Christ in Genesis #2: Abel's Sacrifice — Stephen Kaung

Cain and Abel in Genesis 4

Will you please turn to the book of Genesis, Genesis, Chapter 4. Genesis, the fourth chapter, we'll read the first twelve verses. Genesis, Chapter 4, verse 1. And man knew Eve his wife, and she conceived and bore Cain, and said, I have acquired a man with Jehovah.

And she further bore his brother Abel. And Abel was a shepherd, but Cain was a husband. And in process of time it came to pass that Cain brought of the fruit of the ground an offering to Jehovah. And Abel he also brought of the firstlings of his flock, and of their fet.

And Jehovah looked upon Abel and on his offering, and upon Cain and on his offering he did not look. And Cain was very angry, and his countenance fell. And Jehovah said to Cain, Why art thou angry? And why is thy countenance fallen?

If thou doest well, will not thy countenance look up with confidence? And if thou doest not well, sing lieth at the door, and unto thee shall be his desire, and thou shalt rule over him. And Cain spoke to Abel his brother, and it came to pass when they were in the field that Cain rose up against Abel his brother and slew him.

And Jehovah said to Cain, Where is Abel thy brother? And he said, I knew not. Am I my brother's keeper? And he said, What hast thou done? The voice of thy brother's blood is crying to me from the ground.

And now be thou cursed from the ground, which hath opened its mouth to receive thy brother's blood from thy hand. When thou tillest the ground, it shall not henceforth yield thee its strength. A wanderer and fugitive shalt thou be on the earth.

Abel's Faith and More Excellent Sacrifice

THE LETTER TO THE HEBREWS. Hebrews chapter eleven, verse four. Chapter eleven, verse four. By faith Abel offered to God a more excellent sacrifice than Cain, by which he obtained testimony of being righteous, God bearing testimony to his gifts.

And by it, being, having died, he yet speaks. Let us pray. Our Heavenly Father, how we praise and thank Thee that Thou art ever faithful to Thy own word. We do thank Thee for giving Thy word to us, and now we just look to Thee to open Thy word to our hearts.

Speak to us, O Lord, and transform us according to Thy image. In the name of our Lord Jesus, Amen. The last time when we were together, we mentioned that the book of Genesis is a book of biographies. God is not so much interested in doctrines, in teachings, in ways and methods or techniques, but God is very much concerned and interested in man.

And that is the reason why the first book of the Bible is a book of biographies. In the book of Genesis, we find the biographies especially of ten persons. And in these ten persons, God had done such a work in each one of them that we could see in each one of them a symbol, a trademark, something that came out of the dealings of God with their lives.

And when you put all these symbols together, you will find the man at the God's own heart. First we see this man in our Lord Jesus, and then we shall see this man in the church, the body of Christ. The first man, of course, is Adam, and in Adam's life we see the tree.

As God had created Adam, He put Adam before the tree of life. And by the side of that tree, the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. And Adam was to choose between these two trees. Adam was to exercise the free will that God had created him with.

And in choosing either of these two trees, he would decide his own destiny. Either he would choose the tree of life to receive the life of God into him, and thus be united with God in life, and then in purpose.

And actually this is God's original design for creating man. God's purpose for creating man is that man may be such a vessel that will be able to receive his life into him, and be joined with God in life and in purpose.

If he should choose the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, then he would try to develop his own soul, trying to develop his own knowledge of good and evil, and try to be independent of God, or to make a God out of himself.

But the result is, knowing what is good, but did not have the power to do good, knowing what was evil, but did not have the power of not doing evil, it brought death to his life. So here you'll find Adam standing before these two trees.

The tree of life, the life of God, a life depending on God, a life in union with God, a life that lives by the life of God, and a life that is glorious, victorious, and will fulfill God's purpose in man.

Or the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. Yes, there will be the knowledge of good and evil, and ethical knowledge, rationalization, but the result is, it will be condemnation and it will be death.

Unfortunately, our forefather chose the wrong tree. Instead of receiving the life of God in him, he rejected God's life. He wanted to develop his own soul life, make himself a God. Man failed and was driven out of the garden of Eden.

The Promise of the Seed and the Meaning of Abel

Now, of course, we mentioned that God did give man a second chance, because thousands of years later, in the fullness of time, we find another tree on Calvary, and on that tree, the Son of Man, the Son of God, was crucified.

