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Many people through history have tried to figure out why mankind is the way that they are. Because one thing that we all observe is that people have problems. People do bad things. And this is something that's not unique to any one person.
This is something that's unique to everyone. And so people have tried to explain this. And this is not something that's just unique to the Christian community where we try to explain what sin is. Even unbelievers have tried to explain what sin is.
And actually there's a few different views that I'm going to share with you here about what some unbelievers who have looked at what is sin and the views that they have come up with. One is that humans evolved from animals and have animal nature that still persists.
So when people do bad things, it's just their animal lust, their animal desires that are being satisfied. Another one is human anxiety and finiteness. And what this means is that people as humans were designed to be God's image bearers.
But people try to step out of that to go beyond that. And actually Adam and Eve did that. They tried to step beyond that to be something greater than what God designed them to be. But then they realized, well, you know what?
I'm just a human. I can't be God. And so that leads them to anxiety and it leads them to act out. And so that would be another example of what people have tried to explain. Another one is economic struggle.
Sin is essentially not helping the poor. So you see someone, you should help them, but you don't. That's sin. Another view is there is no such thing as sin, which is a common one today. People think that people are inherently good.
And so when people do bad things, it's just something that the culture has set up. And there really is no such thing as sin. Now none of these views that I just shared with you explain what sin is. The Bible describes sin as idolatry, spiritual adultery, rebellion, or satisfying impure desires.
The Bible goes much deeper to the root of the problem. Sin is complete and utter selfishness that elevates self above God and others. I introduce today's sermon this way because we are going to see the ugliness of sin.
Adam and Eve sinned, and what we read in Romans 5 during the call to worship, is that a sinful nature has been transferred to all humans. And we will see this sin evident in Genesis chapter 4. And so please turn in your Bible with me to Genesis 4.
It's just a few pages in, in your Bible. I think it's probably about page 3. And we're going to look at the story of Cain and Abel today. And we're going to look at the line of Cain, this wicked line that comes from him.
And our big idea this morning is that the epidemic of sin transfers from the first parents to their offspring. The epidemic of sin transfers from the first parents to their offspring. And this sin is shown in three ways.
The first way is Cain's anger leads him to murder. Cain's anger leads him to murder. In Genesis 1 .28, God told the first humans to multiply through reproduction. And right at the beginning of chapter 4, we see that Adam and Eve did that very thing.
They have their first child. Verse 1, Now Adam knew his wife Eve, and she conceived and bore Cain. The first child is Cain. And in the second half of verse 1, you will notice that Eve knew the one who blessed her womb.
As it is said here, I got a man with the help of the Lord. Right after Cain, a second son was born to Adam and Eve. In the beginning of verse 2, And again she bore his brother Abel. And you'll notice their occupations here.
She bore his brother Abel. Now Abel was a keeper of sheep, and Cain a worker of the ground. So these two men had two different fields of work. Abel looked after the sheep, while Cain worked the ground.
So Abel was a shepherd, and Cain was something like a farmer. In verse 3, we see that Cain knew that the one true God was the Lord God. And he brought an offering to him. The offering he brings to him was from the field.
He brought an offering of food. His younger brother Abel also brought an offering to the Lord. If you look at the beginning of verse 4,. And Abel also brought of the firstborn of his flock, and of their fat portions.
So we see that these two brothers bring an offering to the Lord. But the Lord approved one, but rejected the other. Second half of verse 4,. And the Lord had regard for Abel in his offering. But for Cain in his offering, he had no regard.
So we have to ask a question here. Why did God approve Abel's offering, but disapprove of Cain's? What was it about that? Was there something about this offering that was different? We have a few clues to look at here.
If you look back at verse 3, it says that Cain brought an offering of fruit to the Lord. In Leviticus, when God was giving instructions to the Israelites about an offering to the Lord, they were to bring their firstfruits.
They were to bring the best of what they had to the Lord. And there is no mention here of Cain bringing the firstfruits. He just brought some of what he had. And in verse 4, you will notice that Abel brought the firstfruits.
