Hope & Disappointment
Genesis 4:1-6 · Vern Peterman · Feb 17, 2008
Genesis, No. 12
Holly Hills Bible Church
https://hollyhillsbiblechurch.org/teaching/messages/4926053397528

Transcribed from the recording by SermonAudio, so expect the occasional misheard word.

Good morning. As I was listening to the words of the song and thinking about what Wayne said, it struck me that these words we'll be studying this morning out of the fourth chapter of Genesis are words, we've got them in English, but in their original writing are likely the oldest written document in existence. Words from probably at least 6,000 years ago. And I believe no other document exceeds it in age. Phenomenal. And Wayne is right.

Hebrews 4.12 says that these words that we're reading here are living and active and powerful. Plus, they touch a place that nothing else touches. at the very place of contact between soul and spirit. So anyway, these are privileged words that we are looking at here.

Last week we looked at Genesis chapter 3 and we had seen how Adam and Eve were there in the garden and by the tempting of Satan using the serpent as an instrument Eve was deceived, but Adam, who was there, just said nothing. And he ate also. And a lot of times you might look at that and say, well, what a dumb thing to do, right? But if you think about it, actually, we were there. We were in Adam, is what we studied this morning in our elective. We were in Adam. He was our representative. And the sin nature that we see carried out and we'll see quite amply and fully in this morning's passage was something that we inherited. It's an inheritance. You like an inheritance? Well, guess what? This is our inheritance. But we'll also see that the Lord has an answer for that bad inheritance, for that heritage that we have. And we see that Adam and Eve, they bit into some bad fruit. As a matter of fact, that fruit had a bite. But so as in Adam all die, and we'll continue to look and even sing towards the end of the service about how the Lord has placed those, every single one who has put their trust in Christ. As in Adam all die, so in Christ shall all be made alive.

Adam and Eve were driven from the garden no longer to have access, especially to the tree of life. And instead, Adam found out what the toil was like. And then Adam and Eve began to discover life outside the garden and life with a ground that is cursed, life with all the consequences of the choice that Adam had made.

Let's take a summary look at Genesis chapter 4, the first 16 verses. We read that Adam and Eve, and interestingly enough, Eve is the one whose comments are recorded, became the parents of this young boy, and I'm sure they were delighted to have him, Cain. Unfortunately, and actually quite awfully, he later killed his brother, Abel. God dealt with Cain, as we'll see here in this passage, after his wicked and horrible act against his brother Abel.

And we'll see how that took place. In verses 17 through 24, close to the end of the chapter, but not quite, it tells about Cain's descendants and all those who came from him. And it seems, and especially in the person of Lamech, Lamech is the way it's often pronounced. The murder tradition was carried on. It got even worse, as we'll see. And then, finally, the last two verses, verses 25 and 26, tell of Adam and Eve's hope in their son, Seth. The one who would replace Abel, who was killed.

One of the words that shows up right at the beginning of this chapter and shows up, as we'll see, two more times afterwards, is a term that's translated in the King James to know, or in the New American Standard, had relations. It's a Hebrew term for intimate physical relations. And it's from a word that means to know. It's used rather figuratively or euphemistically And it's referring to an experiential kind of knowledge that comes from physical intimacy.

One of the things we'll also see in this passage is we'll begin to see the human genealogy that begins with Adam and Eve. And also on the cabinet to the right, where you'll find these CDs and that document that reference was made to, there is a family tree for the whole book of Genesis. Wherever the family tree is connected to Adam and Eve, that's shown on this document.

I don't even have a hope that you would be able to read this on the screen, so I'm not going to even try that. But it is available as a supplemental handout. If we run out, we'll make more available next week. I think you'll find it at least valuable, if not even just fascinating, to look through and to see what's shown there.

This family tree has got some interesting people in it. And what it shows at the end, it's highlighted in yellow in the printout, is the part of the family tree that is the tribes of Israel. So, that's available in the cabinet to the right if you'd like one of those.

In this word to know, or translated head relations in the New American Standard, that same term is used in verse 17 and in verse 25. And the key thing there is that it implies a physical intimacy, an intimacy that God intended to be expressed in marriage, and in marriage entirely. But it's interesting in the Greek Old Testament, and you have this on the slide in your handout on page one there. In the Greek Old Testament, this word no is gnosis, to have an intimate knowledge of. And Peter, in 1 Peter 3, verse 7, uses that same word when he speaks of husbands. He says that husbands are to live in an understanding way. The same word. The husbands are to have a full range, a full spectrum of knowledge of their wives.

