MORNING MESSAGE: John Cline
Text: Genesis 4
Reader: Keith Harcus
“Am I my brother’s keeper?” Nowadays, we would make that question more inclusive, “Am I my brother’s or my sister’s keeper?” but we all still understand the meaning of it. Should we be looking out for those in our lives? Ipe Mavunkal would say, “Yes!” He feeds kids – last week it was 162, and this week it was probably more!
Project video of Ipe feeding the kids in Gaborone, Botswana
Last time in our sermon series through the Book of Genesis, we saw chapter 3 conclude with Adam and Eve being expelled from the Garden of Eden. Here is what happened next in their lives:
Adam made love to his wife Eve, and she became pregnant and gave birth to Cain. She said, “With the help of the Lord I have brought forth a man.” Later she gave birth to his brother Abel. Now Abel kept flocks, and Cain worked the soil. (Genesis 4:1,2)
For all their sinful tendencies, the truth is that there was no indication that Adam and Eve sought to do anything to harm another human or to not look after them. With their children Cain and Abel, however, we find a new, troublesome attitude, at least on Cain’s part.
In the course of time Cain brought some of the fruits of the soil as an offering to the Lord. And Abel also brought an offering—fat portions from some of the firstborn of his flock. The Lord looked with favor on Abel and his offering, but on Cain and his offering he did not look with favor. (Genesis 4:3-5a)
In the Ancient Near East, the “fat portions” of an animal were considered the choicest part to eat. Abel denied himself this choicest meat cut and instead brought it as an offering to God, giving an offering of the “fat portions” from the firstborn lambs of his flock. He gave of the best and the first part. Abel didn’t greedily feed himself first. We read, “The Lord looked with favour on Abel and his offering.” Cain also brought an offering to God, but unlike Abel’s, it was not of the choicest or “first fruits” of his crop. It was a sloppy, careless offering of “some of the fruits of the soil”. Cain didn’t put God first but gave to Him of what was leftover after he had first eaten. In response, we read, “On Cain and his offering God did not look with favor.”
God never rejected Cain’s offering, nor did He reject Cain. Rather, God simply pointed out that in comparison with Abel’s offering, Cain’s offering was insufficient. Abel’s offering had cost him something, but Cain’s cost him nothing, and God knew that.
So, Cain was very angry, and his face was downcast. Then the Lord said to Cain, “Why are you angry? Why is your face downcast? If you do what is right, will you not be accepted? But if you do not do what is right, sin is crouching at your door; it desires to have you, but you must rule over it.” (Genesis 4:5b-7)
Note that God did not reject Cain’s offering. He just told Cain to be careful, “for sin is crouching at your door: it desires to have you, but you must rule over it.” You see, God didn’t leave Cain on his own. No! God desired to stay involved in Cain’s life, helping him. God warned Cain to do what was “right” for He knew Cain was planning to do wrong to his brother Abel. Sin is “crouching at the door to your heart, Cain. You must overcome it”, God told Cain. But Cain thought, “Screw that. I have a plan and I’m going to follow through on it.”
Now Cain said to his brother Abel, “Let’s go out to the field.” While they were in the field, Cain attacked his brother Abel and killed him. (Genesis 4:8)
Where was the concern that Cain was to have for his brother? To Cain was thus given the ignominious title of humankind’s first “murderer”.
Then the Lord said to Cain, “Where is your brother Abel?” “I don’t know,” he replied. “Am I my brother’s keeper?” The Lord said, “What have you done? Listen! Your brother’s blood cries out to me from the ground.” (Genesis 4:8-10)
“Am I my brother’s keeper?” “Am I my sister’s keeper?” “My parents?” “My children?” “My neighbours?” Jesus was very strong in saying that we are to care for one another, and to love our neighbours as ourselves. Cain didn’t do that, and, as a lesson to him and all of us, God showed Cain that sin always has negative consequences, saying,
“Now you are under a curse and driven from the ground, which opened its mouth to receive your brother’s blood from your hand. When you work the ground, it will no longer yield its crops for you. You will be a restless wanderer on the earth.” (G 4:11,12)
That there would be consequences to him for his sins astounded Cain.
