SPEAKER_00: So we started a new series, a new book of the Bible last week.
SPEAKER_00: And so this is the book of Genesis, which is the first book of the Bible.
SPEAKER_00: Actually, Genesis means the beginning.
SPEAKER_00: And so last week we talked about Adam and Eve, and we talked about how they ate the fruit, and they saw they were naked.
SPEAKER_00: They felt shame for the first time.
SPEAKER_00: Shame entered humanity.
SPEAKER_00: And we saw how they made these little fig leaf makeshift coverings for their bodies, of which we are still doing today in our own ways.
SPEAKER_00: And you can listen to the message last week online if you want to hear all that fleshed out.
SPEAKER_00: And so we see how they covered, they hid from God, how God pursued them.
SPEAKER_00: And then we got this great picture last week for us to grab hold of.
SPEAKER_00: And it was this picture that when God pursued them and called them out of their hiding, that He provided for them, He made clothes for them, and He covered them.
SPEAKER_00: So if you want all that fleshed out, what that means for you, you can listen to the message from last week.
SPEAKER_00: And so that was the first story we've looked at, and we're kind of jumping through Genesis.
SPEAKER_00: We're not going to hit every story, but we're hit a lot of stories.
SPEAKER_00: This week we get the story of Cain and Abel.
SPEAKER_00: So this is Adam and Eve's two boys.
SPEAKER_00: So while the first story in the Bible is about shame and about fear, this story, the second story, is about bitterness, eventually murder, more cover-up, uh dishonesty.
SPEAKER_00: So maybe you've been around the church and maybe you remember this story.
SPEAKER_00: We don't read this story a lot, like in children's church and Sunday school.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, there's just not a coloring sheet of one brother killing another brother.
SPEAKER_00: You're like, you know, children, let's now color the coloring sheet of one brother um beating, crushing the other in a field.
SPEAKER_00: Um and now snack time.
SPEAKER_00: Let's let's head to snack time.
SPEAKER_00: There's just not a good craft for this.
SPEAKER_00: So this is one of those stories that uh growing up we actually don't hear that much.
SPEAKER_00: Um what we what we see in this story is the same thing that we saw last week.
SPEAKER_00: And that is these stories in Genesis, there's just layer after layer after layer of truth.
SPEAKER_00: Because at first, with this story, we think it's about murder.
SPEAKER_00: And then we go, no, no, no, no, no, it's about anger.
SPEAKER_00: You go, oh, well, maybe it's about bitterness.
SPEAKER_00: It's just layer after layer.
SPEAKER_00: And we're going to see that there's even something before that that creates the bitterness, that creates the anger, that creates the murder.
SPEAKER_00: So uh 10 and a half years ago, I knelt on the floorboard of a ski boat in the luxurious Lake Altoona, 30 minutes from here.
SPEAKER_00: Uh I put candles all around the boat.
SPEAKER_00: No, I was not by myself.
SPEAKER_00: This would be that would be very strange.
SPEAKER_00: Uh, and Christy was seated in the seat in front of me, and I had this little black box that I opened, and we know what was in the box, right?
SPEAKER_00: A ring, thank you for participating.
SPEAKER_00: And so a ring was in this black box, and I said very sweet things to her, of which are none of your business, and asked her to marry me.
SPEAKER_00: And so she's still wearing that same ring today, ten and a half years later.
SPEAKER_00: Now, just a couple months before that, my grandmother, Granny, she had come to me and she said, Hey, uh, you know, we have several rings in the family.
SPEAKER_00: Your mom wears one, your aunt wears one, I wear one, your sister wears one.
SPEAKER_00: Uh, there's another ring that's been in a safety deposit box for years.
SPEAKER_00: I haven't seen it in a long time.
SPEAKER_00: I I don't even remember what what it is, but there I I think there might be a diamond on it.
SPEAKER_00: You know, I'm I'm like a young 25-year-old thinking about getting married.
SPEAKER_00: I'm like, I would like to know about this ring.
SPEAKER_00: And so she goes and gets it, and I come back to her house a week later, and she shows it to me.
SPEAKER_00: And I'm a kid, it's in a Ziploc bag.
