Abel: Faith Filled Worship, Part 1

And good morning and welcome to Kootenai Church.

We're glad that you're here today. Would you please stand as we sing this morning, Christ our glory.

Blessings in heaven are rare, and should we try to be still, and shortens our journey, and hastens us home. May stars and sends us home. Be wasted on seeking our joy, and placing our hope in what will be destroyed.

A city that hands have not raised. A tree that sin has not slain. A star king that sin has not slain. Through trouble and anguish, increase all the more. They cannot compare to the glory in store. I'm sorry, Paul, Savior, Christ our star.

The love shine by faith. We see the hand of God, creation's grand design. In the lives of those who prove his faithful, by faith and not by sight. By faith, our fathers roamed the earth. With the power of his promise in their hearts.

Of a holy city built by God's own hand. A place where peace and justice reign. We will stand as children of the promise. Our eyes on him, our souls reward. Till the race is finished, and the work is done.

By faith and not by sight. By faith, the prophets saw a day. When the longed for Messiah would appear. With the power to break the chains of sin and death. And rise triumphant from the grave. By faith, the church was called to go.

In the power of the spirit to the law. To deliver captives and to preach good news. In every corner of the earth. We will stand as children of the promise. Our eyes on him, our souls reward. Till the race is finished, and the work is done.

By faith, the mountains shall be moved. All things are possible. Our eyes on him, our souls reward. Till the race is finished, and the work is done. By faith and not by sight.

In Psalm 103, David says, bless the Lord, O my soul, and all that is within me. Bless his holy name. Bless the Lord, O my soul, and forget none of his benefits. Who pardons all your iniquities. Who heals all your diseases.

Who redeems your life from the pit. Who crowns you with loving kindness and compassion. Who satisfies your years with good things. So that your youth is renewed like the eagle. He continues and he says, the Lord has established his throne in the heavens.

And his sovereignty rules over all. Bless the Lord, you his angels. Mighty in strength, who perform his word. Obeying the voice of his word. Bless the Lord, all you his hosts. You who serve him, doing his will.

Bless the Lord, all you works of his. And all places of his dominion. Bless the Lord, O my soul.

Bless the Lord, O my soul. O my soul. Worship his holy name. Sing like never before. O my soul, I'll worship your holy name. The sun comes up, it's a new day dawning. It's time to sing your song again.

Bless the Lord. Worship his holy name. Bless the Lord. My strength is there. And my time has come. In years and then forever. Bless the Lord, O my soul. Worship his soul. Worship his soul. Like never before.

You may be seated.

Good morning, I have a number of announcements that I need to go over this morning. Many of which, in fact, probably all of these are not in your bulletin. They require a little bit of an explanation.

First of all, every time at this time of the year, every year at this time of the year, we have a fundraiser for the Crisis Pregnancy Center, our local one here in town. And this year is no different.

Out in the foyer and around that big post that's right in the middle of the entryway there, you will see some pieces of paper taped up on the wall there. If you would like to sponsor one of the clients for the local Crisis Pregnancy Center, you can take one of those pieces of paper and Mary Ann Britton will be out there after the service to explain to you how we go about doing that.

It's a great opportunity to bless some of the young women who are their clients of the center. So that's first. Second, we have a Christmas choir that we'll be meeting next week if you would like to participate in that and be part of one of the special services or special music for one of the services around Christmas time.

Then please plan to meet next week after the service in this classroom that is back here. Carve out a little bit of time for that. And then third, I need to announce this kind of every year about this time just to remind you of a reminder about parking in the parking lot.

Our parking lot, because it's not paved and we don't have lines spelled out for people to park, it kind of proves that evolution can never happen because left to itself over the course of time without a reminder, it just degenerates into chaos instead of any kind of order or semblance of structure.

So when you come in, please remember to park as close as you can to somebody else who's already in the line. Don't just go down and find another place what you think might be a line and just park your car there.

Just find a car and park next to that. Not close enough so that you need a can opener to get into your car, but close enough so that you're not leaving three quarters of a space between you and the car next to you or a car and a half length or something like that.

