in verse 12 of Genesis 17, he says, and every male among you who is eight days old shall be circumcised throughout your generations.

A servant who is born in the house or who is bought with money from any foreigner who is not of your descendants. A servant who is born in your house or who is bought with your money shall surely be circumcised. Thus shall my covenant be in your flesh for an everlasting covenant. But in verse 14, but an uncircumcised male who is not circumcised in the flesh of his foreskin, that person shall be cut off from his people. He has broken my covenant. Alright, so God instantiates this.

Now one of the things that was interesting about this is that Abraham was an adult male. This is something that for me too much information about Randy but I was circumcised as an infant and so I have no recollection of it which is probably a good thing but here God is asking Abraham to do something that is going to involve some physical pain with a very sensitive part of his human anatomy his male anatomy and that is probably the thing that we most often think about with circumcision is okay here's a very private and sensitive organ on the male and he gets circumcised. He gets the foreskin cut off and I guess now I've technically gone over the anatomical nature of things. But that was for Abraham and his descendants.

Different cultures have different traditions. It's not uncommon for people here in the states to be circumcised, but in other places they just don't even go there. So we need to ask ourselves, why did God have Abraham have himself circumcised and circumcised the other males in his family? To set them apart. And that's an important thing to recognize is that the circumcision was a unique and distinct thing that set them apart. Did it save them? circumcision was not for salvation. There was a consequence and that's important.

Paul's going to go in Romans chapter 4 and we'll get there in the study this morning so I'm not going to jump too far ahead but Paul's going to explain the order of events and the significance of them when we take a look at Romans 4 so I don't want to jump too far ahead on that. Another part, we've been studying Genesis in the main service. Another part that's important to look at circumcision is in Genesis 34, when Dinah was violated by Shechem, or the prince of Shechem, her brothers negotiated for all the men in Shechem to be circumcised. And then on the third day after they'd been circumcised and were suffering, Simeon and Levi went in and slaughtered the men. So circumcision for Gentiles is not necessarily a good thing, even in that same context of the line of Abraham. One thing we need to ask, was there a provision for circumcision for Gentiles in the Old Testament? Anyone have any thoughts on that?

Yeah, he just said if a slave was bought in your household, and those were certainly good could have been Gentiles, of course. Yeah. Let me quickly scan on my notes here. I wrote down the reference, actually. Exodus 12, 48, if you want to turn with me there. Let's take a quick look at that. We've got to cover the historical nature of this before we look at the text itself. Exodus 12, 48.

It says, But if a stranger sojourns with you and celebrates the Passover to the Lord, let all his males be circumcised, and then let him come near to celebrate it, and he shall be like a native of the land. But no uncircumcised person may eat of it. So God actually created a way for the Gentiles to come into Judaism and participate in the Passover and be circumcised.

This was part of God's initiating a Gentile into being one of his own in the Old Testament context. That was one of those things I wasn't aware of until my early 20s when I was in seminary. The teacher was teaching and brought that up and I was like, wow, basically I just thought the Jews were unto themselves. But then if you don't have circumcision and bringing a Gentile into into Israel, how do you deal with the lost person in the Old Testament during the time of Israel?

God made a way to bring them in so that they could be part of his people. Now, here is an interesting thing that we need to think about before we finally dig into this passage in Ephesians. What do you do with Israel being separate because of the circumcision, but also needing to be a light to the world? How do we deal with that?

Was Israel supposed to be separate and then never tell people about having a relationship with God? No. Instead, Israel was supposed to go be a light and reach out to those who were Gentiles and draw them in. So there shouldn't have been a lot of really sore adult males out in the world But, unfortunately, Israel took it upon themselves to be separate and really not communicative and not sharing the relationship with God. That was one of the judgments that Christ came to bring on Israels that they had rejected sharing like they should have.