Now, I know that it's the perennial joke. Who can understand a woman, right? But guess what? Scripture spells it out, and here's Peter. And by the way, he was married. Here's Peter who writes there, and this is not hypothetical, he says husbands live in an understanding way with their wives. Guess what? It's your assignment as a husband to understand your wife in the greatest and fullest sense. And in a way, Peter writes, that honors them. Honors them as joint heirs of the grace of life. Eve gained a man. That's how she wrote it and claimed it and said it. She gave birth to the son and she did credit the Lord for the birth of the son.

Named him Cain who was a tiller of the earth. Of course that's kind of what you'd expect because that's what after all Adam was said that he would do. From the sweat of your brow you'll work the ground. But thorns and thistles, it will yield. So here's Cain, like father, like son, working on the soil. She also gave birth to Cain's brother, Abel, who was a keeper of the sheep for wool at that time, not for meat. Abel's sacrifice from his flocks to the Lord was found acceptable. But Cain's from the ground was not found acceptable.

And I have to make one little comment. I'm going to show you some pictures, and they show these guys all clean-shaven. I kind of doubt it, but that's the way they come. Now God, as he did with Adam and Eve, asked questions of Cain. Real interesting. It's the pattern we saw with Adam and Eve. It wasn't, now look, Adam, you know this and this and this, and Eve, you know this and this and this. No, God comes with questions, not because he doesn't know the answers. but because he wants them to be thinking about it.

It might seem as we read the passage first off, and particularly the verses that Wayne read for us there, that the difference between what Abel offered and what Cain offered for a sacrifice was what was sacrificed. Here's Abel, he gave of the flocks, and here's Cain who gave of the fruit of the ground. At first it might look like the material is really all that's at issue. But if we look at Genesis 4, 6, and 7, the verses that Wayne read for us there, it points to Cain's heart and attitude. The Lord comes to him addressing, why are you angry? You've got an anger issue. What's behind it? His heart and his attitude were a deeper issue.

Not only that, but as we look at Hebrews 11.4, the one that was quoted in brief here as we began, we see, by faith, Abel offered to God a better sacrifice, which tells us Cain did not. Cain's sacrifice wasn't, yeah, was it the wrong material? Yeah, it was the wrong material. But deeper than that was not by faith. It was not by trust in the Lord. It's this is what I can do. This is what I can produce. This is what I can make. And it better be good enough for God because that's what I'm putting down. It was all of what Cain could accomplish and what Cain was satisfied with.

Questions, questions, questions. One of the things we find when Adam had sinned, God asked Adam and Eve questions. First Adam, several questions. Then Eve, one question. But questions. Abel's sacrifice was accepted by the Lord and Cain's was not. So God asked Cain some questions. This is before the murder incident had taken place. The Lord asked Cain questions, questions, questions. When Cain had indeed killed Abel, followed through on his anger, God asked Cain even more questions. What is this that you've done?

One of the things to look at, why does God keep asking questions? Why is it that the first approach to these people is questions? Again, we point out God's questions were not there because God didn't know the answer. God's questions in each of these cases was to draw out the human response, to get these human beings to consider and respond to the truth.

Perhaps Cain would come out and actually say the truth. At least the opportunity is there. He wanted them to have a lightbulb moment. That's the point. God wanted them to have a lightbulb moment. To understand the truth after their own consideration of it. That's what he was doing. That's why God would repeatedly ask the questions. Now I have a question for you. If you had an anger problem, would you want God to come asking you about it? Would you like that? Was that what you'd prefer? That's exactly what happened.

As we look at it, the bottom line in most anger is perceived injustice. I didn't get fair treatment. It didn't happen like it was supposed to. Things didn't happen in such a way that justice was served, at least as I see it. And so I'm mad. I'm ticked.

The first step in dealing with that anger is to see that God, who scripture spells out, is infinitely and eternally just. is the measure of justice. It's not my determination of what's just. It's His. It's His justice, not mine. It is very possible that people get angry over what they see as an injustice, but with a warped perception of it. Let me ask this. Were the offerings that Cain and Abel gave not intended to be an offering to God? then what did Cain think he was going to accomplish by killing his brother? Is that going to improve his position before God? I think not. God is the measure of justice. He is infinitely just. The next, and I will call it the final step, is to recognize that every single injustice of all time will be dealt with. God is not ignorant of any injustice.

You ever talk to somebody, heard somebody, or maybe even thought it yourself, I got away with this. I didn't get caught. I'm glad this didn't get found out. Right? The reality is, every single injustice of all time, God's aware of. Every one. And not only that, He is infinitely able to determine what's an injustice and what isn't. No lack there at all. Every single injustice will either have been dealt with on the cross, and yes, every single sin is paid for, Or there will be justice in this life, either in a legal system or outside of it.