It says,. And Abel also brought of the firstborn of his flock, and of their fat portions. So we see here that Cain brings just some of his fruit, and Abel brings the firstfruit of what he had. Abel gave the Lord the best of what he had, and Cain did not.
While that may be some of the reason why God approved Abel's offering, there is also a deeper issue here. It really comes down to the heart. It comes down to the heart of the person giving the offering.
Abel gave this offering to the Lord out of faith. But Cain did not. And the quality of the offering that Abel brought is demonstration of a sincere faith. Where the offering that Cain brought was a demonstration of lack of faith.
Hebrews 11 .4 gives us a clue here. 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.
So we see here that Abel's offering was an offering from faith. This is a great reminder that God cares about our heart. There is nothing material that we can offer to God that's going to please him if it's not done in a right heart.
But God looks to the heart. He cares about our character, and he cares about our faith. Isaiah 66 .2, the Lord says, Here is the one to whom I will look, he who is humble and contrite and trembles at my word.
That's the person to whom God is going to look. He's not impressed with someone who has all this gifting, but does not have any faith, that has an impure heart. He's impressed with the one who has a pure heart, who does things out of faith.
And as you come here on Sunday, God's not impressed if you come here out of obligation. I hope that when you come on Sundays that you want to be here. He is not impressed if you give, when the offering plates go around, if you give out of obligation.
You should be thinking, you know what, I'm going to do this because this is worship to the Lord. I want to do this. You please God when you have this sincere desire, that is a desire of faith, like Abel.
And that is showing your heart, and this is showing your genuine faith in God. Cain, showing his true heart and true character, did not react well to this, as you might imagine. If you look at the second half of verse 5, So Cain was very angry, and his face fell.
So God does not accept his offering, and he's furious. Then the Lord asked Cain a series of questions. He first asks him, why is he angry, and why is his face downcast? Verse 6, the Lord said to Cain, why are you angry?
Why has your face fallen? Another way to say, why are you downcast? He then asked him in the beginning of verse 7, a hypothetical question. If you do well, will you not be accepted? And if you do not do well, sin is crouching at the door.
Essentially, the Lord is saying, if you do right, then you will be accepted. Just as your brother Abel was. And in the second half of verse 7, God tells Cain that if he does not do well, then he will continue down the path of sin.
One thing we need to observe here is that Cain already sinned. He sinned by becoming angry. Anger is a sin. But it's about to get a lot worse here. God tells him, you need to master this. This anger that you have.
Because the opportunity to sin more and greater is right there. That's why it says it's crouching at the door. So this smaller sin has the potential to be something so much greater. Cain, right now, is in the position where he can recover from the sin if he makes the decision quickly.
Cain needs to repent. And by the way, what is repentance? Repentance is a sorrow for sin, and it's a turning from sin. So that's what Cain needs to do here. He needs to feel sorrow that he is angry at God.
But what we will see is that he does not do that. And when you think about this, we need to repent when we sin unless it turns into something much bigger. You notice that here as I'm looking at this? He says, if you do not do well, sin is crouching at the door.
Its desire is contrary to you, but you must rule over it. So he's telling him, you can't let this get out of control. When I think of sin in my own life, I think of it as putting out a fire. A small sin is like a small fire.
What we are going to see here is that Cain failed to put out the small fire of anger, and instead this turned into a burned-down building. Because all of us are going to sin. But the question is, will we repent when we sin?
Or will we continue in it? Verse 8, we see what Cain does here. Cain spoke to Abel, his brother. And when they were in the field, Cain rose up against his brother Abel and killed him. So sin was crouching at the door, and Cain did not rule over it.
It mastered him. And as a result, he murdered his brother. He did the unthinkable. God warns Cain that he does not need to go down this path. But Cain does not listen. He does not repent. Instead, he kills his brother.
And we need to kill our sin as you think about this. Sin is one of those things where it keeps getting worse and worse and worse if we don't deal with it. We need to deal with it. And you can think of the sins in your life.
You know the sins that you struggle with. And those are sins that you need to put to death. Romans 8 .13 says,. But if by the Spirit you put to death the deeds of the body, you will live. John Owen is a famous pastor from the 17th century.
