WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:06.160 Let's read together from the Old Testament, from Genesis chapter 4, verses 1 to 16. 00:00:06.160 --> 00:00:12.580 Now Adam knew his wife Eve, and she conceived and bore Cain, saying, 00:00:13.240 --> 00:00:18.740 I have gotten a man with the help of the Lord. And again she bore his brother Abel. Now Abel was a 00:00:18.740 --> 00:00:23.719 keeper of sheep, and Cain a worker of the ground. In the course of time, Cain brought to the Lord an 00:00:23.719 --> 00:00:28.420 offering of the fruit of the ground. And Abel also brought of the firstborn of his flock and of their 00:00:28.420 --> 00:00:34.320 fat portions. And the Lord had regard for Abel and his offering, but for Cain and his offering he had 00:00:34.320 --> 00:00:41.740 no regard. So Cain was very angry, and his face fell. The Lord said to Cain, why are you angry, and why is 00:00:41.740 --> 00:00:48.120 your face fallen? If you do well, will you not be accepted? And if you do not do well, sin is crouching 00:00:48.120 --> 00:00:55.359 at the door. Its desire is for you, and you must rule over it. Cain spoke to Abel his brother, and when 00:00:55.359 --> 00:01:00.420 they were in the field, Cain rose up against his brother Abel and killed him. Then the Lord said to 00:01:00.420 --> 00:01:06.640 Cain, where is Abel your brother? He said, I do not know. Am I my brother's keeper? And the Lord said, 00:01:06.799 --> 00:01:12.140 what have you done? The voice of your brother's blood is crying to me from the ground, and now you 00:01:12.140 --> 00:01:17.500 are cursed from the ground, which has opened its mouth. Receive your brother's blood from your hand. 00:01:18.079 --> 00:01:23.079 When you work the ground, it shall no longer yield to you its strength. You shall be a fugitive and a 00:01:23.079 --> 00:01:29.719 wanderer on the earth. Cain said to the Lord, my punishment is greater than I can bear. Behold, 00:01:29.719 --> 00:01:34.739 you have driven me today away from the ground, and from your face I shall be hidden. I shall be a 00:01:34.739 --> 00:01:40.659 fugitive and a wanderer on the earth, and whoever finds me will kill me. Then the Lord said to him, 00:01:40.959 --> 00:01:47.859 not so. If anyone kills Cain, vengeance shall be taken on him sevenfold. And the Lord put a mark on 00:01:47.859 --> 00:01:53.120 Cain, lest any who found him should attack him. Then Cain went away from the presence of the Lord 00:01:53.120 --> 00:02:00.620 and settled in the land of Nod, east of Eden. This is God's holy word. We start a new series today 00:02:00.620 --> 00:02:06.920 from Genesis 4 through Genesis 11 that'll take us through the month of November. And the overall 00:02:06.920 --> 00:02:13.020 title for the sermon series is Grace Among the Ruins. And the reason for that is Genesis 4 to 11 00:02:13.020 --> 00:02:20.980 is this section of stories about God's excessive grace that always extends farther than human 00:02:20.979 --> 00:02:26.780 corruption extends. So these are fall stories, decline stories. And in every one of them, there's a sense 00:02:26.780 --> 00:02:33.459 that things are getting worse and worse and worse with humanity. And we talk about creation and then 00:02:33.459 --> 00:02:42.079 the fall. So the big story of the Bible, creation, fall, redemption, new creation. And Genesis 3 is all 00:02:42.079 --> 00:02:46.759 about the fall. But really, when you read Genesis carefully, you begin to realize that the fall 00:02:46.759 --> 00:02:53.799 is a series of stories, not just one. So the original fall happens in Genesis 3, the fall into sin. 00:02:54.259 --> 00:03:00.859 But Genesis 4 to 11 is a long narrative of deeper and deeper fall stories out of the frying pan, 00:03:00.959 --> 00:03:05.560 into the fire. It gets worse and worse every single section you go through this part of the Bible. 00:03:06.699 --> 00:03:12.879 And the word fall that we use to describe sin entering the world actually first shows up in Genesis 4, 00:03:12.879 --> 00:03:19.219 not Genesis 3. So in verse 5, it says that Cain's face had fallen. So that's the first use of the 00:03:19.219 --> 00:03:25.180 word fall that we use for sin. And it's really talking about depression there, about being downcast 00:03:25.180 --> 00:03:30.079 and despair and anger and hatred and envy and all the sins of the soul that are going on in his heart. 00:03:30.500 --> 00:03:35.439 So that's the way the first word fall is used. But also, this is the first time the word sin is ever 00:03:35.439 --> 00:03:42.300 used in the Bible. In Genesis 4 verse 7, so you have that reference to sin is crouching at the door. 00:03:42.300 --> 00:03:48.380 So this is the first time we see these words. That tells us that this chapter is about sin. 00:03:49.180 --> 00:03:54.200 The theme is very clear. It's about sin. It's about the fall. It's strange to think about this, 00:03:54.260 --> 00:04:00.380 but I think it must be true, right? That there was a first time for every type of sin that's ever 00:04:00.380 --> 00:04:07.260 been committed. And this is the first time murder is ever committed in human history. And there has 00:04:07.260 --> 00:04:12.160 been so much murder since, and of course still is every week in this world. But here we have the very 00:04:12.159 --> 00:04:18.439 first instance of it. I was joking with the musicians before the service and this week with a couple 00:04:18.439 --> 00:04:22.500 of people who asked, what is the sermon going to be about? And I said, well, the application is 00:04:22.500 --> 00:04:29.920 relatively clear. Do not murder your siblings. Case closed. That's bad. We learned that here in Genesis 4. 