Have you ever known somebody to have had something happen to them and people will say, either individuals or even maybe all of society, well, he got what he deserved? Well, that's justice served. Sometimes we will look at a legal system and say, okay, justice was served. And sometimes we'll look at the legal system and say, no, justice wasn't served. Regardless, there is some justice served in this life, but the human difficulty is typically that we want to see justice satisfied to our satisfaction in this life and the sooner the better.

Isn't that what usually grabs people? They are angry because they didn't see justice happen as they perceive it. in this life right now. That's what they're ticked off about. That is the source of a great mass of human anger. I want justice as I see it right now in this life where I witness it. There is one more place where justice is served and that's in eternity. And so there are two places in the past and in the future where justice is dealt out. And we don't see those now. And it's all those places that people don't see that they get upset about. Anger is also something that the sin nature serves up really good. I recall a time I was in college. Nancy and I are not quite engaged yet. My sister, who was a couple years younger than me, had moved down into the same place where we were at to go to college as I had been. And she was out shopping at a store. And two store detectives came out. and grabbed her and hauled her into their office, even though she'd paid for everything and had a receipt. And so they held her and were making all kinds of threats.

Well, I was unaware of this until my dad called me up a little bit later, and he told me about this. Well, it amazes me to think about it now, but at the moment, As soon as he told me about that, those two guys were dead meat in my mind. I just imagined their brains splattered all over the walls. I was enraged that they would do such a thing.

And then within a very short period of time, my dad said, but I already went down there and got her out and read those guys out. And I'm not going to sue them, although we could. But I told them that what they did was wrong, and they'd better never do that again, and they'd better apologize, and all that sort of thing. But from that time, and obviously you can tell I remember it, from that time, there was just a real recognition that I had already become judge, jury, and executioner. And my anger, if played out, would have been a horrible thing, an awful thing.

And that's when I look at it, and I think these little truths that we're laying out here, pivotal. God is the one who is the measure of justice, not me and not anybody else. And in reality, yes, we have a legal system, and sometimes justice is carried out there. But the truth is, no injustice, however small or large, will be left untouched.

But we can talk about anger. How about guilt? I can put guilt here in the same slide. I haven't done it on your handout, but I could put it on the same slide and it's the same thing. God is the one who is the measure of justice. And if I have a guilt, There is a way that it's dealt with. If I'm a believer, that guilt is laid on Jesus Christ. By grace. It's not a matter of, I got away with that one. But, wow, His amazing grace. How about a grudge? It's kind of the same category, isn't it?

God is the one who is the measure of justice. And nothing, nothing will escape His justice. It will either have been dealt with on the cross, dealt with in this life, or dealt with in eternity. And we can rest in that. And it's not just Verne giving some humanistic how-tos, some legal lists. Oh, just do this. Here's the checklist. No. In the end, what is this?

God's the one who carries it out. Scripture reveals that. Justice will be fulfilled either on the cross, in this life, or in eternity. The answer to anger, to the grudge, to the guilt, is faith in the facts. Who is God? What's his character? What has he done? I need to settle with him and leave it to him. and walk in fellowship with him. That's the answer.

Now, Cain had a curse and he had a sign. The penalty for his sin was that the ground was cursed beyond the curse of Adam where thorns and thistles would yield. This is one step further. This curse would mean that the ground would not yield for him at all. You've been a tiller of the ground, Cain. and the ground will yield nothing for you. You want food out of it? Forget it. It's not going to do it. Thorns and thistles.

But there's also a sign. I think the King James has a mark. Ultimately, this word is the word that's used for sign throughout Genesis and the rest of the Old Testament. God gave Cain some sort of an unknown awesome sign. People have speculated as to what that is.

The truth is we don't know. But it was a sign that was awesome enough that people would say, I'm not touching that guy. I might want to, but I'm not touching him. No revenge killing. So Cain would be a wanderer and he would avoid this revenge killing because God had given a sign. Now here's a painting of Cain running from God's curse. This was done in 1880.

And I think there's a few things that are probably not quite on target. His age, for example, is likely one of them. And I'm not so sure that initially he had a great plan of people following him. I think that was later. But one of the reasons I put it up here is because there was some kind of a sign. We don't know what the character of it was.

What did God make Very evident. And we're talking likely even a miraculous sign that said, don't touch this guy. Which is kind of amazing. And I kind of wondered, I thought, what did the Lord do? Maybe a sign kind of like this. Okay? Just a huge warning that everyone would see. They would say, don't touch this guy. And it's not because he's a good guy, but because I've said don't. Don't do this.

