Just the Tip!?!?

Reading: Ezekiel 23-24 and Galatians 5

Scripture: Galatians 5:12, I wish those who unsettle you would emasculate themselves!

Thoughts: Sarcasm and exaggeration are so common today that sometimes it is difficult to see. As Paul was speaking to the Galatian church about the group of people who were intent on making all the Christians follow the Law that Jesus came to fulfill. They were telling them that they needed to be circumcised to be saved. Christ fulfilled the Law and threw his sacrifice we no longer need the sign of the old covenant we no longer need to bring goats and sheep to use their blood to cover our sins. Christ was the perfect lamb who covered the sins of the World. Paul is calling out those people trying to add rules and regulations to what Christ did. It seems to me that Paul is saying that if you are pushing the circumcision to show you are more holy than maybe you should do more than just trim the foreskin. We were brought into God’s family through the perfect life and sacrifice of Jesus not by walking out any set of rules and regulations set forth to show us that we cannot measure up to the requirements of perfection that God calls for. Only by accepting the gift of Christ’s blood covering in us can we have a connection and a right relationship with God.

Prayer: Father God, I thank you for sending your Son. I thank you for making a way for me to have a relationship with you. You are worthy of all praise and adoration. Your ways are higher than our ways, your knowledge is so much greater than ours. I thank you for the provisions and blessings you pour out on us. I thank you for the refining you are doing in my life. Help me remove the things in my life that are not of you. I thank you for the people in my life who are helping me recognize those things.