Circumcision - Part 1 with Bro. John "Ernie" Perez

Join us "Around the Table" with Bro. John "Ernie" Perez, Sis. Patti Perez and Sis. Audia as he takes us on the study of Circumcision in the Old and New Testament.

What if the most controversial sign in Scripture is also one of the clearest windows into God’s faithfulness? We open the pages of Genesis and walk through the covenant story where God alone passes between the pieces, pledging Himself to bless Abraham and his seed. From there, we trace how circumcision becomes a token in the body that points back to that blood-soaked promise, encompassing sons, servants, and the entire household with a single identity: set apart for God.

We unpack the ancient covenant ritual, why the eighth day matters, and how a mark in the flesh anticipated a deeper work of the heart. The conversation moves through Abraham’s name change, the promise of Isaac, and the prophetic pattern of the “only son,” then reaches forward to Moses and Zipporah’s urgent obedience in Exodus 4—an unsettling reminder that calling cannot replace submission. Along the way, we connect the sign to the New Testament’s language of heart circumcision and the church’s understanding of baptism as more than a public statement—an act where Christ cuts away the old and raises us into new life.

At the center stands Jesus. If God pledged His own life to uphold the covenant, then “God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself” becomes the hinge that makes sense of it all. We don’t toss the old to make room for the new; we watch the Author finish one chapter and turn the page. Expect a study-rich journey with clear references, practical takeaways for your own reading, and a renewed sense of what it means to live set apart without drifting into empty rule-keeping. Listen, take notes, and tell us what you discover. If this conversation helps you grow, subscribe, share it with a friend, and leave a review so others can find it too.  (*Recorded 11/24/25)

Ways to Give at www.m3mi.org...Thank you for your seed!  :)

Transcript

Setting The Table And Theme

SPEAKER_03 0:12

Hey y'all, come to Simple Assembly and filter on your house, sister I am. Thank you so much for joining me on this journey today. So grab your turn. Yes, let's open the wheel and see what Jesus has to say today. Hey, welcome to Simple Discipleship Unfiltered. I'm Sister Diana, and I'm gonna tell you we we you need to buckle it down. You need to buckle it down because I was going through the uh this uh sheet that brother Ernie gave me, and we're going into a topic on uh biblical circumcision, and it goes deep. Put on the waiters, it goes deep. It goes deep. I'm sorry, brother. I'm not trying to brag on you, but I'm bragging on you because I told Sister Audia just going through it to just do what I normally do. I was like, oh my gosh, oh my gosh. I was like, this is deep, this is deep. So this is this is one of those lessons where you're gonna want to be somewhere where you've got your tablet, your journal, whatever it is that you've got that you write on, because this is something that you're gonna want to take notes, you're gonna want to open your word, you're gonna want to see for yourself how he goes in here and dissects the subject. And and I don't know if we're gonna get it all on one. I don't I don't know if it's gonna be two or three or whatever, but it but it's it is a lot, but it's so good. You know, we went into some of this when we're talking about baptisms, and so you cover that as well, but man, there's just so much before that when you get into Abraham and Moses and and David. I mean, it just there's just a lot that you're gonna dig into, and I'm so happy to have you here. Thank you for joining us, Brother Ernie.

SPEAKER_01 2:14

Uh I'm glad to be here. I I I never think of myself as deep. I try to do things simply, so thank you for the comp compliment.

Study, Note‑Taking, And Expectations

SPEAKER_03 2:26

Yeah, but but you can go deep as long as you make it simple. It's okay. I mean, and I think that that's what you're doing here because this is I don't want anybody to be chased away by the fear of, oh, something I can't handle. No, you can handle it, it's a lot, but you need to start learning the word by and you only learn the word by opening it and reading it and studying it. You know, the Bible says to study to show yourself approved, right? So it's not a matter of you just being bottle fed all the time. So this is one of those I'm gonna encourage you. If you listen to it in the car, when you get home, you're gonna want to re-relisten to it so that you can take notes and you can open the word and and highlight and underline and and whatever you do on your book. But also around the table today, I got Sister Patty. Good morning, mama. I got Sister Audia. Good morning, yeah. And for all you other lazy dogs who didn't want to come out today because of the little bit of rain, you're gonna miss a big old pot of potato soup over there. I'm telling you, she's gonna be baking in it.

SPEAKER_01 3:32

What if they live in a mud puddle? It's hard to get through it.

SPEAKER_03 3:35

Listen, if there was a cell on something somewhere, you know what I'm saying? They would wait out to get to it, you know what I'm saying? If there was something being free given, you'd and this is this is you can't get any better than this free, you know what I'm saying? So this is this is good stuff. So but uh been cooking for us this morning, and we got Thanksgiving this week. We have so much to be thankful for, don't we?