00:04:31.459 --> 00:04:37.100 But of course, the event of murder that takes place in the story is just the tip of the iceberg. 00:04:37.939 --> 00:04:45.560 It's about the depth of sin. And you get in these stories a definition of sin, not by way of theological 00:04:45.560 --> 00:04:50.840 proposition. So this doesn't read like a systematic theology that tells you here's what sin is. Instead, 00:04:51.220 --> 00:04:58.240 what you get is stories that are explaining human corruption and sin to you. And this is definitely 00:04:58.240 --> 00:05:03.740 one of them. Now, maybe the question then at the start of this sermon series is, do you believe in sin? 00:05:03.740 --> 00:05:10.680 And that's a very important question because, you know, that so many people, the sociologists of 00:05:10.680 --> 00:05:17.780 Edinburgh today want to say that sin is a pre-modern concept that was used by people that stand in very 00:05:17.780 --> 00:05:24.439 tall pulpits to convey social control over others, and that we need liberation from the concept of sin 00:05:24.439 --> 00:05:29.660 if we're really to ever be free in this world. But I think the question is, if you don't have a concept 00:05:29.660 --> 00:05:35.620 for sin, what kind of words do you use to describe the big problems of this world? And some of those 00:05:35.620 --> 00:05:43.780 might be things like trauma and self-interest and dysfunction, and one of the most common is 00:05:43.780 --> 00:05:49.580 maladaptive behavior. And all of those describe something true about the problems of humanity. 00:05:49.579 --> 00:05:57.159 But if you don't have a bigger bucket to drop those words into where they make sense, 00:05:58.000 --> 00:06:03.680 if you're not able to say that sin is actually the expression of moral corruption against God 00:06:03.680 --> 00:06:08.479 Himself who created the moral order, then how can you talk about any of those words actually describing 00:06:08.479 --> 00:06:14.419 something that's morally wrong? Do you have a category of morality at all? But here we see, 00:06:14.420 --> 00:06:20.460 I think in the human experience and in these stories, that sin is real. Sin is real. And we learn 00:06:20.460 --> 00:06:27.280 more and more each week about sin through the lens of this section of the Bible. Sin is a power in your 00:06:27.280 --> 00:06:35.840 life. It's a force. It is a predator. It is a parasite that shouldn't exist but leeches onto the good. 00:06:36.280 --> 00:06:43.240 It is a state of being. It's also an action and a thought. And each week we'll see something more about 00:06:43.240 --> 00:06:50.220 that. Today, this story tells us about the estrangement that sin brings, the coldness of sin, 00:06:50.319 --> 00:06:57.720 the potential of sin, and then grace, excessive grace really, of God to the earliest sinners in human 00:06:57.720 --> 00:07:05.480 history. So first, we learn here about the estrangement of sin. So in verse 1 and 2, you'll see Adam and Eve, 00:07:05.920 --> 00:07:13.139 they have a firstborn son. His name is Cain. And the Lord brings forth this son, Cain, for Adam and Eve. 00:07:13.699 --> 00:07:19.199 And then right after that, they have a second son, Abel. So there's an elder brother and there's a 00:07:19.199 --> 00:07:24.519 younger brother. The elder brother is a farmer. The younger brother is a shepherd. And we don't know 00:07:24.519 --> 00:07:30.100 a ton else about them or their differences. But then if you look at this peculiar phrase that the 00:07:30.100 --> 00:07:33.579 commentators tell us in verse 3, it says that, 00:07:33.579 --> 00:07:37.620 in the course of time, Cain brought an offering to the Lord. So that little phrase, 00:07:37.959 --> 00:07:46.079 in the course of time, seems to be a liturgical term. So something like, in the right time, 00:07:46.120 --> 00:07:53.139 at the appropriate time, Cain brought an offering. So we've got this development here in very subtle 00:07:53.139 --> 00:08:02.759 ways of a who, a when, a what, a where. And the who is the sons of Adam. The what is at the right, 00:08:02.879 --> 00:08:06.699 I should say the when, is the right time. Maybe even, maybe it's a reference to the Sabbath. 00:08:07.139 --> 00:08:13.560 They knew when to do this. And what did they do? They brought an offering, a sacrifice to God. And 00:08:13.560 --> 00:08:19.000 it's bringing it to God, to His presence. Meaning they knew where to bring it. And if you read the 00:08:19.000 --> 00:08:23.560 rest of the Torah, the first five books, you realize that you bring it where? To an altar that 00:08:23.560 --> 00:08:31.180 God has told you to come to. And so this is the earliest moment in human history of a sacrifice, 00:08:31.540 --> 00:08:38.740 of an offering. And I don't know if you've ever thought about this, but Cain and Abel here are 00:08:38.740 --> 00:08:43.779 behaving, without any text explaining this, that they're behaving like priests. Like you will see 00:08:43.779 --> 00:08:50.720 the priests behave later on. And another, maybe something, thought that struck you before is that 00:08:50.720 --> 00:08:56.659 if you look at all the world religions, barring only a few that we've ever found, every single one 00:08:56.659 --> 00:09:04.759 of the world religions contains sacrifice or offerings as the central mechanism of how people 00:09:04.759 --> 00:09:11.459 approach the divine. And right here in the beginning of this story, right after sin has entered the world, 00:09:11.460 --> 00:09:18.040 right after they have exited the Garden of Eden, there is no instructions. There's no laws. God 00:09:18.040 --> 00:09:23.180 doesn't do what He will do later in Leviticus and say, now therefore there's an altar here and you have 00:09:23.180 --> 00:09:28.639 to bring a sacrifice here and you're a priest and this is how it all works. Instead, we see this instinct 00:09:28.639 --> 00:09:35.680 in humanity, the sons of Adam to priests, to bring an offering, to bring a sacrifice because they feel 00:09:35.680 --> 00:09:39.920 the weight of what sin has cost them. And what it's cost them is estrangement from God. 00:09:39.919 --> 00:09:46.699 And ever since then, all of humanity and every civilization, every culture, every world religion 00:09:46.699 --> 00:09:52.620 that's ever existed has brought sacrifices and offerings. Why? Because the human heart knows 00:09:52.620 --> 00:09:59.059 that we are estranged from God and that there is an estrangement from God, from the divine, that can 00:09:59.059 --> 00:10:04.240 only be fixed by way of sacrifice, by way of offering. And so it's just instinctive that humanity 00:10:04.240 --> 00:10:12.560 begins to do this. If you think about your own life, if you hurt somebody that you love, if you hurt 00:10:12.560 --> 00:10:19.060 somebody that you love, what do you do? If you want to repair the relationship, you say, you know, I will 00:10:19.060 --> 00:10:27.060 do anything to make up for it. I will give my time away. I'll give my money away. I'll buy you gifts. 00:10:27.059 --> 00:10:33.339 I will own the fault that's been committed by me, and I'll swallow my pride, and I will say, I want to 00:10:33.339 --> 00:10:38.379 make a sacrifice before you because I want to repair this relationship. And so we do this instinctively 00:10:38.379 --> 00:10:43.639 in the normal rhythms of life. And then if you read the Bible, you read ancient history at all, you know 00:10:43.639 --> 00:10:50.079 that the Greeks had their tabernacles and temples, and the Romans, and the Vedic priest of Indian 00:10:50.079 --> 00:10:55.199 religion, and the many forms of Hinduism. Humanity has been bringing sacrifices for all of human history, 00:10:55.200 --> 00:11:01.200 and it is because we are estranged from the real God. And it's instinctive to feel that way and to 00:11:01.200 --> 00:11:06.720 know that I need to repair this relationship. I need to do something to be able to come home again, 00:11:06.980 --> 00:11:11.800 to be able to step back through the gate of the garden, back into the holy presence of the real God, 00:11:11.879 --> 00:11:17.020 the living God. All the world religions, they're instinctively right that we owe something to bring, 00:11:17.320 --> 00:11:21.379 to go back into God's presence. But of course, they offer it to the wrong thing, the wrong person, 00:11:21.379 --> 00:11:29.240 to just an idol. And when you read the Bible, you realize that sacrifice is saying three things, 00:11:29.399 --> 00:11:35.200 three things that the human heart longs to say to God. Number one, it's an offering where you're 00:11:35.200 --> 00:11:41.059 saying, when I bring crops, when I bring grain, when I bring a lamb, God, you are worth more to me 00:11:41.059 --> 00:11:46.379 than all of this stuff in my life. That's the offering. But it also says, I need to repair with you. 00:11:46.379 --> 00:11:52.720 So sacrifice is an acknowledgement that I know something else has to be burned up in my place, 00:11:52.779 --> 00:11:58.100 in my stead, that I deserve death for what I've done before you. And only something standing in 00:11:58.100 --> 00:12:02.879 my place can actually repair the justice, the injustice of that relationship. And then the 00:12:02.879 --> 00:12:08.139 third aspect of sacrifice is communion. And so throughout the Bible, when a sacrifice is altered, 00:12:08.299 --> 00:12:15.480 the altar then becomes a table. And then you're actually invited to eat with God, to have God's regard 00:12:15.480 --> 00:12:21.019 in your life, to come back and sit down at the table with God. Every single person everywhere has 00:12:21.019 --> 00:12:27.460 this instinct. Now, before Cain does anything wrong in this story, he is acting like a priest, 00:12:27.480 --> 00:12:32.300 and he is coming before God seeking to repair the relationship. And all I want to say, and I need 00:12:32.300 --> 00:12:39.480 to move on, is that from the very first moment of human history, God has offered a way. 00:12:39.480 --> 00:12:47.360 We know that the relationship is broken. And instead of Adam and Eve and Cain and Abel and every other 00:12:47.360 --> 00:12:51.539 human getting what they're supposed to get, and that's death. That's what God says in Genesis 3. 00:12:51.600 --> 00:12:58.580 You deserve death. Instead, immediately, we turn the page and there is a way back. There is a way of 00:12:58.580 --> 00:13:03.460 communion. There is a way to enter back into relationship with God. And it's through looking for a 00:13:03.460 --> 00:13:11.280 substitute. And through that, God offers communion with the first people. Let me say one more thing 00:13:11.280 --> 00:13:16.180 about it that's very important. We said that there's a when and there's a where and there's a 00:13:16.180 --> 00:13:22.680 what going on here. But think about it. Where are they? Where is Cain and Abel in this story? 