God’s Timeline – Part 12
Cain
and Abel
Pastor Bruce A. Shields
House
of Faith Church | www.PS127.org | www.TruthDigest.org
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SERMON INTRODUCTION
-
Creation Week
-
Adam, Eve, and the Fall
-
Cain and Abel
SCRIPTURE READING
Genesis 4:1-16
“Adam made love to his wife Eve, and she became pregnant and
gave birth to Cain. She said, “With the help of the Lord I have brought forth a
man.” 2 Later she gave birth to his brother Abel.
Now Abel kept flocks, and Cain worked the soil. 3 In the
course of time Cain brought some of the fruits of the soil as an offering to
the Lord. 4 And Abel also brought an offering—fat portions from some of the
firstborn of his flock. The Lord looked with favor on Abel and his offering, 5
but on Cain and his offering he did not look with favor. So Cain was very
angry, and his face was downcast.
6 Then the Lord said to Cain, “Why are you angry? Why is
your face downcast? 7 If you do what is right, will you not be accepted? But if
you do not do what is right, sin is crouching at your door; it desires to have
you, but you must rule over it.”
8 Now Cain said to his brother Abel, “Let’s go out to the
field.” While they were in the field, Cain attacked his brother Abel and killed
him.
9 Then the Lord said to Cain, “Where is your brother Abel?”
“I don’t know,” he replied. “Am I my brother’s keeper?”
10 The Lord said, “What have you done? Listen! Your
brother’s blood cries out to me from the ground. 11 Now you are under a curse
and driven from the ground, which opened its mouth to receive your brother’s
blood from your hand. 12 When you work the ground, it will no longer yield its
crops for you. You will be a restless wanderer on the earth.”
13 Cain said to the Lord, “My punishment is more than I can
bear. 14 Today you are driving me from the land, and I will be hidden from your
presence; I will be a restless wanderer on the earth, and whoever finds me will
kill me.”
15 But the Lord said to him, “Not so; anyone who kills Cain
will suffer vengeance seven times over.” Then the Lord put a mark on Cain so
that no one who found him would kill him. 16 So Cain went out from the Lord’s
presence and lived in the land of Nod, east of Eden.”
I.
CAIN AND
ABEL
a. Cain and Abel were born
i.
Cain was born first,
and then Abel
b. They both worked and gave offerings to the Lord
God
i.
Herein lies the
problem. In Genesis 3 after Adam and Eve were given their punishments for
their unconfessed/repented sins, the Lord God established the sacrificial
system.
ii.
The Lord God
sacrificed an animal and made “coverings” for Adam and Eve
iii.
From that point on,
offerings to the Lord God would be animals
c. A command was given about offerings
i.
Just as Adam and Eve
disobeyed God’s command in the Garden, we see here that Cain too was ignoring
the command of God
ii.
When God gives a
command, it is not a suggestion, or a guide that you can manipulate, change or
do “your way”
iii.
If God says, “do not
eat of that tree,” then you don’t eat of that tree.
iv.
If God says, animal
sacrifice shall be made as a covering for your sin, and you will do this as an
offering to me, then that’s what you do.
1. Abel gave offerings of the first born of his flock,
symbolic of God giving His first born as an offering for our sin.
2. Cain decided to give the fruit of the land (from his
garden) to God
3. God said in Genesis 3:17
“…cursed is the ground because of you…”
4. First, Lord gave example in the Garden of
sacrifice offerings, secondly nothing else would do, especially the fruit from
a cursed ground for an offering to the Lord
v.
This is why the Lord
looked with favor upon Abel’s offering and not Cain’s
II.
CRIME AND
PUNISHMENT, AGAIN
a. Cain ignored the Lord God’s “call” / discipline
i.
However, the Lord
tried to discipline Cain
ii.
When we begin to
wander from the narrow path, the Lord will call out to us and discipline us in
an effort to correct our path.
iii.
Discipline means
“training” or “correcting ones path”
iv.
Genesis
4:5b-7 “So Cain was very angry,
and his face was downcast.
6 Then the Lord said to
Cain, “Why are you angry? Why is your face downcast? 7 If you do what is right,
will you not be accepted? But if you do not do what is right, sin is crouching
at your door; it desires to have you, but you must rule over it.”
v.
Cain had the perfect
opportunity to correct the path he was on, which was a trail of temptation that
led to sin
b. Cain kills his brother Abel
i.