SPEAKER_05 3:58

Amen.

Gratitude, Prayer, And Posture

SPEAKER_03 3:59

Take a minute to say how good God has been this year, all the time, and it's not that it's been easy, but he's been good in all of it, though. That's the point. It ain't been easy, but it he's been good in all of it. So I just want to give him a little thanks and praise this morning. Man, we're fixing to go into this and and brother Ernie. I know normally we don't open up, you know, with the prayer because we're recording and do class and all of that, but would you just to prepare the hearts because this is such a deep thing I want people to really get?

Homework: Define Circumcision Across Scripture

SPEAKER_01 4:35

Go ahead, Lord Jesus. We're so grateful for you. So grateful, God for your death, your burial, your resurrection, and for your presence now. Yeah, yes, yeah, that you go with us every day. Yeah, even when we're not aware of you, you are aware of us. We want to thank you that your word is true, your promises are sure. We ask that you help us, Lord, to discover the true treasures of your word, that our lives will become more a reflection of who you are to a lost world, Lord. And we'll be careful to give you all the praise and the thanks and the glory in Jesus' name.

SPEAKER_02 5:27

Amen. Amen.

SPEAKER_03 5:29

Amen.

SPEAKER_02 5:31

All right.

SPEAKER_01 5:33

Let's go. Well, when we talked about this, doing this, one of the things that I requested was is that each of us who attend would do your own research.

SPEAKER_03 5:47

So you gave homework.

SPEAKER_01 5:48

Yes, I gave a homework assignment. Find out what you can about circumcision, not just in the Old Testament, but throughout Scripture, and then uh bring us some comments. And I'll I'll go through the lesson, I surely will, but uh I I want you to give me your perspective on what you and this is not your right, your wrong. This is what you found regarding the subject. So if we go in alphabetical order, that would be Audia, that would be Diana, and that would be Wonder Woman.

SPEAKER_03 6:31

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 6:33

And and so Audia, you're in the batter's box.

SPEAKER_03 6:36

It would actually be Ann, but she she gets a pass. She is working today.

SPEAKER_01 6:42

Okay, well, she didn't even make it to the on-deck circle, okay?

SPEAKER_03 6:46

But she did present her homework.

Abraham’s Call And Covenant Basics

SPEAKER_01 6:48

She she sent her homework, she is great. Yeah. So so Audia, you if you would uh spend you know five or six minutes telling us, if you if you want to, about and if you don't want to, no, that's fine. Um about what you learned.

SPEAKER_00 7:04

Okay, so I started out in the old testament, starting with Abraham, and then I went to to Deuteronomy, and where it talks about, and the Lord your God will circumcise your heart.

SPEAKER_01 7:27

Okay, so tell us about Abraham's circumcision first.

SPEAKER_00 7:31

Okay, Abraham's circumcision was the original start of circumcision when God said to him to take. I need to get back in, I just shut my Bible. I'm sorry. Where in in Genesis 17, where he talks to him and said, get back over there, there it is. And and then God said to Abraham, that he tells them that in order to be a follower of him, he has to do this. And so does everyone in every male in his household, including his servants.

SPEAKER_01 8:21

Even his hired servants.

SPEAKER_00 8:22

Even his hired servants.

SPEAKER_01 8:23

So not just his his indentured servants, not just captured slaves, but hired servants, employees.

SPEAKER_00 8:33

Yeah. And so, and you look at this, and Abraham, Abraham, or or he was just still Abram then. He was 99 years old. And so you think about this man's gone through his whole entire life, you know, loving God, following God, you know, but and then he says to him, Okay, I'm gonna make this covenant with you. And in order for this covenant between us to more or less be binding, or that you show your devotion to me, you have to be circumcised. And with this rock, with this rock and this knife, and not only you, but your son, both Isaac and Ishmael.

SPEAKER_01 9:34

Well, Isaac wasn't born yet.

SPEAKER_00 9:35

Yeah, but I mean Ishmael was the only one there at that time, but not only that, but every male in your household in who's a servant, everybody's got to do this, or you can't follow me. You won't be a part of this group that's going to eventually go to a promised land that God has for them. And my question after I started reading this and I read through in the Old Testament was why circumcision? Why did God pick that?

SPEAKER_01 10:16

Okay. We'll deal with that. I want you to just limit yourself to about five minutes so we can get comments from Diana and from Wonder Woman here.

SPEAKER_00 10:26

God was telling him, not only are you going to circumcise a part of your body, but in doing this, you will circumcise your heart to him. You will cut out the bad things in your heart.