00:13:23.400 --> 00:13:29.180 And it might be instinctive to you to say, they're out in the wilderness. They've been kicked out of the 00:13:29.179 --> 00:13:33.500 Garden of Eden. They've been kicked out of Eden, right? They're east of Eden. But if you look 00:13:33.500 --> 00:13:40.059 carefully, that's not true. So at the end of Genesis 3, verse 24, it says that they have been kicked out 00:13:40.059 --> 00:13:47.039 of the Garden of Eden. But it's not until Genesis 4, 16 that we learn Cain has been removed from Eden 00:13:47.039 --> 00:13:54.579 itself. So where is Cain and Abel when they make the sacrifice? They are in Eden. And Ezekiel 28 says 00:13:54.580 --> 00:14:00.860 that Eden is this mountaintop temple. That's how it describes it. And at the very top of this mountaintop 00:14:00.860 --> 00:14:06.180 temple is the Garden of Eden. And what's happened to them is because of their sin, they've exited the 00:14:06.180 --> 00:14:13.440 garden. They can't be in the home, the true home with God, the garden itself. But just like later, 00:14:13.639 --> 00:14:20.640 and if you've read Leviticus or Exodus, Numbers, you know, you might know that the temple, the tabernacle, 00:14:20.639 --> 00:14:27.639 Solomon's temple, God said, I want you to make the temple, the tabernacle, like Eden. So it's not the 00:14:27.639 --> 00:14:31.340 other way around. It's that the tabernacle and the temple are like Eden. And you might remember that 00:14:31.340 --> 00:14:38.379 the temple has a holy of holies, the closest place to God's presence. And then it's got the holy place 00:14:38.379 --> 00:14:43.899 just outside of the holiest of holies. Now, only the priest can go into the holy of holies once a year to be 00:14:43.899 --> 00:14:50.580 fully in God's presence all the way in. But where do the sacrifices take place? Where's the altar? 00:14:51.439 --> 00:14:56.879 It's in the holy place, the place just outside the holiest of holies. Where is Cain and Abel? 00:14:57.679 --> 00:15:02.960 They are in Eden. They are in God's presence. That's how the text puts it. Cain says, 00:15:03.460 --> 00:15:08.480 God, please don't kick me out of your presence. God's presence is Eden. It's in Eden. It's in this 00:15:08.480 --> 00:15:14.639 great temple. And there is an altar there. And they are standing in the holy place, yearning to go 00:15:14.639 --> 00:15:20.340 all the way in behind the curtain. And that means at the very beginning of human history, 00:15:20.879 --> 00:15:27.120 it is God who pulls the veil of the curtain back and steps out of the curtain and says, 00:15:27.360 --> 00:15:33.419 I will meet you at the place of the altar. God says, I will extend my grace so much that already, 00:15:33.559 --> 00:15:38.559 already he's pulling back the veil. He's stepping through the curtain and he's meeting Cain and Abel. 00:15:38.559 --> 00:15:45.519 His presence is being gifted to the place behind, beyond the curtain. Already God's grace is so sweet, 00:15:45.919 --> 00:15:50.000 so overwhelming, so excessive, so surprising, according to what you would have read in Genesis 00:15:50.000 --> 00:15:54.539 chapter 3. Now, the second thing we learn here, and this is where you get into the meat of the story, 00:15:54.959 --> 00:16:00.979 is the coldness of sin. Not only does sin estrange us, take us away from God's presence, yet God comes 00:16:01.359 --> 00:16:06.719 behind the veil to us. The second thing is the coldness of sin. And then that's what happens in 00:16:06.720 --> 00:16:12.620 verse 3 to 5. So in verse 3 to 5, they actually give the offering. So in the course of time, Cain brings 00:16:12.620 --> 00:16:18.440 the offering to the Lord from the fruit of the ground, and then Abel brings of the firstborn of 00:16:18.440 --> 00:16:24.240 his flock and the fat portions. Now you read that, and you say they've both brought an offering, but then 00:16:24.240 --> 00:16:31.080 God accepts one offering and gives his gracious presence to Abel, but not to Cain. And the question 00:16:31.080 --> 00:16:35.820 becomes, what's the difference? What's the difference between the two? It looks like they're performing the 00:16:35.820 --> 00:16:41.460 same thing. And there's so little info given, and that's on purpose, because the difference is not 00:16:41.460 --> 00:16:47.820 found in any behavior they did. It's not found in the religious acts at all. The difference, the reason 00:16:47.820 --> 00:16:51.980 there's such little information is because it's trying to get you to say, it must be the case that 00:16:51.980 --> 00:16:58.400 the only difference between Cain and Abel is a difference in their hearts. It's not because, as some 00:16:58.400 --> 00:17:04.400 commentators have sometimes said, because Cain offers grain, but Abel offers that animal sacrifice, 00:17:04.400 --> 00:17:09.900 blood sacrifice. That's not the difference. We know later on in Leviticus that God accepts both. No, 00:17:09.980 --> 00:17:17.240 what's the difference? And all we're given is these two little words that Abel brought of his firstborn 00:17:17.240 --> 00:17:24.980 and of the fat portions. And you read the rest of the Bible, and you start to realize that God asks for 00:17:24.980 --> 00:17:31.580 the firstborn, and he asks in Leviticus for the fat portions. Very strange to us as modern people. Why? 00:17:31.579 --> 00:17:38.279 Why the fat portions? Because for the ancient person, fat is flavor. And for us too, good steak. Fat is 00:17:38.279 --> 00:17:45.359 flavor. And in the same way, when you bring your firstborn, when Abel brings his firstborn, what is 00:17:45.359 --> 00:17:51.059 he saying? He's saying, God, you are more valuable to me than the first thing that I get in life from 00:17:51.059 --> 00:17:57.379 my work. You are more precious to me than that. And when he brings the fat portions, it's a 00:17:57.380 --> 00:18:02.360 it's a pulling back the veil on his heart. His heart is saying, Lord, you are more precious to me than 00:18:02.360 --> 00:18:08.940 the thing that flavors, the thing that gives flavor to life. And it's built right in even to the names. 