The First Case of Sibling Rivalry

Hebrews 11 and the Need to Read the Old Testament

Well, we are continuing this morning in our study of the book of Hebrews. I want to encourage you to open up your Bibles and turn with me to Hebrews chapter 11. We've gone verse by verse through the book of Hebrews so far.

And earlier in this year, I stated that because we are now in Hebrews chapter 11, that we were going to be taking a tour of the Old Testament because in Hebrews chapter 11, the writer gives us an overview of many of the Old Testament individuals that were considered to be great in faith.

Well, so far, we are into the third month of the year and we're only into the fourth verse of chapter 11. So we're going a little slower than I initially anticipated. And we have not yet gone to the Old Testament, but this morning we will.

This morning will be our first venture into really diving into the Old Testament study that I had promised earlier in the year. We're going to begin today by looking at Hebrews chapter 11 and verse 4 and we're going to combine it with a character study of the major people that are the focus of it.

There will be times in our lessons that we will go further than Hebrews chapter 11 does. That's something I wanted to point out about our overview of the Old Testament. There are going to be times where even though Hebrews chapter 11 doesn't address something because it is an important part of what happens in the narrative of the book of Genesis and the rest of the Old Testament, there are going to be times where we focus there using Hebrews 11 simply as our focal point, but we're going to be going off and looking at some other things as well.

So keep that in mind as we are doing this study. So often as members of the New Testament Church, I think we forget the vast majority of the Bible is given to us in the Old Testament. And as such, it is easy for us to be much less familiar with the lessons taught in the Old Testament than the ones that are taught in the New Testament.

This is partly the reason for what I want us to do in looking at these character studies. I want us to have a good understanding of the Old Testament because if we don't understand the Old Testament, we really don't understand the New Testament because the New Testament is built on the foundation of the Old Testament.

One of the things that I remember and I guess they're still pretty popular are the little New Testament Bibles that people hand out. And New Testament Bibles are great and if you keep one in your pocket like I do for when you go to hospitals and you want to minister to people and you want to pull out a Bible and read to them something from the Psalms or the New Testament, those are great.

The problem that I think with those little Bibles is that if that's all we give people, we're not giving them the whole story. And if you don't understand the Old Testament foundation, you really won't understand who Jesus Christ is and you really won't understand what the New Testament is all about.

So we really need the Old Testament and we need to know what it says to be able to have a well-rounded and understandable faith. So that's part of what we're going to do in this study. So we're going to begin by looking at Hebrews 11 and verse 4 and then we're going to venture back into the Old Testament.

The First Offering in Hebrews 11:4

So let's stand together. We'll read our opening text. We always stand for the reading of the Word of God because it is the Word of God. And we want to give it its due honor and reverence. By faith, Abel offered to God a more acceptable sacrifice than Cain, through which he was commended as righteous, God commending him by accepting his gifts.

And through his faith, though he died, he still speaks. Father, as we examine the text of Scripture today and as we go back into the book of Genesis and examine the story of Cain and Abel, I pray, O Lord, that you would first and foremost keep me in line with your truth, keep me from error, sanctify me for this time.

And Lord God, sanctify your congregation and open their hearts that they would understand what the Word of God is saying, that we might all grow in our faith, that we might leave this place changed from having heard the Word.

This is our prayer in Jesus' name. Amen. There's a four-year-old boy who was watching television with his two-year-old sister and their mother was in the kitchen doing dishes. And the mother hears a blood-curdling scream come from the living room.

So, of course, she drops the dishes and she makes a mad dash for the living room, where she finds the two-year-old sitting on the couch behind the four-year-old, the little girl having grabbed the hair of the boy and was intentionally pulling up.

And the little boy is just screaming, Ah, you know, it hurts so bad. And the mom, trying to be the diplomat, walks over to the little girl, she grabs her hand, she takes the hand off the hair, and the little boy, of course, is angry and she says, Now, now, she doesn't know that it hurts.

