in and Abel and Their Offerings
This chapter is based on Genesis 4:1-15.
Cain and Abel, the sons of Adam, were very unlike in character. Abel
feared God. Cain cherished rebellious feelings and murmured against God
because of the curse pronounced upon Adam and because the ground was
cursed for his sin. These brothers had been instructed in regard to the
provision made for the salvation of the human race. They were required to
carry out a system of humble obedience, showing their reverence for God
and their faith and dependence upon the promised Redeemer, by slaying
the firstlings of the flock and solemnly presenting them with the blood
as a burnt offering to God. This sacrifice would lead them to continually
keep in mind their sin and the Redeemer to come, who was to be the great
sacrifice for man.
Cain brought his offering unto the Lord with murmuring and infidelity
in his heart in regard to the promised Sacrifice. He was unwilling to
strictly follow the plan of obedience and procure a lamb and offer it with
the fruit of the ground. He merely took of the ground and disregarded the
requirement of God. God had made known to Adam that without shedding
of blood there could be no remission of sin. Cain was not particular to
bring even the best of the fruits. Abel advised his brother not to come
before the Lord
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without the blood of sacrifice. Cain, being the eldest, would not listen
to his brother. He despised his counsel, and with doubt and murmuring
in regard to the necessity of the ceremonial offerings, he presented his
offering. But God did not accept it.
Abel brought of the firstlings of his flock and of the fat, as God had
commanded; and in full faith of the Messiah to come, and with humble
reverence, he presented the offering. God had respect unto his offering.
A light flashes from heaven and consumes the offering of Abel. Cain sees
no manifestation that his is accepted. He is angry with the Lord and with
his brother. God condescends to send an angel to Cain to converse with
him.
The angel inquires of him the reason of his anger, and informs him that
if he does well and follows the directions God has given, He will accept
him and respect his offering. But if he will not humbly submit to God’s
arrangements, and believe and obey Him, He cannot accept his offering.
The angel tells Cain that it was no injustice on the part of God, or partiality
shown to Abel, but that it was on account of his own sin and disobedience
of God’s express command that He could not respect his offering—and if
he would do well he would be accepted of God, and his brother should
listen to him, and he should take the lead, because he was the eldest.
But even after being thus faithfully instructed, Cain did not repent.
Instead of censuring and abhorring himself for his unbelief, he still
complains of the injustice and partiality of God. And in his jealousy and
hatred he contends with Abel and reproaches him. Abel meekly points
out his brother’s error and shows him that the wrong is in himself. But
Cain hates his brother from the moment that God manifests to
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him the tokens of His acceptance. His brother Abel seeks to appease his
wrath by contending for the compassion of God in saving the lives of their
parents when He might have brought upon them immediate death. He tells
Cain that God loves them, or He would not have given His Son, innocent
and holy, to suffer the wrath which man, by his disobedience, deserves to
suffer.
The Beginnings of Death
While Abel justifies the plan of God, Cain becomes enraged, and his
anger increases and burns against Abel until in his rage he slays him. God
inquires of Cain for his brother, and Cain utters a guilty falsehood: “I
know not: am I my brother’s keeper?” God informs Cain that He knew
in regard to his sin—that He was acquainted with his every act, and even
the thoughts of his heart, and says to him, “Thy brother’s blood crieth
unto me from the ground. And now art thou cursed from the earth, which
hath opened her mouth to receive thy brother’s blood from thy hand; when
thou tillest the ground, it shall not henceforth yield unto thee her strength;
a fugitive and a vagabond shalt thou be in the earth.”
The curse upon the ground at first had been felt but lightly; but
now a double curse rested upon it. Cain and Abel represent the two
classes, the righteous and the wicked, the believers and unbelievers, which
should exist from the fall of man to the second coming of Christ. Cain’s
slaying his brother Abel represents the wicked who will be envious of
the righteous and will hate them because they are better than themselves.
They will be jealous of the righteous and will persecute and put them to
death because their right-doing condemns their sinful course.
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Adam’s life was one of sorrow, humility, and continual repentance.
