We shall close this section by glancing, for a moment, at verses 43-49. Here we are taught that while it was the place and privilege of every true Israelite to eat the passover, yet no uncircumcised stranger should participate therein.--"There shall no stranger eat thereof ... all the congregation of Israel shall keep it." Circumcision was necessary ere the passover could be eaten. In other words, the sentence of death must be written upon nature ere we can intelligently feed upon Christ, either as the ground of peace or the centre of unity. Circumcision has its antitype in the cross. The male alone was circumcised; the female was represented in the male. So, in the cross, Christ represented His Church, and hence the Church is crucified with Christ; nevertheless she lives by the life of Christ, known and exhibited on earth, through the power of the Holy Ghost. "And when a stranger shall sojourn with thee, and will keep the passover unto the Lord, let all his males be circumcised, and then let him come near and keep it; and he shall be as one that is born in the land: for no uncircumcised person shall eat thereof." "They that are in the flesh cannot please God." (Rom. viii. 8.)
The ordinance of circumcision formed the grand boundary line between the Israel of God and all the nations that were upon the face of the earth; and the cross of the Lord Jesus Christ forms the boundary between the Church and the world. It matters not, in the smallest degree, what advantages of person or position a man possessed, he could have no part with Israel until he submitted to that flesh-cutting operation. A circumcised beggar was nearer to God than an uncircumcised king. So, also, now, there can be no participation in the joys of God's redeemed, save by the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ; and that cross sweeps away all pretensions, levels all distinctions, and unites all in one holy congregation of blood-washed worshipers. The cross forms a boundary so lofty, and a defense so impenetrable, that not a single atom of earth or of nature can cross over or pass through to mingle itself with "the new creation." "_All_ things are of God, who hath reconciled us to Himself." (2 Cor. v. 18.)