And she goes back to doing the dishes. The next thing, about two minutes later, she hears, Ah, again, and she runs back out. Now, the little boy has her hair in his hand and he looks at the mom and says, She knows now.

Sibling rivalry, he thinks that's funny, sibling rivalry is often not a fun thing to have to endure. As a parent of two children, I can attest to the fact that siblings can display feelings of jealousy, envy, pride, and even outrage towards one another, really at the drop of a hat.

Often when one is in trouble, one of the funniest things that I see in my house is when one child is in trouble, the other child will then become angelic. And they will sidle up to you. When you're disciplining one child because they have done something wrong, the other child will come and snuggle, as if to say, I'm not bad, I'm not evil, they're evil.

And that's just another aspect of that sibling rivalry. But sibling rivalry is nothing new. Throughout history, we've recorded accounts of brothers warring against brothers over property rights, over inheritances, over significant others, and almost anything else we can imagine.

In fact, sibling rivalry is so pervasive that we actually have a recorded account of it existing between the very first pair of siblings. Of course, I'm talking about the story of Cain and Abel. I want us to read the story of Cain and Abel this morning, and I want us to understand the history of the account that is in the book of Genesis and is recounted for us here in Hebrews.

And I want to make commentary on how the writer of Hebrews is viewing the story in regard to the subject of faith. So let's turn now to Genesis chapter 4. We're going to walk through the story together.

I'll make comments as we go. Genesis chapter 4. This is directly following the fall of man. You all know the story. God created the world. God created man and woman. And when He created man and woman, He gave them but one command.

He says, you may eat of any tree in the garden, but you shall not eat of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for on the day that you eat of it, you shall surely die. Well, Adam and Eve did not respond in obedience, but instead responded in disobedience, and as such they became sinners and they brought sin into the race of mankind.

And we still today deal with the sin that has been passed down to us. Well, this story happens right after God has given His judgment upon them for their sin. God judged the serpent. God judged the woman.

And God judged the man in Genesis chapter 3. And then in Genesis chapter 4, it says in verse 1,. Now Adam knew Eve, his wife, and she conceived and bore Cain, saying, I have gotten a man with the help of the Lord.

Here we see the first parents of the human race in their condition right after they had fallen into sin. They had experienced life in the Garden of Eden, which as far as I can tell was as close to a heavenly existence as there has ever been on the earth.

Yet because of their inability to restrain their passion for rebellion, they now live forever as exiles from God, exiles from the Garden. And they were out in a cruel world where the earth was no longer in their submission, but rather was under a curse.

And everything that they would receive would have to come from the sweat of their brow. They were alone. It was just the two of them. God didn't create anyone else from the dust of the ground. God created Adam and Eve.

And all of us are children of Adam and Eve. Adam and Eve were alone, that is until they came together and produced the first child. And I think really we can little imagine what that must have been like, to create the first child or to have the first child.

You know, if you think about it today, women who go through childbirth, at least they have some example of kind of what it's going to be like. Most of us, you know, we have most women who go through pregnancies, go through pregnancies with a doctor who kind of explains what it's going to be like.

And they're in the nursing room with them. They have a midwife who's gone through this or, you know, their husbands have gone through Lamaze classes or whatever. They go through the experience with people who have already gone through the experience before.

So even though it's new for them, it's not as if they don't have any idea of what's going to happen. You can imagine how different it was for the first woman, Eve, to have born the first child. What an experience it must have been.

There was no prior birth. There was nothing to compare it to. There was no way to know what was to come. And I'm sure it was frightening for her and for him. However, when their child did arrive, Eve recognized him as being a gift from God and a miracle.

The pains of childbirth were overshadowed by the joy of having the newborn baby in her arms. And she confessed in verse 1, I have gotten a man with the help of the Lord. And some commentators have conjectured that Eve is here making a statement of faith.