And this is going to become especially necessary as we get closer into winter when we're going to be losing space for plowing snow and storing snow. So please just keep that in mind. And then two last ones, both of which regard conferences that we're having.

Our spring conference, our spring equipping conference featuring Daryl Harrison and Virgil Walker needed to be rescheduled because of a scheduling conflict with Daryl Harrison. So that has been moved from the third week of May, May 20th to the 21st I think is when it was.

We had to postpone that two more weeks to June 3rd through the 5th. So please take note of that. This conference is, Daryl Harrison is the Dean of Social Media at Grace to You, the radio ministry of John MacArthur.

Virgil Walker runs or helps run G3 Ministries that does the G3 Conference and many of the regional conferences that G3 Ministries puts on. G3 is Gospel, Grace, and Glory. Those two men are probably the most equipped men to handle the subject matter that we are going to assign to them.

And that is the whole area of social justice, progressive Christianity, woke theism, Marxism, socialism, egalitarianism, all of the liberal things that are kind of coming into Christianity and becoming more and more prevalent.

We're gonna have them here to address that. We're going to probably plan for an all-day Friday as well as an all-day Saturday. So whereas we used to do just Friday night and Saturday, since we have both of those guys, we're gonna milk as much out of them as we possibly can.

So it will be an all-day Friday. We'll be starting Friday morning and going all-day Friday and then doing all-day Saturday as well. So that will be June 3rd through the 5th. And then lastly, Justin Peters called me this week and asked me for a favor, which I was happy to oblige him.

He asked if he could come and do his Clouds Without Water seminar here at our church and if we could record it. That recording will be the update for his video set of DVDs that he does. It will be the updated conference.

It was probably, it was 2010 when we had Justin do that last, even though he's been here part of our church for so many years in the interim. But he needs to update his video. So we are gonna do that.

We're going to have a conference with his Clouds Without Water seminar January 14th and 15th. So that's a Friday and a Saturday. This conference will be free. We're not gonna charge anybody to come into that.

And we are going to provide the food for that for Friday night and Saturday. We're gonna take up an offering which will help cover the food expenses and any money given over and above the cost of the food will go to support Justin's ministry.

And because we want it to be a high-quality sound and audio recording for Justin's ministry, we're going to not allow children under the age of five. And if you have somebody, a kid who's over five who fusses and screams, then not them either.

But no children under five in the sanctuary while we're recording that. Because as much as I love the sound of screaming children during my own messages, since we are recording this for Justin, we want to try and exclude that as much as we can.

So if the online registration is up on our website, we just need to know who's coming so we know how much food to prepare for that and how to set up the sanctuary here. It's gonna be shots of the audience as well as shots of Justin doing his seminar.

Two sessions on Friday night and four on Saturday, January 14th and 15th. So mark those out on your calendar. And again, there's no cost to this. You just have to go to the church website and register.

And you'll see it on the rotating banner that's at the top of the website. You can click there. Just give us your name, how many people are coming to the party so we know how many people to expect. All right?

That's it. Please turn to Genesis chapter four. Genesis chapter four. And speaking of Justin, by the way, he will be here to preach November 28th, the Friday after Thanksgiving. Genesis chapter four. And we're gonna read beginning at verse one.

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. Again, she gave birth to his brother Abel. And Abel was a keeper of flocks, but Cain was a tiller of the ground.

So it came about in the course of time that Cain brought an offering to the Lord of the fruit of the ground. Abel on his part also brought of the firstlings of his flock and of their fat portions. And the Lord had regard for Abel and for his offering, but for Cain and for his offering he had no regard.

So Cain became very angry and his countenance fell. Then the Lord said to Cain, why are you angry and why has your countenance fallen? If you do well, will not your countenance be lifted up? And if you do not do well, sin is crouching at the door and its desire is for you, but you must master it.

Cain told Abel his brother. 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? He said, what have you done? The voice of your brother's blood is crying to me from the ground. 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 be a vagrant and a wanderer on the earth. Cain said to the Lord, my punishment is too great to bear. Behold, you have driven me this day from the face of the ground and from your face I will be hidden and I will be a vagrant and a wanderer on the earth and whoever finds me will kill me.

