| [an error occurred while processing this directive] | English Standard Version |
| 1[an error occurred while processing this directive] | 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, |
| 2[an error occurred while processing this directive] | 2but he is under guardians and managers until the date set by his father. |
| 3[an error occurred while processing this directive] | 3In the same way we also, when we were children, were enslaved to the elementary principles of the world. |
| 4[an error occurred while processing this directive] | 4But when the fullness of time had come, God sent forth his Son, born of woman, born under the law, |
| 5[an error occurred while processing this directive] | 5to redeem those who were under the law, so that we might receive adoption as sons. |
| 6[an error occurred while processing this directive] | 6And because you are sons, God has sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, crying, “Abba! Father!” |
| 7[an error occurred while processing this directive] | 7So you are no longer a slave, but a son, and if a son, then an heir through God. |
| 8[an error occurred while processing this directive] | 8Formerly, when you did not know God, you were enslaved to those that by nature are not gods. |
| 9[an error occurred while processing this directive] | 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? |
| 10[an error occurred while processing this directive] | 10You observe days and months and seasons and years! |
| 11[an error occurred while processing this directive] | 11I am afraid I may have labored over you in vain. |
| 12[an error occurred while processing this directive] | 12Brothers, I entreat you, become as I am, for I also have become as you are. You did me no wrong. |
| 13[an error occurred while processing this directive] | 13You know it was because of a bodily ailment that I preached the gospel to you at first, |
| 14[an error occurred while processing this directive] | 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. |
| 15[an error occurred while processing this directive] | 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. |
| 16[an error occurred while processing this directive] | 16Have I then become your enemy by telling you the truth? |
| 17[an error occurred while processing this directive] | 17They make much of you, but for no good purpose. They want to shut you out, that you may make much of them. |
| 18[an error occurred while processing this directive] | 18It is always good to be made much of for a good purpose, and not only when I am present with you, |
| 19[an error occurred while processing this directive] | 19my little children, for whom I am again in the anguish of childbirth until Christ is formed in you! |
| 20[an error occurred while processing this directive] | 20I wish I could be present with you now and change my tone, for I am perplexed about you. |
| 21[an error occurred while processing this directive] | 21Tell me, you who desire to be under the law, do you not listen to the law? |
| 22[an error occurred while processing this directive] | 22For it is written that Abraham had two sons, one by a slave woman and one by a free woman. |
| 23[an error occurred while processing this directive] | 23But the son of the slave was born according to the flesh, while the son of the free woman was born through promise. |
| 24[an error occurred while processing this directive] | 24Now this may be interpreted allegorically: these women are two covenants. One is from Mount Sinai, bearing children for slavery; she is Hagar. |
| 25[an error occurred while processing this directive] | 25Now Hagar is Mount Sinai in Arabia; she corresponds to the present Jerusalem, for she is in slavery with her children. |
| 26[an error occurred while processing this directive] | 26But the Jerusalem above is free, and she is our mother. |
| 27[an error occurred while processing this directive] | 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.” |
| 28[an error occurred while processing this directive] | 28Now you, brothers, like Isaac, are children of promise. |
| 29[an error occurred while processing this directive] | 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. |
| 30[an error occurred while processing this directive] | 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.” |
| 31[an error occurred while processing this directive] | 31So, brothers, we are not children of the slave but of the free woman. |
| [an error occurred while processing this directive] | ESV Text Edition: 2016. The ESV® Bible (The Holy Bible, English Standard Version®) copyright © 2001 by Crossway Bibles, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers. The ESV® text has been reproduced in cooperation with and by permission of Good News Publishers. Unauthorized reproduction of this publication is prohibited. All rights reserved. |
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