Hosea 3

 

Hosea 3

1 The Lord said to me, “Go, show your love to your wife again, though she is loved by another man and is an adulteress. Love her as the Lord loves the Israelites, though they turn to other gods and love the sacred raisin cakes.”

² So I bought her for fifteen shekels of silver and about a homer and a lethek of barley.

³ Then I told her, “You are to live with me many days; you must not be a prostitute or be intimate with any man, and I will behave the same way toward you.”

⁴ For the Israelites will live many days without king or prince,without sacrifice or sacred stones, without ephod or household gods.

⁵ Afterward the Israelites will return and seek the Lord their God and David their king. They will come trembling to the Lord and to his blessings in the last days.

Exodus 9

 

Exodus 9

1 Then the Lord said to Moses, “Go to Pharaoh and say to him, ‘This is what the Lord, the God of the Hebrews, says: “Let my people go, so that they may worship me.”

² If you refuse to let them go and continue to hold them back,

³ the hand of the Lord will bring a terrible plague on your livestock in the field—on your horses, donkeys and camels and on your cattle, sheep and goats.

⁴ But the Lord will make a distinction between the livestock of Israel and that of Egypt, so that no animal belonging to the Israelites will die.’”

⁵ The Lord set a time and said, “Tomorrow the Lord will do this in the land.”

⁶ And the next day the Lord did it: All the livestock of the Egyptians died, but not one animal belonging to the Israelites died.

⁷ Pharaoh investigated and found that not even one of the animals of the Israelites had died. Yet his heart was unyielding and he would not let the people go.

⁸ Then the Lord said to Moses and Aaron, “Take handfuls of soot from a furnace and have Moses toss it into the air in the presence of Pharaoh.

⁹ It will become fine dust over the whole land of Egypt, and festering boils will break out on people and animals throughout the land.”

¹⁰ So they took soot from a furnace and stood before Pharaoh. Moses tossed it into the air, and festering boils broke out on people and animals.

¹¹ The magicians could not stand before Moses because of the boils that were on them and on all the Egyptians.

¹² But the Lord hardened Pharaoh’s heart and he would not listen to Moses and Aaron, just as the Lord had said to Moses.

¹³ Then the Lord said to Moses, “Get up early in the morning, confront Pharaoh and say to him, ‘This is what the Lord, the God of the Hebrews, says: Let my people go, so that they may worship me,

¹⁴ or this time I will send the full force of my plagues against you and against your officials and your people, so you may know that there is no one like me in all the earth.

¹⁵ For by now I could have stretched out my hand and struck you and your people with a plague that would have wiped you off the earth.

¹⁶ But I have raised you up for this very purpose, that I might show you my power and that my name might be proclaimed in all the earth.

¹⁷ You still set yourself against my people and will not let them go.

¹⁸ Therefore, at this time tomorrow I will send the worst hailstorm that has ever fallen on Egypt, from the day it was founded till now.

¹⁹ Give an order now to bring your livestock and everything you have in the field to a place of shelter, because the hail will fall on every person and animal that has not been brought in and is still out in the field, and they will die.’”

²⁰ Those officials of Pharaoh who feared the word of the Lord hurried to bring their slaves and their livestock inside.

²¹ But those who ignored the word of the Lord left their slaves and livestock in the field.

²² Then the Lord said to Moses, “Stretch out your hand toward the sky so that hail will fall all over Egypt—on people and animals and on everything growing in the fields of Egypt.”

²³ When Moses stretched out his staff toward the sky, the Lord sent thunder and hail, and lightning flashed down to the ground. So the Lord rained hail on the land of Egypt;

²⁴ hail fell and lightning flashed back and forth. It was the worst storm in all the land of Egypt since it had become a nation.

²⁵ Throughout Egypt hail struck everything in the fields—both people and animals; it beat down everything growing in the fields and stripped every tree.

²⁶ The only place it did not hail was the land of Goshen, where the Israelites were.