SPEAKER_00: I don't know who's keeping diamond rings and dirty Ziploc bags in the safety deposit box, but that's my family.
SPEAKER_00: And so it is this corroded gold band.
SPEAKER_00: The band's out of the question, not possible.
SPEAKER_00: And the diamond actually, I mean, it was just, it was nasty, dirty, and you I'm looking at, I don't, I don't know.
SPEAKER_00: I don't know if it's possible, I don't know if this is gonna work out.
SPEAKER_00: And she says, well, go get it cleaned up and let's figure out you know if it's worth anything.
SPEAKER_00: So I go to the shop and they clean it up and it's hand cut and blah, blah, blah, yada, yada, yada, good diamond.
SPEAKER_00: So I'm I'm good to go.
SPEAKER_00: So I head down to the Mart, downtown Atlanta.
SPEAKER_00: I got a recommendation of what store to go in.
SPEAKER_00: I go in the store, and there's all these cases, right?
SPEAKER_00: And I we had not pre-shopped, and I know some of you maybe you pre-shopped with your fiance.
SPEAKER_00: We didn't pre-shop, you know, we didn't do any of that.
SPEAKER_00: I'd just been studying her jewelry secretively behind her back.
SPEAKER_00: And so I'm going case by case, right, ring by ring, like which which ring will be perfect for her, which ring will be great for her.
SPEAKER_00: Um, because here's in our culture, we we give these things to each other, uh at engagement and then at weddings as offerings.
SPEAKER_00: Because it's a little gift that means a whole bunch.
SPEAKER_00: So, what it is, is it's an offering.
SPEAKER_00: It's something that we said, we're giving something as to show we give everything.
SPEAKER_00: That's what this kind of offering is.
SPEAKER_00: And this is actually what this story's about.
SPEAKER_00: At the core, at the beginning, before the bitterness, before the anger, before the murder, there was this offering.
SPEAKER_00: It wasn't a sacrifice offering, it was an offering of devotion.
SPEAKER_00: That Abel and Cain, they come and they make it, and it's supposed to be giving something as to show you give everything.
SPEAKER_00: So the story is Cain and Abel, Abel's the shepherd, Cain's the farmer, and so that story in Genesis 4, it says that each brought their offering, not a sin offering, offering of devotion.
SPEAKER_00: And Abel brings fat portions from his firstborn from his flock, Cain brings the first fruits of his soil, and then we read in verse 4 and verse 5 of chapter 4 of Genesis, the Lord looked with favor on Abel and his offering.
SPEAKER_00: But on Cain and his offering, he did not look with favor.
SPEAKER_00: So Cain was very angry and his face was downcast.
SPEAKER_00: I actually come away from those two verses and sort of go, this is a little unfair, right?
SPEAKER_00: This is kind of what I feel sometimes.
SPEAKER_00: I read those two verses and be like, he brought something, you know, he's trying here, right?
SPEAKER_00: But they each brought an offering.
SPEAKER_00: So what's wrong with Cain's offering?
SPEAKER_00: What's wrong with it?
SPEAKER_00: Well, the story doesn't tell us.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, the story doesn't tell us at all what's wrong with Cain's offering.
SPEAKER_00: But we actually get the answer a long time later in the Bible, in Hebrews chapter 11 in the New Testament, and this is what the writer Hebrews says, by faith Abel brought God a better offering than Cain did.
SPEAKER_00: So nothing was wrong with the object that Cain brought.
SPEAKER_00: The problem was inside of Cain.
SPEAKER_00: Because it had to do with faith.
SPEAKER_00: Right?
SPEAKER_00: So it's sort of like Cain brought his offering, but he forgot himself.
SPEAKER_00: And God cares about him.
SPEAKER_00: That's what God cares about.
SPEAKER_00: So Romans 12 says that our offering to God is to be a living sacrifice to him.
SPEAKER_00: That's what our offering is.
SPEAKER_00: That's our little thing, is saying, all of me.
SPEAKER_00: As much as I can do it, as much as I can't, all of me to you.
SPEAKER_00: Our entire beings unto him.