He said, Kill your sin, or your sin will be killing you. And that's what happened here. Abel was killed, and Cain did not kill his sin. But his sin killed him. So Cain lets go of his anger so much that he murders his brother.
And it goes from a small fire into a burned down building. So this is the first way this epidemic of sin is shown. Cain's anger leads him to murder. The second way this epidemic of sin is shown is Cain denies his sin but is punished.
Cain denies his sin but is punished. The Lord confronts Cain like he confronted Adam in the garden. You remember how the Lord confronted Adam? He didn't just say, What did you do? He asked him a series of questions to draw him out, to lead Adam and Eve to confess that they sinned.
God asks Cain, here in verse 9,. Then the Lord said to Cain, Where is Abel your brother? And Cain responds, I do not know. Am I my brother's keeper? So God asks Cain to draw him out instead of telling him, I know you murdered your brother.
And Cain plays ignorance, which is a form of denial. You notice how the first humans did not confess sin right away? Does this sound familiar? How often do we, when confronted with our sin, try to be ignorant?
I didn't know what I was doing. Or it wasn't my fault. We often do that in the end. That's precisely what Cain is doing here. He's acting out of ignorance and he's denying it. Then the Lord confronts him with his sin in verse 10.
And the Lord said, What have you done? The voice of your brother's blood is crying out to me from the ground. God uses this image of the innocent Abel crying out. And then God curses Cain. He curses him by removing him from the field that he works.
Verses 11 and 12. 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. This curse forces Cain to leave the field from which he works to be a fugitive on the earth. This would be like you going from a steady home life here in Eureka, where you work and live, to being forced out and trying to find a new way to live.
And this would not be like, OK, I'm going to start a new life somewhere else. No, this would be, I don't want to leave, but I'm being forced out. That's the punishment that God is giving Cain. And Cain was crushed by this consequence.
And notice here, notice Cain's response as I read this. He's going to think that there's something further to this punishment that God didn't even mention. And we'll talk about that. Verses 13 and 14.
Cain said to the Lord, My punishment is greater than I can bear. Behold, you have driven me today away from the ground, and from your face I shall be hidden. I shall be a fugitive and a wanderer on the earth.
And whoever finds me will kill me. So Cain is crushed by this punishment because not only is he driven from the field in which he works, but he also feels that God's provision will be removed from his life.
And with God's provision removed, he would become a target for future humans to murder him. Presumably because they will know the heinous crime that he committed. You notice that? God never said that people will find him and kill him.
You notice that? All that the Lord said was that you're going to be a wanderer on the earth. And so Cain says, well, someone's going to kill me then. And notice what God says here. What the Lord does is he's going to uphold the punishment.
But do not be fooled by Cain's response. This is not repentance. He is complaining. He is saying, my punishment is too great. This is not repentance. He doesn't feel sorrow for his sin. He's not turning from his sin.
He feels sorry that he is in this situation. He's complaining. And this is a ridiculous comment because the Lord would have been right to end his life right there. Because he just took a life. And actually later on in the Bible, you're going to see that that command is given.
If you take a life, then your life should be taken. But right here, God does not do that. God has been gracious to him. The Lord is gracious to him in his physical life. And this was the Lord's response in verse 15.
And the Lord is going to correct Cain's response. So the Lord is responding to Cain's outburst. Not changing his sentence. So a sentence is not being reduced here saying that, okay, now you're not going to die.
The Lord never said he was going to die. But now the Lord's protecting him by putting a mark on him. So that if anyone kills him, there's going to be a consequence. So the banishment from the field and the sentence of being a fugitive on the earth still stands.
But the punishment will not be increased by someone taking his life. And that's what Cain thought would happen. This shows that God does not believe in personal revenge. The Lord says that vengeance is mine in Romans 12 .19.
And God also allows the government to punish the wicked as well. And Romans 13 explains that. While God protects Cain physically from retaliation, he does not forgive Cain. So God protects him physically.
He puts a mark on him. Nobody can kill him. Or they will be punished severely. You notice that? But he does not forgive him. And we know this because of what verse 16 says. Then Cain went away from the presence of the Lord and settled in the land of Nod, east of Eden.