²⁷ Then Pharaoh summoned Moses and Aaron. “This time I have sinned,” he said to them. “The Lord is in the right, and I and my people are in the wrong.

²⁸ Pray to the Lord, for we have had enough thunder and hail. I will let you go; you don’t have to stay any longer.”

²⁹ Moses replied, “When I have gone out of the city, I will spread out my hands in prayer to the Lord. The thunder will stop and there will be no more hail, so you may know that the earth is the Lord’s.

³⁰ But I know that you and your officials still do not fear the Lord God.”

³¹ (The flax and barley were destroyed, since the barley had headed and the flax was in bloom.

³² The wheat and spelt,however, were not destroyed, because they ripen later.)

³³ Then Moses left Pharaoh and went out of the city. He spread out his hands toward the Lord; the thunder and hail stopped, and the rain no longer poured down on the land.

³⁴ When Pharaoh saw that the rain and hail and thunder had stopped, he sinned again: He and his officials hardened their hearts.

³⁵ So Pharaoh’s heart was hard and he would not let the Israelites go, just as the Lord had said through Moses.

A Woman Who Lead An Army

 

Deborah is the name of the woman who lead an army of Israelites. Deborah the Prophetess is one of my favorites. She inspires me. Of course, I mentioned that before in another post. She is another proof God uses women. Here is her story and song.

Judges 4

1 Again the Israelites did evil in the eyes of the Lord, now that Ehud was dead.

² So the Lord sold them into the hands of Jabin king of Canaan, who reigned in Hazor. Sisera,the commander of his army, was based in Harosheth Haggoyim.

³ Because he had nine hundred chariots fitted with iron and had cruelly oppressed the Israelites for twenty years, they cried to the Lord for help.

⁴ Now Deborah, a prophet, the wife of Lappidoth, was leading Israel at that time.

⁵ She held court under the Palm of Deborah between Ramah and Bethel in the hill country of Ephraim, and the Israelites went up to her to have their disputes decided.

⁶ She sent for Barak son of Abinoam from Kedesh in Naphtali and said to him, “The Lord, the God of Israel, commands you: ‘Go, take with you ten thousand men of Naphtali and Zebulun and lead them up to Mount Tabor.

⁷ I will lead Sisera, the commander of Jabin’s  army, with his chariots and his troops to the Kishon River and give him into your hands. ’”

⁸ Barak said to her, “If you go with me, I will go; but if you don’t go with me, I won’t go.”

⁹ “Certainly I will go with you,” said Deborah. “But because of the course you are taking, the honor will not be yours, for the Lord will deliver Sisera into the hands of a woman.” So Deborah went with Barak to Kedesh.

¹⁰ There Barak summoned Zebulun and Naphtali, and ten thousand men went up under his command. Deborah also went up with him.

¹¹ Now Heber the Kenite had left the other Kenites, the descendants of Hobab, Moses’ brother-in-law, and pitched his tent by the great tree in Zaanannim near Kedesh.

¹² When they told Sisera that Barak son of Abinoam had gone up to Mount Tabor,

¹³ Sisera summoned from Harosheth Haggoyim to the Kishon River all his men and his nine hundred chariots fitted with iron.

¹⁴ Then Deborah said to Barak, “Go! This is the day the Lord has given Sisera into your hands.Has not the Lord gone ahead of you?” So Barak went down Mount Tabor, with ten thousand men following him.

¹⁵ At Barak’s advance, the Lord routed Sisera and all his chariots and army by the sword, and Sisera got down from his chariot and fled on foot.

¹⁶ Barak pursued the chariots and army as far as Harosheth Haggoyim, and all Sisera’s troops fell by the sword; not a man was left.

¹⁷ Sisera, meanwhile, fled on foot to the tent of Jael, the wife of Heber the Kenite, because there was an alliance between Jabin king of Hazor and the family of Heber the Kenite.

¹⁸ Jael went out to meet Sisera and said to him, “Come, my lord, come right in. Don’t be afraid.” So he entered her tent, and she covered him with a blanket.