So the Lord said to him, therefore, whoever kills Cain, vengeance will be taken on him sevenfold. And the Lord appointed a 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.

Cain had relations with his wife and she conceived and gave birth to Enoch and he built a city and called the name of the city Enoch after the name of his son. Will you stand with me as we pray? Let's bow our heads.

Our Father, we come to you today recognizing that we are dependent upon you for the grace to worship you as you should be worshiped. We need your grace to approach you. It is only because of the merits of Christ and what he has done through his sacrifice that we can have any standing before you for what you require is righteousness and holiness and purity in the inner man.

And we in ourselves have none of that. We thank you that by the death of Christ and through his life and his perfection that we are made righteous in your sight. We pray today that as we come together to worship you that our hearts may be pure before you.

We confess to you our iniquity and pray that you would give us grace to see our sin, to see ourselves in light of your law, and of your word, and that you would give us grace to seek after you and your face and to worship you as you deserve to be worshiped.

You are worthy of all that we could give you and so much more. We pray that you would strengthen us today to honor you and to glorify you and to worship you as we ought. In Christ's name. Amen. Jesus.

In Ephesians chapter 3 verses 17 and 19. It says.

So that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith and that you being firmly rooted and grounded in love may be able to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and the length and the height and the depth and to know the love of Christ which surpasses knowledge that you may be filled up to all the fullness of God.

And authority can ne 'er truly change from the dawn.

You may be seated. Turn now if you will please to Hebrews chapter 11. Hebrews chapter 11. We're going to read together beginning one verse prior in chapter 10 verse 39 and we'll read through the end of verse 7.

Hebrews 11. Now faith is the assurance of things oh sorry, verse 39. I called that out and then I don't know what I was thinking. But we are not of those who shrink back to destruction but of those who have faith to the preserving of the soul.

Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for the conviction of things not seen. For by it the men of old gained approval. By faith we understand that the worlds were prepared by the word of God so that what is seen was not made out of things which are visible.

By faith Abel offered to God a better sacrifice than Cain through which he obtained the testimony that he was righteous God testifying about his gifts and through faith though he is dead he still speaks.

By faith Enoch was taken up so that he would not see death and he was not found because God took him up for he obtained the witness that before his being taken up he was pleasing to God. And without faith it is impossible to please him for he who comes to God must believe that he is and that he is a rewarder of those who seek him.

By faith Noah being warned by God about things not yet seen in reverence prepared an ark for the salvation of his household by which he condemned the world and became an heir of the righteousness which is according to faith.

Let's pray together. Our Father it is our desire that you would speak to us through your word as we have just sung. It is our expectation because you have promised that your word when it is accurately and rightly proclaimed that your voice is truly and powerfully heard.

We pray that that may be the case today that you would use your word to soften our hearts to encourage us in the truth to comfort us, to convict us to encourage us and equip us and to reprove us and rebuke us as necessary.

We pray that in the course of our study here that we may see clearly the provision that you have made in the sacrifice of your son the Lord Jesus Christ and all that that means for us and for our worship.

We ask your blessing upon this time in Christ's name. Amen. Hebrews 11 has for us numerous examples of men and women who with faith and through faith accomplished great things and saw the blessing and approval of God in their lives.

And what is remarkable about Hebrews 11 is not only the numerous people that are there but the variety of people the variety of kinds of people the variety of their experiences and their cultures and the things that actually they accomplished for the Lord.

And what we see in Hebrews 11 is that faith in the life of a believer is seen in a number of different ways. Here just in this chapter we see that faith pleases God it does good works it obeys God's word it looks forward and anticipates heavenly promises it trusts God it conquers obstacles it turns its back on the wealth of the world and the approbation of the world and actually endures hostility.

It does all of those things. Faith is so ubiquitous in the life of a true believer that it is applied in so many ways it is seen in every corner of their life and in every element and aspect of their life.

That is what we should expect that just as we have received Christ Jesus we would walk in Him and that in every area of our walk we might see our faith demonstrated and we would see our faith rewarded.

It's easy to apprehend that or get that with the mind what is more difficult is to apply that in the heart so that we're actually living according to faith in our day to day walk. And this journey through Hebrews chapter 11 I think is going to help us to see what that looks like in various areas of our life.