SPEAKER_00: That's our worship.
SPEAKER_00: Now, a gift can actually be quite manipulative, right?
SPEAKER_00: Maybe you've been around church long enough to see how this can work out, right?
SPEAKER_00: Like the great benefactor of the church, he gives money, but by giving money he asserts himself and gets control of what he wants.
SPEAKER_00: Or maybe you've been around your family and there's the wealthy uncle that sort of controls everybody with money, or the wealthy father who is a patriarch and he controls the situation with money.
SPEAKER_00: Right?
SPEAKER_00: This can happen.
SPEAKER_00: Doesn't always happen.
SPEAKER_00: This can happen.
SPEAKER_00: A gift can be used for control.
SPEAKER_00: Maybe some of you, I have a good friend, her father paid for her college.
SPEAKER_00: And even now, it's been 15 years, even now, she can remember how much control her father put over her in a negative sense because he was paying for her college.
SPEAKER_00: It was constant.
SPEAKER_00: It wasn't a gift.
SPEAKER_00: It wasn't a parental gift.
SPEAKER_00: It was a way to control her in a negative way.
SPEAKER_00: A gift can be a bribe.
SPEAKER_00: A gift can be not really a gift at all.
SPEAKER_00: And we've seen this.
SPEAKER_00: We've done this, right?
SPEAKER_00: We've done this.
SPEAKER_00: Right?
SPEAKER_00: To keep her around, to keep him around, to get what we want, to woo the boss, to woo the girl, you know, give him a gift.
SPEAKER_00: And so out of that we get what we want.
SPEAKER_00: And it's even possible, maybe you're here, you've been a worshiper for years, and you know what?
SPEAKER_00: And you go, you are a worshiper, and you get it.
SPEAKER_00: Maybe you're here and you've been leaving things like this, or you know, whatever, Christian gatherings, and you would say you're a worshiper, but really you're a briber.
SPEAKER_00: It's possible.
SPEAKER_00: Maybe, maybe, maybe.
SPEAKER_00: Because really you live with a sense of warrant before God, like you deserve this or you deserve that because you sang that song and you showed up and you gave that money and you're moral.
SPEAKER_00: But see, unless worship comes from a place of humility, then it is attempted bribery.
SPEAKER_00: Not worship.
SPEAKER_00: I was studying this week and I read about the difference between worshipers and bribers, and here's what I learned.
SPEAKER_00: Uh so like when life doesn't go well, a worshiper gets upset, gets mad, questions, maybe gets angry with God, gets, you know, question, God, why would this happen?
SPEAKER_00: But the worshipper's saying, Would you help me understand?
SPEAKER_00: There's this there's this humility in the frustration.
SPEAKER_00: A briber comes away when life doesn't go well, and they don't ask, they demand.
SPEAKER_00: And maybe it's within their pity, but they demand, I deserve better than this.
SPEAKER_00: Don't you see what I have done?
SPEAKER_00: Don't you realize what I have been doing?
SPEAKER_00: Look at my record of morality, look at my record of church attendance, look at my record of giving.
SPEAKER_00: And so, is that worship or was it bribery?
SPEAKER_00: So, point number one: a life of true offering is a gift of gratitude, not a payment for bribery.
SPEAKER_00: This has everything to do with the way Abel brought his offering in faith, and Cain did not.
SPEAKER_00: And then point number two comes right out of point number one, and that's this a life of true offering comes from a place of humility, not a drive for control.
SPEAKER_00: Isn't it insane that we would try to control God?
SPEAKER_00: But we do.
SPEAKER_00: We do it all the time.
SPEAKER_00: When we're not in humility before him and his sovereignty and his goodness, and we're trying to use our morality to get something that we deserve something from him.
SPEAKER_00: So back to the story.
SPEAKER_00: So God spoke his preference of Abel's offering, and from then on, Abel is uh he's he's in judgment from Cain.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, Abel is judgment on Cain.
SPEAKER_00: Sorry.
SPEAKER_00: Abel is judgment on Cain because Cain's feeling uh, he's just feeling judgment, and it's not that Abel's doing this, it's so it's sort of like that friend who's just so good at everything, and they're so annoying because they're good at everything, and you're looking at them and and and just naturally in your humanity and your sin, you feel judgment, right?