So, let's take a look at Ephesians 2, 11-13 now that we've kind of done a little building up on the passage and the concept of circumcision. Therefore, remember that formerly you, the Gentiles in the flesh, who are called uncircumcision by the so-called circumcision which is performed in the flesh by human hands, remember that you were at this time separate from Christ, excluded from the commonwealth of Israel, and strangers to the covenants of promise, having no hope and without God in the world.

But now in Christ Jesus you who formerly were far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ. So the first half we get to talk about circumcision some more and then the first two-thirds in the last verse we can talk about the consequence of Christ and how God dealt with the problem of the separation of circumcision. So he says, therefore remember that you, the Gentiles, in the flesh, now he says Gentiles in the flesh, okay, he's speaking there again of, okay, you've got your foreskin. In the flesh, you have this element.

They were not only Gentiles by birth, by ethnicity, okay, the Greek word there for Gentiles is ethnos, okay, it just means of other ethnicities or the large mass of people that were not Jews. And he says, but you were uncircumcised, or you're Gentiles in the flesh, that kept you separated.

Now, when we read about God's discussion in Genesis 17, well not discussion, His command to Abraham in Genesis 17, could there have been descendants of Abraham who were effectively Gentiles? Yes, if they weren't circumcised, then they were cast out. You either cut off the foreskin or you're cut off. You've got a choice, but there's going to be some cutting off one way or the other. So even still, Gentiles in the flesh could have been people who were descendants of Abraham.

Anyone think of a prominent historical biblical Old Testament figure who was going to not be doing any circumcision? Ishmael? No, he was circumcised. Actually, the Arabs carry on that tradition as well. Any other guesses or recollections? Moses. Remember his wife? His wife came and did it because he was wimping out or something. I don't know. But even Moses started to blow it and his wife had to deal with him.

Highly unfortunate. But also I think one of the interesting things is that the scripture doesn't hide the poor choices of the saints that went before us. It's recorded for us. So they were Gentiles in the flesh. Again, what was Abraham's circumcision? What did it reflect? It sealed the covenant. It was an outward sign of an inward relationship or an inward decision. So he said you guys don't have an inward relationship and you also lack this outward sign. Let's say a man of faith that was a Gentile accepted God's truth in terms of all of the issues that would relate to Judaism. So according to scripture, he should be circumcised. Yes. And if he weren't? Well, he's not...

That's a theoretical maybe, but I have to believe that in the Old Testament times and times there were Gentiles who lived by faith of what they'd heard or seen that ultimately maybe weren't. Well, there were Gentiles, and here's where we're getting into somewhat speculative stuff. Yeah, it's a speculative question.

The rabbinical tradition is that a Gentile who only knew so much, but knew God, was still saved. If all you had was up till Noah, and you believed it, then you would still be saved, even if you didn't. That's rabbinical tradition, and I don't want to get too caught off on the potential of what that might mean. If you've been presented with the concept of circumcision and you choose to reject it, It's willful disobedience, but salvation isn't by circumcision alone.

It's by grace through faith. And the covenant with Abraham was for blessing of material things and not salvation. So we want to have that out there for people to consider. So, we have Gentiles in the flesh and then he continues on and he says that you who are called uncircumcision by the so-called circumcision which is made by hands, which is performed in the flesh by human hands.

Let's take a look at Romans 4, 9-12 and explore what Paul has to say about circumcision in Abraham. This is by itself its own study, and we could spend a whole hour discussing this, but we'll just look at it as a highlight, and you'll have to forgive me if it feels like we're going over it quickly. Romans 4, 9 through 12. Would somebody mind reading that out loud besides myself?

Comment this blessedness, that upon the circumcision only, or upon the uncircumcision also, For we say that faith was reckoned to Abraham for righteousness. How was it then reckoned when he was in circumcision or in uncircumcision? Not in circumcision, but in uncircumcision. And he received the sign of 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.

Let me read the next one. And the father of circumcision to them who are not of the circumcision only, but who also walk in the steps of that faith of our father Abraham, which he had been yet uncircumcised. So in a sense that partially answers the question.

