Everyone who has ever had any acquaintance with the Lord knows that in accepting Him there is joy. It is always expected that a new convert will have a beaming countenance and a joyful testimony. So it had been with the Galatians. But now their expressions of thanksgiving had given way to bickering and strife. The first joy and the warmth of the first love was gradually dying away. This was not as it should have been. "The path of the just is as the shining light, that shineth more and more unto the perfect day." Proverbs 4:18, KJV. The just live by faith. When men turn from the faith or attempt to substitute works for it, the light goes out. Jesus said, "These things have I spoken unto you, that My joy might remain in you, and that your joy might be full." John 15:11, KJV. The fountain of life is never exhausted. The supply is never diminished. If therefore our light grows dim and our joy gives place to a dull, monotonous grind, we may know that we have turned aside out of the way of life.

Tell me, you who desire to be under law, do you not hear the law? For it is written that Abraham had two sons, one by a slave and one by a free woman. But the son of the slave was born according to the flesh, the son f the free woman through promise. Now this is an allegory: these two women are two covenants. One is from Mount Sinai, bearing children for slavery; she was Hagar. Now Hagar is Mount Sinai in Arabia; she corresponds to the present Jerusalem, for she is in slavery with her children. But the Jerusalem above is free, and she is our mother. For it is written,

"Rejoice, O barren one that dost not bear;
break forth and shout, thou who art not in travail;
for the desolate hath more children
than she who hath a husband." Verses 21-27.

How many there are who love ways that everybody but themselves can see are leading them directly to death. With their eyes wide open to the consequences of their course, they persist, deliberately choosing "the pleasures of sin for a season," rather than righteousness and length of days. To be "under the law" of God is to be condemned by it as a sinner, chained and doomed to death. Yet many millions besides the Galatians have loved the condition and still love it. If they would only hear what the law says! There is no reason why they should not, for it speaks in thunder tones. "He who has ears to hear, let him hear." Matthew 11:15.

It says, "Cast out the slave and her son; for the son of the slave shall not inherit with the son of the free woman," Verse 30. It speaks death to all who take pleasure in the "beggarly elemental spirits" of the world. "Cursed be everyone who does not abide by all things written in the book of the law, and do them." Galatians 3:10. The poor slave is to be cast out "into outer darkness: there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth." Matthew 25:30, KJV.

"For, behold, the day cometh, that shall burn as an oven; and all the proud, yea, and all that do wickedly, shall be stubble; and the day that cometh shall burn them up, saith the Lord of hosts, that it shall leave them neither root nor branch." Therefore, "Remember ye the law of Moses My servant, which I commanded unto him in Horeb for all Israel, with the statutes and judgments." Malachi 4:1, 4, KJV. All who are "under the law," whether they be called Jews or Gentiles, Christians or heathen, are in bondage to Satan--in the bondage of transgression and sin--and are to be "cast out." "Everyone who commits sin is a slave to sin. The slave does not continue in the house forever; the son continues forever." John 8:34, 35. Thank God, then, for "adoption as sons."

False teachers would persuade the brethren that in turning from wholehearted faith in Christ and trusting to works which they themselves could do, they would become children of Abraham and so heirs of the promises. "They which are the children of the flesh, these are not the children of God; but the children of the promise are counted for the seed." Romans 9:8, KJV. Now, of the two sons of Abraham, one was born after the flesh, and the other was by "promise," born of the Spirit. "By faith Sarah herself received power to conceive, even when she was past the age, since she considered Him faithful who had promised." Hebrews 11:11.

Hagar was an Egyptian slave. The children of a slave woman are slaves, even though their father is free. So Hagar could bring forth children only to bondage.

But long before the servant-child Ishmael was born, the Lord had plainly signified to Abraham that his own free son, born of his free wife Sarah, would inherit the promise. Such are the workings of the Almighty.

The two women, Hagar and Sarah, represent the two covenants. We read that Hagar is Mount Sinai, "bearing children for slavery." Just as Hagar could bring forth only slave children, so the law, even the law that God spoke from Sinai, cannot beget free men. It can do nothing but hold them in bondage. "The law brings wrath," "since through the law comes knowledge of sin. Romans 4:15; 3:20. At Sinai the people promised to kept the given law. But in their own strength they had no power to keep the law.

Mount Sinai "bore children for slavery," since their promise to make themselves righteous by their own works was not successful and can never be.

Consider the situation: The people were in the bondage of sin. They had no power to break their chains. And the speaking of the law made no change in that condition. If a man is in prison for crime, he does not gain release by hearing the statutes read to him. Reading to him the law that put him there only makes his captivity more painful.

Then did not God Himself lead them into bondage? Not by any means, since He did not induce them to make that covenant at Sinai. Four hundred and thirty years before that time He had made a covenant with Abraham which was sufficient for all purposes. That covenant was confirmed in Christ, and therefore was a covenant from above. See John 8:23. It promised righteousness as a free gift of God through faith, and it included all nations. All the miracles that God had wrought in delivering the children of Israel from Egyptian bondage were but demonstrations of His power to deliver them (and us) from the bondage of sin. Yes, the deliverance from Egypt was itself a demonstration not only of God's power but also of His desire to lead them from the bondage of sin.

So, when the people came to Sinai, God simply referred them to what He had already done and then said, "Now therefore, if ye will obey My voice indeed, and keep My covenant, then ye shall be a peculiar treasure unto Me above all people: for all the earth is Mine." Exodus 19:5, KJV. To what covenant did He refer? Evidently to the one already in existence, His covenant with Abraham. If they would simply keep God's covenant, keep the faith, and believe God's promise, they would be a "peculiar treasure" unto God. As the possessor of all the earth, He was able to do for them all that He had promised.

The fact that they in their self-sufficiency rashly took the whole responsibility upon themselves does not prove that God had led them into making that covenant.

If the children of Israel who came out of Egypt had but walked "in the steps of that faith of our father Abraham" (Romans 4:12, KJV), they would never have boasted that they could keep the law spoken from Sinai, "for the promise, that he should be the heir of the world, was not to Abraham, or to his seed, through the law, but through the righteousness of faith." (Romans 4:13, KJV). Faith justifies. Faith makes righteous. If the people had had Abraham's faith, they would have had the righteousness that he had. At Sinai the law, which was "spoken because of transgression," would have been in their hearts. They would not have needed to be awaked by its thunders to a sense of their condition. God never expected, and does not now expect, that any person can get righteousness by the law proclaimed from Sinai, and everything connected with Sinai shows it. Yet the law is truth and must be kept. God delivered the people from Egypt "that they might observe His statutes, and keep His laws." Psalm 105:45, KJV. We do not get life by keeping the commandments, but God gives us life in order that we may keep them through faith in Him.