Galatians 4

Sons and Heirs

¹I mean that the heir, as long as he is a child, is no different from a slave, though he is the owner of everything,²but he is under guardians and managers until the date set by his father.³In the same way we also, when we were children, were enslaved to the elementary principles of the world.⁴But when the fullness of time had come, God sent forth his Son, born of woman, born under the law,⁵to redeem those who were under the law, so that we might receive adoption as sons.⁶And because you are sons, God has sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, crying, “Abba! Father!”⁷So you are no longer a slave, but a son, and if a son, then an heir through God.

Paul's Concern for the Galatians

⁸Formerly, when you did not know God, you were enslaved to those that by nature are not gods.⁹But now that you have come to know God, or rather to be known by God, how can you turn back again to the weak and worthless elementary principles of the world, whose slaves you want to be once more?¹⁰You observe days and months and seasons and years!¹¹I am afraid I may have labored over you in vain.

¹²Brothers, I entreat you, become as I am, for I also have become as you are. You did me no wrong.¹³You know it was because of a bodily ailment that I preached the gospel to you at first,¹⁴and though my condition was a trial to you, you did not scorn or despise me, but received me as an angel of God, as Christ Jesus.¹⁵What then has become of your blessedness? For I testify to you that, if possible, you would have gouged out your eyes and given them to me.¹⁶Have I then become your enemy by telling you the truth?¹⁷They make much of you, but for no good purpose. They want to shut you out, that you may make much of them.¹⁸It is always good to be made much of for a good purpose, and not only when I am present with you,¹⁹my little children, for whom I am again in the anguish of childbirth until Christ is formed in you!²⁰I wish I could be present with you now and change my tone, for I am perplexed about you.

Example of Hagar and Sarah

²¹Tell me, you who desire to be under the law, do you not listen to the law?²²For it is written that Abraham had two sons, one by a slave woman and one by a free woman.²³But the son of the slave was born according to the flesh, while the son of the free woman was born through promise.²⁴Now this may be interpreted allegorically: these women are two covenants. One is from Mount Sinai, bearing children for slavery; she is Hagar.²⁵Now Hagar is Mount Sinai in Arabia; she corresponds to the present Jerusalem, for she is in slavery with her children.²⁶But the Jerusalem above is free, and she is our mother.²⁷For it is written,

“Rejoice, O barren one who does not bear;

break forth and cry aloud, you who are not in labor!

For the children of the desolate one will be more

than those of the one who has a husband.”

²⁸Now you, brothers, like Isaac, are children of promise.²⁹But just as at that time he who was born according to the flesh persecuted him who was born according to the Spirit, so also it is now.³⁰But what does the Scripture say? “Cast out the slave woman and her son, for the son of the slave woman shall not inherit with the son of the free woman.”³¹So, brothers, we are not children of the slave but of the free woman.