¹⁹ “I’m thirsty,” he said. “Please give me some water.” She opened a skin of milk, gave him a drink, and covered him up.

²⁰ “Stand in the doorway of the tent,” he told her. “If someone comes by and asks you, ‘Is anyone in there?’ say ‘No.’”

²¹ But Jael, Heber’s wife, picked up a tent peg and a hammer and went quietly to him while he lay fast asleep, exhausted. She drove the peg through his temple into the ground, and he died.

²² Just then Barak came by in pursuit of Sisera, and Jael went out to meet him. “Come,” she said, “I will show you the man you’re looking for.” So he went in with her, and there lay Sisera with the tent peg through his temple—dead.

²³ On that day God subdued Jabin king of Canaan before the Israelites.

²⁴ And the hand of the Israelites pressed harder and harder against Jabin king of Canaan until they destroyed him.

Judges 5

1 On that day Deborah and Barak son of Abinoam sang this song:

² “When the princes in Israel take the lead, when the people willingly offer themselves—praise the Lord!

³ “Hear this, you kings! Listen, you rulers! I, even I, will sing to the Lord; I will praise the Lord, the God of Israel, in song.

⁴ “When you, Lord, went out from Seir, when you marched from the land of Edom, the earth shook, the heavens poured, the clouds poured down water.

⁵ The mountains quaked before the Lord, the One of Sinai, before the Lord, the God of Israel.

⁶ “In the days of Shamgar son of Anath, in the days of Jael, the highways were abandoned; travelers took to winding paths.

⁷ Villagers in Israel would not fight; they held back until I, Deborah, arose, until I arose, a mother in Israel.

⁸ God chose new leaders when war came to the city gates, but not a shield or spear was seen among forty thousand in Israel.

⁹ My heart is with Israel’s princes, with the willing volunteers among the people. Praise the Lord!

¹⁰ “You who ride on white donkeys, sitting on your saddle blankets, and you who walk along the road,
consider

¹¹ the voice of the singers at the watering places. They recite the victories of the Lord, the victories of his villagers in Israel. “Then the people of the Lord went down to the city gates.

¹² ‘Wake up, wake up, Deborah! Wake up, wake up, break out in song! Arise, Barak! Take captive your captives, son of Abinoam.’

¹³ “The remnant of the nobles came down; the people of the Lord came down to me against the mighty.

¹⁴ Some came from Ephraim, whose roots were in Amalek; Benjamin was with the people who followed you. From Makir captains came down, from Zebulun those who bear a commander’s staff.

¹⁵ The princes of Issachar were with Deborah; yes, Issachar was with Barak, sent under his command into the valley. In the districts of Reuben there was much searching of heart.

¹⁶ Why did you stay among the sheep pens to hear the whistling for the flocks? In the districts of Reuben
there was much searching of heart.

¹⁷ Gilead stayed beyond the Jordan. And Dan, why did he linger by the ships? Asher remained on the coast
and stayed in his coves.

¹⁸ The people of Zebulun risked their very lives; so did Naphtali on the terraced fields.

¹⁹ “Kings came , they fought, the kings of Canaan fought. At Taanach, by the waters of Megiddo, they took no plunder of silver.

²⁰ From the heavens the stars fought, from their courses they fought against Sisera.

²¹ The river Kishon swept them away, the age-old river, the river Kishon. March on, my soul; be strong!

²² Then thundered the horses’ hooves—galloping, galloping go his mighty steeds.

²³ ‘Curse Meroz,’ said the angel of the Lord. ‘Curse its people bitterly, because they did not come to help the Lord, to help the Lord against the mighty.’

²⁴ “Most blessed of women be Jael, the wife of Heber the Kenite, most blessed of tent-dwelling women.

²⁵ He asked for water, and she gave him milk; in a bowl fit for nobles she brought him curdled milk.

