Genesis 4-The First Murder

       

                                            Genesis 4-The First Murder

      In last weeks study we learned that Satan came to Eve and planted 3 seeds with her.

1. The Seed of Doubt
2. The Seed of Desire
3. The Seed of Pride

      Eve receives the seeds and disobeys God to eat the fruit of the one tree God said not to eat from. Eve then hands it to her husband and without much convincing he rebels against God and eats it. Because of their disobedience and rebellion, 6 consequences happen.

1. Shame-seeing their nakedness
2. Hiding from God-trying to hide their sin
3. Fear-never before did they need to fear the Lord but now they find themselves in awe of Him.
4. Blame-The blame game begins and not accepting responsibility for their actions.
5. Punishment and curses-4 of God's creations will now face wither punishment or a curse.
   1. Satan- now cursed with enmity between him and his seed and the woman and her seed, her seed will crush his head and his seed will crush her seeds heal.
   2. The Woman- now in childbearing she will experience labor pain and have desire for her husband and he will rule over her.
   3. The Man-now when working the ground he will labor and sweat to eat from the ground herbs of the field and will return to dust when he dies.
   4. The Ground-now cursed because of Adam will now produce thorns and thistles. Does anyone else find it interesting that our Savior Jesus Christ was crowned with a crown of thorns? (Matt. 27:29)
6. Banished from Paradise-now they must leave God's beautiful garden and live east of Eden. The Garden of Eden is now closed by Cherubim and a flashing sword, so that no man can eat now from the Tree of Life.

      We also learned that in Gen. 3 there are 3 aspects of Grace.

1. Human race continues
2. Sustainable life
3. God clothed them

     This week in Chapter 4 we begin with Adam and Eve knowing each other which means they were sexually intimate and Eve conceived a child naming him Cain. In Hebrew Cain is Kahyin and it means possession. By her statement “I have gotten a man from the Lord” she is expresses that children are a gift from the Lord and only He can give this gift. She also just might be thinking in her mind that this man God has given her will be the one that will crush Satan. Then she gives birth to Abel which in Hebrew is Hehel meaning breath. So we have 2 boys with very different abilities.

                 Cain                                                 Abel

         Possession                                          Breath

         Farmer                                                Shepherd

         1^st Born                                              2^nd Born

     Cain brings fruit of the ground and offers it to the Lord while Abel brings his first fruit of his flock as an offering. So why did God not accept Cains but he did Abel's? Was it because meat and fat are better than grain? Let's take a look at some of the offerings acceptable to the Lord and see if it will help us understand why. In Leviticus chapters 1-7 we get a list of offering and how they were to be done and why. I'm going to give you the list and scripture references but part of your homework next week will be to study the different offerings and how they were to be done. There are 5 offerings listed in chapter 1-7.

1. Burnt offerings-
   Lev. 1,6:6-13, 8:18-21, 16:24
   Purpose-voluntary act of worship;atonement for unintentional sin in general;expression of devotion,commitment and complete surrender to God.
2. Meat (grain)offering-
   Lev. 2, 6:14-23
   Purpose-voluntary act of worship; recognition of God's goodness and provision;devotion to God.
3. Peace Offering-
   Lev. 3,7:11-34
   Purpose-voluntary act of worship;thanksgiving and fellowship (it included a communal meal).
4. Sin Offering-
   Lev. 4:1-5;5:13;6:24-30;8:14-17;16:3-22
   Purpose-mandatory atonement for specific unintentional sin;confession of sin;forgiveness of sin;cleaning from defilement.
5. Trespass or guilt offering-
   Lev.5:14,6:7,7:1-6
   Atonement for unintentional sin requiring restitution;cleansing from defilement;make restitution;pay 20%
   (Taken from KJV study notes)

      So does this mean that offering were only done after Moses came down from the mountain? No

In Gen. 8:20 we see Noah offering a sacrifice to the Lord when they got off the Ark. We also see Abraham building an altar out of obedience to sacrifice his son but God stops him and provides a ram in the thicket so it isn't just the Law given to Moses it was even before that. But do you notice that in each of these offerings 3 are voluntary and 2 are mandatory. Abel's offering was a burnt offering and Cain's offering was a grain offering. I think the reason it was unacceptable by God was Cain's heart and motive and it wasn't a first fruit. He did not really care about God to do it with a real devotion to God but more as a “because I have to” attitude. We don't have these 5 offerings today the same way they were done then but what can we bring to the altar as a sacrifice?

1. Burnt offering-we can bring an expression of devotion, commitment and complete surrender to God.
2. Grain offering-we can recognize God's goodness and provisions and have devotion to God-the one True God.
3. Peace offering-we can give thanks and fellowship by having communal meals together.
4. Sin offering-this is mandatory for atonement of our sins which Jesus did on the cross. How we participate is by accepting Jesus Christ and what he has done for us.
5. Trespass or guilt offering-this is mandatory atonement for unintentional sin. How we participate is by asking for forgiveness when we have unintentionally wronged or hurt someone. Make amends and make it right by paying the cost.