In the example of Abel we see a man who was worshiping in faith whose faith was informed or whose worship was informed by his faith. We see a man who applied faith and trusted God even in the midst of his worship and his sacrifice and that is in fact what pleased the Lord with Abel's sacrifice as opposed to Cain's sacrifice.

The very first example in this series of men that is presented to us in Hebrews 11 is Abel. And the author goes all the way back to the very beginning Genesis chapter 4 and gives us him as an example and you'll notice what the author says at the end of verse 4 that Abel through faith though he is dead he still speaks.

That is something that can be said actually of everybody in Hebrews 11. All of these men and women are dead and yet their example still speaks to us. The lessons from their life still speak to us. But there is something about Abel there is a way in which Abel speaks to us that is unique in ways that the other people mentioned in Hebrews 11 do not speak to us and we're going to get to that not this week but we're going to get to that next week and it has to do with Abel's death and his prophecy and his role as a prophet because Jesus called him a prophet.

But that will be next week. Today we're looking here in Hebrews 11 we're going to be turning back in a moment to Genesis chapter 4 but I just want you to recognize that what the author of Hebrews says in Hebrews 11 verse 4 that Abel though he is dead still speaks.

This is a lesson for us and there are a number of lessons from the life of Abel. You've heard the old adage that dead men tell no tales. Well all the dead men in Hebrews 11 still speak. They have plenty of tales to tell us and they have plenty of lessons to learn and may God grant us ears to hear the lessons from Hebrews chapter 11.

So Abel is the very first what the author calls in verse 2 the men of old. He's the very first man of old that the author presents to us and by going back to creation in verse 3 by faith we understand that the worlds were prepared by the word of God.

The author is already indicating that he's going back to the beginning and he's going to now give us a chronological approach to the Old Testament where he cites various men and even women throughout the Old Testament and the examples in their lives of faith.

And he wants to show us that living by faith is not a uniquely New Testament reality. We tend to think that. We tend to make the mistake or Christians tend to make the mistake that you look at the Old Testament saints and it was their works, their deeds, their mighty heroicism that was the basis upon which God accepted them and that is not the case.

It is faith. It has always been faith. No man ever is accepted by God on his own terms or the merits of his own life. Never. It has never been that way at no time since Christ died and at no time prior to the death of Christ.

All the way back to the very beginning men were accepted by God on one term and one term only and that is faith. And by taking us back to Abel he's giving us that example. He's demonstrating that. Now, Abel is notable and remarkable for a number of reasons.

I'll give you three of them. First, Abel is the first person in Scripture whose faith is explicitly demonstrated in his actions and whose faith was explicitly commended by God. Now we may say that there are some things that Adam and Eve did earlier which implicitly showed a faith or a belief but Abel is the first person in Scripture whose faith is explicitly demonstrated in his actions and whose actions in faith is explicitly commended by God.

The very first one. Others may have had faith prior to him but he's the first example offered chronologically in Scripture and he is an example of a faith that informed his worship. Now this is significant, remember, for the original audience of the book of Hebrews.

What was the issue for the original audience of the book of Hebrews? They had come out of the temple worship and now they were worshiping God under the parameters of the new covenant in keeping with the demands of the new covenant having abandoned the sacrifices and the priesthood and all of the forms and the rituals of the old covenant and now their worship has entirely changed.

It is an entirely different kind of worship than what they had grown up with. Having been used to hearing the bells and smelling the smells of all of the temple worship, now they come together and they gather together as a New Testament, New Covenant community and there's no smells, there's no bells, there's no lowing of the animals and the sheep and all of the stuff that they were used to hearing when they went up to the temple.

So now their worship is radically different in so many ways that it affects all of the senses actually of their worship are affected. And so now the question for this New Covenant community is what does it mean to move forward and worship in faith in the new covenant having abandoned all of the forms and features of the old covenant?

How am I to worship in faith? How am I to approach God in faith if I can't go to a physical priest that I can see and hear the words of that physical priest and see the animal offered on my behalf? How does faith now inform my worship?