Well, the thing that we have to recognize, when did God chronologically in scripture at what address did God show up to Abraham and tell him about his plans for Abraham? Anybody remember roughly the address in Genesis where that takes place? He was already pretty elderly. Well, we're talking about what address in scripture. What's the Bible verse or passage? Yeah, sorry. It's okay. It's actually earlier than 15. It's Genesis chapter 12, that's right. In Genesis chapter 12, and let's take a quick gander there if you look at starting at verse 1 through 3.

Now the Lord said to Abram, remember he hadn't had his name changed yet, Go forth from your country, and from your relatives, and from your father's house, to the land which I will show you. And I will make you a great nation, and I will bless you, and make your name great. And so you shall be a blessing, and I will bless those who bless you. And the one who curses you, I will curse. And in you, all the families of the earth will be blessed."

And in verse 4, Abraham went forth. Okay, so no circumcision is involved here. God has made the promise, and Abraham obeyed. He already was to become the recipient of those blessings, and the circumcision was not a requirement at that point in time. Circumcision doesn't come until 17, and remember, it is simply a sign. So when we take a look back here at Romans 4, 9-12, we see that Paul argues, listen, Abraham obeyed. The circumcision and the sign that that was didn't come until later. God had already declared Abraham righteous.

So righteousness was through faith, just like we talked about. Circumcision is by hands. That should tell us a little bit of the context that we deal with circumcision. It is an earthly sign for what type of covenant? Is it an earthly or a heavenly covenant? It's an earthly covenant. So circumcision, the Jews were really concerned about the earthly covenant and the circumcision that came with it, but they were attaching to it heavenly things. God had not intended those heavenly things to be attached to it, but they had attached those things to it.

And so Paul argues against that in Romans and then also we see here in Ephesians the same thought. This is just human hands doing this work on humans. And you guys are making a major distinction here where maybe it's not so major. In verse 12 he says, Remember that you were at that time separate from Christ. He's speaking again to the Gentiles.

Separate from Christ, excluded from the commonwealth of Israel and strangers to the covenants of promise, having no hope and without God in the world. Separate from Christ. Were the Jews also separate from Christ? The Jews were also separate from Christ at this point in time. So Paul's reminding them, hey, you've got Christ now, but remember that that was the case. But as we've already stated, they were excluded from the Commonwealth of Israel.

Now, one of the things that's interesting is that to be a Jew ethnically was the same as being a Jew politically or governmentally. God didn't make a distinguishment historically between the nation and the religion. They were one and the same. So it's interesting Paul uses the word here that's translated Commonwealth of Israel.

It was more than just simply, hey you guys are ethnically this. It was considered to be one and the same. But they were excluded from that because they hadn't had this physical circumcision done by hands. And they were strangers to the covenant of promise.

Now I've got here on the handout, in Genesis chapters 12, 15, 17, 22, 26, and 28, God reiterates the covenant to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. All three of them were given the covenant and it was reiterated generationally to all three of them. So when he says the covenants of promise, He is speaking of the plural. God made one promise to Abraham, but he reiterated it through three generations. So we have the covenants of promise. Now what were the three promises? Let's just, we have to remind ourselves. It's always good. Alan's silently, he's mouthing it. The lamb, the seed, and the blessing. Alright.

So today, just to remind ourselves, today have all those promises been fulfilled? No. In fact, I was recently reading an op-ed piece somewhere in the news where it was, oh, well, we need to have the second Palestinian state next to Israel that's its own strong thing because that's the only way there will ever be peace. I thought of some choice things to say, but I don't think peace is going to come from that. The land, they're still yet to fulfill that.

They are, Israel today is still in existence. God is still blessed genealogically with the descendants of Abraham. And genuinely the Lord has blessed the Jews as a people group with much prosperity. And so we have the land and the seed and the blessing.

But the promise, the covenants of promise, the Jews had them but the Gentiles were strangers to them. And so Paul reminds them of that separation that they have. He continues on and finishes the verse saying that they have no hope and are without God in the world.

