PARADISE LOST!

Genesis 4:1-16
Bob Bonner
July 25, 2004

This time of year, we get to experience God’s creation in ways that are harder to do during the winter months of the year. Now, there is warmth and color around us that invite us to step out doors, to take walks in the woods, or to float down rivers. Those activities enable us to soak in the Master and His masterpiece.

There are times that I have hiked in the woods and deliberately moved off the well worn trail to get onto less traveled and maybe even unexplored terrain. When I feel like I am deep enough in the woods, I like to stop and think about the Lord. What can I learn about Him from taking in His creation? It is a wonderful time for me to worship. I do the same thing when I snorkel or scuba dive. I just enjoy trying to find places that few others have been to, just to pretend like I’m stepping into a part of creation unsoiled by human life. When I find one of these places, I feel like I’m experiencing the Lord in the purity of His creation.

But without fail, every time, either early on or toward the end of my visit into the depths of God’s creation, I am rudely reminded that this is no longer my heavenly Father’s original creation. I specifically remember a time I was on a remote island in the South Pacific snorkeling in about 20 feet of water. This island had about 1500 inhabitants on it the first time I visited it. Annually, the total population on this island used to swell to 2000 people with natives and visitors each year. The ocean floor was virtually untouched on this island until 60 years ago, because before WWII there was nothing on this island to sustain human life, no clean water or edible vegetation.

Knowing that the snorkeling would be great on this island, I decided to take my gear with me, even though the purpose of the trip was not to go swimming or snorkeling, but to go fishing. The second day we were there I got my first opportunity to dive in what I imagined to be virgin waters. For about 30 minutes I swam in awe of the absolute beauty of this under water world. The bright colors and varieties of fish overwhelmed me. The clarity of the water and the formation of the rock bottom and sea walls took my breath away. I can remember thinking, “Wow, God you have really outdone yourself here!”

Then it happened. I swam around an underwater ledge and saw something flash back the sunlight that was beaming down over my shoulder. I looked more closely to see what it was. There, on the bottom of this virgin terrain was a Coors Lite aluminum beer can! With all the beauty surrounding it, this place was marred by trash! Along with it, I was reminded that this is not heaven nor is it paradise. But it is paradise lost! Disappointment flooded my soul once again with the realization that no matter where I go on this planet, I still live in a fallen world.

Have you ever felt those same feelings? If they bother you, imagine how Adam and Eve felt, having lived in a perfect paradise only to see with every new day of their lives more evidence of what they lost due to their rebellion against God. Probably nothing bothered them, broke their hearts or weighed down their souls more than what we will read about this morning, in Genesis 4, the murder of their second son, Abel by their first son, Cain.

Before we read this passage, let’s place this scene in its proper historical context. As we look at just the book of Genesis, there are two obvious divisions. There is the Before the Fall, found in chapters 1-3, and there is the After the Fall, beginning with chapters 4 - 50, that actually goes on until we reach the last two chapters of the Bible where God speaks about the new creation, the new heaven and earth to come.

In the first three chapters, we see God’s perfect Paradise. The world as God created it was filled with life, where Adam and Eve enjoyed nothing but pleasure and abundance. They lived in perfect harmony with God, His creation and with others.

But beginning with chapter four, we see the first pictures of Paradise Lost. In contrast to life, we see death. In contrast to pleasure, we see pain, both physical and emotional. Rather than an abundance of food waiting to be taken, we see meager sustenance that is only gained by toil. Ultimately, what was a harmonious existence is now a life lived in alienation and conflict with God, His creation and with others.

As I read the first sixteen verses of this chapter I find so much interesting and enlightening information about life, that I can’t quite get my arms around it all. So our approach this morning will be simply to first read through these verses, making editorial comments along the way; and then, we will highlight some major truths that I sense God would have us consider and think about as we seek to walk with Him from this day forward.

