Galatians 6:14

‘BUT FAR BE IT FROM ME TO GLORY, EXCEPT IN THE CROSS OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST, THROUGH WHICH THE WORLD HAS BEEN CRUCIFIED TO ME, AND I TO THE WORLD. FOR NEITHER IS CIRCUMCISION ANYTHING, NOR UNCIRCUMCISION, BUT A NEW CREATION.'

Let them consider the third and final fact. That Paul desires to glory in only one thing, the cross of Christ. He glories in nothing else (when it comes to the question of salvation and relationship with God). That is central to his preaching and to the faith he teaches. For through it he has died to the world, and to all that is earthly, which includes the flesh and includes the Law. And all these have been crucified to him. As far as he is concerned they are dead, because he has come to know the full meaning and significance of the cross and He Who was crucified on it, that through Him and His sacrificial death he and all who truly believe have been reckoned as righteous by faith and have received the Holy Spirit. And now that alone is what matters to him.

He does not glory in the fact that people have been circumcised, or indeed baptised (1 Corinthians 1:17). He does not glory in the fact that they do this or that, that they observe times and seasons, ritual food laws or laws of ‘cleanliness'. He does not glory in any of their activities. He does not glory in religious activity of any kind. He glories in only one thing, ‘the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ' that delivers and makes men free, and in the One Who died there, the Lord of glory Who died and rose again, and in those who have died on it with Him and have found new life.

So as far as he is concerned circumcision is irrelevant. And uncircumcision is irrelevant. To argue about them, except in order to protect the message of the cross, is to argue about irrelevancies. They no longer matter. What matters is a new creation resulting from the preaching of the message of the cross. What matters is the total sufficiency of the cross and the One Who died there in providing salvation.

Our Lord, Jesus Christ.' All through the epistle he has referred to Christ Jesus, or Jesus Christ. But now he wants to lay a greater emphasis. He is ‘our Lord', Jesus Christ. He is the Lord of all. In the Septuagint this Greek word is used to express God's special name, YHWH, and Paul makes it clear elsewhere that this is how he sees it, as applied to Christ. When he uses ‘Lord' of Jesus, it means the name that is above every name to which every knee shall bow (Philippians 2:9). And it is this to this Lord, Who gave Himself up on the cross, that he gives all his attention and in Whom alone he glories. For what greater glory can there be than this greatest of all paradoxes, ‘the Lord of all' on a cross.

‘A new creation' or ‘a new creature'. Furthermore the old creation is done away in our Lord, Jesus Christ. It is now under judgment and only time stands in the way of its final destruction. But a ‘new creation' has arisen, comprised of ‘new creatures'. For if any man is in Christ Jesus he is a new creation (2 Corinthians 5:17). And that is what matters. Those who have died with Christ and arisen as new creations, those who now have Christ living in them, those who now live by faith in the Son of God Who loved them and gave Himself for them, they have what matters, and what alone matters. And they are part of a great new creation, the Kingly Rule of God, they live in the heavenlies (Ephesians 2:6), the world in which the Spirit is triumphant. The old has passed away, the new has come.

Paul may well have had in mind here the words of Isaiah 48:6, ‘I have showed you new things from this time, even hidden things which you have not known, they are created now and not from of old.' And Isaiah 54:9, ‘With everlasting kindness will I have mercy on you, says the Lord your Redeemer. This is as the waters of Noah to me ---.' The new world after the Flood was seen by the Jews (e.g. Philo) as a ‘new creation'. And what is happening now is an even greater new creation. In Christ it is as though time has begun again. It is as though the world has been offered a second chance, as indeed it has.

So, he in effect says, ‘Forget the Law, forget circumcision, forget the old ways. Consider the new creation brought to us through the crucified and risen Lord.' And that is only thing that Paul is willing to glory in.