Because if you'll remember in chapter 3, in chapter 3, God judges the serpent and then God judges the woman. But what does He say to the woman? He says, I will put enmity between you. Or rather, He judges the serpent.

He says, I'll put enmity between you and the woman and between your offspring and her offspring. He shall bruise your head and you shall bruise His heel. And many people have seen that. That's Genesis 3 .15.

They've seen that as what is called the Proto-Evangelium, or the first statement of the gospel, the first statement that God makes the pronouncement that He's actually going to destroy the work of Satan through the seed of the woman.

Now, we know who the seed of the woman is. The Apostle Paul tells us that Jesus Christ is the seed of the woman that was being spoken of there in Genesis 3. That He was the promised seed. However, Eve did not know that.

So Eve receives this child from God. And she says, I've gotten a man from the Lord. I've gotten the seed. You have to imagine, she must have thought, this is the one. This is the one who's going to bruise the head of the serpent.

But instead, this man was not to be the Savior. But instead, he would be a fiend. Instead of destroying the work of the devil, he would actually become an agent of Satan. And would be one who would do his work.

Cain, Abel, and the Pattern of Rivalry

So we come to verse 2. And it says,. And again, she bore his brother Abel. Now, Abel was a keeper of sheep. And Cain, a worker of the ground. Now, this second child is born to Adam and Eve. And this child is much different from the first.

The first son was one whose passion was working the ground. And the second one whose passion was working with animals. Now, something very important to consider is that their passions, their vocations that they chose, both were equally noble vocations.

One was not inherently any more virtuous than the other. However, the differences in occupation would ultimately be the impetus for the difference in offerings that they would bring to the Lord. One would bring an offering from the ground.

The other would bring an offering from the flock. One would be accepted by God. And one would not. But this begins for us a pattern that we see in Genesis. And actually a pattern that we see throughout Scripture.

The pattern of there being two siblings. God choosing one and not choosing the other. And there being a rivalry that ensues as a result. Think about, after Cain and Abel, what is the next rivalry that we see?

The main rivalry between Ishmael and Isaac. And then after that we see between Jacob and Esau. And then after that we see Joseph and his brothers. Over and over through Genesis there is this continual repetition of this sibling disagreement, this sibling separation.

One thing that we should also remember is that as the firstborn son, Cain was the natural heir of the blessings of God. The one to whom the family rights were supposed to pass on to. However, like we see in other stories of Scripture, the preeminence and familial position did not sway God's choice.

God didn't choose Cain just because he was first. In fact, we see God chose Abel instead. Verse 3, In the course of time, Cain brought to the Lord an offering of the fruit of the ground. And Abel also brought of the firstborn of his flock of their fat portions.

And the Lord had regard for Abel and his offering. But for Cain and his offering, he had no regard. So Cain was very angry. And his face fell. Now something to look at in verse 3 there. It says, In the course of time.

It doesn't tell us how long. And part of this study, I said we're going to kind of overview the Old Testament. One of the things that we need to understand, there's a lot of questions that people have about the Old Testament.

Sometimes when you're looking on the internet or when you're at school or when you're out at work, somebody might ask you a question. And one of the most prominent questions is, Hey, where did Cain and Abel get their wives?

That's a big question. Because the Bible doesn't tell us anything about Adam and Eve's other children. But something that we can read into the text when we see here, it says, In the course of time. It doesn't tell us how long.

But we do know this later on in the text. It says Adam and Eve had many children. These two were their first. Seth is one that comes later. But there are actually many other children. And somebody says, Well, is it wrong for Abel and Cain to have taken a wife from among their sisters?

Well, it couldn't have been. Because at this point in time, there would have been no other choice. And not only that, people say, Well, wouldn't that have meant that there had been some kind of mutation in the line of humankind?

I don't think that that's the case at all. And even if you were to look at history in an evolutionary viewpoint and look back in an evolutionary way, which we would totally reject as Christians. But even in that way, there is a point in time in which there had to have been sibling interaction.