There we find our Lord Jesus. He took the penalty of our eating the tree of the knowledge of good and evil upon himself, and died for us. And then, because of his death, the tree of life is again given to us.

The way to the tree of life is open to us. Whosoever believeth in the Lord Jesus shall not perish, but have everlasting life. So, dear brothers and sisters, we who have received this tree of life in us, from now on, our life should not be governed by the knowledge of good and evil.

It is not good enough. Our life should be governed by the life of God. From now on, our question is no longer whether this is good or bad. The people of this world use this as their standard, but for us Christians, our question will be, is it life or is it death?

And if it is life, then we shall walk in it, and if it is death, then avoid it. So, in Adam we find Adam's tree. Now, this morning we would like to continue on with the second person in the book of Genesis, and that will be Abel.

Abel's sacrifice. He was driven out of the garden of Eden, or before he was driven out. After man sinned, God came to man. On the one hand, God pronounced His judgment upon man. Yet, at the same time, He gave man a wonderful promise.

In Genesis 3, verse 15, God said, I will put an enmity between thee and the woman. That is, between the serpent and the woman. An enmity between the seed of the serpent and the seed of the woman. And the seed of the woman shall crush the serpent's head, and the serpent shall bruise his heels.

Now, that is the first promise we find in the Bible. It is a wonderful promise. God gave this promise immediately after man's fall. The seed of the woman. In the seed of the woman will be the salvation of the world.

After man was driven out of the garden of Eden, man knew his wife, and she bore the first child. And when the first child was born, they named him Cain. Now, the name Cain means acquisition. In other words, it means that we have acquired a man from the Lord.

We have acquired a man from the Lord. What does it mean? Adam and Eve, when they got the first child, they thought this was the seed of the woman. They thought that God's promise became true. They thought that in Cain will be the salvation of mankind.

But unfortunately, Cain was not that man. The seed of the woman was not just any man born of women. We know that the seed of the woman is fulfilled in Christ Jesus, our Lord. In the fullness of time, he was born of a woman, a virgin, under the curse of the law that he might deliver us from the law and give us our inheritance, even the adoption, the sonship.

What a disappointment it was to Adam and Eve to find that this child, Cain, was not the seed of the woman. Very soon, they discovered that he was not. So when the second child was born, you find a complete reaction.

They called the second child Abel. Abel means breath or vanity. They discovered that man under the dominion of sin was just a breath, was just vanity. It was just like a breath. It soon fades. It was all vanity.

So they called the second child Abel. Now these two children, as they grew up, they all began to have their profession, occupation. And Cain became a husbandman. He began to till the ground and became a husbandman.

Cain's Earthly Labor and Abel's Shepherding

Now we know that before man sinned, when they were in the garden of Eden, they ate the fruit of the tree in the garden. That was their food. And after man sinned, God cursed the ground. And God told man that from now on, man had to toil and to labor for his living.

But the ground will grow thistles and thorns. And with his sweat, he will get his fruit. So here you'll find this ground was a cursed ground. And Cain became a husbandman. There he tilled the ground. There he fought against the thorns and the thistles.

Now is it not true that in order to make a better living, man had to fight against nature? Because nature has changed. There he had to toil and to labor and to sweat and try to make a better living out of the ground.

And that was what Cain was doing. He tried to make a living, to make the best out of the curse. He tried to live for himself. But Abel became a shepherd. You know, this is very strange. Because man at that time did not eat any meat.

Man had no need of meat at that time. Man began to eat meat after the flood. After the flood, because of the degeneration of our physical body through sin, God allowed man to eat meat, but not the blood.

But before the flood, in the time of Cain and Abel, man did not eat any meat. Man only ate fruits and herbs out of the ground, the vegetables. But why did Abel choose to become a shepherd? There must be a reason for it.

He began to tend the sheep that he might eat. The sheep. But he knew that God, before he drew Adam and Eve out of Eden, God killed an animal, shed its blood, and made the scheme close for Adam and Eve to cover their nakedness.

In other words, Eve must have told their children because of their sin, an innocent animal must be killed, blood must be shed, in order that they may be closed with the righteousness of God. So these two children must have heard this story from their childhood.

They grew up with that story. But with Cain it was just a story. With Abel he believed it. And because he believed that man was under sin, and there was no remission of sin without the shedding of blood, and because of this, out of his faith and fear of God, he became a shepherd.