What were the things that the Gentiles were clinging to during the time of Israel as a nation, as a people group? What were the Gentiles clinging to? idols. They had rejected God. At some point in time, the Gentiles had walked away and rejected a relationship with God.

This is a bit of a rabbit trail, so I want to be very careful in introducing this, but I think it's an important concept to understand. I, as a parent, am responsible for Abigail and Evelyn understanding God's Word to some degree. I'm responsible for presenting to my six-year-old and my three-year-old God's Word and the opportunity for them to have a relationship through Jesus Christ or with Jesus Christ and through Jesus Christ and in Jesus Christ. If I blow it and I don't share that with them, which I haven't, I've already shared it with them, but if I blow it and I don't share that with them and they make me a granddad and they, and I don't share it with my grandchildren, and then they don't share it, and it continues on, what happens? There's an entire line, if we were to draw on the chalkboard some kind of genealogical heritage of some sort. There is a consequence from my bad decision that carries on. How many people came off Noah's Ark? It was his. God didn't help him. This is Noah's Ark. How many people came off the Ark? Seven. Eight. No one has a wife. There are three sons and there are three wives. So eight people came off of the ark.

And how many of them knew God? As far as we can tell all of them I think that if I were on the ark as long as they were I'd have figured out God wasn't messing around and he was real But the genealogically speaking at that point in time 100% of the world was populated just like with Adam and Eve 100% of the world was populated with people who knew and understood God at some point in time the Gentiles Abandoned hope They abandoned their relationship with God and they ceased to pass that on and carry it down.

When I look around this room, I see parents and grandparents and great-grandparents that love their children and their grandchildren and their great-grandchildren and want to share their faith with their children. And it carries on. They have hope in Christ and they share it and they carry it on. But the problem when you get to the person who rejects, some descendant of Noah, rejecting the Gospel, or not the Gospel, I didn't say that, strike that from the record, rejecting the good news of relationship with God, then suddenly you have a whole tree of people rejecting it.

And the Gentiles would not have been needed, if you will, to be separated from the Jews had the relationship with God been carried on. Abraham would not have needed to have been a unique light to those who were lost. He wouldn't have had to have gone into the promised land had parents and grandparents and great-grandparents passed on to have a relationship with God. So when we talk about no hope and without God in the world, that was a consequence of people not passing on their knowledge and their understanding of relationship with God.

It's one of those things where the lost person comes and says, well what about all the people going to hell? Unfortunately, one of the consequences of your actions may also impact your descendants. And that's a hefty thing. We all are responsible for our one-on-one relationship with God to an extent. But if you go and you make a poor choice, that can impact your descendants. And that's a hefty thing. So, I don't want to get into too massive of a rabbit trail, but it is important to recognize that the Gentiles had no hope and they were without God in the world because those who had gone before them had made some choices.

But when they were presented with certain things, they also too. How many of these people, and this is an unanswerable question, but let's just ask it to think about it. How many of these people may have been presented with Judaism and rejected it, but when the gospel of Christ came, they said, hey, that's something I can get behind. How many of the people would have rejected Judaism, but responded to the gospel of Jesus Christ? We don't have an answer to that. Oh no, but was Israel really representing what God had for them to represent?

And that's part of it. As a believer, like I said I've been traveling for three weeks, as a believer in my office in Texas where I go down and do these remote, well I work remotely, but when I go down to be at the headquarters, I'm finding in the last six months that I've had a lot more response from my co-workers to the gospel and to talking about spiritual things. They're not interested in the physical material things of this world because right now a lot of people can't afford them. You know, I don't pray for an economic disaster to wipe out a bunch of jobs and people's livelihood, but if that's what it takes for people to respond to the gospel, I'm going to trust the Lord that he's going to use whatever circumstances they are. But may we be a light.

Coming in and sharing grace has kind of shocked several of my co-workers because they've not heard grace before. And that also is a little reflection on myself because I wasn't always so gracious historically either. But coming in and talking about grace is pretty dramatic.

