31 Therefore, brothers and sisters, we are not children of the slave woman, but of the free woman.
But - and this is the wonderful thing - God's 'outcasting' of those who trust in good works for salvation, His condemnation of them in His Word, is in mercy, and in tenderness. It is because He loves us that He takes away our props, and everything else we lean on, so that we may at last lean wholly on Him. The law does this condemning work precisely for this reason - to bring us to despair, in order finally to bring us into the glorious liberty of the children of God. Thus it was with Paul and the Galatians - the hard things he said to them were said in love, to bring them to an end of themselves, and to lead them into the liberty of Christ once again. Nor is it different today: the seemingly hard and unpleasant aspects of the Word are meant to smash our self-confidence and self-dependence, and bring us, naked and forlorn, to the true Rock of Ages, where we find salvation. Thus the word from the passage may be regarded as one of tender appeal: Come out from the old covenant - it carries nothing but loss and woe - into the gracious provision of the new. It is possible to change over - Paul did, and oh, the difference it made to him! Well might he cry in 12, 'Be as I am' - and do as I have done, take your stand with the people of God, and enter into His great salvation.