In other words, he wanted to raise up sheep in order to bring these sheep to God as sacrifice, that with the shedding of the blood his sins might be forgiven. In other words, he sought for the salvation of his soul.

He did not live for himself, in a sense, but he lived for God and for God's salvation. He became a shepherd. You know, when Christ was born, the angels appeared to the shepherds, tending the sheep in the field of Bethlehem.

Now, we are told that these shepherds are not ordinary shepherds. These shepherds are temple shepherds. In other words, you find sheep were being offered in the temple. Therefore, sheep were being kept.

Sheep that had been under the scrutiny of the priests. Sheep that were perfect, without any blemish, ready to be sacrificed. And there would be shepherds there, tending to these sheep, ready to be offered in the temple for God.

And these shepherds are special. And because of this, you'll find the angels appear to the shepherds. They were the first ones who knew that a child was born, a son was given, because they tended the temple sheep.

They must be of such pure heart. Therefore, they saw God. So evidently, you'll find in the very choosing of their professions, Cain chose a profession for the maintenance of his physical body. But Abel chose a profession for the salvation of his soul, for the salvation of the Lord.

In the very choosing of their profession, you can see two different philosophies of life. With Cain, his philosophy of life was to make the best out of the worst situation in the world. But with Abel, he feared God.

He chose the salvation of the Lord. One day, at the fullness of the day, Cain took off the first fruit of the produce of his land, the offer. Now, dear brothers and sisters, we must remember that Cain was not a bad person.

If you read carefully, you'll find Cain was not a bad person at all. He was a good man. He was the average man. He was a man who was diligent, dutiful, even religious. He killed the ground. He was not wasting or doing all kinds of bad things.

The Bible did not say anything about it in the beginning. You'll find he was rather good. He was an average man. And he was a religious person. He was not like many people in this world who has no sense of worshipping God.

But Cain felt the need of worshipping God. So, in the fullness of the day, you'll find Cain took off the first fruit of the produce of his land and he offered this to God. Most likely, he will try to approach the Garden of Eden as near as he could.

You know, there was the cherubim with the flashing sword guarding the gate to the way to the Tree of Life. So, evidently, all that Cain will do, probably he would draw as close as he could be before the flashing sword and the cherubim.

And there he offered the produce of his land to God. He knew that God must be angry with man. So, he tried to appease God with the best that he had. Now, is it not all natural religions are based on appeasement?

No matter what religion it may be in this world, all the religions of the world are based upon the principle of appeasement. They knew that God must be angry. Therefore, you have to offer something to appease Him, to bribe Him.

And is it not true that in all natural religions it is based on the principle of marriage of good works? Take the first fruit of the produce of the land, the work of your own hand, and the best of your work, your marriage, and by offering your good works to God, then certainly God will forgive you and God will accept you.

Now, that is natural religion. In the very act of Cain, you find the source, the root of all religions, appeasement. But, it depends on yourself. All the natural religions tell you that if you want to be saved, you have to do it yourself.

You have to depend on yourself. So, Cain here, you'll find, he depended on himself. He depended on the works of his own hand, thinking that these should be good enough for God. But he was rejected. God did not look upon Cain and his offering.

Abel, Cain, he offered a lamb. The blood was shed. And God looked upon Abel and upon his offerings. God accepted him. Now, brothers and sisters, you'll find the difference is not between Cain and Abel as people.

In other words, God was not partial to Abel. God would look upon Abel and Cain in the same way. But the difference was in their sacrifice. God did not look upon Cain because of what he offered. God looked upon Abel because of what he offered.

Faith, Sacrifice, and the Righteousness of God

In Hebrews, chapter 11, you'll find that by faith, Abel offered a more excellent sacrifice. So far as people are concerned, we are the same. There is no difference. In Romans, chapter 3, we are told that there is no difference.

All have sinned and come short of the glory of God. There is absolutely no difference. But what makes the difference is the sacrifice. Cain had faith in himself, but not in God. Abel had faith in God and in his word.

By faith. How important it is that by faith we offer the sacrifice that God would accept. Now, this is revealed religion. Now, if you want to make a difference of all religions. Now, we do not consider Christianity as a religion because Christianity is Christ.

But suppose you consider it as a religion. Now, you'll find there is a great difference between Christianity as a religion from all the other religions of the world. You can put all the other religions in the world in one category, natural religion.

By natural religion we mean that it is something conceived naturally by the thoughts of man. And then you can put Christianity on the other side as a totally different category, revealed religion. That is, it is not conceived by man, but it is revealed from above, revealed by God.