SPEAKER_00: Like it's not them, it has nothing to do with it, it has everything to do with you, but they're so good, and you're going like when they handed out the gifts, like all they went to him and they didn't come to me, and and you just feel judgment because you were fall so short of that person.
SPEAKER_00: And so here's Cain, and you got the good brother who brought the great offering, and God approved of it.
SPEAKER_00: And so every time Cain looks at Abel, he is feeling judgment.
SPEAKER_00: Then we pick up this in four verses six and seven.
SPEAKER_00: Then the Lord said to Cain, Why are you angry?
SPEAKER_00: Because he's feeling judged, he's getting angry, he feels bitter, he's angry at God, he's he's starting this bitterness towards his brother.
SPEAKER_00: Why is your face downcast?
SPEAKER_00: If you do what is right, will you not be accepted?
SPEAKER_00: But if you do not do what is right, sin is crouching at your door.
SPEAKER_00: It desires to have you, but you must rule over it.
SPEAKER_00: And I love this.
SPEAKER_00: I love that God's pursuing him and God's asking him questions.
SPEAKER_00: That's what God does.
SPEAKER_00: He's pursuing us, he's asking questions.
SPEAKER_00: Help us to understand ourselves.
SPEAKER_00: This is his grace to us.
SPEAKER_00: And there's that phrase in there sin is crouching at your door.
SPEAKER_00: So I've I've talked about uh my cat, cinnamon, before.
SPEAKER_00: Um cinnamon was our cat when we were when I was little, and we got cinnamon when I was probably fifth grade or so, and cinnamon was a terror.
SPEAKER_00: She was she came home and she was this cute, white, fluffy, little brown and black spots, and she was just the cutest little kitty cat.
SPEAKER_00: And somewhere she became paranoid and afraid, and she became just this horrible, horrible cat.
SPEAKER_00: And what was interesting is I constantly was underestimating this little cute cat.
SPEAKER_00: She was just so cute.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, she's like pet food commercial cute, right?
SPEAKER_00: Like just so cute.
SPEAKER_00: And and you know, a week would go by where she had not bit me on my arm or something, and you would just think, well, of course she wants to be petted.
SPEAKER_00: She's so precious.
SPEAKER_00: And and then you would go to pet her and she would just attack you, or you'd be walking down the hallway and she'd be crouching, literally hunting, like all you know, how they drop down and they're kind of crawling, and she would come, she would attack you.
SPEAKER_00: I was constantly underestimating her.
SPEAKER_00: I had friends come over and be like, Kyle, don't mess with a cat.
SPEAKER_00: I'm telling you, if you're on one edge of the hallway and she's not, just go ahead and call out for help.
SPEAKER_00: She is coming for you.
SPEAKER_00: And my friends over and over again, my friends would just be like, she's cute.
SPEAKER_00: She's like three pounds.
SPEAKER_00: It's just not that big of a deal.
SPEAKER_00: And then later that night, they've, you know, they got attacked by a cat.
SPEAKER_00: I'm like, I've told you, but they just kept underestimating that little cat.
SPEAKER_00: Right?
SPEAKER_00: This is actually the language of this phrase.
SPEAKER_00: Sin is crouching at your door.
SPEAKER_00: This is actually the language, the imagery there is of a leopard hunting.
SPEAKER_00: Right?
SPEAKER_00: And we've all seen the cat, whether it's your cat or your neighbor's cat, or we've seen, you know, we're watching National Geographic, whatever.
SPEAKER_00: But we've seen the cat get low and crouch, and she's ready.
SPEAKER_00: God is saying, Cain, I know you're upset, but here's your chance.
SPEAKER_00: The cat is is low and is crouching.
SPEAKER_00: Own up to the monster.
SPEAKER_00: Own up to the beast.
SPEAKER_00: Own up to it and repent of it before it turns outward, but he doesn't.
SPEAKER_00: Cain doesn't do it.
SPEAKER_00: He never owns up to it, he never repents of it, he never says there's a monster in me.