These first sixteen verses of Genesis 4 obviously span thirty or forty years. Hence, what we are reading is a highly condensed version, written to highlight some major truths. The story begins with the birth of Adam and Eve’s first child, Cain. Let’s read this together. “Now the man had relations with his wife Eve, and she conceived and gave birth to Cain, and she said, ‘I have gotten a man-child with the help of the Lord.’” At this point all is still well, as far as Eve is concerned. The promise that she would be the mother of the living has begun. And to her credit, she recognizes that without the mercy of God, she would never have had this child, hence she names him “Cain” meaning “have received” with the help of the Lord.

Some time passes, and according to verse 2, she has another child. But the second child’s name tells it all. This mother’s hope in having a godly child disappears and disappointment fills her soul. We read in verse 2, “Again, she gave birth to his brother Abel.” The name “Abel” means “vapor” or “vanity.” It refers to something that is brief; here today, gone tomorrow, something that has no long lasting value to it. In light of eternity, it is a name that declares defeat and discouragement.

Eve did not name Abel “vanity” due to Abel being a failure, because he had yet to do anything. Rather, in light of knowing and seeing what Cain was turning into as a man, and what a disappointment he was to his mother, this name with which Abel was saddled was more about Eve’s feelings about her life when Abel was born, than it was about Abel himself. She had given up hope that life had any real meaning, that because, try as she would to raise Cain rightly, at an early age he showed that he was strong willed and rebellious.

According to God’s description of Cain found in 1 John 3:12, we read: “...Cain was the evil one...because his deeds were evil.” So, right off the bat, as early in the history of human society as we can get, we see the results of evil being lived out in Cain.

On the other hand, in contrast to Cain, we read elsewhere in scripture what kind of person Abel was; we discover in Hebrews 11:4 that he was a man of faith. Jesus describes Abel as “righteous” in Matthew 23:35, and in Luke 11:50-51, Jesus tells us that Abel was a Prophet. In other words, Abel received words of divine revelation directly from God, preached it to his quickly growing family, and was supernaturally enabled by God to live righteously. He was the first clearly identifiable worshiper of God.

In stark contrast, we have Cain, who refused to listen to his younger brother, refused to obey God and only gave a half hearted attempt to worship God.

With the rest of the verse, we learn about the two sons’ vocations. We read, “And Abel was a keeper of flocks, but Cain was a tiller of the ground.” To put it in modern terms, one was a rancher and the other was a farmer—both honorable vocations.

With verse 3, we realize that more time has passed and as it did, the real heart of each son toward God was revealed. Whereas the last part of verse 2 stressed the work of the two brothers, verses 3-5 addresses their worship of God.

A key point needs to be made before we read these next verses. God considers it important that our lives are not to be solely wrapped around our work. We are to labor and to pray. Out of our work comes our worship in the form of our offerings to God.

Last week, we saw that from the very beginning man and woman were not groping blindly to find God or to understand how God wanted them to worship Him. God demonstrated for Adam and Eve that a proper form of worship, a worthy offering of worship, was to be a blood sacrifice like the one God made in killing the animals to put clothes on Adam and Eve. Last week we saw that without a blood sacrifice and an innocent substitution animal, like Jesus the “Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world,” there would be no forgiveness of sin or fellowship with God.

Hence, this knowledge of what was an acceptable sacrifice to God was nothing new to Cain. He had been taught this by his mother and father, as well as by his brother, the prophet of God, Abel. The human race knew what made up true worship and an acceptable sacrifice. They knew that forgiveness came at the cost of shedding innocent blood.

Therefore, when we read the opening words of verse 3, “So it came about in the course of time...” it should be understood in light of the context of what we just learned about worship in Genesis 3. Cain had learned, through time that work and true worship was to be part of his life. Do we see here genuine or true worship coming from Cain? No. Instead, we read about the stark contrast between Cain’s unacceptable offering and Abel’s acceptable offering to God. We read, “...that Cain brought an offering to the Lord of the fruit of the ground.” Note that Cain’s offering was not a blood sacrifice. He could have traded some of his grain with Abel for a lamb and Cain could have offered a proper gift to God. But he didn’t.