So these Gentiles had no hope in the world. They were separated from Christ. They were separated from God. But then we can keep going on in verse 13, which is where I really would like to spend a little bit more time this morning. But now in Christ Jesus, you who formerly were far off, and of course by now after two verses of being told that they were far off, I think they all got it. There's no question in their minds. You who were formerly far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ.

What did God have to do to get rid of this problem of ethnicity and circumcision and the distinction that the Jews had amongst the Gentiles? I'm sorry, what? The law. Okay, well he had the law. That was the problem. What did he have to do to get rid of the law? He had to kill the nature of Adam, the federal head. He had to get rid of that federal headship and bring us into Christ.

Which means that the Jews could stop clinging to the circumcision. Which means the Gentiles could stop having to wonder, huh, do I really believe in God? Do I believe in God enough to be circumcised as an adult male? You know, how do I explain to my four-year-old son who's, you know, who I've just converted to Judaism and so you get to be circumcised. This is going to hurt but you will recover. God got rid of that. He took care of that problem completely through identification.

The death, burial, resurrection, ascension and seeding of his son and us being tied with him at salvation. So he says that we've been brought near by the blood of Christ. Now, what did the Jews have when it came to drawing near to God? What did the Jews do or what was their practice in Levitical law to draw near to God? Sacrifice. There was an entire atonement system that God set in place to show his righteousness to Israel and their lack of righteousness.

But when Paul writes this, it's just as shocking to the Gentile as it is to the Jew. The Gentile has to go, wow! I was far off, I had nothing going for me. Except for maybe they had good looks, right? That's what God's really after. Not really. But what did the Gentiles have? They had nothing.

But the Jews also knew that drawing near to God was a risky proposition. What do you do if you think that you're righteous and you go into this holy of holies as a Levitical priest? They had a whole process, because if he blows it, he will be struck dead. So drawing near to God is a pretty significant deal for both the Jew and the Gentile. The Jew sees it from a different perspective. The Gentile goes, wow, I had nothing. I didn't even know about it. The Jew goes, I had nothing and I knew about it.

So he says they can draw near. Now the next question, and this is one, this is just a personal, you know, as I often, when I'm teaching, I bring up my past misconceptions. How many of us feel like we can draw near to God at any moment? Hopefully everybody feels confident answering in the affirmative one way or the other, whether you raise your hand or not. The thing is that Coming from a legalistic and charismatic background, which I did, the idea of drawing near to God was something that Paul could write about and I just thought he was pretty much talking about somebody else and certainly not to me. You can draw near to God with something that he would...

Surely he was talking about the Ephesians and not anyone that went to my church. We weren't good enough. We would hope that if we were really good that week, we'd have a nice emotional experience during our music time usually, because there was nap time when the preacher was speaking, right? But Paul writes that they can draw near to God.

We can have that relationship with God that is intimate. We can have that relationship with God. If you're identified with Christ in His death, burial, resurrection, ascension, and seating, you're seated with Christ. That means that the guy sitting in the seat next to you, the guy, that's a bit of a crass statement, the being, the entity, sitting in the seat next to you, which you are hidden in, Christ, next to you is God the Father. So you don't have to be freaked out about being near God because you're already in His Son and you're right next to Him. Go ahead.

Well, I was just going to say too, you know the Jews, this is so profound for them because they couldn't enter the Holy of Holies. That was once a year, one guy. But only the priests, right. So they were always at bay. This drawing near was totally, I mean that's like mind-blowing to them to say that they can draw near to God. That's almost heretical for them.

Yeah, well it could have been deadly. Yeah. Bob? Let me extend that thought a little bit. In verse 13 it says that appealing to the heart and soul of the Gentiles, that ye were far off. And that's positionally and conditionally. Absolutely, yeah. But we know that much, if not Yeah. Worn the badge of the flesh. Yeah.

And so I think it's, I mean, this is kind of an extended thought process, but you know that God didn't say to the Gentile world, did he, that you're positionally incapable of modifying your relationship to me. I mean, in a sense, we're all saved by grace through faith and faith through the principle until, I mean, faith has always been the principle, right? From Adam to today. Yeah. So, I mean, the Gentiles sounds like, you know, if you could really stretch this in terms of the interpretation, say that the Gentile nations were positionally and conditionally separated. Yes.

