¹Here’s what I’ve been saying. As long as your own children are young, they’re no different from slaves in your house, even though they’re going to own all the property someday.

²Other people take care of them and the property, until they become adults.

³It’s the same with us. When we were children, we were slaves to the basic spiritual powers of the world.

⁴But then the chosen time came, and God sent his Son. He was born to a woman, and he was born under the authority of the law. This was so he could set everyone free who was under the authority of the law.

⁵He wanted us to be adopted as children, with all the rights that children have.

⁶Because you are his children, God has sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts. This is the Spirit who calls out, “Abba , Father!”

⁷So you’re not a slave anymore, you’re God’s own child. And because you’re his child, God has given you all the rights of those who are his children.

⁸At one time you didn’t know God. You were slaves to gods that aren’t really gods at all.

⁹But now you do know God. Even better, God knows you. So why are you turning back to those weak and worthless powers? Do you want to be slaves to them all over again?

¹⁰You’re observing special days and months and seasons and years!

¹¹I’m afraid for you. I’m concerned that somehow I’ve wasted my efforts on you.

¹²I’m begging you, brothers and sisters: Become like me. After all, I became like you. You didn’t do anything wrong to me.

¹³Remember when I first preached the good news to you? I stopped in your area because I was sick.

¹⁴I know that my sickness was hard on you. But you weren’t mean to me, and you didn’t make fun of me. Instead, you welcomed me as if I were an angel of God—as if I were Christ Jesus himself.

¹⁵So why aren’t you treating me the same way now? I know for a fact that if you could have torn out your own eyes and given them to me, you would have.

¹⁶Have I now become your enemy by telling you the truth?

¹⁷Those people are trying hard to win you over, but not for your own good. They want to separate from us so that you’ll be eager to follow them.

¹⁸It’s fine to be eager to do something when it’s for a good purpose. In fact, you should be eager all the time, and not just when I’m with you.

¹⁹My dear children, once again I’m in pain for you, as if I were a woman giving birth. That’s how much I want to see Christ make you like himself.

²⁰I wish I could be with you now and change my tone of voice. I really don’t know what to do with you.

²¹Tell me, you who want to be under the authority of the law: Don’t you know what the law says?

²²It is written that Abraham had two sons, one by a slave woman and the other by a free woman.

²³Abraham’s son by the slave woman was born in the usual way. But his son by the free woman was born because of a promise from God.

²⁴These things are pictures. The two women stand for two covenants. One covenant comes from Mount Sinai, and it gives birth to children who are going to be slaves. That’s Hagar.

²⁵Hagar stands for Mount Sinai in Arabia. She is like the earthly city of Jerusalem, because she and her children are slaves.

²⁶But the heavenly Jerusalem is free, and she is our mother.

²⁷It is written,

“Be glad, woman,

you who have never had children.

Shout for joy and cry out loud,

you who have never had labor pains.

The woman who is all alone has more children

than the woman who has a husband.”

²⁸Brothers and sisters, you are children who were born as a result of God’s promise, just as Isaac was.

²⁹At that time, the son who’d been born in the usual way tried to hurt the other son, who’d been born by the power of the Spirit. It’s the same way now.

³⁰But what does Scripture say? “Get rid of the slave woman and her son. The slave woman’s son will never share the family property with the free woman’s son.”

³¹Brothers and sisters, we’re not children of the slave woman. We’re children of the free woman.