00:18:09.340 --> 00:18:18.800 So Cain's name in Hebrew is Kayan, and it's in this family of words that means accumulation by gain and 00:18:18.800 --> 00:18:25.140 holding on to possessions. It really means accumulation by way of technology, by way of craft. Cain, 00:18:25.140 --> 00:18:31.000 next week, is going to build the first city by way of technology and by craft. And so there's this 00:18:31.000 --> 00:18:35.880 subtle suggestion that the difference in Cain and Abel is the difference in the heart, not in the 00:18:35.880 --> 00:18:40.380 religious practice. And what's the difference in the heart? The difference in the heart is Cain is the 00:18:40.380 --> 00:18:47.940 classic elder brother. He's the first elder brother, actually, in all of history. And he's the classic 00:18:47.940 --> 00:18:53.660 elder brother. In other words, he comes and he performs the religious act, but he does it in a 00:18:53.660 --> 00:19:00.580 humdrum, cold, mechanical way where you can tell even from the subtle hints that he does not care 00:19:00.580 --> 00:19:04.640 about communion with God. He doesn't care about the estrangement he's had from God. He doesn't want to 00:19:04.640 --> 00:19:09.840 be back in God's presence. He's just fulfilling a religious duty in the same way that the Pharisees 00:19:09.840 --> 00:19:14.960 will be called the elder brothers many thousand years from now. He's the classic elder brother. 00:19:16.100 --> 00:19:20.880 And we're given one explanation, one little word in the New Testament that really gets at the heart 00:19:20.880 --> 00:19:27.760 of the difference. And it shows up in Hebrews chapter 11 when we're told that Abel brought a 00:19:27.760 --> 00:19:36.620 sacrifice and was accepted. How? And the writer to the Hebrews says, by faith. By faith, Abel's sacrifice 00:19:36.620 --> 00:19:45.680 was regarded and commended to him as righteousness. Now, listen, where does the gospel first show up 00:19:45.680 --> 00:19:53.400 in the Bible? Genesis 3, Genesis 4. What is happening here? You could look at this and you could say, 00:19:53.500 --> 00:19:58.880 well, doesn't God come to Cain and say, if you do well, will you not also be accepted? And you could 00:19:58.880 --> 00:20:04.120 read that as, if you do good works, will you not also be invited back into God's presence? But what is 00:20:04.120 --> 00:20:11.880 he saying? No, it's saying in the New Testament, by faith, Abel was commended as righteous. The very same 00:20:11.880 --> 00:20:16.080 thing that will be said of Abraham, that by faith he was received as righteous. What is this a 00:20:16.080 --> 00:20:22.140 pronouncement of? This means that in Genesis 4, it wasn't the ritual act of sacrifice that enabled 00:20:22.140 --> 00:20:29.440 Abel to receive God's communion, his regard. What is it? It's that he believed that God would be gracious 00:20:29.440 --> 00:20:36.280 to him, a sinner. And he said, God, you are more valuable to me than my flock, than my stuff, than my 00:20:36.279 --> 00:20:41.980 gain. And so I know that this religious act of sacrifice is paltry. It's not the blood of bulls 00:20:41.980 --> 00:20:46.460 and goats. They're never going to satisfy the justice that's required of me. What does the text 00:20:46.460 --> 00:20:54.559 say? Hebrews 11 says, he was justified by faith that day. And it was the fact that Cain was actually 00:20:54.559 --> 00:21:00.019 depending upon his own merits, his own life. He had no regard for God. He didn't want to be saved. 00:21:00.019 --> 00:21:08.339 He didn't want to come forward to God in faith. And that's the difference. Sin, sin estranges you from 00:21:08.339 --> 00:21:17.200 God. It creates distance and God provides a way. Sin then even in the midst of that way that God has 00:21:17.200 --> 00:21:24.900 given, saying, come to me, turn to the substitute, turn to the sacrifice. Sin creates a cold mechanistic 00:21:24.900 --> 00:21:31.360 posture in the human heart that turns most people into elder brothers and sisters. That even when 00:21:31.360 --> 00:21:36.660 we embrace the religious calling that we've been given by God to enter back in and to come back to 00:21:36.660 --> 00:21:41.920 worship and to approach him on the basis of substitutionary sacrifice, we do it with cold 00:21:41.920 --> 00:21:47.400 hearts. And the God who wants to be warm to us, and we're made to be warm towards him. There's a 00:21:47.400 --> 00:21:52.960 coldness. The sin of Cain, what is it? It's just classic idolatry. It's saying, I'll do the religion, 00:21:52.960 --> 00:21:59.200 but I don't really want God at all. And this will be enough for me. You know, hopefully God will accept 00:21:59.200 --> 00:22:03.559 me on the basis of my religious performance. He's a classic older brother. That means that 00:22:03.559 --> 00:22:10.759 if you are to ever re-enter the garden of God, the place that God made for you to meet with him and be 00:22:10.759 --> 00:22:16.380 at home with him in true joy forever, what we learn here is it's not going to be by the way of obedience 00:22:16.380 --> 00:22:21.680 anymore. You know, Adam and Eve could have stayed in the garden by the way of obedience, but now we learn 00:22:21.680 --> 00:22:29.740 it will not be by the way of good works. It could only be by faith that God would regard you as just. 00:22:30.940 --> 00:22:35.100 And we don't yet know the mechanics of that. We don't yet know, but we'll find out in a moment. 