Our lesson today is lecture 5 entitled The Flood. Now we've got a lot to cover here and we just finished our last lecture discussing the introduction to sin in humanity, how this is not God's will, how he gives Adam an Eve, free will in order to freely love him and choose him in love, and yet they fall to sin at the instigation of the devil, and now sin has entered into the world. Mankind is in a state of deprivation. Deprived of God's grace, God will seek man out.
God promises a redeemer through the arrival of the new woman and her seed, the new man. So this of course, as we discussed would be Mary as the new Eve and Jesus as the new Adam. Now we have a lot of salvation history to cover until we get to that point. So what we want to begin with now is chapter 4 with the arrival of Cain and Abel.
So let's look at that. Let's go and read chapter 4 verses 1 and 2 just to start and then we'll just continue our story. So chapter 4 verse 1 says, now Adam knew his wife and she conceived and bore Cain saying, I have gotten a man with the help of the Lord. And again she bore his brother Abel.
And Abel was a keeper of sheep and Cain, a tiller of the ground. Alright, so here we have this concept of biblical knowledge as people say, you know, so and so biblically new, so and so. And it's a very important word, this concept of knowing a man knowing his wife. And in Hebrew, they have it right here in your notes for you.
In Hebrew the word is yaddah. Yaddah is the word for covenantal knowledge. It's actually really funny whenever I teach this in classes, I always bring up the famous Seinfeld episode where he says, you know, yadda yadda yadda. And it's a funny way of remembering this word yaddah.
You always have to throw some flim on your Hebrew, it's not a little bit more official. But this word is very, very important. It's not just knowing a thing or knowing something abstractly. It's to know someone that you are in covenant with.
And so that makes perfect sense. Adam, yaddas, Eve, right? And she gives birth to both Cain and Abel. So let's see what happens here next.
Let's just keep reading with verse three. In the course of time, by the way, I really think that's really interesting. It just simply says, in the course of time, we don't know how much time passed. Could have been the next week, but it seems to imply a long time passed.
But anyways, I'm digressed. In the course of time, Cain brought to the Lord an offering of the fruit of the ground. And Abel brought some of the firstlings of his flock and their fat portions. And the Lord had a regard for Abel in his offering, but for Cain in his offering, he had no regard.
So Cain was very angry and his countenance fell. The Lord said to Cain, why are you angry and why has your countenance fallen? If you do well, will you not be accepted? And if you do not do well, sin is lurking at the door.
Its desire is for you, but you must master it. Okay, so here we have what we call two kinds of sacrifice, right? So Cain offers God the fruit of the ground and Abel offers his firstlings of his flock, indicating the very best, the first choices of his flock. And the fact that God had no regard for Cain and his offering is says, and that Cain did not do well, indicates here that God is looking at much more than just the content of the sacrifice itself.
So it's not like Cain brought to God mold the old Brussels sprouts or something like that. I always use that Joe Brussels sprouts. He's these mold the old Brussels sprouts that God didn't want because God doesn't like Brussels sprouts. He's more of a barbecue kind of guy.
And then so Abel brings him the firstlings of his flock and barbecue just is much better than mold the old Brussels sprouts. No, that's not what's going on here. God is looking at the disposition of heart, the fact that Abel brought the very best, indicates that's what God wants, that we give to God the very best that we have, and that we don't give to God just kind of what is left over. And this is simply true of our love, our affection, our focus, and really our very ourselves.
God wants our hearts. This is a big theme that we're going to see throughout all of scripture, both in this course here on Salvation History, puts all of our other focused Bible studies, the heart, in Hebrew it's love of, the heart is very, very important. So that's what God wants. And we can apply this very easily with our spiritual life, right?
Our prayer life. We don't want to go through the motions. We don't want to be like Cain bringing a simple sacrifice, quote unquote, sacrifice, or just to show up at Mass or church or doing our rosary to simply praying the prayers, but our hearts not in it. We need to give God our very, very best in our spiritual life.
This of course applies to stewardship in general, of our time, our talent, of our treasure, giving God the very first wings of our flocks. That's a really huge important lesson that we could apply to our lives. God wants to look at this position of our heart where we put God first, okay? So clearly Cain doesn't do this.
Clearly Cain is making an offering that is sort of an afterthought for him. And this is why God did not accept the offering, not because it was more of a Brussels sprouts, but because God wanted Cain's heart. And then so this is why God responds to him in verse six. Why are you angry?
Why has your countenance fallen? If you do well, will you not be accepted? If you do not do well, sin is lurking at the door. It's desire is for you, but you must master it.
Now, there's a couple of things I want to point out. This is this is really incredible here. Again, applying it to our spiritual life. God says you must master sin.
It's interesting that the new American Bible, I'm reading from the new revised standard version, Catholic edition here, it says sin is lurking at the door, but the new American Bible says a demon is lurking at your door. And that's really a fascinating take here on this translation. And it completely reminds me of what Peter says in 1 Peter 5 8 through 9. He says, be sober, be watchful.
Your adversary, the devil prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking for someone to devour. Resist him, firm in your faith. This is so crucial for spiritual warfare. We've got to always be on guard because just like Satan instigated Adam and Eve to rebel against God, to let their trust in their heavenly Father die and thereby through pride, try to take and seize the blessing on their own, Satan tries to do the same thing to all of us.
He's this demon who's looking at the door as Genesis 4 7 here says. He is a lion prowling about like a roaring lion like Peter 1 Peter 5 8 says. We've got to be on our guard. We've got to be sober.
We've got to master it. It's so crucial for spiritual warfare. There's another very important verse that pops in mind. I have it written right here in the margin of my Bible.