SPEAKER_01 10:40

But he doesn't say that to Abraham.

SPEAKER_00 10:42

No.

SPEAKER_01 10:42

Abraham doesn't know that.

SPEAKER_00 10:44

No.

SPEAKER_01 10:45

Okay. Good, good point. Let's pass on to Diana.

SPEAKER_03 10:49

Um, you know, I'll I I have been doing a study on this, you know, because I'm we really got into doing the baptisms, and so it was a big deal for people when we and we did a couple of podcasts together about talking about what actually happens in the water, because I get irritated when people say that this is just a public profession of faith. And though it is, it isn't just that.

SPEAKER_01 11:15

It is, it is that, but that is not the most significant thing.

SPEAKER_03 11:19

That's the point is it is that, yeah, because you're in public and you're doing this, and of course, you know, but and that's good, but there there is the circumcision that takes place in the water, and so that this has been something that's been on my mind. And of course, you know, I'm leaving Monday, uh, next Monday for Israel. And so I've been, you know, on the study of the covenant that God has with Israel, and we've been having the podcast talking about do we still support Israel, you know, as far as you know, a nation as opposed to the covenant that God established with Abraham, because a lot of people are now saying that's separate, that God has separate, the land is separate, and all this is separate. And so my thing is, it's still the covenant, it's still the covenant that was made. And when you go back and begin to read about circumcision, it starts right here, and it never has been done away with all throughout time, except Jesus comes and Jesus fulfills it, but he doesn't do away with it. He does God doesn't change his mind that that that the plans that he has for Israel are still the plans that God has for Israel. How about to choose you know whether they want to do it when they chose all throughout scripture not to want to do it, they decide they do.

SPEAKER_01 12:44

How about this? We look at it as history as his story.

SPEAKER_04 12:49

Yeah, right?

SPEAKER_01 12:51

And in in every history book, there are chapters.

SPEAKER_04 12:55

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 12:55

Because you end one chapter, you don't nullify the book. Yeah, you just open the next chapter.

SPEAKER_04 13:03

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 13:04

So Jesus didn't come to abolish the law, he just completed that chapter and opens a new chapter in the history of God and humanity.

SPEAKER_00 13:18

And that that was one thing that I thought about is that it didn't end, the Old Testament didn't end these things. It just brought to light the purpose of what it was going to do after Jesus got here.

SPEAKER_03 13:37

Yeah, yeah. So anyway, I'm excited to go into here. Actually, I was doing a teaching with the women yesterday about the circumcision, the what God was doing with Abraham, then he goes through Moses, then he goes through David and Solomon, and then Jesus. So, I mean, so I'm excited as we go in because I really want people to get into these verses and see what you've dissected in the word.

SPEAKER_01 14:01

Mama, you have something to say?

SPEAKER_02 14:03

Yes, and I'm using the homework of Ann Atkins.

God Alone Passes Through

SPEAKER_03 14:09

Oh. She's gonna read Ann's uh dissertation of uh this. All right, go ahead.

SPEAKER_01 14:15

I want you to know if you're listening in. She will be be sure and send mama a check.

SPEAKER_03 14:22

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 14:26

Now she's also gone through uh what the other two have said, but then she gives a meaning of what circumcision is. Yeah. Circumcision means cutting around, it's a minor operation that removes the foreskin of a male organ.

SPEAKER_03 14:42

It's minor. It's just minor.

SPEAKER_02 14:45

Now, any man who did not accept the circumcision would be cut off from the community. Yes. Now, circumcision of the flesh shows our faithfulness and obedience to God, but circumcision of the heart is have an obedient heart. Now, baptism shows our faithfulness and obedience to God and our covenant with Him. Now, where a lot of people in nowadays they circumcise their children, whether they're Jewish or not, because of the health factor. And some children didn't do not get, but during World War II over in Germany, that was they would undress those little boys and men to see if they were Jewish or not. This was it would show you are part of this community. If you weren't, you're not a part of this community, so you're cut off from that community. That's where circumcision was.

SPEAKER_03 15:57

So they were marked.

SPEAKER_01 15:59

So they were marked and separated.

SPEAKER_02 16:02

They were marked and separated.