00:22:35.799 --> 00:22:42.200 Third, the potential of sin. Here's the test, then the test that comes to Cain in verse 6 and 7. 00:22:42.920 --> 00:22:46.400 So in verse 6 and 7, the Lord comes to Cain and says, 00:22:46.400 --> 00:22:52.860 why are you angry? Why is your face downcast and fallen? Why are you depressed? Why are you so upset? 00:22:53.600 --> 00:22:58.920 If you do well, will you not be accepted? So just like I said a moment ago, you could read that and 00:22:58.920 --> 00:23:06.420 say, is he saying that if Cain would only sacrifice the proper way, do the right works, then God might 00:23:06.420 --> 00:23:12.840 accept him and give regard to him? But the reason you find out, again, that that's not the case is right 00:23:12.839 --> 00:23:19.699 in verse 7 right after that, what he says to him. This is the most important clause in this chapter. 00:23:20.619 --> 00:23:26.879 Chapter, verse 7, part B, and God says this. It's where we learn the most about sin. If you do not do 00:23:26.879 --> 00:23:35.459 well, sin is crouching at the door. Its desire is for you, and you must rule over it. There's no theological 00:23:35.459 --> 00:23:41.740 proposition in Genesis 4 to 11 about what sin is. There's no hard definition, but this is the sentence 00:23:41.740 --> 00:23:48.140 where you learn the most about what has happened to us about human corruption. And this is how we know 00:23:48.140 --> 00:23:53.319 that he's telling Cain, it's not by works that you will get back into my grace. No. Why? Because what 00:23:53.319 --> 00:24:01.000 does he say? He says, if you do not do well, sin, literally in Hebrew, is a croucher at your doorstep. 00:24:02.140 --> 00:24:09.900 What does that mean? He's taken the language of Genesis 3, the serpent, and saying sin is a 00:24:09.900 --> 00:24:17.480 predatorial force that is now crouching, hiding itself in the bushes at your feet, in the bottom of your 00:24:17.480 --> 00:24:24.880 heart. And what would it mean to not do well? What would it mean? It would mean you never see that. 00:24:26.380 --> 00:24:30.840 So by definition, if sin is a crouching predator, you know, crouching tiger, hidden dragon. 00:24:30.839 --> 00:24:35.220 Sin. That wasn't funny, I guess. No. 00:24:38.419 --> 00:24:41.799 Sin is a crouching tiger. It really is. It's a predator. It's a coiled serpent. 00:24:43.459 --> 00:24:47.859 If by definition it is that, it's coiled, you can't see it, then that means he's saying to Cain, 00:24:48.000 --> 00:24:53.839 can you see? Can you see that you're a sinner? You don't see it. It's crouching at your doorstep, 00:24:53.959 --> 00:24:58.859 but you're not awake to it. What is he asking Cain? He's saying, will you simply see and confess, 00:24:58.859 --> 00:25:06.419 I'm a sinner in need of grace. That's the request he's making. And here we learn what I think is 00:25:06.419 --> 00:25:10.099 probably the most powerful definition, one of the most powerful definitions of sin in the Old 00:25:10.099 --> 00:25:15.719 Testament. Let me rattle off to you four quick things about what sin is according to this moment. 00:25:16.599 --> 00:25:24.039 We learn here that sin is a power in your heart that should not be there. So sin is a serpent, 00:25:24.039 --> 00:25:30.859 a leopard, a tiger in the bottom of your heart that doesn't belong there. In Genesis 3, sin was the 00:25:30.859 --> 00:25:37.279 serpent on the outside trying to tempt you. In Genesis 4, now sin is inside of you trying to destroy you. 00:25:38.240 --> 00:25:42.819 And it's not supposed to be there. What was once on the outside has now moved to the inside. 00:25:43.159 --> 00:25:50.200 So it's alien to what humanity should be. And secondly, sin wants you to think that it's not there. 00:25:50.200 --> 00:25:57.140 And so maybe this is the greatest danger we have with our sin. Sin wants you to believe that sin 00:25:57.140 --> 00:26:01.640 doesn't exist. And of course, in the same way that I mentioned at the beginning that today the 00:26:01.640 --> 00:26:09.059 sociologist will tell us sin is a fiction. It's a way that churches have tried to control people over 00:26:09.059 --> 00:26:17.720 history, social control by way of ministers and pulpits. But that's exactly what sin wants us to think, 00:26:17.720 --> 00:26:23.180 that it doesn't exist, that it's not there. It's crouching. It's trying to hide itself from us. Thirdly, 00:26:24.519 --> 00:26:30.380 sin is a force that has the potential, we learn here, to dominate you. So this is the real meat of it. 00:26:30.400 --> 00:26:36.180 He says, sin is a predator crouching at your door, and if you don't rule over it, it's going to rule over you. 00:26:36.180 --> 00:26:42.360 And he's saying there that, Cain, what's going on in your heart right now as you look and you hate your 00:26:42.360 --> 00:26:47.579 brother and you have envy towards him and you want God's regard, that is a predator in you that is going to 00:26:47.579 --> 00:26:53.240 grow and grow and grow unless you can master it, rule over it. Now in the same way, you think about, 00:26:54.259 --> 00:27:01.659 just take something as simple as maybe refusal to forgive a parent for the way they treated you as 00:27:01.659 --> 00:27:07.220 a child, for the way they raised you. Think about the refusal to forgive somebody in your life that has 00:27:07.220 --> 00:27:13.859 really hurt you. And the more