But God spoke like this: ‘His descendants will be foreigners in a foreign land, and they will enslave them and mistreat them four hundred years,
and the nation that they will serve as slaves, I will judge,’ God said, ‘and after these things they will come out and will worship me in this place.’
knowing this, that our old man was crucified together with him, in order that the body of sin may be done away with, that we may no longer be enslaved to sin.
Do you not know that to whomever you present yourselves as slaves for obedience, you are slaves to whomever you obey, whether sin, leading to death, or obedience, leading to righteousness?
But thanks be to God that you were slaves of sin, but you have obeyed from the heart the pattern of teaching to which you were entrusted,
and having been set free from sin, you became enslaved to righteousness.
(I am speaking in human terms because of the weakness of your flesh.) For just as you presented your members as slaves to immorality and lawlessness, leading to lawlessness, so now present your members as slaves to righteousness, leading to sanctification.
For you have not received a spirit of slavery leading to fear again, but you have received the Spirit of adoption, by whom we cry out, “Abba! Father!”