Jesus And The Covenant Fulfilled

SPEAKER_01 16:04

Which for listeners, if if you're in the holiness group, or if you don't understand how the holiness group does things, they're looking for a way to effectively say, I have left the world. Now, we can all carry things too far, and we can try to save ourselves, and that won't work. But the goal to live a life that reflects I am not what the world is. That is a right goal. Remember something. Moses saw an Egyptian beating a Hebrew. Moses was a prince in Egypt. His word would have been enough to shut everything down. But instead he rose up and killed the man, and he knew he was wrong because he buried him in the sand. So his temper got the best of him. He committed murder when his word would have been enough to stop the activity. But here's what I want you to see. Moses was making a statement. I am not an Egyptian. The church, whether you're in the holiness movement or not, our life needs to make a statement. I am not an Egyptian. I am not. I am separated from them. And so circumcision, it was a common practice in many cultures. But not for the reason Abraham did it. It was a rite of passage. It took some some of them, I think they were 12 or 13 years old and said, now I'm gonna circumcise you as a ceremony. They still do it in some African nations. It had nothing to do with Judaism. It had to do with a mark of manhood. Now, in order for us to really comprehend this, I don't get I'm not deep. Stop it. Yeah, you decide once you once we get into it. You tell me, right? But y'all tell me, yeah. We we want to be simple.

SPEAKER_03 18:41

It is very simple and and and precise.

SPEAKER_01 18:44

So what we're gonna do, you're right. This is not gonna take, this is gonna take more than one podcast. Which is fine, which is fine. All right. So we'll start by turning to Genesis chapter 12.

Isaac, Promise, And Prophetic Patterns

SPEAKER_03 18:58

And just I need to interject something. It is Thanksgiving week of 2025, and all three grandbabies are here stuck in a room, and I'm trying to make them be quiet. So if anybody starts screaming in the background or, you know, she hit me, he hit me, whatever, that's what's going on back there. So I just want to give a little bit because we've had a couple of podcasts where they've popped in, and that and that's the thing. They're they're back there trying to be contained, and I don't think it's gonna last long. But but here we go. Now where we at?

SPEAKER_01 19:31

So I'm just gonna read Genesis chapter 12, just the first four verses. Now the Lord had said unto Abram, get that. The Lord had said that's past tense. So this happened before then Abram's father died. So this makes me feel like this began in Ur of the Chaldees. All right, I get that sense, I get that feeling. Now the Lord. The Lord had said unto Abram, Get thee out of thy country and from thy kindred and from thy father's house, unto a land that I will show you. I'm cutting you off from your world right now, unto myself. And I will make of thee a great nation, and I will bless thee and make thy name great, and thou shalt be a blessing, and I will bless them that bless thee, and curse him that curseth thee, and in thee shall all the families of the earth be blessed, in order for all the families of the earth to be blessed through you. You must cut yourself off from your past, because I'm taking you to a new level of existence.

SPEAKER_03 20:45

Okay, so let's pause right there. Why was it necessary for him to leave where he was?

Sign In The Flesh: Genesis 17

SPEAKER_01 20:52

The scripture doesn't say precisely, but I think reading it, it's because it was a land of idolatry, like much of the world.

SPEAKER_03 21:00

His dad actually made idols, right?

SPEAKER_01 21:05

That that is the Jewish tradition. We can't prove that, but that's the Jewish tradition. And that he had to be set apart from that.

SPEAKER_05 21:12

Yes.

SPEAKER_01 21:12

So God is cutting him off from that so he can embrace that which was new. All right, and so then we look in Genesis 15.

unknown 21:22

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 21:23

And we'll do just a little bit of reading here. Starting with the first verse. And if you're driving down the road, I'm using the King James translation. So when you get home, if you want to look verbatim, just you know, open up your phone or your Bible and choose the King James translation. Open up your laptop if you don't have a regular King James translation. After these things, the word of the Lord came unto Abraham in a vision. Saying, Fear not, Abram. I'm sorry, came unto Abram in a vision. I am thy shield and thy exceeding great reward. And Abram said, Lord God, what wilt thou give me, seeing I go childless, and the steward of my house is this Eliezer of Damascus. Why why is this such a big deal? Because God had promised him.

SPEAKER_04 22:26

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 22:27

And you become a blessing to all the families of the earth. How am I going to? I don't even have a son. I don't have anyone to. If I die tomorrow, this covenant is null and void.

SPEAKER_03 22:39

Yeah. Why are you wasting this vision on me?

SPEAKER_01 22:42

Right. So and so the Lord and Abram are having this conversation. Yeah. As it happens, verse 7, God says, I am the Lord that brought thee out of Ur of the Chaldees. That's another thing which makes me think that Genesis chapter 12, that statement the Lord had said unto Abram, goes back to the fact that Abram was called of God while he was still living in Ur, to give thee this land and to inherit it. And he said, Lord God, whereby shall I know that I shall inherit it? Then we go into cultural custom of covenants. God is going to make a covenant with Abraham because Abraham and the Mesopotamian culture in general understand the power of covenants. There's several different types of covenants. So God dealt with him with something that he can hang his hat on and say, I get this. I understand. This is not just some ordinary promise. This is a covenant.