It's hard to think that it ended, back to the point I was absolutely absolutely well and that's still I mean that still holds true today that that if you know whatever you know you can still respond to it and then God will take care of getting you the rest of what you need to know to know him the I mean you think of Joseph and his impact in Egypt it must have been native Egyptians who ultimately That closure of what the truth was, as Joseph knew it, may happen on down the line.

There seems to have been a small-ish group of people who did respond to the gospel and probably exited to Egypt with the Jews. Not a big number. comparatively. Sure, and the thing is that throughout history there are examples of people who understood God being God and responded. It's unfortunate that it was a smaller number.

If you think about it, had Israel been a light during the time of Rome? How would Rome have responded to the Messiah if Israel had truly been All of history, we can say what if of course, all of history would have been radically different had Israel taken on this responsibility of being a light to the world and done so. It makes perfect sense if you think of the Gentile nations of history. Ultimately the power of the flesh is drawn towards mythology, right? Yeah. And all of the Greek and Roman traditions of various gods. I mean, that's the nature of man, is it not? Sure.

Well, last night I was looking up, my daughter has a piece of technology at her school that's called the Prometheus board. And it's basically used as a computer to do things on a whiteboard. Prometheus was a Greek guy who brought, he stole Zeus' fire. Lame. It brought it down to mankind. Also lame. And then daily, as Zeus punished him by daily, he would have his liver eaten out by eagles or vultures or something like that. And then it would grow back at night. I don't know to this extent though.

This is man's dealing with suffering and consequences. That's not God's way of dealing with things, but the mythology shows. Here's man's coming up with stories to try to deal with disobedience and try to deal with, I mean, Zeus. What a fantastic example of just a really powerful guy. He wasn't in any way reflective of the God that we know in the scriptures. But dealing with God, drawing close to God, the blood of Christ made it possible for us to draw close to God.

One question that I have, and I've got it here at the end of the handout for discussion, why could physical outward signs never save people? Why can physical outward signs not save people? Baptism, circumcision, taking communion, those are all things that people have historically ascribed some kind of significance to. Why can outward signs not save people? They're humanly derived and they can be counterfeited. Let's be honest.

There's a great evangelism at a swimming pool. Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. Just laying down. There we go. Everybody got dumped and so they're saved. Good point. Because it's not a circumcision of the heart. Yeah. Which is what it's about. It's about what your heart is and only the Lord really knows what that is. It's an outward sign of an inward decision or an inward relationship.

That is the whole reason why circumcision has any meaning at all. An eight day old baby is not making a willful decision to serve God with his life. But the law says circumcise the baby. Just a total side note, but on the eighth day there is actually, it's when the body starts generating vitamin K and your blood begins to be able to clot, generally speaking, better. So waiting eight days, God had the biology figured out. But an eight day old baby is still not capable of making that decision. I mean, I've heard of some smart kids, but not at eight days. So the outward sign at that point in time is not good for the babies. The infants aren't making an inward decision with an outward sign being reflected in circumcision.

Now we've talked about Lordship and Salvation already in this class, but that's not the entire reason why I asked the next question. Why do believers and unbelievers alike tend to look towards outward things to verify inward things? Why do we do that? Because we can see them. Now let's ask this important question. Should we never ever look at outward things for any verification of inward things? But you can't use a measuring stick to measure someone's salvation or growth or any of that. As I said, only the Lord really can do that.

Yeah. In the Gospel, I'm sorry, in the first epistle from John, you know, 1 John 4, 7 and 8, we sung it at church, you know, Beloved, let us love one another, for love is from God, and everyone, everyone, you know, that loveth. He starts, hey, there's going to be, there should be an outward thing that people see and identify, but that's not the only thing that lets you know, hey, this person's saved. They gave me a hug. You know, Paul also says, if those outward things let us glory in nothing, except the cross, because that's exactly why. Otherwise, we take the credit for those things.

