“For neither is circumcision anything, nor uncircumcision, but a new creature.”
(Galatians 6:15, ASV)
I heard a story about a man that took a muscle-car. You know the older cars from the 50’s and 60’s that had the big V-8 engines. Well, the car had a bad engine. So, he removed the engine and did a lot of modifications to the car in order to fit it with an air-cooled four-cylinder engine he found from an old Volkswagen Beetle. He went from the massive power-house to an engine that was barely able to move the muscle-car forward.
Now, everyone who saw his muscle-car was quite impressed. When he parked it at the fast-food restaurant, people would gather around to look at it. He had mag-wheels. The car had a slick custom paint job appropriate for a hot-rod. They looked at the interior and saw the bucket seats, a custom tachometer, and four on the floor (a four-speed shifter).
However, when he got in to start the vehicle up, everyone was quite disillusioned. Something with the engine just did not seem right. It did not have that deep V-8 muscle-car sound. When he drove out of the parking lot, it just creeped along. It was underpowered for the size and style of the car.
The big problem was this. While the outside looked great, the inside did not match its appearance. You see it is what is on the inside that really matters.
This is the way it is with people also. Paul in this conclusion to his letter to the Galatians made a big point in this statement. “For neither is circumcision anything, nor uncircumcision, but a new creature.” The legalists were worried about something that did not really matter. They put their emphasis on the flesh, externals. Their demands for the Galatians to be concerned with legalistic obedience to the law, especially that of circumcision, obscured the main thing. That was the wonder of God’s grace through which people were born again as new creations in Christ. Paul wrote of this to the Corinthians.
“Wherefore if any man is in Christ, he is a new creature: the old things are passed away; behold, they are become new.” (2 Corinthians 5:17, ASV)
Paul indicated that it does not matter if one is circumcised or not. It was of no spiritual significance. The only thing that mattered was that people would experience God’s grace through faith in Christ, by which they would become new creatures in Christ. This becoming a new creature is a result of being born again by the Spirit of God. At salvation the Spirit of God indwells every true believer and manifests a new divine nature in the believer.
So, it is a truth. It is what’s on the inside that truly matters. Neither circumcision of the flesh nor uncircumcision of the flesh can produce this inner transformation. It is a work of God done in the heart of the one who truly believes. We, who have believed, need to be mindful of this magnificent work of the Holy Spirit within us. We have been recreated. All that we need to live the Christian life in high victory is already within us. We just need to spiritually grow so that as new creations we will bear more and more fruit in our lives for the glory of God.
Renewing the Heart 