The new covenant that God promised to make with His people included major changes to their hearts. He promised to give them a “new” heart (Ezekiel 36:26). The new heart would be “one” with His (Ezekiel 11:19).
It would have “His law written on it” (Jeremiah 31:31-34) and it would be “circumcised” (Deuteronomy 30:6). Circumcision was given to Abraham as a sign of the covenant that He was making with God (Genesis 17:10-14). Typically it was performed on boys when they were eight days old (Leviticus 12:2-3).
It was a sign of the parents’ faithfulness, not the boy’s. The removal of the foreskin symbolized removing a portion of ourselves that was not necessary. It represents our need to remove our sin nature in favor of living in accordance with God’s way.
God commanded another type of circumcision which occurs internally, not externally. A circumcision for both males and females. “So circumcise your heart, and stiffen your neck no longer” (Deuteronomy 10:16).
Again in Jeremiah 4:4 He commands us to “circumcise yourselves to God and remove the foreskin of your heart.” The heart is the center of our will and desires. He is calling on believers to cut away the sin nature that directed their hearts prior to salvation.
God realizes we are incapable of circumcising our hearts, so He promises to do it for us. “Yehovah your God will circumcise your heart and the heart of your descendants, to love Yehovah your God with all your heart and with all your soul, so that you may live” (Deuteronomy 30:6). Jesus is also identified as participating in the heart circumcision process, “In Jesus you were also circumcised with a circumcision made without hands, in the removal of the body of the flesh by the circumcision of Christ” (Colossians 2:11).
Jesus died for our sins, and now after we are saved, He participates in placing a new, circumcised heart in us. Finally, the Holy Spirit is identified with the circumcision process. Paul speaks of Christians as being children of Abraham and therefore united with the Jewish people into one family.
Paul wrote, “He is a Jew who is one inwardly; and circumcision is that which is of the heart, by the Spirit and not by the letter” (Romans 2:29). Father, Son and Spirit are working to cut away from our heart the sins nature that give rise to the “sins that so easily entangles us” (Hebrews 12:1). The Trinity empowers the process of sanctification, “for it is God who works in you, both to will and to work for his good pleasure” (Philippians 2:13).
Circumcision is like baptism. Both are outward expressions of an inward change. Baptism shows that we have died to sin and have been born again to our new life in Christ.
Circumcision shows our commitment to remove sin from our lives and from our hearts. Heart circumcision shows we are new creations (Galatians 6:15) keeping God’s commandments (1 Corinthians 7:19) and expressing our faith through love. (Galatians 6:5).
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