That is an issue that's all the way through the book of Hebrews. And so the question that they had to face was would they go back to that or would they press on in faith to the preserving of the soul?

So Abel is the very first one whose faith is explicitly demonstrated by his works. Second, Abel is the very first one to suffer as a result of his faith. Now having just come out of the chapter 10 where these to whom the author is writing had endured a great conflict of sufferings and been made a reproach and had endured tribulations and affliction and where even though they had not suffered to the point of shedding blood and resisted to the point of shedding blood if the trajectory continued we could expect that they were going to eventually shed their own blood for their faith.

So the example of Abel is an example of one he's the very first one who suffered for his faith. In fact, he suffered the very worst thing that he could have suffered and that is death. And he suffered death not at the hands of a complete stranger.

Not at the hands of somebody out in the world. But somebody that he had had Thanksgiving well, they didn't have Thanksgiving dinner somebody they had had dinner with had sat around and had been raised together in the same home they had enjoyed the same benefits and the blessings had conversation with the same parents had sat around the same dinner table and enjoyed conversation together and these early Christians to whom the author of Hebrews is writing and speaking these were people who had been ostracized from their believing community sorry, from the Judaistic community and having embraced the believing community under the New Covenant they were now experiencing this type of hostility and opposition not just from their own countrymen but sometimes in some cases from their very own family members.

Abel is the perfect example of one who suffered who suffered the worst suffering possible death and he did so at the hands of his own family member this would just ring this would just ring in the ears of this believing community.

Third Abel is the first person to ever die though other blood had been shed prior to this it was animal blood. Abel is the first person to ever die. He is the first person to be murdered. He is the first person to be martyred.

He is the first human to shed his blood and that makes him also the first person to step into heaven in the presence of God. Now you and I get to step into heaven there's going to be a lot of people there but when Abel died and he stepped into the presence of God it was just him and the Lord and the multitude of angels that's lonely.

And if we are to read the record of Genesis we might expect that it was a lot of years before somebody else stepped in to join him in heaven. He's the first person to die not the first blood to be shed but this is important the first human blood to be shed.

And since his is the first human blood to be shed it becomes something of a type of foreshadowing a picture of ultimately a blood of a righteous man who would be shed in terms of a sacrifice namely the Lord Jesus Christ.

And we'll get to that more again next week. So there are three notable features if you're looking at verse 4 three notable features of Abel's example. Abel is an example to us in his sacrifice that we would say his worship in his righteousness and in his testimony his sacrifice his righteousness and his testimony.

You see him in verse 4 by faith Abel offered to God a better sacrifice than Cain through which he obtained the testimony that he was righteous. So sacrifice his righteousness God testifying about his gifts.

And through faith though he is dead he still speaks. That is his testimony. So we're going to look today at Abel's sacrifice. And then next week we'll be back here in Hebrews chapter 11 looking at his righteousness and his testimony to look at his sacrifice.

Let's go back now to Genesis chapter 4. Back to Genesis chapter 4 we're going to look at the account that we read at the beginning of the service. Genesis chapter 4 though we're not going to go through the entire chapter we are going to go through the first five verses of that to just look at the sacrifice and why it was significant.

And before we jump into the text I want you to understand that what you're about to read is real history. Real history. This is not an allegory. It's not a myth. It's not an Aesop's fable. It's not some story that's told to communicate some higher point or some symbolic reference.

It's not an allegory telling the events through the course of millions of years that bear no resemblance to the text. This is literal history not the kind of history that is invented in the minds of atheists and evolutionists who rewrite their tales weekly and invent scientific fact out of whole cloth by the dozens whose story is constantly changing.

This is actual real history. There was a literal creation out of literally nothing by a God. And there was a literal garden a paradise with a literal Adam a literal Eve a literal temptation a literal snake a literal tree a literal fall a literal curse a literal exile from that garden literally cherubim at the entrance of the garden.

All of this this is all real history. This is human history taking place roughly about 6 ,000 years ago. So this is not an allegory or a myth. We're going to treat this as history because it is in fact history.

Now I say that not so that you might wonder how it is why it is that I didn't make the word literal the word of the day for the kids today but just so that you understand how we're going to be approaching this and what our position is on the book of Genesis and the early chapters of Genesis.