Now, you'll find a vast difference between revealed religion from the natural religion. According to the natural thought of man, it is appeasement. But according to the revealed thought of God, it is satisfaction.

In other words, it is not a matter to appease the anger of God, try to bribe Him. It is a matter of to satisfy the righteousness of God. God's righteousness must be satisfied. That is the glory of the blood of our Lord Jesus.

You know, we often think of the blood of the Lord Jesus as something to be sprinkled upon our heart. That is true. In Hebrews we find that the conscience of our heart being sprinkled. Because the conscience of our heart being sprinkled by the blood, our conscience are cleansed.

We have a clear and clean conscience before God. Now, thank God for that. But we must remember that blood is not basically for us. The blood is primarily for God. To satisfy the righteousness of God. You remember during the Passover, God commanded the children of Israel to prepare a lamb for each household.

And the lamb must be killed. Not just have a lamb, but the lamb has to be killed. And after the lamb was killed, now what about the blood? The blood must be put in a basin, must be carried out of the door, and it must be put on the lintel and the doorpost for whom to see.

The family will be gathered within the door. They will not see the blood. They put the blood outside the house. The blood on the lintel, on the doorpost. And probably the basin will be left at the bottom of that threshold.

In other words, the blood was not for the Israelites to see. The blood was for the angel of destruction to see. When the angel of destruction passed over the whole land of Egypt and saw the blood, he passed over.

That symbolizes that the blood is basically to satisfy the righteousness of God. Now, often times we forgot that. Often times we think that the blood is for us. Thank God, it is for us. Because of the blood, our conscience is cleansed.

Therefore, we are no longer under condemnation. We have a clear conscience before God. We can stand before God with holy boldness. It is because of the blood of the lamb. In Hebrews chapter 10 we are so told that we can enter into the holy of holies by the blood of the lamb.

That is true. But basically it is to satisfy the righteousness of God. Unless the righteousness of God is satisfied, there is no salvation. And that is the reason why no matter what you do, you try to appease God, there is no satisfaction.

All the human religions try to appease God. And by what? By good works. By doing some good things. By the produce of the land. Even the first fruit of the produce of the land. The best that you can gather with you.

And you try to bribe God with the best to forgive and forget your sins. But you cannot. All our righteousness is all as filthy rags. We are told in the book of Isaiah. The best that we can offer to God are filthy.

Only Christ. Only Christ can satisfy the righteousness of God. So here you find one is depending on yourself. But real religion is depending on Christ. On the redemption that God has provided for man through our Lord Jesus Christ.

So the result is one is rejection and the other is acceptance. God looked upon Abel, that is upon his offering. God saw the blood. God saw Abel in the sacrifice. And he was accepted. Dear brothers and sisters.

How can we be saved? We cannot be saved by our good works. We can only be saved by the blood of the land. By the blood of our Lord Jesus. We are accepted in the beloved. Not because we are any better than anybody else.

We are no better. But because we have the faith. We believe that God has sent his son into this world. And Christ has died for us. The blood has been shed. God's righteousness has been satisfied. And our conscience has been sprinkled with the blood.

But we have holy boldness to stand before God. This is Abel's sacrifice. When Cain saw that he was rejected by God, he was angry. He thought that God should accept what he offered. He thought that he was doing God an honor.

Trying to serve God. He was doing the best that he could. He was honoring God. And why should God reject him? So God told him, You are rejected because you offered the wrong thing. If you do the right thing, you will be accepted just as your brother.

But if you do not do the right thing, sin is at the door. And what happened? One day Cain and Abel was walking in the field. They were talking. And suddenly Cain rose up and murdered his brother. Do you see the picture here?

The Flesh, Human Goodness, and Cain's Violence

Cain was an average man. He was not bad at the beginning. On the contrary, you find in the beginning he was a diligent farmer. If he was not diligent, he would have no produce. He was quite religious.

He thought of worshiping God, of serving God. Even with the first fruit of the produce of his land. He was a good man. You say there is no good in man? Probably you won't believe it. Because here you'll find Cain was good.

What good? Good flesh. Manifested the good in his flesh. In his flesh there was something good. And he manifested that good of his flesh. But because he lived according to the flesh, even the good of his flesh, one day the bad in his flesh will come out.

The murder is already there. It hasn't had a chance. But when the chance is given, it will come. And that is the reason why the Bible said, He that is born of the flesh is flesh. In other words, flesh.