So Cain actually leaves the presence of the Lord. So this whole time up to this point, Cain was protected by the Lord. Not so anymore. Now he's a fugitive. And the Lord's provision is gone. This is the second way the epidemic of sin is shown.
Cain denies his sin but is punished. The third way the epidemic of sin is shown is Cain's wicked line commits great sins. Now that Cain has been driven from the presence of the Lord, we are going to see a line of people after him who are wicked.
And there's one guy on this list who, if he lived today, he would probably be on the America's Most Wanted list. He's a really bad guy. At this point in Genesis, what Moses is doing is showing two different lines of people.
There's an evil line and there's a good line. The evil line comes from Cain. The good line comes from Seth. And we'll look at the line of Seth more next week. We begin looking at Cain's line with the birth of Enoch in verse 17.
Cain knew his wife and she conceived and bore Enoch. When he built the city, he called the name of the city after the name of his son, Enoch. Now this is not to be confused with Enoch in Seth's line. We're actually going to see a different Enoch next week.
This is a part of Cain's line. What Cain does in verse 17 is to build the first city in human history. And he did this separately from God. So that the city is built autonomous from God, not under God's provision.
Because, of course, he was driven from God. Cain's line becomes known for building and advancing society. While Seth's line will be known as being God's people. And I'll draw the application more next week.
We cannot be known as being builders of society, but we need to be known as God's people. And that's something that we will see in the text. Cities are typically places where there's lots of sin. Have you ever thought about that when you look at a city?
There's typically lots of crime. That's because when you put lots of sinners in one place, what happens? Bad things happen. There's lots of sin, lots of crime. Unthinkable things happen in the city. And this is something that Cain, in his line, established.
The first cities. Cities are an invention of mankind. But this is something that God will redeem. If you look at the end of the Revelation, there's a city called the New Jerusalem. So these cities which started out bad will one day be redeemed in this heavenly city known as the New Jerusalem.
Then in verse 18, we go from Enoch, and several people come from him. So please look with me in verse 18. To Enoch was born Irad. And Irad fathered Mahualel. And Mahualel fathered Mashualel. And Mashualel fathered Lamech.
Nobody names their kids those names. Those are unique. Seth is easy. Cain is easy. Not those names. The last of these listed is significant here. Remember I mentioned the America's most wanted guy? Wouldn't be America because he didn't live in America, of course.
But this is Lamech. He's a bad guy. In verse 19, we get the ball rolling here of how bad he is. Lamech took two wives. The name of one was Adah, and the name of the other, Zillah. If you just do a quick reading of that, you might miss this.
What's wrong with this? There's two wives. I thought there was only supposed to be one wife. So this is the first polygamist in human history. Do you remember the command that God gave to Adam and Eve in Genesis 2?
He said, A man shall leave his father and mother, and he shall hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh. But there's three here. There's one man and there's two women. So he's changing God's good design to do something evil.
Now in verse 20, we continue to see Cain's line advance civilization. As Jabal started this practice of people dwelling in tents and having livestock. So look with me at verse 20. Adah bore Jabal. He was the father of those who dwell in tents and have livestock.
Now while Jabal was in the field, his brother Jubal was into the arts. So he would have been more artsy. He was the first to establish musical instruments. We're seeing the origin of all these things here.
Cities, tents, and livestock, and now musical instruments. And this is where music came from. Then in verse 22, Zillah, Lamech's other wife, bore Tubal-Cain, who created a few more instruments. Now verse 22.
Zillah also bore Tubal-Cain. He was the forger of all instruments of bronze and iron. So we see there that these instruments of bronze and iron are established. And obviously our society still uses these today.
And this was the first time that these were found. God put these resources all over the earth, and the Lord told mankind to subdue them, to use them. And so now bronze and iron and resources like that are being used.
And notice there in 22 also. You notice what Zillah names her son? Tubal-Cain. So she names her son after Cain. That tells you a little bit of how bad this line is. You don't name your children after someone who's wicked, right?
I mean, nobody names their children like Adolf Hitler. Nobody does that, because that's a wicked person from history that nobody wants their child to be associated with. But the mother here has no problem naming her child Cain.