SPEAKER_03 23:53

Yeah, we were talking about yesterday how this ain't no peaky promise. Would you like to keep on, you know, this is something that you're the a covenant, you know, there were conditional, unconditional covenants, but then we're about to step into something that goes past that.

The Eighth Day And Separation

Moses, Zipporah, And Immediate Obedience

Etched In Stone, Etched In Flesh

SPEAKER_01 24:07

We're going to look at that covenant momentarily. Okay. So then God instructs him, verse 9 Take me in heifer of three years old, and a she goat of three years old, and a ram three years old, and eternal dove and a young pigeon. You need animals for sacrifice for this covenant. It involves death and blood. The blood of the animals and the death of the animals. Now, and he verse 10, and he took unto him all these and divided them in the midst and laid them each piece one against another, but the birds divided he not. And when the fowls came down upon the carcasses, Abram drove them away. And when the sun was going down, a deep sleep fell on Abram. And lo, an horror of great darkness fell upon him. So this is not just ordinary, I lay my head down. This is almost trance-like. Because the deep sleep comes upon him, but he is aware of the horror of the darkness. Now then, and he, who is he? God, said unto Abram, Now I'm going to make you some promises. Now let's look at the animals. He cut them in half. He put the birds out. He didn't cut them in half. What I've learned about this type of covenant, the parties in the covenant, whether it's two people over from this country and two people from another country, or one man from one family, one man from another family. After the sacrifices are laid out on the ground, they pass between the sacrifices, making like an S shape, possibly a figure eight, and then they end up at opposite ends. And the significance of that was, as you pass it, look at all these animals, look at all this death, look at all this bloodshed. Whatever the terms of this covenant are, the promises, the blessings that I am making with you, before I will let you come up short of the promises or the blessings of this covenant, may this be done to me. In other words, I will give my life before I let the promises of this covenant fail to come to fruition in your life. But this covenant involves two people or two individuals, God and Abram, right? But only God passes through the midst of the sacrifice. So only God makes the promise. This is some of the main reasons that in the Gospel of St. John, John says over and over, he writes things where Jesus said, I am in the Father and the Father is in me. I and the Father are one. If you don't believe for the words that I say, believe for the works that you see. When he said, Abraham saw my day and rejoiced in it. Before Abraham was I am, he was claiming to be the I am. So this means that the scripture that Paul writes in 2 Corinthians 5 and 19, that God was in Christ, reconciling the world unto himself. We know God can't die, but this means there was some sort of manifestation of the God who fills all time and space within the body of the Son of God. So every pain or disappointment or heartbreak that Jesus experienced as a human being, God was sharing that experience literally. Why would he do that? Because he made a covenant with Abraham. Before I let you or your seed come up short of any of these blessings. And since God can't die to fulfill the promise, God was in Christ reconciling the world unto himself. Colossians chapter 2, the fullness of the Godhead dwells bodily in Christ Jesus because it's the only way God could fulfill the covenant that he made with Abram, and God doesn't fail to keep his word. So it's not like he sat in heaven and said, somebody else go suffer.

SPEAKER_04 29:30

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 29:33

And I think that people have a that's where people have a problem when they separate Jesus and God. They're saying, well, why would God send his only son? Why didn't he just come himself?

SPEAKER_01 29:44

He did both.

SPEAKER_03 29:45

He did both. That's the point. But if you don't understand that of scripture, if you don't get John 1, 1, right? Right. If you don't get that, then in your mind, you're thinking, God's a horrible dad, because he's going to take his son and make him go do all of it.

SPEAKER_01 30:03

That was Madeline Murray O'Hare's contention. And the first time I heard that statement to where I was paying attention to it, I thought, you don't know scripture. You don't know Jesus. You don't know that yes, he is the son of God. That's why Isaac is prophetic of the Lord, because he was Abraham's only begotten son by Sarah. He had Ishmael, but Ishmael wasn't the son of promise. He was the son that got according to man's law, not according to God's promise. And God said, You take your son, your only son Isaac, up on the mountain and offer him to me for a burnt sacrifice. That was a pattern that God set. It was a prophetic event, even though it was historically accurate.

SPEAKER_04 30:51

Yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 30:54

The only begotten son of God.

SPEAKER_03 30:56

And we just interject, and it's in the same place.