There had to have been at some point. Because the mankind has grown from a single source. And even evolutionists don't disagree with that. So it's important to consider the fact that there's nothing wrong with considering that in this course of time, when it says Abel had a wife and Cain, you know, well, Cain had a wife.

It doesn't say anything about Abel having a wife, but in Cain having a wife, we understand this course of time could have provided what was needed for them to have just that. And again, the question that we're looking at here doesn't really deal with that.

But the question that a lot of people have when looking at this text is, Why is it that God accepted Abel's sacrifice and rejected Cain's sacrifice? We understand that Abel was a shepherd. So Abel brought what would have been his natural offering.

Abel brought an offering from the flock. Cain was a farmer for, if you want to use that term, he was a worker of the ground. And of course, it's natural that Cain would have brought a harvest offering to God.

So why is it that God chose to accept one and not to accept the other? This has caused people a lot of problems in trying to interpret the story. And some people have come to answers that don't necessarily flow from the text.

Some people say, well, the reason why God accepted Abel's offering is because Abel brought a blood offering. And the Bible says without the shedding of blood, there is no forgiveness of sins. And because a blood offering is necessary for the forgiveness of sins, then Abel brought the wrong kind of offering and that's why God didn't accept it.

The only problem with that is, number one, the text doesn't say that it was a sin offering. It says they brought an offering to God. It doesn't say it was a sin offering. And if you look in the Old Testament, you'll see over and over and over where grain offerings were offered up to God for different reasons.

So to necessarily say that because it was a blood offering and the other wasn't a blood offering, that's why God accepted it, you were reading into the text at that point. We're coming up with our own answer to an answer that's not given to us.

I'm not saying that's not the right answer. I'm just saying right there we're saying something that's not in the text. We're saying this is a sin offering and we don't know that. So it makes it difficult.

There were many times, and if you look through Leviticus 6, you will see that God gives an outline for a proper harvest offering. So it's not wrong necessarily to bring God an offering from the field.

However, either way, the text in Genesis does not tell us why the offering was accepted and why the other was not. All that it says is that Cain's offering was rejected. And as a result, he was angry.

The Bible says his face fell. I love how the Bible sometimes speaks in words that are so simple yet so subtle. The subtlety of that statement, his face fell. Have you ever seen somebody get really angry?

Have you yourself ever gotten really angry? Yeah. You know what happens to your face when you get angry. You just kind of, you lose any, you know, because I'm sure Abel was, you know, I'm sure he was pretty proud of whatever it was he was bringing.

I'm sorry, Cain, I'm thinking of Cain. It's easy to mix up the two when you're telling the story. But I'm sure he was pretty proud when he carried that offering up there. You know, he was excited. He had it.

And then God didn't accept it. And his face fell. And he became angry. And verse 6 says this. The Lord said to Cain, Why are you angry? And why has your face fallen? If you do well, will you not be accepted?

And if you do not do well, sin is crouching at the door. It's desires for you, but you must rule over it. You see, here's the thing. This is so important and people miss it. But verse 6 tells us something.

Even though the text doesn't tell us why Abel's offering was accepted and Cain's wasn't. Cain knew. Because God tells him right here. He says, why are you angry? Why is your face falling? If you do well, will you not be accepted?

The point is, he knew what he was doing was wrong. He had an understanding himself. We might not know what was wrong with it. But he knew what was wrong with it. He knew what requirement in the offering had been omitted.

And he had submitted his offering anyway. This is a picture of the depravity of the human condition. Cain faced the very God of heaven. He knew what God required of him. Yet instead of bringing obedience to God, he held back from God full submission.

And instead, offered to God an impotent sacrifice. And he knew he was doing it. So at that point, God offers him a warning. He says, sin is crouching at the door. Now I believe the sin that he's referring to here is the sin of anger.

