Colossians 2:11

Some people are pushing for circumcision, the cutting of the man’s foreskin, to be fully saved. Paul was not having it. The previous verse said that we are filled in Christ. In this verse, Paul is taking on the claim from some strong circumcision groups (Acts 11:2, Galatians 2:12) that people need to be circumcised to get something they could hypothetically not get in the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus. Again, Paul was not having it. He even said these people were spies aiming to put people in bondage (Galatian 2:4).

The message from the circumcision group is that you are not complete until you are circumcised; you are not complete in the sight of God; something is missing that we need to get in the tradition of circumcision.

Remember that Paul had a lifelong fight with the Jews who belonged to the circumcision group, who were constantly saying that circumcision was the way to go, to be fully saved, to fully belong to God.

Let’s take a step back.

We are talking about thousands of years of circumcision, something that God commanded as a sign of the covenant between himself and the people of Israel, but somehow, certain people have smuggled that provision into Christianity.

The matter reached the level of having a council convened in Jerusalem early in the church's life (Acts 15:1-35). The statement was that “it seemed best to the Holy Spirit and to us not to place any greater burden on you than these necessary rules” (Acts 15:28). Conversely, any other thing was at least a burden and unnecessary. Paul later wrote that it was worse than that. He said if you are circumcised, Christ is of no use to you (Galatians 5:2). And that is way more serious than it’s a burden and unnecessary.

It was a delicate matter. The first leaders of the budding church at the time were Jewish, a people whose identity was wrapped up in their circumcision as a sign that they were special to God. But so was the Sabbath, and so was the temple, and so was [you can continue naming things].

But the circumcision was the most personal of all, the one, as it were, most difficult to shake off; it was a mark on your skin that means something beyond the physical, associated with the divine, backed with the word of God himself. Difficult to push to the background. Even Jesus was circumcised, right?

Paul said those who preach such things are doing so to avoid persecution (Galatians 6:12); they are not willing to go through hell in the hands of the Jews, who would persecute anyone who wants to persuade anyone that their practices are not relevant but now the only one that matters is Christ, who the Jews gave up to be killed in the hands of the Romans rulership.

Jesus said that some people who kill his disciples would think that they are offering service to God (John 16:2).

And remember how they stoned Stephen (Acts 7:54-60). They were (including the Pharisee Paul, who wrote Colossians) confident that they were offering service to God, who had commanded that anyone who draws people away from the worship of the true God should be stoned to death (Deuteronomy 13:6-9).

In several places in the gospels, they wanted to kill Jesus. They were not killing for fun; they may have gone home to thank God they offered him service.

The point is that these people are convinced that they are doing the right thing. Paul was only shaken out of that false conviction by Christ’s revelation.

Based on his revelation of Christ, he writes and convinces others to put their trust in Christ and him alone, but he was not blind to the fact that not everyone is similarly convinced.

His letter to Colossians is not to make the fight fair, but it is a necessary fight for truth.

Paul has been given the responsibility for the truth that he wants to deliver, and he uses the language of warfare to describe his work; he said he demolishes arguments and every pretension that is raised up against the knowledge of God and takes every thought captive to make it obey Christ (2 Corinthians 10:5).

The weapon of his warfare is not carnal, so he does not take stones to hit those who are pushing another gospel. He did not combat the Jews stone for stone. He did not create his own stone brigade. He takes over territories in people's minds, which leads to their being subject to Christ. And his suffering is something he rejoices in because he knows they are not in vain (2 Corinthians 4:17).

As part of that warfare, Paul takes the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God (Ephesians 6:17). He tells the truth that the Colossians have the better circumcision, not made with human hands.

There is nothing Paul wants less than for the Christians to feel that they are less than the best of the Jews.

In Christ, he tells them that they are different because not just a little bit of flesh was removed from them, but the whole fleshly body of sin has been removed, a deep, deep circumcision that we have deep inside.

Something changes in you that, basically, there is no word for. Paul calls it a new creation (2 Corinthians 5:17). Jesus calls it being born again and being born of the Spirit (John 3:3, 6). Peter calls it “born anew, not from perishable but from imperishable seed, through the living and enduring word of God” (1 Peter 1:23). John says we are not born of human will (John 1:13).

But in this particular passage, Paul wants the Colossians to have such a high view of what happened to them in Christ that no other appeal can shake them away from their full trust in Christ. No size of the whip would faze them. They are settled in Christ, unshakable, rooted in him, and would not give anyone the time of day who wants to appeal to them otherwise.