There might be some good and lots of bad. But whether it is good or whether it is bad, it is flesh. And all flesh is condemned by God. If we allow the good of our flesh to live by the good of our flesh, the result will be the bad of our flesh will sooner or later follow.

Do not depend. Believe in your flesh. Have no confidence in your flesh. If you have confidence in your flesh, and live even by the good of it, one day the bad of it will be revealed. And that's what you find in Cain.

That which is born of the flesh is flesh. You cannot change your flesh. You cannot try to transform your flesh. Religious flesh is still flesh. Just like irreligious flesh. Before God, flesh, the whole flesh, all flesh is condemned.

And it is a blessed day when you realize there is no good in your flesh. Even in the life of the Apostle Paul, you find the Apostle Paul, before he knew the Lord, oh, how he had confidence in his flesh.

Because there is so much good in his flesh. You know, if you read chapter 3 of Philippians, he said, I was born an Israelite of the tribe of Benjamin. On the eighth day I was circumcised. I was brought up a Pharisee, a son of the Pharisee, according to the righteousness of the law I was blameless.

Here was a man, the goodness of the flesh. He was born an Israelite. God's chosen people. He was born of the tribe of Benjamin. Why he boasted of the tribe of Benjamin? Because, you remember, the ten tribes separated themselves.

But Benjamin continued on with Judah. Benjamin never separated. He was circumcised on the eighth day, because God told Abraham, all your male must be circumcised on the eighth day. Ishmael was circumcised when he was thirteen years old.

Abraham was circumcised when he was ninety-six years old. Saul was circumcised on the eighth day. And he was brought up a Pharisee, a Pharisee of the sect of Pharisees, the strictest of all sects. And according to the letter of the law, he was blameless.

Oh, he has so much good in his flesh. But at that time, he was a persecutor of the followers of Jesus Christ. He himself acknowledged later on in Timothy, in the letter to Timothy, he said, I was a persecutor, an arrogant, insolent person, the chief of sinners.

But he didn't know that. He didn't know that. Oh, how he depended on his good flesh. And how he sinned against God. Until God met him on the road to Damascus, and what a change. And even after that, he had to come to a point to see that even after he believed in the Lord Jesus, he could not depend on his good flesh.

In Romans chapter seven he said, I know. According to my renewed mind, I know what is good. I know I should not be greedy. And I tell myself, I do not want to be greedy. I will not be greedy. But he said, the more I will not to be greedy, the greedier I become.

Until he said, Oh, wretched man that I am, who can deliver me from this body of death? I acknowledge that in me, that is in my flesh, there is no fear, brothers and sisters. Do not say that the flesh is all bad.

It is true. There are some good in the flesh. But even the good in the flesh is condemned by God. If you try to live by that, the result is death. It will bring out all the bad that is in you. So we need to have our eyes opened to see that in me, that is in my flesh, there is no fear.

And only that will we be completely delivered. So he said, Thank God through Jesus Christ our Lord. Dear brothers and sisters, remember this one thing. Not only at the time that we are saved, we cannot depend on ourselves, we have to utterly cast upon the Lord Jesus and His blood.

Living by Christ Rather Than the Flesh

But remember, this is a principle of living. Even after we are saved, don't go back to depend on your flesh. God has not changed your flesh. He has saved you. He has given you a new life. But He hasn't changed your flesh.

So after you are saved, if you try to go back and depend on your flesh, your good flesh, brothers and sisters, the tragedy will be, all the badness of our flesh will come forth. We need to see there is no good in our flesh.

We cannot live according to the flesh. The flesh is condemned before God. The flesh and all its passions and lusts are crucified on the cross with Christ. It is no longer I, it is Christ who lives in me.

Brothers and sisters, this is the way to live. Otherwise, you will be walking the way of Cain, depending on his flesh. And what a tragedy it is. He became a wanderer and a fugitive. He went out from the presence of God.

But then you find Abel. By faith, Abel offered a more excellent sacrifice. He depended upon Christ and upon His blood. He did not depend upon anything himself. And because of this, he was accepted by God.

Abel's Witness, Persecution, and the Cry of the Blood

Now, isn't it true that the flesh always persecutes the spirit? Isn't it true that the world always persecutes those who are the Lord? This happened in the beginning of human history. There you find Cain, a representation of the flesh.

