2:11
Paul is now moving on to address the whole Jew-Gentile divide, and to demonstrate how this has been completely done away with in Christ. It is worth looking at how he has gone about this so far. The starting point has been God, His sovereignty and His grace and richness towards us. Then he spoke about how we are saved purely by the grace of God, the gift of God, so that no one can boast. There is no room for pride at all. Here Paul starts by looking at the situation the Gentile believers found themselves in. The Jews considered themselves better than the Gentiles. They called the Gentiles “the uncircumcision”, they were excluded from God’s covenant. Paul also notes that circumcision was a mark made by human hands. This is in contrast to the new birth that is something made by God.
2:12
So before Christ the Gentiles were indeed separated from Christ and alienated “from the commonwealth of Israel”. They were strangers to the covenant and the promises, and were without hope and without God in the world. Without Christ their situation was indeed dire. So the Jews had, at one level, a point. But all that was without Christ, and with Christ everything changes, as we shall see.
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