SPEAKER_00: And I'm the problem, and I'm a sinner, and there are things going on in me that are gonna lead to dark places, possibly killing my own brother.
SPEAKER_00: We we just we just always think our sin is smaller than it really is.
SPEAKER_00: We just ras, you know, we rationalize it into our lives.
SPEAKER_00: And God's saying, no, no, no.
SPEAKER_00: Deal with the feeling, deal with the motive, deal with that inner sin before it becomes outer sin.
SPEAKER_00: Deal with the motive and the thought before it becomes behavior.
SPEAKER_00: There's your application.
SPEAKER_00: You want application out of a sermon today?
SPEAKER_00: That's it.
SPEAKER_00: Deal with the motive, deal with the deal with the sin under the sin before it becomes sin that's out there and starts to just destruction upon people.
SPEAKER_00: Deal with the lust, deal with the envy, deal with the shame or the fear or the pride.
SPEAKER_00: Keep dealing with it, deal with it again, repent of it again.
SPEAKER_00: Go to counseling, talk to a friend, do those things while it's crouching before it attacks.
SPEAKER_00: So, point number three, a life of true offering seeks to understand the heart, not simply adapting behavior.
SPEAKER_00: But Cain doesn't deal with it.
SPEAKER_00: So we pick up in Genesis 4, verse 8.
SPEAKER_00: Now Cain said to his brother Abel, let's go out to the field.
SPEAKER_00: And while they were in the field, Cain attacked his brother Abel and killed him.
SPEAKER_00: Right?
SPEAKER_00: This is his solution.
SPEAKER_00: Right?
SPEAKER_00: He's feeling judgment from his brother, not that his brother's putting it on him.
SPEAKER_00: Well, maybe he is, we don't quite know, probably not, but he's feeling judgment because his brother's the good brother and he's not the good brother, and so he's feeling that here's the solution.
SPEAKER_00: Get rid of the brother.
SPEAKER_00: Right?
SPEAKER_00: So it's like if uh if I and Mother Teresa are the only people left on the planet, and I'm not feeling holy, the way for me to feel holy is a solution.
SPEAKER_00: Get rid of the sweet mother Teresa, and all of a sudden I'm holy.
SPEAKER_00: There's nobody else around, I'm holy.
SPEAKER_00: This is Cain's solution.
SPEAKER_00: Then the Lord said to Cain, Where's your brother Abel?
SPEAKER_00: Now he lies, dishonesty, he thinks he can hide, just like Adam and Eve thinks he can hide.
SPEAKER_00: I don't know, he replied, Am I my brother's keeper?
SPEAKER_00: Right?
SPEAKER_00: It's just pride before the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: Then verse 10, the Lord said, What have you done?
SPEAKER_00: Listen, your brother's blood cries out to me from the ground.
SPEAKER_00: Now you are under a curse and driven from the ground, which opened its mouth to receive your brother's blood from your hand.
SPEAKER_00: When you work the ground, it will no longer yield its crops for you.
SPEAKER_00: You will be a restless wanderer on the earth.
SPEAKER_00: We read the story, we sort of want to distance ourselves from Cain, don't we?
SPEAKER_00: I do.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, I look at the sky, I go, okay, so he he gives a bad offering.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, he comes before the Lord with no faith, no inner that little something that should mean everything.
SPEAKER_00: It was just a little something.
SPEAKER_00: And then he denies having any problem with it.
SPEAKER_00: He denies any inner issue going on.
SPEAKER_00: And then because of that, he acts out of the problem and goes to a dark place that he would have never thought he would have gone to to start with.
SPEAKER_00: And I see all of that and I go, well, I am I'm not that.
SPEAKER_00: I'm not I'm not close to that.
SPEAKER_00: I'm probably, you know what, I'm it sort of in my pride go, well, I'm I'm more like Abel than Cain.
SPEAKER_00: Right?
SPEAKER_00: Isn't that easy to swing over when you read this story and just swing over and go, well, I'm not like Cain, I'm actually like Abel.
SPEAKER_00: But the very fact that in our pride we make that swing is what makes us like Cain.