Verify The Word And Part Two Tease

SPEAKER_01 30:58

Yes. So we see here in the sacrifice that this covenant is being made. And then God goes on to tell him prophetically what's going to happen to Israel, right?

SPEAKER_00 31:14

Yes.

Closing Thanks And Listener Actions

SPEAKER_01 31:15

So then we jump to chapter 17. And the first 14 verses is the story. God comes to Abraham again. When Abraham was 90 and 9 years old, the Lord appeared to Abram and said unto him, I am the Almighty God, walk before me and be thou perfect. That's a tall order. And I will make my covenant between me and thee. He's already actually made covenant. And a lot of scholars say there's more than one covenant between God and Abraham. I wouldn't debate with that, but I think it's all rolled up in the singular covenant. And it's just being reinforced. Okay? But whatever view you take, that's okay. And I will make my covenant between me and thee, and will multiply thee exceedingly. And Abram fell on his face, and God talked with him, saying, Oh, as for me, behold, my covenant is with thee. He remembers the sacrifices now, and thou shalt be a father of many nations. Neither shall thy name any more be called Abram, but thy name shall be called Abraham, for a father of many nations have I made thee, but he did not yet have Isaac. For an everlasting covenant, to be a God unto thee, and to thy seed after thee, and I will give unto thee, and to thy seed after thee, the land wherein thou art a stranger, all the land of Canaan for an everlasting possession, and I will be their God. So now the seed is both singular and plural. Seed in the Son you will have, singular. Plural in the descendants of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, the twelve tribes and their descendants.

SPEAKER_03 33:22

Yeah. And they still don't have all the land.

SPEAKER_01 33:26

They still don't. No, no. He's walking around in it. Okay. And verse 8, and I will give thee into thy seed after thee the land wherein thou art a stranger, all the land of Canaan for an everlasting possession, and I will be their God. And God said unto Abraham, Thou shalt keep my covenant, therefore thou and thy seed after thee in their generations. This is my covenant, which ye shall keep between me and you, and thy seed, your descendants, after you. Every man, child among you shall be circumcised, and ye shall circumcise the flesh of your foreskin, and it shall be a token of the covenant between me and you. So it's a sign or a token of the covenant. We made the covenant with the sacrifices, but you must always recognize that those that those sacrifices and the covenant we made are always in effect in your life. How? By carrying circumcision in your body.

SPEAKER_03 34:42

But let me ask a question. If this is something that had not been established yet, how did they know what circumcision was?

SPEAKER_01 34:51

Well, it was common. It's not that it was uncommon. It wasn't that every single tribe and nation did it, but it was common in certain cultures that it was a rite of passage for boys at five, six, seven, or twelve or thirteen years old to be circumcised as a sign that they were stepping into manhood. Only for Abraham, that's not what it is. It's a sign that you have made a covenant with God and you will honor the covenant, even though you don't see the animals laid out anymore. You will cut this, you will mark your body so that in your most intimate moments in life you remember. Yeah, uh I'm in a covenant with God. God is the master of my life. And ye can you shall circumcise, verse 11, the flesh of your foreskin, and it shall be a token of the covenant betwixt me and you. And he that is eight days old shall be circumcised among you. Every man, child in your generations, he that is born in the house, bought with money of a stranger, which is not of thy seed. So your servants, your slaves, the child of your slaves, the child of your employees, your hides hired servants, if they're males and they're in your house, in order for them to be covered by the blessing and the covenant that I have put on you, they must carry the sign of the covenant in their bodies. He that is born in thy house and that is bought with thy money must needs be circumcised, and my covenant shall be in your flesh for an everlasting covenant, and the uncircumcised man whose flesh of his foreskin is not circumcised, that soul shall be cut off from his people. So as as we went through this reading, verse 10, every man, child among you must be circumcised. Every man, child. Verse 11, it is a sign or a token of the covenant. It is a visible mark in the body of all males partaking in the covenant. 12. All male children were to be circumcised when eight days old. And it is commonly believed certain clotting factors are at higher levels when a child is eight days years old. I heard talk about vitamin K being at the highest level when you're eight days old. I couldn't verify that, but I could verify that certain clotting factors are at the highest point in your life at eight days of age.

SPEAKER_02 37:49

That means that there will be no hemorrhage. When you're if it was seven days, you cut it. It can bleed to death. It would bleed to death.

SPEAKER_01 38:01

Right. So whether it's the vitamin K or other clotting factors, it's done on God says do it on the eighth day. Abraham did not know medically why the eighth day was the best day. It never says in the law of Moses why the eighth day is the best day. But God doesn't do anything outside of his glorious, wonderful, perfect will. Yes, among the males. And there's something I want you to see in Acts chapter 2 here. It's not in my notes, it just popped in my head. So I but I want you to understand this about the Lord. Peter's sermon in Acts chapter 2, talking about Jesus, he gets to verse 23. And who, Mama, do you got the King James translation? Why don't you read verse 23 for me? It's regarding Jesus.