Cain said to the Lord, “My punishment is more than I can bear. Today you are driving me from the land, and I will be hidden from your presence; I will be a restless wanderer on the earth, and whoever finds me will kill me.” But the Lord said to him, “Not so; anyone who kills Cain will suffer vengeance seven times over.” Then the Lord put a mark on Cain so that no one who found him would kill him. So, Cain went out from the Lord’s presence and lived in the land of Nod, east of Eden. (Genesis 4:13-16)
Cain feared that he would be on his own in the world, a “restless wanderer” who surely would be killed by whoever found him. I once dealt with a church member who had, for years, sexually molested his daughter and niece, who turned him in. When caught, that man’s biggest fear was that he would be sent to jail and murdered there. I told him that his “biggest” fear should instead be that he would lose his family if he didn’t make things right with them. But all he feared was being murdered as a result of his sins, just as Cain had feared. Both that man and Cain survived their sentences. Cain survived because God protected him with a “mark” or “sign”, God’s grace and mercy being piled upon Cain. When we sin, God remains with us. He doesn’t leave us or allow others to destroy us because of that sin. I might not be my brother’s or my sister’s “keeper” but God does not reject us. Now, we aren’t told how Cain’s life-story played out – if he came to be a worshipper of God or not – but here is what we know:
Cain made love to his wife, and she became pregnant and gave birth to Enoch. Cain was then building a city, and he named it after his son Enoch. (Genesis 4:17)
Reading this passage, a commonly asked question is, “Who was Cain’s wife?” The Bible does not provide the name of Cain’s wife nor give any other information about her. Adam and Eve had other sons and daughters, though, so it is probable that Cain married one of his sisters. That answer makes us moderns’ shudder for that would mean incest had occurred. Our current injunction against incest has existed for thousands of years due to our knowledge about genetic disorders being built up and then passed down through family lines. In the case of Cain and his wife, however, they were the children of Adam and Eve – who were perfect creations of God and so there would not have been a genetic disorder. But still…yuck, the thought of incest creeps us out!
So, Cain built a city and named it after his son Enoch. Coincidentally, there seems to be archaeological support for this for digs have found that the word “enoch” was an early word for “city” in the Sumerian language. The oldest city in ancient Mesopotamia/modern-cay Iraq is from around 4,000 B.C. and is now known as “Eridu”, a word similar to the name of Enoch’s son, Irad, so there are ties to the Bible seen in that name. Returning now to Genesis 4, we read about Cain’s family:
To Enoch was born Irad, and Irad was the father of Mehujael, and Mehujael was the father of Methushael, and Methushael was the father of Lamech. Lamech married two women, one named Adah and the other Zillah. Adah gave birth to Jabal; he was the father of those who live in tents and raise livestock. (Genesis 4:18-20)
Lamech was humankind’s first polygamist (a thing the Bible expressly forbids). “Am I my brother’s keeper?” “Am I my sister’s keeper?” Let’s expand that a bit to, “Am I my neighbour’s keeper?” as Jesus would have us do. Or “Am I my spouse’s keeper?” as the biblical teaching about monogamy, love for the wife and respect for the husband would have us live out. Polygamy in marriage is so hurtful to the one rejected in favour of the new spouse that we could say it is a kind of murder (maybe not of the body as Cain did, but of the soul, at the very least). Bad actions such as polygamy are not recorded in the Bible as things for us to emulate, but only as historical occurrences that were reported without comment on them. Simply because we read that something happened in the Bible, it doesn’t imply that it was good or according to God’s will. That is why we need to read the entirety of Scripture to gain God’s perspective on behaviour. Many Bible readers have gone astray by failing to make such a distinction.