²⁶ Her hand reached for the tent peg, her right hand for the workman’s hammer. She struck Sisera, she crushed his head, she shattered and pierced his temple.

²⁷ At her feet he sank, he fell; there he lay. At her feet he sank, he fell; where he sank, there he fell—dead .

²⁸ “Through the window peered Sisera’s mother; behind the lattice she cried out, ‘Why is his chariot so long in coming? Why is the clatter of his chariots delayed?’

²⁹ The wisest of her ladies answer her; indeed, she keeps saying to herself,

³⁰ ‘Are they not finding and dividing the spoils: a woman or two for each man, colorful garments as plunder for Sisera, colorful garments embroidered,
highly embroidered garments for my neck—
all this as plunder? ’

³¹ “So may all your enemies perish, Lord! But may all who love you be like the sun when it rises in its strength.” Then the land had peace forty years.

Radical-S.O., Lecrae, J. Williams

 

Galatians 5

 

Galatians 5

1 It is for freedom that Christ has set us free. Stand firm, then, and do not let yourselves be burdened again by a yoke of slavery.

² Mark my words! I, Paul, tell you that if you let yourselves be circumcised, Christ will be of no value to you at all.

³ Again I declare to every man who lets himself be circumcised that he is obligated to obey the whole law.

⁴ You who are trying to be justified by the law have been alienated from Christ; you have fallen away from grace.

⁵ For through the Spirit we eagerly await by faith the righteousness for which we hope.

⁶ For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision nor uncircumcision has any value. The only thing that counts is faith expressing itself through love.

⁷ You were running a good race. Who cut in on you to keep you from obeying the truth?

⁸ That kind of persuasion does not come from the one who calls you.

⁹ “A little yeast works through the whole batch of dough.”

¹⁰ I am confident in the Lord that you will take no other view. The one who is throwing you into confusion, whoever that may be, will have to pay the penalty.

¹¹ Brothers and sisters, if I am still preaching circumcision, why am I still being persecuted? In that case the offense of the cross has been abolished.

¹² As for those agitators, I wish they would go the whole way and emasculate themselves!

¹³ You, my brothers and sisters, were called to be free. But do not use your freedom to indulge the flesh; rather, serve one another humbly in love.

¹⁴ For the entire law is fulfilled in keeping this one command: “Love your neighbor as yourself.”

¹⁵ If you bite and devour each other, watch out or you will be destroyed by each other.

¹⁶ So I say, walk by the Spirit, and you will not gratify the desires of the flesh.

¹⁷ For the flesh desires what is contrary to the Spirit, and the Spirit what is contrary to the flesh. They are in conflict with each other, so that you are not to do whatever you want.

¹⁸ But if you are led by the Spirit, you are not under the law.

¹⁹ The acts of the flesh are obvious: sexual immorality,impurity and debauchery;

²⁰ idolatry and witchcraft; hatred, discord, jealousy, fits of rage, selfish ambition, dissensions, factions

²¹ and envy; drunkenness, orgies, and the like. I warn you, as I did before, that those who live like this will not inherit the kingdom of God.

²² But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness,

²³ gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law.

²⁴ Those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires.

²⁵ Since we live by the Spirit, let us keep in step with the Spirit.

²⁶ Let us not become conceited,provoking and envying each other.

Hosea 2

 

Hosea 2

New International Version (NIV)

1 “Say of your brothers, ‘My people,’ and of your sisters, ‘My loved one.’

² “Rebuke your mother, rebuke her, for she is not my wife, and I am not her husband. Let her remove the adulterous look from her face and the unfaithfulness from between her breasts.

³ Otherwise I will strip her naked and make her as bare as on the day she was born; I will make her like a desert,
turn her into a parched land, and slay her with thirst.

⁴ I will not show my love to her children, because they are the children of adultery.

⁵ Their mother has been unfaithful and has conceived them in disgrace. She said, ‘I will go after my lovers,
who give me my food and my water, my wool and my linen, my olive oil and my drink.’

