Most of us like to brag. We brag about our children and pull the pictures out of our wallots to make sure the people we're bragging to know for sure that what we are saying is true. We show people the trophies we have pilled up on our shelves; we have our walls covered with service awards; we go to country clubs, where the waiter is sure to know us, to talk to clients and we try to wear the fashionable thing and none of this is anything permanent.

People boasted in Paul's day to. The Judaizers came with reguirements for new believers to return to Jewish laws and customs for the right kind of faith. Circumcision was the big thing it was the external mark which counted something to boast about.  And just like today, those people also missed the mark because all the external customs in the world provide nothing permanent.

Paul, who was kind of the Hebrew of all Hebrews was circumcised and he could have joined in with the boasting, but instead he chose to say this: "May I never boast except in the cross of our Lord Jesus circumcision nor uncircumcision means anything; what counts is a new creation." So today we can brag, not of ourselves or our accomplishments, or of our pedigree, but because Jesus went to the cross for us. We can cling to the cross of Christ. We are a new creation in him and he now lives in us.

So when you are going somewhere this week, be sure to do some bragging on your Lord. Hang that baptismal certificate on your wall, place a cross on your trophy shelf, pray before your meal at your country club, tell the waiter that God loves hixnlher and wear the most Christian you in your closet.

                                                                         Yours’ in Christ,

                                                  Pastor Jake