On the other hand, we read of Abel, “Abel, on his part also brought of the firstlings of his flock and of their fat portions.” The intention of those words is to say that Abel brought the choicest and the fattest of his flock, the best he had, to God. It was truly a love gift, the best he had to offer. It was what God wanted. As a result of giving God what He had asked for and wanted, we read this about Abel: “And the Lord had regard for Abel and for his offering.” In Hebrew, to have “regard for” literally translates “God turned toward Abel.” This is a picture of an oriental custom still practiced today in many cultures, of turning your face toward someone as a sign of welcome, approval and acceptance. It is the writer’s way of saying that God was fully pleased and approved of Abel because of his heartfelt gift or offering to God.

“...but for Cain and for his offering,” we read, God “had no regard.” Literally, “God did not turn toward Cain but left him to see his back,” which was a sign of disapproval and rejection. God refused Cain’s offering because it was not what God wanted and Cain knew it. Even so, we read, “So Cain became very angry [literally “bitter” with God and jealous toward Abel] and his countenance fell.”

Even the way this is written in Hebrew, we can see that the Hebrew used here is an elaborate construction describing Abel’s offering, whereas the Hebrew construction describing Cain’s offering is very simple statement.

So, what’s the point? Abel went out of his way to worship God with his whole heart. He gave God the best he had to offer at that time. Maybe in years past he offered a lamb that was two hundred pounds, but this year it was only one hundred and fifty pounds. It didn’t matter how big the offering it was, but it mattered that it was the best he could offer that year.

Cain merely discharged a religious duty, trying to get by with the minimal, which wasn’t even the minimal. It was totally unacceptable. It was an offering, but it wasn’t necessarily the first fruits, and for sure, it was not a blood offering. It was not heartfelt worship.

For Cain, life was all about Cain. It was working to get, to acquire and to appropriate. But for Abel, life was about worshiping God. It was working so as to give away in a form of worship. It was giving, to ascribe to God that He was worthy to be worshiped as the great provider.

When you come to worship God corporately or at home in private, do you give God your full and undivided attention? Do you come to Him fully prepared to meet with the awesome creator, the holy God of the universe? Or do you walk right in, half asleep, late to your appointment with God, not even having brushed your teeth, expecting to get something rather than to give something? What kind of offering have you given of yourself to God today? How would God rate your own heartfelt worship on a scale of one to ten, ten being the best?

God knows your heart just as He knew Cain’s heart. In verse 6, God confronts Cain about his less than worshipful heart and gives him a stern warning. We read, “Then the Lord said to Cain, “Why are you angry? And why has your countenance fallen? If you do well, [not “if you try hard or do your best then everything will be alright” but “if you bring an acceptable sacrifice to Me”] will not your countenance be lifted up? And if you do not do well, sin is crouching at the door; and its desire [same word for “desire” in 3:16, about a woman's desire to control her husband] is for you, but you must master it.”

God knew that Cain was jealous and bitter toward Him, the world and specifically his brother Abel, who by doing what was right made Cain look bad. God also knew that this sin of bitterness was ready to pounce on Cain and push him over the edge to murdering Abel if Cain didn’t listen to God.

Notice the difference the between Cain’s and Eve’s sin. Whereas Eve had to be talked into her sin by the serpent, Cain couldn’t be talked out of his sin by God. Sin burned in his heart. And sin, after being conceived in his heart, gave birth to action and he murdered his brother.

Look at verse 8. “Cain told Abel his brother.” The meaning of this in Hebrew is a little vague. What did he speak to his brother? He could have said something like “God just got in my face because of you! You made me look bad. I hate you. I’m going to get you for that!”

Or, Cain could have been slyer and simply said to Abel, with a disarming smile, “Let’s go out into the fields and have a heart to heart talk,” knowing he wanted to get him alone to kill him.

Either way, we get the idea, and the rest of the verse reads, “And it came about when they were in the field, that Cain rose up against Abel his brother and killed him. Then the Lord said to Cain, ‘Where is Abel your brother?’ And he said, ‘I do not know. Am I my brother’s keeper?’” This was no accident. The word used here for “kill” in Hebrew is the word for a premeditated murder, which was conceived out of hatred.