⁶ Therefore I will block her path with thornbushes; I will wall her in so that she cannot find her way.

⁷ She will chase after her lovers but not catch them; she will look for them but not find them. Then she will say,
‘I will go back to my husband as at first, for then I was better off than now.’

⁸ She has not acknowledged that I was the one who gave her the grain, the new wine and oil, who lavished on her the silver and gold—which they used for Baal.

⁹ “Therefore I will take away my grain when it ripens,
and my new wine when it is ready. I will take back my wool and my linen, intended to cover her naked body.

¹⁰ So now I will expose her lewdness before the eyes of her lovers; no one will take her out of my hands.

¹¹ I will stop all her celebrations: her yearly festivals, her New Moons, her Sabbath days—all her appointed festivals.

¹² I will ruin her vines and her fig trees, which she said were her pay from her lovers; I will make them a thicket,
and wild animals will devour them.

¹³ I will punish her for the days she burned incense to the Baals; she decked herself with rings and jewelry,
and went after her lovers, but me she forgot,” declares the Lord.

¹⁴ “Therefore I am now going to allure her; I will lead her into the wilderness and speak tenderly to her.

¹⁵ There I will give her back her vineyards, and will make the Valley of Achor a door of hope. There she will respond as in the days of her youth, as in the day she came up out of Egypt.

¹⁶ “In that day,” declares the Lord, “you will call me ‘my husband’; you will no longer call me ‘my master.’

¹⁷ I will remove the names of the Baals from her lips; no longer will their names be invoked.

¹⁸ In that day I will make a covenant for them with the beasts of the field, the birds in the sky and the creatures that move along the ground. Bow and sword and battle
I will abolish from the land, so that all may lie down in safety.

¹⁹ I will betroth you to me forever; I will betroth you in righteousness and justice, in love and compassion.

²⁰ I will betroth you in faithfulness, and you will acknowledge the Lord.

²¹ “In that day I will respond,” declares the Lord—“I will respond to the skies, and they will respond to the earth;

²² and the earth will respond to the grain, the new wine and the olive oil, and they will respond to Jezreel.

²³ I will plant her for myself in the land; I will show my love to the one I called ‘Not my loved one.’ I will say to those called ‘Not my people,’ ‘You are my people’;
and they will say, ‘You are my God.’”

Exodus 8

 

Exodus 8

¹ Then the Lord said to Moses, “Go to Pharaoh and say to him, ‘This is what the Lord says: Let my people go, so that they may worship me.

² If you refuse to let them go, I will send a plague of frogs on your whole country.

³ The Nile will teem with frogs. They will come up into your palace and your bedroom and onto your bed, into the houses of your officials and on your people, and into your ovens and kneading troughs.

⁴ The frogs will come up on you and your people and all your officials.’”

⁵ Then the Lord said to Moses, “Tell Aaron, ‘Stretch out your hand with your staff over the streams and canals and ponds, and make frogs come up on the land of Egypt.’”

⁶ So Aaron stretched out his hand over the waters of Egypt, and the frogs came up and covered the land.

⁷ But the magicians did the same things by their secret arts; they also made frogs come up on the land of Egypt.

⁸ Pharaoh summoned Moses and Aaron and said, “Pray to the Lord to take the frogs away from me and my people, and I will let your people go to offer sacrifices to the Lord.”

⁹ Moses said to Pharaoh, “I leave to you the honor of setting the time for me to pray for you and your officials and your people that you and your houses may be rid of the frogs, except for those that remain in the Nile.”

¹⁰ “Tomorrow,” Pharaoh said. Moses replied, “It will be as you say, so that you may know there is no one like the Lord our God.

¹¹ The frogs will leave you and your houses, your officials and your people; they will remain only in the Nile.”

¹² After Moses and Aaron left Pharaoh, Moses cried out to the Lord about the frogs he had brought on Pharaoh.

¹³ And the Lord did what Moses asked. The frogs died in the houses, in the courtyards and in the fields.

