Thank you for joining us for our five days per week wisdom and legacy building podcast. Today is Day 831 of our trek, and it is Wisdom Wednesday. The past several weeks on Wednesday we have been focusing on interpreting current events through a Biblical Worldview.
To establish a Biblical worldview, it is important that you also have a proper understanding of God’s Word. Especially in our western cultures, we do not fully understand the scriptures from the mindset and culture of the authors. In order to help us all have a better understanding of God’s Word, I would like to invest the next several weeks reviewing a series of essays from one of today’s most prominent Hebrew Scholars Dr. Micheal S. Heiser, which he has compiled into a book titled I Dare You Not to Bore Me with the Bible.
We are broadcasting from our studio at The Big House in Marietta, Ohio. If you study local customs or cultures within nations around the world, you are likely to find certain practices that just will not make sense to you. This may apply to diet, dress, rituals, superstitions, or physical changes. One such practice that God set forth as a sign of separation from the world and dedication to Him was the practice of circumcision for all males that are the decedents of Abraham. These descendants became the Nation of Israel. So the topic of our essay today is…
Circumcision is mentioned nearly 100 times in the Bible. It is a central focus for Old Testament and New Testament theology as mentioned in Romans 4:9-12.
Now, is this blessing only for the Jews, or is it also for uncircumcised Gentiles? Well, we have been saying that Abraham was counted as righteous by God because of his faith. But how did this happen? Was he counted as righteous only after he was circumcised, or was it before he was circumcised? Clearly, God accepted Abraham before he was circumcised!
Circumcision was a sign that Abraham already had faith and that God had already accepted him and declared him to be righteous—even before he was circumcised. So Abraham is the spiritual father of those who have faith but have not been circumcised. They are counted as righteous because of their faith. And Abraham is also the spiritual father of those who have been circumcised, but only if they have the same kind of faith Abraham had before he was circumcised.
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