And Abel, a representation of the spirit. Because he sought for spiritual things. And there you will find Cain persecuted Abel and murdered him. There you will find from the very beginning of human history, the world, even the religious world, always rise up and persecute those who follow the Lord.

It hasn't changed. Even in our time, you'll find how the flesh always hates the spirit. Because the flesh is rejected by God. And even until our day, you'll find not only the world, but the religious world always persecute those who are pure in heart.

They cannot stand to see people who are accepted by God. There is nothing to fear. Why? Because even Abel was murdered. The Bible says, by faith, having died, he yet speaketh. In other words, though he was killed, yet his blood cried out.

And God heard his cry. Abel's blood cried for vengeance. But the blood of our Lord Jesus cries for forgiveness. Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do. And not only the blood of our Lord Jesus cries out forgiveness, but the blood of the martyrs throughout the centuries cries out forgiveness.

You remember the first martyr in the church, Stephen? When he was stoned to death, he cried out, God, Lord, forgive them. Forgive them. And this has been the cry throughout the centuries of the blood of the martyrs.

Even though they died, yet they speak. In other words, there is a testimony. A testimony to the reality of the greatness of the salvation of the Lord. Cain, who lived according to flesh, became a wanderer and a fugitive.

Yes, it is true. He went out from the presence of the Lord. But you know, Abel Cain was the first one who built a city. Isn't that a contradiction? God said he was to be a wanderer. But he built a city.

He was rebellious to his very end. He was always trying to make the best of his situation. Trying to improve his own situation. But never repented and humbled himself before God. But look at Abel. Though he was killed, yet he spoke.

Continue on. Brothers and sisters, we who believe in the Lord Jesus, do you think that we can expect the world to welcome us? To put out a red carpet for us? Not only the world as such will not do it, but remember, if you really follow the Lord, even the religious world will rise up and persecute.

Do not be surprised. Throughout the twenty centuries of church history, you find that the official Christianity always persecutes those who are pure in heart. So many are killed, not by the world, but by the Christian world.

But thank God, man can kill your body, but cannot kill your soul. That is why the Lord says, Fear not. Just fear the One who can destroy your soul. Just fear God. And not only that, even though outwardly you find there will be persecutions, there will be all these things happening, and yet, having died, He yet speaketh.

In other words, there will be a testimony. Where is the testimony of Jesus? How is the testimony of Jesus maintained? Throughout the centuries, remember, the testimony of Jesus has been and is still being continued on and maintained by those who live according to Spirit, who trusted in the sacrifice, in the blood of the Lamb, who follow the Lamb wherever He goes.

Even though outwardly they will be persecuted, they will be despised, and yet, the testimony of Jesus will be continued on. They yet speak. Do we want to be a wanderer and fugitive? Or do we want to have our testimony goes on?

And that you see in the light of these two brothers. They had the same opportunities. They lived at the same time. Not very far from the days of the Garden of Eden. The Garden of Eden was still before them.

They could see the flashing sword, the cherubim. Probably they could see afar off the Tree of Life. And yet, one did not believe, did not believe in God, did not believe in God's Word, rather trusting himself.

But the other, by faith, offered a more excellent sacrifice, and God there witnessed to him that he is righteous. And by it, having died, he yet speaketh. Today, it is the same thing. The same gospel is preached.

The same offer is given. But some have faith, and some do not. And may the Lord help us that we be those who, by faith, offer this more excellent sacrifice, even Christ Jesus. But remember, it is not just a matter of offering a sacrifice.

Not just a matter of receiving the Lord Jesus. But after we have received Him, this is a way of life. We do not live for ourselves. We live for Him. We do not live by ourselves. We live by Him. And if we do, then we will have a testimony on this earth.

May the Lord help us. Shall we pray? Our Heavenly Father, we do praise and thank Thee that even though men have failed, and yet Thou art merciful and gracious. Thou has prepared a sacrifice for us. And our Father, how we praise and thank Thee that Thou has given us faith to believe in Thy sacrifice, even the blood of our Lord Jesus.

And how we thank Thee that we are now accepted in the Beloved. Now, Father, we do pray that we may not walk in the way of Cain, but we may always walk in the way of Abel. We pray that we may not live henceforth for ourselves, but we live for Thee.

And we live by Thee. And we pray that no matter how difficult it may be in following Thee, and yet, Lord, we thank Thee that there may be a testimony going out. We ask in the name of our Lord Jesus. Amen.