¹⁴ They were piled into heaps, and the land reeked of them.

¹⁵ But when Pharaoh saw that there was relief, he hardened his heart and would not listen to Moses and Aaron, just as the Lord had said.

¹⁶ Then the Lord said to Moses, “Tell Aaron, ‘Stretch out your staff and strike the dust of the ground,’ and throughout the land of Egypt the dust will become gnats.”

¹⁷ They did this, and when Aaron stretched out his hand with the staff and struck the dust of the ground, gnats came on people and animals. All the dust throughout the land of Egypt became gnats.

¹⁸ But when the magicians tried to produce gnats by their secret arts, they could not. Since the gnats were on people and animals everywhere,

¹⁹ the magicians said to Pharaoh, “This is the finger of God.” But Pharaoh’s heart was hard and he would not listen, just as the Lord had said.

²⁰ Then the Lord said to Moses, “Get up early in the morning and confront Pharaoh as he goes to the river and say to him, ‘This is what the Lord says: Let my people go, so that they may worship me.

²¹ If you do not let my people go, I will send swarms of flies on you and your officials, on your people and into your houses. The houses of the Egyptians will be full of flies; even the ground will be covered with them.

²² “‘But on that day I will deal differently with the land of Goshen, where my people live; no swarms of flies will be there, so that you will know that I, the Lord, am in this land.

²³ I will make a distinction between my people and your people. This sign will occur tomorrow.’”

²⁴ And the Lord did this. Dense swarms of flies poured into Pharaoh’s palace and into the houses of his officials; throughout Egypt the land was ruined by the flies.

²⁵ Then Pharaoh summoned Moses and Aaron and said, “Go, sacrifice to your God here in the land.”

²⁶ But Moses said, “That would not be right. The sacrifices we offer the Lord our God would be detestable to the Egyptians.And if we offer sacrifices that are detestable in their eyes, will they not stone us?

²⁷ We must take a three-day journey into the wilderness to offer sacrifices to the Lord our God, as he commands us.”

²⁸ Pharaoh said, “I will let you go to offer sacrifices to the Lord your God in the wilderness, but you must not go very far. Now pray for me.”

²⁹ Moses answered, “As soon as I leave you, I will pray to the Lord, and tomorrow the flies will leave Pharaoh and his officials and his people. Only let Pharaoh be sure that he does not act deceitfully again by not letting the people go to offer sacrifices to the Lord.”

³⁰ Then Moses left Pharaoh and prayed to the Lord,

³¹ and the Lord did what Moses asked. The flies left Pharaoh and his officials and his people; not a fly remained.

³² But this time also Pharaoh hardened his heart and would not let the people go.

A Woman Who Helped Lead An Apostate Nation Back To God.

 

This woman’s name is Huldah. Huldah was a prophetess and she didn’t mince words. Huldah told it like it was. This is her story.

2 Chronicles 34:22-33

²² Hilkiah and those the king had sent with him went to speak to the prophet Huldah, who was the wife of Shallum son of Tokhath, the son of Hasrah, keeper of the wardrobe. She lived in Jerusalem, in the New Quarter.

²³ She said to them, “This is what the Lord, the God of Israel, says: Tell the man who sent you to me,

²⁴ ‘This is what the Lord says: I am going to bring disaster on this place and its people—all the curses written in the book that has been read in the presence of the king of Judah.

²⁵ Because they have forsaken me and burned incense to other gods and aroused my anger by all that their hands have made, my anger will be poured out on this place and will not be quenched.’

²⁶ Tell the king of Judah, who sent you to inquire of the Lord, ‘This is what the Lord, the God of Israel, says concerning the words you heard:

²⁷ Because your heart was responsive and you humbled yourself before God when you heard what he spoke against this place and its people, and because you humbled yourself before me and tore your robes and wept in my presence, I have heard you, declares the Lord.

