galatians4
- 1And if ye be Christ's, then are ye Abraham's seed, and heirs according to the promise.
- 2Now I say, That the heir, as long as he is a child, differeth nothing from a servant, though he be lord of all;
- 3But is under tutors and governors until the time appointed of the father.
- 4Even so we, when we were children, were in bondage under the elements of the world:
- 5But when the fulness of the time was come, God sent forth his Son, made of a woman, made under the law,
- 6To redeem them that were under the law, that we might receive the adoption of sons.
- 7And because ye are sons, God hath sent forth the Spirit of his Son into your hearts, crying, Abba, Father.
- 8Wherefore thou art no more a servant, but a son; and if a son, then an heir of God through Christ.
- 9Howbeit then, when ye knew not God, ye did service unto them which by nature are no gods.
- 10But now, after that ye have known God, or rather are known of God, how turn ye again to the weak and beggarly elements, whereunto ye desire again to be in bondage?
- 11Ye observe days, and months, and times, and years.
- 12I am afraid of you, lest I have bestowed upon you labour in vain.
- 13Brethren, I beseech you, be as I am; for I am as ye are: ye have not injured me at all.
- 14Ye know how through infirmity of the flesh I preached the gospel unto you at the first.
- 15And my temptation which was in my flesh ye despised not, nor rejected; but received me as an angel of God, even as Christ Jesus.
- 16Where is then the blessedness ye spake of? for I bear you record, that, if it had been possible, ye would have plucked out your own eyes, and have given them to me.
- 17Am I therefore become your enemy, because I tell you the truth?
- 18They zealously affect you, but not well; yea, they would exclude you, that ye might affect them.
- 19But it is good to be zealously affected always in a good thing, and not only when I am present with you.
- 20My little children, of whom I travail in birth again until Christ be formed in you,
- 21I desire to be present with you now, and to change my voice; for I stand in doubt of you.
- 22Tell me, ye that desire to be under the law, do ye not hear the law?
- 23For it is written, that Abraham had two sons, the one by a bondmaid, the other by a freewoman.
- 24But he who was of the bondwoman was born after the flesh; but he of the freewoman was by promise.
- 25Which things are an allegory: for these are the two covenants; the one from the mount Sinai, which gendereth to bondage, which is Agar.
- 26For this Agar is mount Sinai in Arabia, and answereth to Jerusalem which now is, and is in bondage with her children.
- 27But Jerusalem which is above is free, which is the mother of us all.
- 28For it is written, Rejoice, thou barren that bearest not; break forth and cry, thou that travailest not: for the desolate hath many more children than she which hath an husband.
- 29Now we, brethren, as Isaac was, are the children of promise.
- 30But as then he that was born after the flesh persecuted him that was born after the Spirit, even so it is now.
- 31Nevertheless what saith the scripture? Cast out the bondwoman and her son: for the son of the bondwoman shall not be heir with the son of the freewoman.