Absolutely. Well, and the thing is that if it's outward signs, you know, I was having a discussion with a co-worker about spiritual things again, and she said, I feel so guilty because I see somebody who has a need and I can't fulfill that need. I said, where does that come from? Where in scripture do you get this idea that you need to fulfill every need of every person you see who's in need? You can't find it. You won't find it. But you will see that the Holy Spirit prompts you to do something at some time that may be fulfilling an outward need that somebody has.

I don't sit around looking for those opportunities like, I'm just not going to do anything until God shows me somebody has a need. I walk in my relationship with Him. And at this moment, He may provide some opportunity. Or He may not. But I'm focused on setting my mind on things above. I don't think I've ever taught a class in the last three years without mentioning Colossians 3. Every time I say it I go, I think I said that last time. But it's such a fundamental part of our walk.

The outward signs are not things we shouldn't look for, but they're not the only thing that we look for as we have relationships with believers. I think most of us have had the opportunity to meet somebody who is bedridden. They may be comatose or maybe something going on. They're not doing something. Are they saved? It can't be proven with an outward sign every time. but God is still God and he still has a relationship with that person. Jeremy?

It's easy for me and I think it's easy for others to draw a false dichotomy. It's either all outward or all inward. You can either go to the extreme in either direction when I think the Bible clearly teaches about priority. Priority is our beholding Christ and then from that we'll follow. And I know in my life a lot of times I miss that. He's going to work out, and the Holy Spirit is going to work that fruit out through us.

Yeah. But so often we draw the line, you know, either it's, you've got to show me that you're saved, or, you know, you've just got to know in your heart and not worry about anything. Even we, and it's not about that, it's... It's that relationship. We have that authority, and one thing flows from the other. Yeah, the relationship that comes from knowing him and how that works out.

Randy? Yeah. One of the best verses that we could ever look at is in Romans chapter 8. It talks in verse 14 that the Spirit of God bears witness with my spirit, I'm a child of God. Yeah. Only three people, persons, witness your salvation really. God the Father, God the Son, God the Holy Spirit. Yeah, absolutely. And the other one was, I know your heart. Yes. And they saw that activity, they saw that faith. And they saw the belief in the gospel. We didn't see it. I didn't see you, I didn't see your act. Yeah. I can't visualize it. Nope. So, there's only one way that we know that.

That's through good works and that God preordained that we should do them. I think the one another verses, there's 26 one another verses in the New Testament as far as our activity. As Paul mentions them, love one another, pray for one another, bear one another's burdens, fulfill the law of Christ, prefer one another. That kind of activity really is evidence as far as an outward thing because you see That kind of behavior is foreign to any unsaved man. Absolutely. They don't do that.

Yeah. And so it's really unique that the Holy Spirit is the one that bore witness with my spirit that I'm a child of God. Yeah, well, and that's how John tells us that we know we're saved. It's by the Holy Spirit. It isn't something that is visible. Oh, I've got hands now. That's because it's the convicting power of the Holy Spirit that brought you to Christ anyway. It wasn't the evangelist that you went forward and he maybe presented, but it was still the Holy Spirit. That's why he knows how you responded. Yeah. Tom, was that what you were going to say? Oh, all right. Well, the bell's going to ring here in a second.

Just to recap, circumcision was something that the Jews held on to as an outward sign of things and they clung to it. The Gentiles didn't have that rite of passage, if you will, that was part of their culture and their understanding of God. But God took care of both of those problems and reconciled believers to himself through his son.

Let's close in prayer and then feel free to discuss things further if people have further comments. Heavenly Father, thank you for the opportunity to study your word. Thank you that you have moved and worked in our lives tremendously and crucified us with your son and identified us with your son in his death, burial, resurrection, ascension and Thank you that you took away any ethnic distinction and instead made us a new type, a new creation in you. We just thank you for the opportunity to gather together, to fellowship together, and to edify one another. We praise you in Jesus' name.