Gods Sabbath

C IRCUMCISION

165

in them of a spirit of entire submission to, and co-operation with, God’s ways and purposes. It signified the consecration of the in strument of their flesh to the service of God by cutting away from it all that was unnecessary to those purposes. The circum cised had dedicated themselves to trusting and following God’s ways in the building of His kingdom, while resolutely in self-dis trust avoiding any reversions to their own ways. Only those who had covenanted with God to forsake their own ways of kingdom-building utterly, in favor of God’s, could truth fully receive the rite. No doubt, females were regarded as cir cumcised if their husbands and sons had received the rite. When it was performed on infants, this was a dedication by their par ents that their sons would be raised up in God’s ways so that they could enter into His rest. Isaac could be born only under the condition that Abraham was willing to give up his own works. To confirm that he really had forsaken these ways, Abraham was to perform the rite of circumcision on himself and his household. In addition to his and his wife’s changed names, his acceptance of this condition was verified in two ways. The first was his performance of the rite as a testimony that his understanding of God’s ways had changed, that he was con victed of the rightness of those ways, and that he fully accepted them exactly as God offered them. “On that very day Abraham took his son Ishmael and all those born in his household or bought with his money, every male in his household, and circumcised them, as God told him.” Genesis 17:23. The second confirmation was the fact that Abraham and Sar ah were thereafter released from their bondage of barrenness and Isaac was born, the event which would never have taken place if Abraham had not entered into the covenant of which cir cumcision was the sign. “Now the L ORD was gracious to Sarah as he had said, and the L ORD did for Sarah what he had promised. Sarah became pregnant and bore a son to Abraham in his old age, at the very time God had promised him. Abraham gave the name Isaac to the son Sarah bore him. When his son Isaac was eight days old, Abraham circum cised him, as God commanded him. Abraham was a hundred years old when his son Isaac was born to him.” Genesis 21:1–5.