Genesis 4 records the first murder in human history. After being expelled from the Garden of Eden, God told Adam that he was to till the thorn and thistle filled ground. It became his responsibility to provide food, shelter, and sustenance for himself and Eve. God placed celestial beings called cherubim to guard the entrance to the Garden of Eden with a flaming sword so that the humans would not have access to the tree of life. This left them solely responsible for their own well-being in a strange and unpleasant world.
Eve’s first child was a son named Cain who became a farmer like his father. The second son was named Abel who became a keeper of sheep. At first glance, we may wonder why the sacrifice of vegetation made to God was unacceptable when the sacrifice of an animal was acceptable to God. We might ask what’s the difference. They were offering from what they lived out. They each had an investment in their efforts. However, one day when Cain and Abel were talking in the field Cain “rose up” and killed his brother. The Scripture proceeds to explain that only Abel’s sacrifice was approved by God. But why?
We must go back to the time that Adam and Eve sinned. When they realized they were naked, they sought their own remedy by sowing fig leaves together so they would have aprons. In other words, their answer to the sin they had committed was by their own effort. Sadly, this is a case of people today thinking that God will approve them by their own efforts. God intervened for Adam and Eve by clothing them with coats of skin. To do that, animals had to shed blood. Man’s answer to sin was his own effort. God’s answer to sin was the shedding of blood.
No doubt this experience was told to Cain and Abel. They wore the coats of skin. They knew the difference between fig leaves and animal skin (requiring the shedding of blood). Abel was well of this and made a sacrifice from his own flocks. Cain was well of this, too. Nonetheless, he fell back to the mistakes of his parents by thinking that plants were sufficient before God. The second mistake that Cain made was to be angry with his own brother because he made the proper sacrifice. His anger grew so much that he murdered Abel. The killer suffered a lifelong sentence away from his family and created his own tribe.
The lesson for us is to always remember that the payment for sin is through the blood of Christ, not the good works that we make even though it could be hard.
Christian Writer 