you hold on to that, it becomes more and more a grudge, and that grudge 00:27:13.859 --> 00:27:19.479 makes you more and more bitter. And it ends up being like a drip of poison that's poured into the 00:27:19.479 --> 00:27:23.679 well that then ruins all the relationships in your life. You can never really get past it. 00:27:25.259 --> 00:27:33.299 Sin is a predatorial force that if you let it in, it will continue to bite at you until it dominates 00:27:33.299 --> 00:27:38.899 you. And so eventually, petting any sin in your life, the tiniest little sin over and over again, 00:27:38.900 --> 00:27:46.500 what happens is, well, Smeagol eventually becomes Gollum. And anything that's in your life, that's 00:27:46.500 --> 00:27:52.680 why Jesus is so extreme in Matthew 5 to 7 when he says, if you struggle with lust, cut your eye out. 00:27:53.340 --> 00:27:59.800 And you say, whoa, of course it's a metaphor. But what is he saying? He's saying that if you make peace 00:27:59.800 --> 00:28:06.300 constantly with even a thought that is sinful, it's going to be the predator that eventually 00:28:06.299 --> 00:28:12.819 dominates you and seizes you. And so you've got to be killing sin lest it kill you, because that is 00:28:12.819 --> 00:28:17.940 exactly what sin wants to do to you. And eventually, you pet your envy, and you pet your bitterness, 00:28:18.519 --> 00:28:23.079 and it becomes murder. And so the idea here is not that there are two different types of people in 00:28:23.079 --> 00:28:26.619 the world. There's Cain's and there's Abel's. You know, there's really bad people that could 00:28:26.619 --> 00:28:32.599 commit murder, and then there's an Abel out there who's peaceful and humble. It's saying that 00:28:32.599 --> 00:28:40.199 every single sinner has a predator at the bottom of their soul. And that sin, that force, that power 00:28:40.199 --> 00:28:47.939 within you wants to dominate you. And so lastly, that means that we've got to see the earliest grace 00:28:47.939 --> 00:28:55.259 that's given in human history here. And in verse 6, let me just take a step back, and we'll be very 00:28:55.259 --> 00:29:02.099 brief. Verse 6, even when Cain has given his offering, and there's no regard for his offering, 00:29:02.740 --> 00:29:09.619 even then, God has every right in the midst of Cain's anger and his lack of desire for God to come 00:29:09.619 --> 00:29:15.420 and bring the courtroom of justice to Cain in that moment, and to say, you don't desire me. You don't 00:29:15.420 --> 00:29:20.059 want to be with me. You're to be cast out. But instead, in verse 6, how does God come? He says, 00:29:20.059 --> 00:29:25.079 Cain, why is your face fallen and downcast? Why are you depressed? Why are you so upset? 00:29:25.859 --> 00:29:32.619 I just want you to note, God comes to this man first as a wonderful counselor. He comes to him 00:29:32.619 --> 00:29:37.919 and says, I'm not here to bring the court of justice upon you right now. I'm here to be your 00:29:37.919 --> 00:29:42.940 counselor and to say, don't you know, Cain, that there is grace for you as well? That's the very first 00:29:42.940 --> 00:29:48.740 way God approaches him. And then right after that, in verse 9, Cain murders his brother, Abel. He lets 00:29:48.740 --> 00:29:53.700 that predator of envy become something so big in his life that he becomes a murderer. 00:29:54.740 --> 00:30:00.740 And how does God come to him? He comes to him in the same way that he came to Adam in Genesis 3. 00:30:00.819 --> 00:30:07.779 Remember in Genesis 3, when he came to Adam, he said, what have you done, Adam? And he came gentle. 00:30:08.500 --> 00:30:13.240 And here, he has every right to come to a murderer and bring the weight of justice down upon him. And he 00:30:13.240 --> 00:30:18.660 comes to him and he says, where's your brother? And you see, he's coming again, and he's trying to 00:30:18.660 --> 00:30:24.080 give him an opportunity. What is this opportunity? The same opportunity Adam was given, and it's to 00:30:24.080 --> 00:30:31.120 confess and say, I did it. That's what this question is. And then we tell where Cain's heart is because 00:30:31.120 --> 00:30:36.120 he gets snarky with God. And he says, am I my brother's keeper? Am I responsible for him? Am I 00:30:36.120 --> 00:30:40.900 supposed to be the one keeping up with him? You see the depth that Cain is continuing to fall into 00:30:40.900 --> 00:30:48.019 when the God of grace comes to him and says, would you just confess? I'm still here to show grace to you. 00:30:48.019 --> 00:30:54.839 I'm still here to show mercy to you. And then in verse 15, some people have read the mark of Cain. 00:30:54.940 --> 00:31:00.619 You know, he says, you have to go outside of Eden. You have to leave the temple. You have to go outside 00:31:00.619 --> 00:31:06.660 the city of God and be a wanderer. And he puts this mark on Cain that says, nobody is allowed to kill 00:31:06.660 --> 00:31:11.980 him. Why? And some people have read that as some kind of negative thing, but no, what is God doing? 