What does Galatians 4:18 Mean?

Context Summary

How great a loss is it when we allow ourselves to be diverted from the simplicity of faith to trust in ceremonies, rites, and a prescribed routine! Inevitably these bring us into bondage. Let us therefore not pay slavish attention to the outward, but seek to have Christ within, and from within He will become the energy and passion of a new life. Each time we yield to the prompting of His Spirit, there is less of self and more of Him.

In Galatians 4:15 we perhaps have a hint as to the nature of Paul's thorn in the flesh. This reference has led many to suppose that he suffered from acute ophthalmia, or inflammation of the eyes. But nothing diverted him from his soul-travail on behalf of his converts, Galatians 4:19. What a beautiful analogy we may trace between the formation of Christ in the soul and the formation of a chick in the egg! At first the tiny germ of life is hardly discernible amid the viscous matter in which it floats; but, day by day, there is less of this and more of the tiny creature which is being formed. So in regeneration the life of Christ is implanted, which will continue to increase until all of self will be lost in the one infilling Presence. [source]

Chapter Summary: Galatians 4

¹  We were under the law till Christ came, as the heir is under the guardian till he be of age
⁵  But Christ freed us from the law;
⁷  therefore we are servants no longer to it
¹⁴  Paul remembers the Galatians' good will to him, and his to them;
²²  and shows that we are the sons of Abraham by the freewoman