SPEAKER_02 39:12

Him being delivered by the determinate counsel and foreknowledge of God, ye have taken and by wicked hands have sacrificed and slain. Verse 24, Audia.

SPEAKER_00 39:23

Him God raised up, having looked at the pains of death, because it was not possible that he should be, he should be held by it.

SPEAKER_01 39:33

God in eternity, before time began, understood that the only begotten Son had to go through this process and ordained it. Before he said, Let there be light, and when he said, Let there be light, remember, John chapter 1, Jesus is the life that is the light. Jesus said, I am the light of the world. John in his letter, 1 John, says of him, he is the light. God is light. In him there is no darkness at all. When God said, Let there be light, the concept of Jesus Christ was in demonstration. Because the darkness was done away with and exposed for what it was. Darkness and chaos. Because he was the light. That's why he's the firstborn of all creation. What's the first thing God created? Let there be light. I just threw that in, not taking up an offering.

SPEAKER_05 40:41

That's extra.

SPEAKER_01 40:43

Okay, so verse 13. All males in the house, that is, family members and servants, whether they be slaves or hire servants, circumcision etches the covenant into the body. Understand when God wrote the Ten Commandments, they were etched or written in stone. Israel was to keep the Ten Commandments as a part of the covenant they made with God to obey him. And it was etched in stone. But there was already a shadow in circumcision of the kind of commitment it was going to take to love God and serve God because it instead of being etched in stone, it was etched in his body. Verse 14. Because to not be circumcised is to reject the covenant. So I wasn't there when God passed between the sacrifices and and was really verifying his covenant with Abraham and prophesying to him about Egypt and Israel being there and then being delivered. I wasn't there. Yes, but you believe it. And you prove your belief is not just empty words by etching it in your body.

SPEAKER_03 42:19

Yeah, but you were. I mean, you know, the old song, you were on his mind, you know what I'm saying? Because the necessity of what happened there affected all has affected all of us throughout eternity. So we're gonna see that.

SPEAKER_01 42:35

So anyone who was not circumcised was cut off, verse 14. That is excluded from the covenant community. And the word cut off, uh I've got a little note here in Genesis. I'm in Leviticus chapter 20, verses 1 through 3. You can go back and read that. But it shows you where in some instances cut off can mean death. Sometimes it just means disassociated from the community. But here is an example of where it means death, which is the ultimate separation from life. So how serious was circumcision? If you didn't have it, you could be cut off. Turn to Exodus chapter 4. This is a part of our history as disciples of Jesus. Never separate yourself from the people of God, whether they're in the Old Testament or the New Testament. This is why we need to understand, have an overall understanding of what's written in Scripture. So that we realize we are just as much a part of the kingdom of God as Abraham. Because of the covenant of which we have received. So Exodus 4, verses 24 and 25. You want to read that, Diana?

SPEAKER_03 44:15

Well, I don't have the King James.

SPEAKER_01 44:18

Just go ahead and read it in what you have.

SPEAKER_03 44:20

Okay, mine's the amplified. Along the way in a resting place, the Lord met Moses and sought to kill him. And now apparently he had failed to circumcise one of his sons, his wife being opposed to it. But seeing his wife is in danger, Sepporah took a flint knife and cut off the foreskin of her son and cast it to touch Moses' feet and said, Surely a husband of blood you are to me.

SPEAKER_01 44:50

So at some time in their married life, when the male child was born, which of the sons we don't know? The oldest, I'm supposing.

SPEAKER_03 45:00

I I, you know, I looked this up when I was doing this, while I was typing this out for you. I looked it up. Okay. So if uh when you look it up, it says it was Garson? Yes. That it was him and and and more than likely. But then when I'm reading my Bible right here, yeah, it says it was the other one. And so you're right to say that you don't know which one it was, you know.

SPEAKER_01 45:27

So so here is the deal. But the question would be, how does Moses remember Moses killed the Egyptian? Yeah, making with his life a statement. I am not an Egyptian.

SPEAKER_04 45:42

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 45:43

My brothers are the Hebrews.

SPEAKER_04 45:45

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 45:47

And evidently, sometime in the life of his sons, Moses wanted them circumcised. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 45:54

But they make it out to like he just forgot to do it, one of them. No, no, no. His wife, his wife said, You ain't cutting my baby boy like that.