Because that anger is about to burst forth in the murder of his brother. God tells him that he needs to seek to control his rage. Something very important to remember is the truth God expresses here. Had Cain simply offered an appropriate sacrifice to God, he would have been accepted.

Yet in rebellion, he chose to offer a worthless sacrifice. And as such, he incurred God's disfavor. And instead of repenting of his rebellion, he instead chose to remain in his sin and allow it to fester into murderous rage.

And it goes on into verse 8, where we read of the death of Abel. It says in verse 8, Cain spoke to Abel, his brother. And when they were in the field, Cain rose up against his brother Abel and killed him.

You know, it should be noted that Cain took out his fury on the only one he could. I believe that given the choice, he would have just as soon killed God for rejecting his sacrifice. But you can't rightly kill God.

So he chose the next one, the next object of his fury. The text says Cain spoke to his brother Abel. There's no record of the conversation, but it's likely whatever the conversation was, it was simply a clever ruse.

It was Cain's way of getting Abel away from others. It was Cain's way of getting him away from the parents. It was Cain's way of getting him out in the field, away from prying eyes. It indicates that this was not a crime of passion.

This was not a crime of anger where it just rose up inside of him and he burst forth. This was premeditated murder with the intent of hiding it. Cold-blooded. You know, most of us are aware this was the first murder in history.

But you know what most of us forget is this is actually the first death in history. This is the first time a human being dies in the Bible. Adam and Eve are still alive. Their other children, if they have been born yet, are still alive.

This is the first man to ever die. And how does he die? He dies at the raging hand of another man. As I mentioned earlier, there's no way to fully imagine how Eve felt the first time she had a child. If you can imagine that, having never experienced that before.

But even further, try to think about Abel's condition. Not ever having seen death. Not having ever experienced anyone else dying. Not even understanding any way in what death is. While his brother is raining blows upon him, bringing his death closer and closer.

It's a frightening thing. And God knew what had been done. As much as Cain tried to hide his crime from the eyes of other humanity, he could not hide it from the eyes of divinity. Verse 9,. Then the Lord said to Cain, Where is your brother Abel?

He said, I do not know. Am I my brother's keeper? There is a smug sarcasm in Cain's answer to God's query. And by using the word keeper, what he's doing there is he's actually insulting his brother in an ever so subtle way.

What is Abel called? Abel is called a keeper of the flock. And he said, Am I the keeper's keeper? I couldn't even bring a right sacrifice and you expect me to keep watch over the watcher? Sarcasm to the living God.

And the Lord said in verse 10, What have you done? The voice of your brother's blood is crying to me from the ground. Cain was caught dead in his traps. His clever attempt at murder and to hide his brother's remains had not missed the keen eye of the omniscient God.

He was on to Cain's sin and now he would level his justice against him. In verse 11 it says,. And now you are cursed from the ground, which has opened its mouth to receive your brother's blood from your hand.

When you work the ground, it shall no longer yield to you its strength. You shall be a fugitive and a wanderer on the earth. The one thing Cain was good at was being a worker of the ground. And that's what God cursed.

He would no longer be a member of the community either. He would no longer be a member of his family. He would be a person who had to wander about. He would be at the mercy of other family members, some of which who would want to take his life in vengeance for his brother.

His sin had brought upon his life a horrible consequence. Now the story goes on, and we have much that we could learn from the story, particularly in regard to Cain's descendants and how they affected the situation with Noah.

But something that I want to make clear, and this is important when you're looking at the timeline of history, none of Cain's descendants are alive today because all of Cain's descendants perished in the flood.

Who are we all descended from? Not Abel, because he died. We are all descendants of Seth because Seth begot the children that would become the family of Noah. And we are all descendants of Noah because Noah was the only family that survived the flood.

So Cain's line ultimately was quenched in the waters of the flood. The ultimate judgment against the first murder. Now that we understand the background of Hebrews 11, I want to address something that's in Hebrews 11 because it's very important.