What a perfect illustration of what Jesus taught us in His Sermon on the Mount. Remember? Matthew 5:21-22. Jesus said this: “You have heard that the ancients were told, ‘You shall not commit murder’ and ‘Whoever commits murder shall be liable to the court.’ But I say to you that everyone who is angry with his brother shall be guilty before the court; and whoever shall say to his brother, ‘Raca’, shall be guilty before the supreme court; and whoever shall say, ‘You fool’, shall be guilty enough to go into the fiery hell.”

Murder is birthed in the heart out of bitterness, jealousy and anger. Cain was bitter and jealous with his brother. At one point he could have listened to God’s warning, stopped the bitter attitude, admitted that God was right about Cain’s wrong doing and wrong attitude, confessed his sin and it would be done with. Or, as he chose, he could ignore God, speak a sly, hateful, deceitful word, lead Abel off to the side and murder him.

But it doesn’t stop there. After the murder, Cain continues to reveal his heart. In verse 9, Cain lies and reveals an uncaring heart. “Am I my brother’s keeper?”

Verse 10, God asks, “What have you done? The voice of your brother’s blood is crying to Me from the ground.” Notice from verse 6 to this point, God asks Cain six questions. Why? Do you think God doesn’t know the answers? No, that’s ridiculous. God is omniscient and knows everything. No, just as He did with Adam and Eve, God asks these questions to seek a confession from Cain. He wanted Cain to think about his sin and consider confessing his sin and asking for forgiveness. But Cain refused to confess and repent, just as his parents had done.

Interestingly, in Hebrews 12:24, the writer of Hebrews references this verse as he points to the blood of Jesus Christ and tells us that the blood of Jesus Christ speaks “better than the blood of Abel.” In other words, the blood of Jesus Christ is crying constantly for mercy and grace for all who take refuge under it, for all who trust Christ as their savior. Hence, Christ’s blood is crying out better than Abel’s.

But Abel’s blood was crying out, and crying out for justice. And the God of justice heard and began to deal with Cain. For we read in the next verse, verse 11, “Now you are cursed from the ground, which has opened its mouth to receive your brother’s blood from your hand. When you cultivate the ground, it will no longer yield its strength to you; [you will no longer possess a green thumb, and will be forced to leave farming] you will be a vagrant and a wanderer on the earth.” Literally, “You will be a wandering fugitive. Nobody will want you to stay long around them. Nobody will want you to be their permanent neighbor. You’ll be as wanted as a known practicing pedophile is to a child’s birthday party.”

Cain’s response is quite understandable. He says to God, “My punishment is too great to bear! Behold, You have driven me this day from the face of the ground; [from my place of work] and from Your face I will be hidden [from worship and fellowship of God. Note which one Cain mentioned first and felt was more of a priority of his life: his work was more important than his worship!] and I will be a vagrant and a wanderer on the earth, [not even my family will want me around. I’ll have nobody] and whoever finds me will kill me.” [“To top it off, everybody will want to kill me!”] It’s ironic that the murderer is afraid of being murdered himself!

“So the Lord said to him, “Therefore whoever kills Cain, vengeance will be taken on him sevenfold.” I believe there is an alternative and better translation of this “sevenfold” idea. This same expression is used later in this chapter and makes more sense if we use the alternative translation, which is the one used by Orthodox Jews today. What is probably meant here is, “Therefore whoever kills Cain before 7 generations, vengeance will be taken on him.” In other words, “Cain, you won’t have to worry about dying too soon. You will live for at least seven generations.” But there is a hint that he will probably be killed at the hands of another. Hence, for seven generations he is going to have to wait for the other shoe to drop. I actually believe that the Lord allowed this as an act of grace, hoping that before then, Cain would come to his senses, confess his sin, seek God’s forgiveness and get his life right with the Lord.