Cain calls his brother
to the field and attacked and killed Abel
c. We don’t know how though
i.
Another example of the
Mandela Effect
1. This is the phenomenon where a large number of
people remember something differently than how it occurred.
ii.
Just like people
believing Eve ate an apple, or the deceiver in the Garden was a snake.
iii.
The Bible never tells
us “how” Cain killed Abel, just that he did.
iv.
The fact that Cain
worked the land as a farmer means he probably had access to many different
tools which could easily be used as a weapon.
III.
THE LORD
GOD AND HIS MERCY
a. The Lord God offers confession / repentance /
forgiveness
i.
So we see a parallel
between inside the Garden and outside the garden
ii.
Adam & Eve, Cain
& Abel
iii.
Command, Don’t eat of the tree, Offerings of animals
iv.
Temptation, eat of the tree, kill your brother
v.
Time to resist, Eve could have returned to Adam, Cain could listen
to the Lord
vi.
SIN, Ate of the tree, Killed brother
vii.
Opportunity
to Confess/repent/forgiveness, Adam
& Eve blame others, Cain lies
b. Cain chooses to lie
i.
The Lord offered
discipline to Cain, and if Cain would have listened, he could have avoided the
sin
ii.
Instead, his
temptation followed turned to sin
iii.
The Lord asks Cain
where Abel is
1.
Not because He didn’t
know, but because He was offering to Cain an opportunity to confess, just as He
did to Adam and Eve
2.
Instead of confession,
Cain decides to lie
c. So the punishment is handed down
i.
The Lord says, Your
brothers blood cries to me from the ground, now YOU are under a curse.
1. Abel was the first person to go to Sheol, the place
of departed spirits, to what would later be called Abraham’s
2. We know from scripture Sheol is beneath the earth and
the holding place for disobedient in Torment, as well as righteous in Paradise,
later called Abraham’s bosom.
3. Jesus tells us in Luke 16
that there is a great gulf between the two, but the rich man in Torment could
still see and talk to Lazarus and Abraham in Paradise.
4. Since the cross, Jesus has “led the captives free”,
and there are no longer righteous souls in Abraham’s bosom. Scriptures tell us
now, to be apart from the body is to be present with the Lord.
5. Unrighteous still go to Torment to await Judgment
Day where Jesus tells us Gehenna awaits them.
ii.
The Lord tells Cain
that the ground will no longer respond to his labor. He can work it but it will
not yield food for him.
iii.
The Lord also makes
him leave the land, and become a wanderer
iv.
God then marks Cain so
no one would kill him
1. We do not know what the mark was, perhaps even a
tattoo on his head saying thou shalt not murder?
2. This does not mean Cain lived forever, just that no
one would kill him
3. He was to be an example to others of God’s
commandment, thou shall not murder
CONCLUSION –
We see here a parallel
between Adam and Eve in the Garden, and Cain and Abel in the land outside of
the garden.
God gives a command, and
as long as we obey it, we are considered righteous, and obedient, and we are
then capable of being part of the Kingdom of God and commune with the Lord God.
However, disobedience is
waiting there, (sin) the Lord says, “If you do what is not right, sin is
crouching at your door, it desires to have you, but you must rule over it.”
Giving in to the
temptations of sin and committing the sin breaks the communion between us and a
holy God. Cain said when being given his punishment, “I will be hidden from
your presence; I will be a restless wanderer on the earth…”
There are many out there
today who are restless wanderers because their disobedience (sin) has broken
their communion with a holy God. They will find no peace nor rest. Their
emptiness is the void created when they lost the presence of the Lord in their
lives.
The Lord God offers
forgiveness.
Daniel 9:9-10 “The
Lord our God is merciful and forgiving, even though we have rebelled against
him; 10 we have not obeyed the Lord our God or kept the laws he gave us through
his servants the prophets.”
1 John 1:9 “If
we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to
cleanse us from all unrighteousness.”
And who can forget the
story of the prodigal son? A perfect example of God’s love and forgiveness,
even when one chooses to follow sin, but returns to confess and repent from
that sin!
Luke 15:20
“And he arose and came to his father. But while he was still a long way off,
his father saw him and felt compassion, and ran and embraced him and kissed
him.”
Next week we will read about the wickedness of mankind filling the earth
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