That's interesting. Now I mentioned earlier that Lamech is a bad guy. Lamech is the seventh guy in this line, of Cain's line. And we saw earlier that he took two wives and became the first polygamist.
Now he is going to do something even worse than that. Verses 23 and 24. Lamech said to his wives, Adah and Zillah, Hear my voice, you wives of Lamech, listen to what I say. I have killed a man for wounding me, a young man for striking me.
If Cain's revenge is sevenfold, then Lamech's is seventy-sevenfold. So Lamech looks at his two wives and confesses to them, I murdered a man. He arrogantly says to his wives, If Cain's revenge is sevenfold, then my revenge will be seventy-sevenfold.
So pretty much I can do whatever I want because I will be protected just like Cain was protected. Why seven? Everyone know that? Why the number seven? Actually, seven is a significant number because it symbolizes completion.
And so when God told Cain that people will be punished sevenfold, he is saying they will be judged completely. The justice will be served. And so Lamech is building off of that here, saying not just sevenfold but seventy-sevenfold.
So the punishment that God would inflict on anyone would be complete. And Lamech is distorting what God said and using that to benefit himself. Lamech is mocking that statement that God made by saying, My ancestor Cain was protected by God physically, and now I will be protected even more.
In other words, Lamech takes God's measure of preventing human vengeance as a free pass to pretty much do whatever he wants. And, of course, he can't get away with this. God is going to judge Lamech, but he thinks he can.
He has this rebellious attitude. So we already see this sin playing out in Cain's ancestors. Remember I talked about how sin is rebellion? We see this rebellion taking place already. So this is the third way that this epidemic of sin is shown.
Cain's wicked line commits great sins. And what we saw this morning is that the epidemic of sin transfers from the first parents to their offspring. And this was shown in three ways. Cain's anger leads him to murder.
Cain denies his sin but is punished. And Cain's wicked line commits great sins. We see the darkness of sin already. And this is just the beginning of human history. This is life outside of the garden, and it's ugly.
And today, in 21st century America, we are people who live outside of the garden. All you have to do is turn on the news, and you see it. Or look at your own life. It's not hard to see. We see the darkness of sin shown here by Cain killing Abel, the autonomy from God in building civilization, Lamech's polygamy, and Lamech murdering a young man, and his extreme arrogance and rebellion.
And why were Cain and his descendants marked by sin? The answer goes back to the text that I read earlier. It's original sin. Human beings are sinners by nature. This comes from the garden of Adam and Eve when they sinned.
And we're sinners by choice. We're sinners by nature, and we're sinners by choice. Now next week, what we're going to do is we're going to be looking at something so much more encouraging. And this is the line of Seth.
Now, I've never preached a sermon about Seth, and so I'm looking forward to doing that because I was named after this guy. And what we're going to see is that while Cain's line is evil, Seth's line is good.
Seth is the replacement of Abel. And from this line, God is going to bless these people. And I'm going to close by giving you a preview of this line next week, this good line that we are going to see.
The last two verses of Chapter 4. And Adam knew his wife again, and she bore a son and called his name Seth. For she said, God appointed for me another offspring instead of Abel. For Cain killed him. To Seth also a son was born, and he called his name Enosh.
And at that time, people began to call upon the name of the Lord. So we see this blessed line, and we'll look at that more next week. And one of the treasures that we will see next week is that this good line leads to Christ.
Through this line comes salvation to the whole world. Let's pray. Father in heaven, as we see the darkness of sin that played out in the first ancestors, we see the continuation of this in our world today.
We see the sin in our own hearts, and we see the sin of society. And what it leads us to is that Jesus is the solution to this problem. Mankind has so many problems. The fundamental problem of every human is that we are sinners by nature and by choice.
And the solution for everybody is the same. Jesus Christ paid the penalty for our sins. And I pray, Lord, that here at Eureka, we would grab ahold of that and cling to that. And that is our life. Jesus is our life.
And I pray that we would understand that and live by that every day and praise you for it. Lord, guide us through this as we look at the good line of Seth next week. In Jesus' name, amen.