SPEAKER_01 46:03

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 46:03

And because they said that looking this up, it said that because it as a Midianite, that it that their custom was to circumcise them before the day before their wedding.

SPEAKER_01 46:17

I wouldn't want to be a Midianite.

SPEAKER_02 46:19

No, no, no, no.

SPEAKER_01 46:22

The day before their wedding. I don't know who wrote that or who thought that or where they found that information. But I'm I'm telling you right now, the groom didn't want to play that game. So here we have Zipporah has exercised her will. You ain't doing that to my boy.

unknown 46:45

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 46:46

Moses was not able to make her understand how important this was. But when the Lord got ready to kill him, she said, oh, oh, I get it now. You said it was really serious, and I didn't believe it. But here is good. So I'm doing it, but it doesn't mean I like it. She didn't like it at all.

SPEAKER_03 47:05

But she didn't want her husband dead either.

SPEAKER_01 47:07

No, and and and she didn't want her son estranged from the covenant.

unknown 47:13

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 47:14

Having seen what it meant to the Lord. And so she didn't have to say, gee, I'm glad to do this, as a matter of fact. She didn't. Go to Leviticus chapter 12. She didn't say she was glad. She said, You're a husband of blood to me. She was disgusted. So we'll start we'll stop here. And at Leviticus 12. And if you in my notes, it's on page two, but you you change the size of the print in your notes.

SPEAKER_03 47:50

It's toward the end of page one, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 47:52

Yeah, okay. And so when we come back, we'll do this. When I started out for this, I didn't mean this study to be this extensive, but if we're gonna do it, let's do it right.

SPEAKER_03 48:03

Right, right. And I think that you can't just here's my thing, and we do it with the book of Acts 2 that we're doing. We're not in a hurry. We want to dig into the word and see what the word has to say. We we put that in our monologue, not because it sounds catchy, we say because let's look in the word and see what Jesus has to say about this. What is it? Jesus is the word, right? All through Amen. So we want to see what does he have to say for this and and to see what he was saying in the beginning, to see how he says it all through time and how he completes it is it's mind-boggling. And I want it to be, right? So let's just uh we'll continue with this lesson on uh another part two of this on circumcision. So I want to encourage you to go home, open, open your word, and to study for yourself, look up these scriptures and and and go read for yourself. Never take for granted that the person that's teaching you knows everything. Amen. Brother Ernie's the main one that will say that to you. So go and look up these scriptures that he's giving you. When we're in Genesis, uh, and we begin in that chapter 12, and when we're going to Genesis 17 and and going to Exodus and Leviticus and all of this, and see for yourself. Mark your word yourself. Mark your word.

SPEAKER_01 49:26

It is important. Paul said to the Corinthian church, you follow me as I follow Christ. So he put the responsibility upon them to never be taken in by false teaching, no matter who the teacher is. Yeah. This is something that the saints of God, many times, members in the congregation, feel like it is all right as long as the preacher said it. Paul didn't even say you can't believe it, just he wasn't saying you can believe. No. If you follow me as I follow Christ, so it's important that you verify what we say. It doesn't make you rebellious, it makes you diligent.

SPEAKER_03 50:05

Yeah, because you're not gonna stand at the judgment seat and say, but brother so-and-so didn't say that was supposed to do that, you know.

SPEAKER_01 50:12

Yeah, yeah. God's not gonna ask you, did you vote for Trump or Biden or Clinton? Or he's not gonna ask you, were you a Democrat or a libertarian? Those are not questions.

SPEAKER_03 50:24

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 50:24

The judgment day. No, no. Did you follow Jesus? Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 50:30

Yeah, did you did you do the deal? Okay. All right, y'all. So thank y'all for being with us today. Look forward to part two. We're gonna go and record that uh right now. So we'll see you guys soon. So thank you for going for giving, for going online and giving and helping us to keep this platform. It's going out to many countries across the world, cities and just people, and we just thank you. And if you have a comment, go to our website and let us know. We love you, we will see you soon. Hey STU family. If you have enjoyed this podcast today, would you please like, follow, and share our podcast link? And we would love to hear your feedback and your podcast topic suggestions. To do that, simply go to our website at www.m3mi.org, scroll to the morph tab, and select contact us. Also, if this to you has been a blessing to you, you can also go to our website and select sew a seed. There's several ways that you can give, whether it's health, vim, medication, or if there's an address to send a check from the order. All your gifts are dictable. And we thank you so much for sewing your seed with us. I want you to remember this. This person said that the person is giving you their time. They've given you their most precious gift because they can never ever get it back. Thank you for sharing this day with me. We love you. We'll see you soon.