To make sure that there would be no accidental killing of Cain, the Lord adds, “And the Lord appointed a sign [that is a preserving sign] for Cain, so that no one finding him would slay him. Then Cain went out from the presence of the Lord, and settled in the land of Nod, east of Eden.” What that sign was, nobody knows. “Nod” literally translated means “wanderings” or “fugitive.” Apparently, even until the end, Cain stubbornly tried to settle or build a town where he could stay, even though God had said he would never settle permanently anywhere. He even named a town after his son Enoch, but there is no sign that Cain ever stayed in one place and put down roots.

Wow! What a said state of affairs. Put yourself in Adam and Eve’s shoes, the parents of Cain and Abel. One son killed by his brother, never to be seen again. And the living brother sent off, banished to wander the rest of his life. How broken hearted was this mother?! Truly we see the beginning of the fulfillment of the curse that she would experience much pain in child rearing. And both of them realized that it never had to be this way. It could have all been avoided, no innocent children being hurt, if they had simply obeyed and worshiped God.

But all the way through, God keeps reaching out, even to Cain, giving him and us every opportunity to be forgiven and to have our lives rescued, if we will only quit being so stubborn and start to delight in the Lord, depend upon Him, and enjoy Him and what pleases Him.

Here are four very clear principles we gain glean from this passage: First, Our worship takes priority over our work. How often do our worship and our obedience in worship take a back seat to our jobs and the pursuit of gathering things? When worship of the living God takes a back seat to anything in our lives, our lives become cursed.

Second: True worshipers love God, and in turn love others. In other words, the evidence that you have a passionate relationship with Jesus is revealed by the depth to which you show compassion for others. Loving others does not really take work, if you learn to love God first. When you love God first, He enables you and gives you His desires to be merciful and caring toward others. You will even find yourself sacrificially taking it on the chin from those you don’t like, because the God of love is at work in your heart. I have witnessed God transform the most selfish, stubborn, “me first” people I have ever known into the most merciful and giving people I have ever known. It’s a miracle and we worship a God of miracles.

Third: Just like Abel, True worshipers will be alienated or rejected by false worshipers. This is happening all of the time in churches across this valley. True worshipers and false worshipers share the same auditoriums Sunday after Sunday. False worshipers live with an unforgiving, bitter, jealous heart filled with hatred. It is either my way or no way. They are both young and old alike, and those are the people that demand that music be done only their way. Those are the people that demand certain styles of preaching from the pastor, or they will do everything they can to get rid of him. Those are the people who think that the monies should have been spent differently.

True worshipers submit to God and to those whom He puts in charge. True worshipers learn to honor others and put the larger group’s best interests above their own. True worshipers don’t tell God how they want to worship, but listen to Him as to how He wants us to worship. True worshipers learn to give and take in music. True worshipers worship with long suffering. False worshipers take the ball and go home. Not go to another church, just simply quit going to church and go home!

Fourth and most important: True worship requires my best of what God requests. I don’t just serve God, participate in a fellowship group, or give what I can conveniently give. True worship of God is revealed in the giving of one’s whole heart and the best of what one has to offer at that moment to God. It doesn’t have to be much, just the best a grateful heart has to offer. I have a choice to stay up until 2:00 am to watch a movie, drag myself to church and finish sleeping; or get up and come to church and give God my best. True worship begins the night before, in preparing to come to worship and to give God our best.

All church families go through cycles concerning their worship. I am not referring to styles of worship, but the quality of heartfelt united worship. I have no way of quantitatively measuring this, so this is just my opinion, but I have sensed for sometime, maybe six months, that as a group, many of you have recommitted yourselves to genuine, personal worship that begins deep in your heart, is practiced at home and brought weekly to church. May your tribe increase!

That which stops personal, genuine worship is unfilled commitments made to the Lord, unconfessed sin and rebellion, the refusal to seek forgiveness from others or the refusal to forgive someone else.

This morning, before our all knowing God, how is your heart of worship? Do you have unconfessed sin? Then take a moment and clear that up with God. Do you have a commitment yet fulfilled? Get it done before next week. Do you have someone to forgive or to ask forgiveness of? Then do it! Try to get it taken care of before next week.

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