²⁸ Now I will gather you to your ancestors, and you will be buried in peace. Your eyes will not see all the disaster I am going to bring on this place and on those who live here.’” So they took her answer back to the king.

²⁹ Then the king called together all the elders of Judah and Jerusalem.

³⁰ He went up to the temple of the Lord with the people of Judah, the inhabitants of Jerusalem, the priests and the Levites—all the people from the least to the greatest. He read in their hearing all the words of the Book of the Covenant, which had been found in the temple of the Lord.

³¹ The king stood by his pillar and renewed the covenant in the presence of the Lord—to follow the Lord and keep his commands, statutes and decrees with all his heart and all his soul, and to obey the words of the covenant written in this book.

³² Then he had everyone in Jerusalem and Benjamin pledge themselves to it; the people of Jerusalem did this in accordance with the covenant of God, the God of their ancestors.

³³ Josiah removed all the detestable idols from all the territory belonging to the Israelites, and he had all who were present in Israel serve the Lord their God. As long as he lived, they did not fail to follow the Lord, the God of their ancestors.

Fallin’-Trip Lee, J. Paul

 

Galatians 4

 

Galatians 4

1 What I am saying is that as long as an heir is underage, he is no different from a slave, although he owns the whole estate.

² The heir is subject to guardians and trustees until the time set by his father.

³ So also, when we were underage, we were in slavery under the elemental spiritual forces of the world.

⁴ But when the set time had fully come, God sent his Son, born of a woman, born under the law,

⁵ to redeem those under the law, that we might receive adoption to sonship.

⁶ Because you are his sons, God sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, the Spirit who calls out, “Abba, Father.”

⁷ So you are no longer a slave, but God’s child; and since you are his child, God has made you also an heir.

⁸ Formerly, when you did not know God, you were slaves to those who by nature are not gods.

⁹ But now that you know God—or rather are known by God—how is it that you are turning back to those weak and miserable forces? Do you wish to be enslaved by them all over again?

¹⁰ You are observing special days and months and seasons and years!

¹¹ I fear for you, that somehow I have wasted my efforts on you.

¹² I plead with you, brothers and sisters, become like me, for I became like you. You did me no wrong.

¹³ As you know, it was because of an illness that I first preached the gospel to you,

¹⁴ and even though my illness was a trial to you, you did not treat me with contempt or scorn. Instead, you welcomed me as if I were an angel of God, as if I were Christ Jesus himself.

¹⁵ Where, then, is your blessing of me now? I can testify that, if you could have done so, you would have torn out your eyes and given them to me.

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

¹⁷ Those people are zealous to win you over, but for no good. What they want is to alienate you from us, so that you may have zeal for them.

¹⁸ It is fine to be zealous, provided the purpose is good, and to be so always, not just when I am with you.

¹⁹ My dear children, for whom I am again in the pains of childbirth until Christ is formed in you,

²⁰ how I wish I could be with you now and change my tone, because I am perplexed about you!

²¹ Tell me, you who want to be under the law, are you not aware of what the law says?

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

²³ His son by the slave woman was born according to the flesh, but his son by the free woman was born as the result of a divine promise.

²⁴ These things are being taken figuratively: The women represent two covenants. One covenant is from Mount Sinai and bears children who are to be slaves: This is Hagar.

²⁵ Now Hagar stands for Mount Sinai in Arabia and corresponds to the present city of Jerusalem, because she is in slavery with her children.

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

²⁷ For it is written: “Be glad, barren woman, you who never bore a child; shout for joy and cry aloud, you who were never in labor; because more are the children of the desolate woman than of her who has a husband.”

²⁸ Now you, brothers and sisters, like Isaac, are children of promise.

²⁹ At that time the son born according to the flesh persecuted the son born by the power of the Spirit. It is the same now.

³⁰ But what does Scripture say? “Get rid of the slave woman and her son, for the slave woman’s son will never share in the inheritance with the free woman’s son.”

³¹ Therefore, brothers and sisters, we are not children of the slave woman, but of the free woman.