SPEAKER_00: And we all know it that you don't have to raise your hand, that underneath these cleaned up versions we present, uh, there is some fragility and bitterness and anger.
SPEAKER_00: And there's a whole lot of worship that comes from insincere places of bribery.
SPEAKER_00: There's some cane in us.
SPEAKER_00: So this week I was just wrestling with this.
SPEAKER_00: Like, how often do I do that?
SPEAKER_00: How often do I bring worship before the Lord?
SPEAKER_00: But really, I'm just trying to get something from him, like an easier life, a more comfortable life, you know, to get the thing I want for me or for my family or for this church.
SPEAKER_00: How often do I do this?
SPEAKER_00: How often am I Cain?
SPEAKER_00: Turning faith and relationship with Heavenly Father into some shallow merit-based exchange rather than his grace to me, rather than to say, you know what, there's just like I have this little bit of me and I'm presenting it to you, but it's it, I'm giving everything I can to present to you, to say everything I the way that I know, I give you everything I have.
SPEAKER_00: And whether I'm rich or I'm poor, or I'm well, or I'm sick, or life's great, or life's falling apart.
SPEAKER_00: You know, blessed be the name of the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: That would not have been Cain's position.
SPEAKER_00: Here's the good news.
SPEAKER_00: And this is really good news, right?
SPEAKER_00: Because we can get to this point and go, oh my gosh, I'm Cain.
SPEAKER_00: This is horrible.
SPEAKER_00: I am him.
SPEAKER_00: I go to these places.
SPEAKER_00: The good news is you don't have to be Abel.
SPEAKER_00: Like the brother Abel.
SPEAKER_00: You don't have to be him.
SPEAKER_00: So we can actually stop exhausting ourselves pretending to be the perfect child because you aren't, by the way.
SPEAKER_00: And here's why is because someone else is able.
SPEAKER_00: I'm not just making that up.
SPEAKER_00: Um actually, Hebrews 12 says that Jesus' blood speaks a better word than the blood of Abel.
SPEAKER_00: So Jesus is while while Abel is a reminder of righteousness, Jesus is our righteousness.
SPEAKER_00: And Abel's blood was spilt out in a field, and it speaks righteousness, and it spoke a need for justice.
SPEAKER_00: But Jesus' blood on the cross gives righteousness as a gift of grace.
SPEAKER_00: And justice had to be met, but it's met in Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: And so Jesus the Son says to God, the Father, these people that have shame, they have fear, and they have bitterness, they have anger, they have inner issues, these people that are like Cain, their sin hangs on me.
SPEAKER_00: My righteousness covers them, and they are radiant.
SPEAKER_00: And they are beloved.
SPEAKER_00: And it is secure, and they are free.
SPEAKER_00: And it's in this humility and in this freedom that we are true offerings.
SPEAKER_00: So here's the good news You may be Cain, but Jesus is your able.
SPEAKER_00: Let's pray together.
SPEAKER_00: God, we thank you as we become honest and as we dare to move past our behavior into what creates behavior, meaning the sin in our hearts.
SPEAKER_00: That we confess motives and thoughts that scare us at times.
SPEAKER_00: Would you give us the courage in your secure love and righteousness?
SPEAKER_00: Would you give us the courage to call out the sin that is crouching at the door before it attacks?
SPEAKER_00: God, we repent.
SPEAKER_00: Meaning we turn away from all those ways that we self-justify and we want self-righteousness, and we try to do this by religious means, and we try to do it with our own effort, and we we with all the ways we try to cover ourselves instead of receiving from you what you have done for us, we repent.
SPEAKER_00: Would you give us humble hearts that come before you to bring these offerings of ourselves?
SPEAKER_00: And we thank you that even while our offering of ourselves, we don't even fully give this, that you gave the perfect offering so we can be at rest.
SPEAKER_00: That Jesus is enough, that Jesus' blood is the better word that has been spoken better than Abel's blood.
SPEAKER_00: And that we can look to this to know that by faith we are righteous, by faith we are loved.
SPEAKER_00: And you we place our trust in our hearts.
SPEAKER_00: In Jesus' name we pray.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.