      I do want you to study these further this coming week but, having gone through this overview looking at the burnt offering and the grain offering, does this give you any insight as to why God did not accept Cain's grain offering? My opinion is that Cain did not do it with the right heart. Cain becomes angry and down cast in a word, he was jealous but God gave him a way out. He, Cain, could do well and pleasing to the Lord and he would be accepted but if not, sin is lying at his door, it desires to have him but Cain must overcome it. God always gives us a way out too. (1 Corinthians 10:13)
      Unfortunately Cain allows sin to overtake him and he becomes the first murderer. Now Abel's blood speaks out with judgment and justice but Christ's blood speaks a better word, a word of forgiveness and reconciliation (Heb. 12:24). After Cain kills Abel God asks another rhetorical question, again for the sake of verbal confession. Cain tries to hide his sin but God knows all and sees all. Our sins always find us out. (Numbers 32:23) We see here the same as with Adam and Eve. There are steps or seed into sin and consequences for succumbing to them.

1. Doubt-Cain doubted God and his word
   
2. Desire- Cain desired acceptance from God(without doing the work)
   
3. Pride-Cain was full of pride thinking he deserved to have God's blessing.
   

The Consequences are:

1. Shame- shame for being found out
   
2. Hiding from God- He tries to hid his sin from God
   
3. Fear- we don't see him having fear until his punishment but it isn't fear of God it is selfishness, fearing for his own life
   
4. Blame-He blames God for not accepting his offering
   
5. Punishment or curse- Cain is cursed by God from the earth. When he tills the ground the earth will not produce fruit. He will now be a fugitive in Hebrew that word is Nvah which means tossed about and vagabond means to wander to and fro.
   
6. Banned from the presence of God- He now lives a wanderers life never finding what he is lacking which is a right relationship with God.
   

     Cains response is very selfish and never taking responsibility for his actions. He has the opposite response to that of David in Ps. 51:11. Where David did not want to be cast from Gods presence and His Spirit removed from him, Cain doesn't seem to think about that or care, he only cares that someone will kill him and still God gives grace and marks him to keep people from killing him. This seems to be an actual physical mark. God says that if anyone does harm him vengeance will be taken on them seven fold. Cain leaves the presence of the Lord and dwells in Nod. Nod means wandering.
Now Cain has a wife which causes us to pause and ask the question, who is Cain's wife?
Adam and Eve had other children so it is possible that Cain's wife was his sister. (ESV study note for vs. 17 says No explanation is given as to the origin of Cain's wife. As is often the case in Genesis, the limited and selective nature of the account leaves the reader with unanswered questions. Presumably, Cain married his sister-a reasonable assumption, since the whole human race descends from Adam and Eve.*laws later forbidding this practice, such as in Lev. 18:9, would not have been relevant at this stage.*)
     So now begins the genealogy of Cain. We are only given so much information but one thing is for sure. Genealogy is important to God to led us to Christ from Adam. So let's begin from Adam and Eve.


                                                     Adam and Eve

           Cain (possession)                                 Seth(compensation)

                                                  Abel(breath)
Enoch(dedicated)                                 Enos(man) 
Cain built a city named after him

             Irad(Fleet)

          Mahujael(smitten by God)

              Methusael(who is of God)

        Adah(wife #1)      Lamech(powerful)      Zillah(wife #2)

          (ornament)                                                                 (shade)

  Jabal brothers     Jubal                Tubal Cain brother and sister Naamah

(stream of water) (stream)             (thou will be brought of Cain)      (loveliness)

     Lamech is the 7^th from Adam and shows how quickly sin multiplies. He takes it upon himself to have 2 wives but God's original plan was monogamy, he brings into history polygamy. Adding to the increase of sin he murders a young man just based on him being wounded. Now claiming that if Cain was avenged 7 fold he should be avenged 77 fold. His vicious announcement of personal revenge found its counterpart in Jesus' response to Peter's question about forgiveness in Matt. 18:21-22.

      Adam and Eve have another son and they name him Seth which means compensation. Rightly named because Eve says that God has appointed her another seed instead of Abel whom Cain killed. Out of the lineage of Seth comes the Messiah that crushes the head of Satan.

      Seth has a son and names him Enos which means man. Then men began to call upon the name of the Lord. Some scholars believe this to mean that now they worship God but when you look at the Hebrew for “then men began” it means, to profane, defile or pollute. From my understanding, this is speaking more of the depravity that is now on the earth and they begin to profane the name of the Lord by calling themselves by the name of the Lord and to defile and pollute themselves (1Ki.18:24).

      Sin is progressing over the earth but wait-God's judgment and salvation are coming soon.

Your homework for next week is to study the offerings and chapter 5 of Genesis.