We don't know what kind of a sign, but something was very clear, and Cain did survive to the end of his days here. Now, the perennial question, the one you've likely, if you've not thought of, you've at least been asked it, where did Cain get a wife?

Genesis 4.17 says that Cain had a wife, so the question is, where did that wife come from?

Genesis 5.4, next chapter, says that Adam and Eve had other sons and daughters, so Cain married a sister, possibly a cousin, I would venture as some possibility, but likely a sister. And you might say, whoa, how'd that happen? Mutations and the resulting inbreeding risks, which have been kind of brought forward in our culture, are something that hadn't developed yet. Remember, God said everything was very good.

And marriage between brothers and sisters wasn't actually prohibited until the Law of Moses at least 2,500 years later. Leviticus 18 is the chapter that has that prohibition against marriage within siblings. And here's this chart a little bit more substantially placed here. So here's at the beginning, created perfect, and then Beginning perfect but increasing with time are these mutations and finally to avoid the inbreeding of those mutations Prohibition and Leviticus 18 against that marriage One of the other things we find in this chapter in verses 17 through 22 It records the building of a city. This is what Cain did built the city and The development of music, the lyre and the pipe, and of tents and of livestock, so you have more of a nomadic lifestyle there.

And even of bronze and iron. One of the things we'll talk about later, we won't go into detail this morning, we'll talk about later is how do we reconcile this thing with what's the typical history and prehistory that's told to us. Because here we find within a few generations substantial evidence of technology and civilization that at least according to secular history books that seems out of sync. We'll get there. We'll talk about that. One thing I would suggest is that iron is not only found among ores, but also in meteorite deposits, in some cases free iron. So anyway, we'll talk about that more later.

It also records this fellow Lamech, the first man with more than one wife. And I have that down here as polygyny. You've likely heard the term polygamy. Polygamy actually just means multiple spouses. It doesn't indicate multiple wives or husbands. So, specifically, more than one wife is polygyny, which is one husband, multiple wives.

Then, though Genesis 2.24 implied that God intended the marriage of one man and one woman, Christ and Paul spoke in the New Testament indicating that from the beginning God intended monogamy, that is, one man, one woman, and for physical relations reserved and preserved for a husband and wife only. That was God's original intent.

You want to take a look at some passages that have that, and this is not in your handout, 1 Timothy 3, 2 and 12, and Titus 1.6. This is where it says, in some of your English translations, the husband of one wife and the meaning in the original Greek there is a one woman kind of man. So this is the requirements for an elder and a deacon and the elders to be, as 1 Peter 5 says, an example.

So a focus on monogamy there. One of the things we notice here is there is cultural development and progress. We talked about, for example, the development of music, of civilization, cities. We talked about technological development, development of metallurgy, for example. We see here a kind of a conflicting direction. We see technological prowess, but not spiritual life.

Cain had been the first man to kill another human being. Here's Lamech who claims multiple killings. And the killings, like with Cain, are not life for life even. It's just, I'll kill somebody because he bugs me. I'll kill somebody because he bothers me. And one after another. And then he would brazenly and openly boast of his murders.

One of the things that we'll find and we'll see it as we continue to go through Genesis is this pattern. We will find tokens of civilization and technology and culture that is arising of these things But in stark contrast, a decline in spiritual and moral understanding and character. And those go along. And interesting. We can even see that in our own day. Great increases in technology and the development of it and the application of it. Great advances in various aspects of culture and the arts and music. And at the same time, incredible spiritual and moral decay. that conflict, that paradox exists in society. And we'll continue to see that as we go through the book of Genesis.

Here's this man Seth, who was born to Adam and Eve. Eve looked upon Seth as God's designated replacement for Abel, whom Cain had killed. And what I find interesting is in both the beginning and the end of the chapter, it's Eve who speaks. This Adam guy has a problem. He just doesn't say anything. As a matter of fact, at the critical moments when he should be saying something, he doesn't. So Eve speaks at the beginning and towards the end of this chapter.

The last sentence here in Genesis chapter 4, says, then men began to call upon the name of the Lord. Now, people have speculated, what does this call upon the name of the Lord mean? Some have said, well, that must mean that they first started having public worship services. So, some have thought that. Some have said, well, that's when they first began to call the name of the Lord by the Lord's name, Yahweh, or as it's sometimes carried over in English, Jehovah. So some have said, well, that's what it means. But I started looking at this and if you look up, call upon the name of the Lord or called upon the name of the Lord, this is the first time it shows up and it keeps showing up in Genesis.