So, Cain’s descendent Lamech, had his first wife, Adah, give birth to a son named Jabal who was the “father” of all involved in agriculture. Lamech and Adah also had another son, a brother to Jabal:
His brother’s name was Jubal; he was the father of all who play stringed instruments and pipes. (Genesis 4:21)
Jubal was the father of those involved in fine arts. Then, Lamech’s second wife, Zillah, got in on the act of giving birt…
Zillah also had a son, Tubal-Cain, who forged all kinds of tools out of bronze and iron. Tubal-Cain’s sister was Naamah. (Ge 4:22)
Tubal-Cain was the father of technology, again, broadly speaking. Our modern thinking says the Iron Age started c.1200 B.C., after the Bronze Age but the Bible says that humans were working with iron even before the great Flood. Early humans probably weren’t the grunting Neanderthals that modern science makes them out to be but were part of a highly civilized and cultured world, as ancient structures and cities show. We will look at that in two weeks’ time.
In any case, the three fundamental elements of human culture – agriculture, fine arts, and technology – are claimed in the Bible as having been established by Cain’s descendants. The Hebrew word translated in the NIV as “father” has underlying connections to the words, “forger” or “inventor”, implying that the three named sons of Lamech were the first to do those things, as the father of tent-living and livestock-farming, the inventor of musical instruments, and the forger of all work with metal. It’s easy to forget that almost everything was new at this time. That was an amazing time of discovery and invention and ingenuity, much like the industrial revolution a few hundred years ago which changed life for humankind. Now, back to the “Am I my brother’s keeper?” scenario.
Lamech said to his wives, “Adah and Zillah, listen to me;
wives of Lamech, hear my words. I have killed a man for wounding me, a young man for injuring me. If Cain is avenged seven times, then Lamech seventy-seven times.” (Genesis 4:23,24)
Lamech felt so entitled and superior that he had no fear of having killed another man. Like Cain before him, he couldn’t believe that there would be consequences to sin. In fact, his sin of murdering some unnamed young man seems wildly out of proportion to the wrongdoing the young man had done to him and – knowing that God had provided protection to Cain “seven times over” after his murderous act – Lamech then claimed, without any justification or endorsement by God, that the Almighty would protect him not just “seven times over” but “seventy-seven times over”. The downward spiral of sin, the collapse of morals, and the lack of fear of consequences for bad behaviour is easy to see and helps us to understand the human condition at the time of the coming great Flood that would wipe out almost everyone. One commentator puts it this way: ‘The narrative thus describes the first affluent society, self-indulgent and self-gratifying, building cities, developing civilization, but doing so in defiance of God and His laws.’
The consequences of the fall of Adam and Eve were played out in Cain not understanding that he was to be his brother’s “keeper” and in Cain’s family increasingly deriding the value of marriage and human life. But God did not give up on humanity simply because of Cain et al.
Adam made love to his wife again, and she gave birth to a son and named him Seth, saying, “God has granted me another child in place of Abel, since Cain killed him.” Seth also had a son, and he named him Enosh. At that time people began to call on the name of the Lord. (Genesis 4:25,26)
Genesis 4 is about Cain’s family line, but we will see in Genesis 5 God providing and protecting the family seed out of which the Messiah, His own son Jesus, would come. That would be through Seth, the replacement son God gave to Adam and Eve. But also notice it was during the time of Seth and his son, Enosh, that people “began to call on the name of the Lord”, that name being “YHWH”, a name that Cain and his family had forgotten about. For many centuries, people, it seems, had forgotten who God was. Prayer re-entered the world at the time of Seth and his family, a line who chapter 5 calls “righteous”, a line that would go through Noah and down to Abraham, David, and culminate with Jesus. We aren’t told that Seth’s family line were active “keepers” of the brother and sisters, but we are told that they were righteous so we can imagine that they treated each other properly. Certainly, Seth’s family line were difference-makers, God’s people. No doubt they were keepers of their brothers and sisters in a way Cain and his family never were. In contrast to Cain and his family line who derided the concept of keeping or looking after others, Seth’s righteous descendants would be faithful to God and the keepers of one another. In the midst of uncaring selfishness by Cain and Lamech and the rest, Seth’s family line would be righteously different. And God would bless them for being so! Starting with righteous Abel and continuing on through his replacement brother Seth, God would be honoured. Let’s be like them. Not like Cain. Amen!