I encourage you to always cross reference in your Bibles. Make it your own. The passage comes from 1 Corinthians 10 verse 13, which says, So these verses here I think are so important to read together. Genesis 4 7, 1 Peter 5 8, 1 Corinthians 10 13 to understand just a little bit here, this quick overview of the importance of being on guard.
And that's precisely what God is saying to Cain. And so let's go on now with our story and see how does Cain respond. Does he master temptation? Does he repel Satan looking at the door or the lion trying to devour him?
Sadly not. Says you well know the story. So let's read verses 8 through 10 here. So here we have the first sin of violence, fratricide.
And I think this is important because as you'll hear me say many times, sin is not just breaking a rule. Sin is breaking a relationship. We saw that in the previous lecture with the sin of Adam and Eve. They broke their relationship, their harmony, their bond, the state of original holiness and justice with God.
God is their heavenly father. They broke that through their rebellion. So here we can clearly see in the next sin of recorded in salvation history, this fratricide where Cain breaks the relationship in a horrible way through murder with his brother. Fratricide is a very interesting symbolic first sin here that's recorded since the fall, because that's what we do to each other.
Our sins hurt each other. Sin breaks relationships. And it's premeditated. This is really important.
He says, let us go out to the field. Let us go out. He's trying to lure his brother out into the field in order to kill him. So it's premeditated.
This was not the crime of passion in any way. No, he premeditated this. Did it in cold blood. Then God asks him, where is Abel your brother?
Now again, this is an important point with what we saw when God asks Adam and Eve. Where are you? So he asks Adam and Eve, where are you? Not because they were really good at hide and seek and they were off hiding in the poison ivy, trying to avoid God and they, God couldn't find them.
Certainly not. God was asking a question to prove a point. You're lost. You're separated from me.
I want contrition. Confession. Same concept here. Where is your brother?
Confess. God, of course, knows what's happening here, but he wants Cain to have contrition and compunction and to come out and say, I've sinned. Have mercy on me. But of course, he doesn't do that because I pointed out very sarcastically him.
I, the shepherd, shepherd. This is interesting here. What this murder also makes a connection with what we saw before, right? In Genesis 3.
15, there's going to be enmity between the woman and her seed and a serpent and his seed. And so the fact that God, Jesus, who is God, but naturally, calls Satan a murderer from the beginning in John chapter 8 verse 44, makes a connection for us. If Satan is a murderer from the beginning, and then we have this sin of murder take place by Cain, it shows us here that Cain is the seed of the serpent. Keep this in mind.
We're going to see a divergent path now between the seed of the serpent and the seed of the woman, the good line versus the bad line. Cain is a murderer like his quote unquote father, Satan, by murdering his brother. That's a very important point. Now, before we move on, I think it's important to clarify here this line about his blood crying out to God.
In scripture, tradition is pointed out that in scripture, there are four sins that cry out to God because they bring incredible injustice into the world and they break the natural order and the natural law in a horrific way. There are four of them. I've listed them here just really quickly in your notes to kind of keep in context how horrible the sin is, but just also to give you larger context of morality here that there are these four sins that cry out to God for vengeance. The first one, of course, is murder as we saw.
The murder of Abel by Cain is a horrific crime that cries out to God, the blood cries out for vengeance, which of course, God will address. Another sin that cries out to God for vengeance is sodomy. We'll see this in the story of Sodom and Gomorrah. The sin of sodomy, homosexuality is a sin that cries out to God because it breaks the natural order of intimacy between a man and a woman.
That's of course a very horrible thing to say nowadays because love is love and all of that. But in fact, in the biblical worldview, it's not normal. It's not natural. And so it cries out to God.
You also have in the Exodus story, the oppression of the poor is a sin that cries out to heaven. And then James 5, 4, tells us defrauding workers of their just wages also cries out to God. So just kind of parenthetically, but very importantly here, all sin, of course, is an injustice. That's worth saying.
All sin is an injustice. All sin breaks the relationship that we have with God. But these particular sins are in a whole other category. So let's look here at the response.
What we find in chapter 4, verse 11, I can't have time to read all of this, of course, but God curses Cain and he exiles him east. We know this from verse 16. I'll read this point here. Let's see.
Verse 16, then Cain went away from the presence of the Lord and dwelt in the land of Nod, east of Eden. Now this whole concept of going east from Eden, a many have pointed out this is being driven farther and farther away from the presence of God. In fact, as it says there, him being cursed, him being exiled, is to be driven away from the presence of God. And in fact, just a few verses prior to this verse 14, Cain says, behold, you have driven me this day away from the ground and from your face, I shall be hidden.
That's what sin does. Sin drives us away from the presence of the Lord. In fact, if we go to chapter 3, verse 9, Adam and Eve hid themselves from the presence of the Lord God. This is a recurring theme.
Sin is not just a mistake. It's not just an error. It's people like to minimalize it, but sin drives us from the presence of the Lord. And we want to hide from the presence of the Lord.
So this is symbolized here in the movement east. As I said, many people have pointed out, they're going to see going east is to be driven further and further in exile. We talked about the importance of exile last week. This is what we're seeing again here with Cain.
And this is going to be a constant theme in all of scripture going all the way to the Babylonian captivity where the people are captured and destroyed. The city is burnt down and then they're driven east. They're taken east into captivity. So keep that in mind there.
East going east is bad. You're away from the God's face. There's so much we can say about being the face of God and we'll make connections with that when we get to Moses, how Moses sees God's face and he talks to God face to face like a friend. So put that in your back pocket.
Keep that on the back burner. We'll come to that theme later on. But what I want to drive home to the point right now is being in the presence or sorry, being cast away from the presence of God is a natural result of sin.