Genesis 4 verses 1 -2. Let's read it together. Now the man had relations with his wife the man being Adam and she conceived and gave birth to Cain and she said I have gotten a man child with the help of the Lord.

And again she gave birth to his brother Abel and Abel was a keeper of flocks but Cain was a tiller of the ground. Now this takes place after the curse. The fall is in Genesis chapter 3. Genesis 1 and 2 is the creation of the world is perfect.

God pronounces it very good. The fall happens in Genesis chapter 3. And after that the Lord curses the man curses the woman curses the serpent and there is a curse upon all of creation in Genesis chapter 3 Adam and Eve are exiled from the garden.

They are kicked out and two cherubim are stationed at the entrance to the garden of Eden so that they could not come back in. They would not go back into that paradise. They were completely exiled from that garden paradise that all takes place in Genesis chapter 3.

Now we get to Genesis chapter 4 and Adam and Eve begin to do what God had commanded them to do at the very beginning which is to be fruitful and multiply. So now they start having children and it would become very apparent very quickly that their children were just as ravaged by the fall and just as cursed and just as wicked and corrupt and broken as Adam and Eve ever hoped that they would not be.

They were just as corrupt as it was possible to be. Their children are going to end up being just like them. And the fact that this fall happened before Cain and Abel were ever born or Adam and Eve had conceived children indicates that it was likely something that happened very quickly after creation.

So we don't have the creation week unfolding. And then millions of years before Adam and Eve fall we have the creation week unfolding and then very quickly Satan sweeps in with his plan to destroy humanity and to destroy what God has created and he tempts the man and the woman.

And they fell into sin. So this happens very early on. We're not talking about a long period of time. Then they began to have children and I want you to think of something this occurred to me this last week and I don't know that I've ever thought of this or heard this presented in this way.

But Adam and Eve would have been uniquely able to remember what it was like to walk with God face to face. This is something that Cain and Abel because they were born after the fall and conceived after the fall.

This is something that Cain and Abel would have known nothing about. But Adam and Eve alone out of everybody who has ever existed would have known what it was like to stand in the presence of God and to see Him face to face and to walk with Him in innocence in purity in holiness and in righteousness.

They would have known that they could only have described that to Cain and Abel. And I would expect that words would be a little inadequate to describe what that is like. When you're trying to express to Cain and Abel your children what it was once like before you ruined everything what it was once like it would have been almost impossible to put that to words would it not.

But they would have had that memory. This is something that Cain and Abel would have never known anything about. So she names the firstborn Cain. His name seems to be quite intentional as is obvious from the words that she says when she says in verse 1 I have gotten a manchild with the help of the Lord.

Those words are a description of why she named him Cain. The name Cain means gotten received or acquired. So you'll notice in verse 1 she says she's explaining giving commentary on his name I have gotten a manchild with the help of the Lord.

That's her explanation. Now if you have a translation that does this you might notice that there are some italics in that verse where she says with the help of with the help of those words are in italics.

So when she says I have gotten a manchild with the help of the Lord with the help of is in italics meaning that it's not in the original manuscripts it just literally reads I have gotten a manchild Yahweh the Lord.

It's the name for God. I have gotten a manchild Yahweh now that is most likely an expression of Eve's own faith in believing what God had promised back in chapter 3 verse 15 when he says to the woman or to the the serpent and I will put enmity between you and the woman and between your seed and her seed he shall bruise you on the head and you shall bruise him on the heel.

That's what we call the proto-Evangelion the very first proclamation of the gospel. This is a gospel prophecy. Even in the garden right after the fall in the curse upon the serpent which Adam and Eve would have heard these words God promised that one would come through the woman who would end up reversing the curse and destroying the serpent and undoing everything that they had done in the fall.

That was the promise. That was the prediction. And so Eve as she gives birth to that first child she may have been thinking back to that time in the garden when the Lord said that one would come from a woman who would undo this and destroy the serpent.

And so she finally says I have gotten a manchild Yahweh the Lord. Meaning that Eve probably would have understood that whoever it was who was going to come through the woman and because it's the seed of the woman that's a very odd construction.