00:31:12.660 --> 00:31:19.559 Cain says, if I go out there, people are going to kill me. Yes, there are other people living in the 00:31:19.559 --> 00:31:24.319 world. I'm not going to touch that today. I'll leave that for a later time. There are other people 00:31:24.319 --> 00:31:29.920 already present outside of Eden. He says, when they find me, they're going to kill me. Why? Because they 00:31:29.920 --> 00:31:35.480 know the justice. They know that if a man has murdered a man, that the court of justice is that 00:31:35.480 --> 00:31:40.900 the man forfeits his life. We read that later in the Torah and Levitical law. But he says, no, 00:31:41.720 --> 00:31:48.599 I will put my name on you. I'll mark you. And the mark of God in the rest of Genesis and Deuteronomy 00:31:48.599 --> 00:31:54.959 is something that says, holy to the Lord, set apart. And I want you to see, because we're running 00:31:54.959 --> 00:32:04.699 out of time, the simple claim is this. God is giving excessive grace to a murderer and giving him 00:32:04.699 --> 00:32:11.500 his life to be lived and saying, there is still a way back. There is still an opportunity to come 00:32:11.500 --> 00:32:17.359 home again. And what we learn here is, even if the beast has taken over in your life fully, 00:32:18.559 --> 00:32:24.519 and there may be some today here who feel that way, that the beast, the little sins that have 00:32:24.519 --> 00:32:31.660 always been there, I have embraced over and over and over and over again. And I have become this person. 00:32:32.319 --> 00:32:37.400 And I've done things in my life that shocked me. I never thought I'd be capable of, what is God 00:32:37.400 --> 00:32:41.980 saying? He's saying, there is a way back. There is a way back. There's a way back into the garden. 00:32:42.940 --> 00:32:50.340 On what basis could he give a grace like this? There's one question as I finish in Genesis 3, 00:32:50.400 --> 00:32:58.040 really one statement from God that is the foundation of Genesis 4 to 11. And it's when God says to 00:32:58.040 --> 00:33:07.300 Adam and Eve that one day there would be born to the woman an offspring that would crush the head of 00:33:07.299 --> 00:33:12.779 a serpent, the head of the serpent. Now we know that it's not just the head of the serpent, Satan, 00:33:12.899 --> 00:33:17.559 outside of us, but it's that offspring is going to have to crush the head of the serpent within us 00:33:17.559 --> 00:33:22.879 as well, the predator within. And that means that if you're an ancient Near Eastern reader, you've got 00:33:22.879 --> 00:33:28.279 to be asking the question, who is this seed of the woman, this one son that would be born? Well, flip the 00:33:28.279 --> 00:33:34.220 page to Genesis 4. What do you think? You think it must be Cain. He's the firstborn son. He was born 00:33:34.220 --> 00:33:39.680 with the help of the Lord, but then he becomes this murderer. Then you think, well, could it be Abel? 00:33:41.579 --> 00:33:47.420 And you can only say, well, Abel's blood, he was murdered. Abel's blood cries out from the ground 00:33:47.420 --> 00:33:53.900 for justice. That's what Hebrews 11 says. So it's not Cain. It's not Abel. But wait, who could it be? 00:33:53.940 --> 00:34:00.920 On what basis could God look forward in history and offer grace to Cain the murderer? On what basis? 00:34:00.920 --> 00:34:08.579 And the basis is that Hebrews 11 says that Abel's blood cried out from the ground for what? For 00:34:08.579 --> 00:34:16.700 justice. But Abel, that priest, Abel, that prophet, was simply Abel, the victim. He could never be 00:34:16.700 --> 00:34:24.180 a substitute. He could never gain justice that his blood deserved. But Hebrews 11 says that Abel's 00:34:24.179 --> 00:34:31.579 blood points to a better sacrifice, a better Abel. And Jesus Christ is the true and better Abel. 00:34:33.839 --> 00:34:39.519 Abel's blood cried out from the ground for justice. And how was Abel murdered? Abel was murdered by an 00:34:39.519 --> 00:34:45.719 elder brother. And thousands of years later, a true and better Abel would come into the world, 00:34:45.719 --> 00:34:54.459 and men of religious scrupulosity, elder brothers all around him, would take him to a fake trial and 00:34:54.459 --> 00:35:01.159 murder him. The elder brother killed the true and better Abel. But though Abel's blood could never 00:35:01.159 --> 00:35:07.259 accomplish justice, Jesus Christ, the true and better Abel, his blood does accomplish justice. See, on what 00:35:07.259 --> 00:35:12.719 basis could God look at Cain and say, there can be justice in your place? And it was because he was 00:35:12.719 --> 00:35:19.179 looking forward to Jesus Christ, the true and better Abel, and saying, one day, your little brother, 00:35:19.299 --> 00:35:25.179 the real Abel, his blood will come up into the heavenly courtroom and be the sacrifice that says, 00:35:25.439 --> 00:35:32.419 because this has been offered, I will never demand another payment. God the Father was willing to 00:35:32.419 --> 00:35:40.079 receive the blood of Jesus Christ to show forgiveness to Cain, the murderer. And that's the gospel. And the 00:35:40.079 --> 00:35:45.299 gospel was preached all the way back in Genesis chapter 4. Friends, if you are here today and you 00:35:45.299 --> 00:35:50.860 say, I've gone too far, you need to know that the blood of Jesus Christ is all the payment you need. 00:35:51.259 --> 00:35:56.259 That you can come back in. You can go through the curtain. You can have home with God. You can enter 00:35:56.259 --> 00:36:01.000 back into the garden. You don't have to be a wanderer forever. You don't have to be lost. 00:36:01.000 --> 00:36:08.760 Come by faith. Let's pray. Father, we ask that you would bring us back into your presence, 00:36:09.139 --> 00:36:14.880 and we thank you so much that it is only by faith in the blood of Jesus that we are received and 00:36:14.880 --> 00:36:20.139 accepted. We thank you for your excessive grace and your mercy to sinners, and we thank you for that 00:36:20.139 --> 00:36:21.659 in Jesus' name. Amen.