I believe that Hebrews 11 verse 4 answers the question that Genesis 4 raises. The question that we asked earlier, the question I said Genesis 4 doesn't really give us an answer to, is why did God receive the sacrifice of Abel and not receive the sacrifice of Cain?

Why did God accept the sacrifice of Abel and reject the sacrifice of Cain? I believe the answer is in Hebrews 11 verse 4 because this is what Hebrews 11 verse 4 says. It says, By faith, Abel offered a more acceptable sacrifice to God than did Cain.

And then it goes on to say, God commended him by accepting his gifts, and through his faith, though he died, he still speaks. You see, what ultimately separated Abel's sacrifice from Cain's sacrifice is faith.

This reminds us of the truth that God always examines our hearts. A sacrifice that is brought out of a begrudging, unbelieving heart will not be honored by God, no matter how worthy the sacrifice. Let me say it again.

A sacrifice that is brought out of a begrudging, unbelieving heart will not be honored by God, no matter how worthy the sacrifice. But one given out of a heart of genuine trust and faith will receive the blessings of God.

God knew the heart of Cain and Abel. He knew one had a heart of faith and one had a heart of cold disbelief. Both offerings looked good on the outside. Both offerings had in and of themselves potential to be righteous offerings.

But the motivation behind the offerings, one was a motivation of faith, the other a motivation of a heart that was cold towards God. Now, beloved, we could have a conversation about God's sovereign choice.

We can have a conversation about how God's grace was given to Abel and that's what changed his heart that he would actually bring a righteous sacrifice and that faith is a gift from God. And all of those things are true.

And we must never gloss over them. Because God is the one who grants the grace and we respond in faith. That is true. And while we commend Abel for his faith, we must understand that Abel's faith is a product of the grace of God.

That is all true. But at the same time, we still have to ask ourselves an important question. Because this is where I think the rubber meets the road with this story. Because it is so easy to bring this story down to a practical application for us all.

And here is the application. Here is the application for the church. Please listen and keep your ears attentive to what I am about to say. Abel offered his sacrifice out of genuine love and faith. Cain offered a sacrifice in unbelief, likely out of a sense of duty in a begrudging manner.

The question is, where are you? Did you come to church today because you love the Lord? Because you trust in Him as your Savior? Because you want to be with His people? And because you desire to offer up a sacrifice of praise?

If so, you should bless God for His gift of faith to you. And say to Him, be the glory. However, if you came to church out of allegiance to some tradition, or to some duty requirement, an attempt to fill some religious requirement that you have on your weekly schedule, then I am fearful for you, for I fear that you are in the condition of Cain this morning.

And you stand precariously near to sin. If you are not careful, that sin will consume you. I encourage you, if that is your condition, if you came here simply to fulfill some religious requirement, cry out in repentance this morning.

And seek the face of God while He may be found. And I pray that He would open up your heart to do just that. Let's pray. Our Father and our God, we see the story of Cain and Abel. And we see two men who truly represent to us a righteous faith and an unrighteous life.

And Lord, we know that the writer of Hebrews, in giving us this example of Abel, reminds us what faith looks like. And how, Lord, we are to respond to You. And I pray, Lord, if there are those here who have come this morning simply out of religious duty, that this sermon would encourage their heart towards righteousness, would confront them in their sin, and would call them to repentance.

For, Lord God, we are here today not out of duty, but out of desire to be with Your people, to worship Your name, to offer up a sacrifice of praise. We pray, O Lord, as we come now to the conclusion of this service, if there are those among us who need prayer, that You would encourage them to come and be prayed for.

And, Lord God, if there are those among us who need Christ, that they would repent in their heart and trust in You, and seek to be baptized in accordance with that faith. And, Lord God, if there are those here who know Christ, and have found a home with us, we ask, O Lord, that You would encourage their heart to make that known as well.

All these things we ask in Jesus' name and for His sake. Amen. Stand with us as we sing our song of introspection. And if you have a need to come, please come as we sing.