And what it is matched up with is prayer. People begin praying to the Lord. You see, the pattern before that time was the Lord would meet with people directly at certain intervals, just like with Adam and Eve. He came at the cool of the day and would meet with Adam and Eve and would talk to them and interact with them personally.

Now what we see is a change where the general pattern, and we'll find some exceptions, but the general pattern was for people to have a relationship with the Lord through prayer and through speaking to the Lord when they could not tell that he was personally there, speaking to the Lord when he didn't show up asking questions. And so there seems to be a change of pattern, and it's consistent, that call upon the name of the Lord, or called on the name of the Lord, those kinds of phrases begin showing up as we go through the book of Genesis. We'll see it as we get to Genesis chapter 12, this is with Abraham, and then chapter 13, chapter 21, chapter 26, the references there are given in your handout.

Additionally, you can find it in 1 Corinthians 3.2, or excuse me, that should be 1.2, Chapter 1, verse 2. 1 Corinthians 1-2 also has that. Here's Paul talking about those who call upon the name of the Lord. As we look through this chapter, what we find is gross sin and God's mercy.

These men like Cain early in the chapter and Lamech later in the chapter did some very evil things. And Lamech repeatedly brazenly, openly, they did awful things to other human beings. God could have responded with far more severe punishment for each one of them. In fact, you might even ask the question, why doesn't God just zap all the bad people?

Well, guess what? It's a good thing he doesn't or we wouldn't be here, okay? It's because of God's mercy. And we find that continually appealed to throughout scripture. Paul, when he writes to the church at Rome, the beginning of chapter 12, by the mercies of God, he writes to Timothy in 1 Timothy chapter 1, because of the Lord's mercy. The Lord had mercy on me. It's because of the Lord's character.

He doesn't just say, well, you know, this experiment with having human beings isn't working out so good. I'm going to hit the reset button. That would be the easy button. Instead, what does he do? He shows mercy and grace. so that those who turn to Him would be saved. And those who turn to Him not only receive mercy, a withholding of punishment due, but grace, blessing undeserved. Astounding. It's because of God's character that it doesn't just say, I'm going to wipe out this whole lot.

This chapter saw the expression of both hope and disappointment. Eve was the one who was most hopeful in this chapter and expressed it at the beginning and at the end. And she did give God credit for the birth of Cain and for Seth. Likely for Abel too, but certainly those births of Cain and Seth are recorded. She expresses hope with the birth of each one of these sons. But ultimately, she was greatly disappointed, I would think, in the life of Cain, who took the life of his own brother. Abel, who had placed his faith and trust in God, was the one who lost his life at the hand of his brother Cain.

With Adam and Eve, and as we saw in this chapter, even with Cain, God seems to have interacted with human beings directly, coming and asking them questions, meeting them even at what appears to be the usual time of day where we talk with God. That seems in those earlier generations to have been God's usual means of communicating with people. But by the end of chapter 4, we find people calling upon the name of the Lord. We see a transition where communicating with the Lord is by faith. Communicating with the Lord is not something you wait for the right time of day, but any time. Even to the point where by the time Paul writes, pray without ceasing. And I hope you don't look at that as a law. Otherwise, you're not going to sleep tonight. And it's going to be tough to eat. But the point being that we have continual access to the Lord. We can pray and talk and communicate and fellowship with Him all the time.

By faith, Abel offered to God a better sacrifice. By faith. Notice that it's by faith that the Lord's looking for. living by faith, praying by faith, trusting in what the Lord has done and will do and accomplish. It is by faith that we understand that we have been saved. It's by faith that we walk in fellowship. We walk by faith, not by sight. We walk by faith, not by sight.

And it's by faith that the Lord desires that we live minute by minute until the moment when we see them face to face. Until that moment when faith is done. Up until then, it's by faith. The same by faith that Abel offered the sacrifice to the Lord. By faith we walk. By faith we live. By faith we trust him. Let's pray.

Lord, as we look at this passage, what awful things took place and yet what a revelation to recognize that we have this privilege of talking to you about everything at any time. How wonderful that is. And we give you thanks for it, Lord. And as we look also at the lessons in this passage too, that you are the one who is the measure of all justice and injustice. And that every injustice which is in conflict with your very character, you have dealt with or are dealing with or will deal with. None of it will be left. And Lord, with every anger that we're tempted to be drawn to with every resentment, with every grudge, with every guilt. Lord, thank you that we can bring those before you and that your accomplishment in Christ is adequate for all these things. We give you thanks for these things. In Jesus' name, Amen.