Slavery vs. Freedom
Genesis 21:1-13; Galatians 4:21-31
"So you are no longer a slave, but a son; and since you are a son, God has made you also an heir."
(GALATIANS 4:7)
One of the exciting things about the Bible is how, from the beginning of Genesis, it reveals God's eternal plan for our redemption in Jesus.Paul, in Galatians, uses the lives of Hagar and Sarah to illustrate the difference between God's Old Testament agreement with His people and the New Testament covenant ushered in through Christ. The slave Hagar and her son born by human plan represent the covenant of the law, which could only point out our slavery to sin. But Sarah, being a free woman and her son the fulfillment of God's promise, represents the covenant of grace begun through Jesus. This new agreement makes us God's children, born into freedom from sin and death, alive by faith, and qualified to share the inheritance of eternal life.
We can't get to heaven by our own good works. The Bible says all our good deeds are like filthy rags (Isaiah 64:6). But by believing in His work on the cross for our sins, we can become sons and daughters of God, heirs with Jesus of the kingdom of heaven.
INSIGHT
"THE CHRISTIAN LIFE IS THAT OUR HEARTS MIGHT BE RESTORED AND SET FREE....JESUS WANTS LIFE FOR US." (JOHN ELDRIDGE)
READ THROUGH THE BIBLE IN A YEAR
Job 39-40
Psalm 61
Luke 24
Genesis 21:1-13
New International Version 1984 (NIV1984)
The Birth of Isaac
21 Now the Lord was gracious to Sarah as he had said, and the Lord did for Sarah what he had promised. 2 Sarah became pregnant and bore a son to Abraham in his old age, at the very time God had promised him. 3 Abraham gave the name Isaac[a] to the son Sarah bore him. 4 When his son Isaac was eight days old, Abraham circumcised him, as God commanded him. 5 Abraham was a hundred years old when his son Isaac was born to him.
6 Sarah said, “God has brought me laughter, and everyone who hears about this will laugh with me.” 7 And she added, “Who would have said to Abraham that Sarah would nurse children? Yet I have borne him a son in his old age.”
Hagar and Ishmael Sent Away
8 The child grew and was weaned, and on the day Isaac was weaned Abraham held a great feast. 9 But Sarah saw that the son whom Hagar the Egyptian had borne to Abraham was mocking, 10 and she said to Abraham, “Get rid of that slave woman and her son, for that slave woman’s son will never share in the inheritance with my son Isaac.”
11 The matter distressed Abraham greatly because it concerned his son. 12 But God said to him, “Do not be so distressed about the boy and your maidservant. Listen to whatever Sarah tells you, because it is through Isaac that your offspring[b] will be reckoned. 13 I will make the son of the maidservant into a nation also, because he is your offspring.”
Footnotes:
a. Genesis 21:3 Isaac means he laughs.
b. Genesis 21:12 Or seed
Galatians 4:21-31
New Living Translation (NLT)
Abraham’s Two Children
21 Tell me, you who want to live under the law, do you know what the law actually says? 22 The Scriptures say that Abraham had two sons, one from his slave wife and one from his freeborn wife.[a] 23 The son of the slave wife was born in a human attempt to bring about the fulfillment of God’s promise. But the son of the freeborn wife was born as God’s own fulfillment of his promise.
24 These two women serve as an illustration of God’s two covenants. The first woman, Hagar, represents Mount Sinai where people received the law that enslaved them. 25 And now Jerusalem is just like Mount Sinai in Arabia,[b] because she and her children live in slavery to the law. 26 But the other woman, Sarah, represents the heavenly Jerusalem. She is the free woman, and she is our mother. 27 As Isaiah said,
“Rejoice, O childless woman,
you who have never given birth!
Break into a joyful shout,
you who have never been in labor!
For the desolate woman now has more children
than the woman who lives with her husband!”[c]
28 And you, dear brothers and sisters, are children of the promise, just like Isaac. 29 But you are now being persecuted by those who want you to keep the law, just as Ishmael, the child born by human effort, persecuted Isaac, the child born by the power of the Spirit.
30 But what do the Scriptures say about that? “Get rid of the slave and her son, for the son of the slave woman will not share the inheritance with the free woman’s son.”[d] 31 So, dear brothers and sisters, we are not children of the slave woman; we are children of the free woman.
Footnotes:
a. Galatians 4:22 See Gen 16:15; 21:2-3.
b. Galatians 4:25 Greek And Hagar, which is Mount Sinai in Arabia, is now like Jerusalem; other manuscripts read And Mount Sinai in Arabia is now like Jerusalem.
c. Galatians 4:27 Isa 54:1.
d. Galatians 4:30 Gen 21:10.
THE GREATEST LOVE [PART 2]
Can you share the gospel in a sentence? It's not as hard as you might think. In fact, the disciple Jesus loved already wrote it for you. All you have to do is know it, believe it, and repeat it.
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