As he taught his children and grandchildren the fear of the Lord, he was
often bitterly reproached for his sin which resulted in so much misery
upon his posterity. When he left the beautiful Eden, the thought that he
must die thrilled him with horror. He looked upon death as a dreadful
calamity. He was first made acquainted with the dreadful reality of death
in the human family by his own son Cain slaying his brother Abel. Filled
with the bitterest remorse for his own transgression, and deprived of
his son Abel, and looking upon Cain as his murderer, and knowing the
curse God pronounced upon him, bowed down Adam’s heart with grief.
Most bitterly did he reproach himself for his first great transgression. He
entreated pardon from God through the promised Sacrifice. Deeply had he
felt the wrath of God for his crime committed in Paradise. He witnessed
the general corruption which afterward finally provoked God to destroy
the inhabitants of the earth by a flood. The sentence of death pronounced
upon him by his Maker, which at first appeared so terrible to him, after
he had lived some hundreds of years, looked just and merciful in God, to
bring to an end a miserable life.
As Adam witnessed the first signs of decaying nature in the falling
leaf and in the drooping flowers, he mourned more deeply than men now
mourn over their dead. The drooping flowers were not so deep a cause of
grief, because more tender and delicate; but the tall, noble, sturdy trees to
cast off their leaves, to decay, presented before him the general dissolution
of beautiful nature, which God had created for the special benefit of man.
To his children and to their children, to the ninth
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generation, he delineated the perfections of his Eden home, and also his
fall and its dreadful results, and the load of grief brought upon him on
account of the rupture in his family which ended in the death of Abel. He
related to them the sufferings God had brought him through to teach him
the necessity of strictly adhering to His law. He declared to them that sin
would be punished in whatever form it existed. He entreated them to obey
God, who would deal mercifully with them if they should love and fear
Him.
Angels held communication with Adam after his fall, and informed
him of the plan of salvation, and that the human race was not beyond
redemption. Although fearful separation had taken place between God
and man, yet provision had been made through the offering of His beloved
Son by which man might be saved. But their only hope was through a life
of humble repentance and faith in the provision made. All those who
could thus accept Christ as their only Saviour, should be again brought
into favor with God through the merits of His Son.
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7: Seth and Enoch
This chapter is based on Genesis 4:25;. 26;. 5:3-8;. 18-24;. Jude
14-15.
Seth was a worthy character, and was to take the place of Abel in right
doing. Yet he was a son of Adam, like sinful Cain, and inherited from the
nature of Adam no more natural goodness than did Cain. He was born in
sin, but by the grace of God, in receiving the faithful instructions of his
father Adam, he honored God in doing His will. He separated himself
from the corrupt descendants of Cain and labored, as Abel would have
done had he lived, to turn the minds of sinful men to revere and obey
God.
Enoch was a holy man. He served God with singleness of heart. He
realized the corruptions of the human family and separated himself from
the descendants of Cain and reproved them for their great wickedness.
There were those upon the earth who acknowledged God, who feared
and worshiped Him. Yet righteous Enoch was so distressed with the
increasing wickedness of the ungodly, that he would not daily associate
with them, fearing that he should be affected by their infidelity and that
his thoughts might not ever regard God with that holy reverence which
was due His exalted character. His soul was vexed as he daily witnessed
their trampling upon the authority of God. He chose to be separate from
them, and spent much of his time in solitude, which he devoted to
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reflection and prayer. He waited before God and prayed to know His will
more perfectly, that he might perform it. God communed with Enoch
through His angels and gave him divine instruction. He made known to
him that He would not always bear with man in his rebellion—that His
purpose was to destroy the sinful race by bringing a flood of waters upon
the earth.
The pure and lovely Garden of Eden, from which our first parents
were driven, remained until God purposed to destroy the earth by a flood.
God had planted that garden and specially blessed it, and in His wonderful
providence He withdrew it from the earth, and will return it to the earth
again more gloriously adorned than before it was removed from the earth.
God purposed to preserve a specimen of His perfect work of creation free
from the curse wherewith He had cursed the earth.
The Lord opened more fully to Enoch the plan of salvation, and by
the Spirit of prophecy carried him down through the generations which
should live after the Flood, and showed him the great events connected
with the second coming of Christ and the end of the world. (Jude 1:14.)
Enoch was troubled in regard to the dead. It seemed to him that the
righteous and the wicked would go to the dust together, and that would be
their end. He could not clearly see the life of the just beyond the grave. In
prophetic vision he was instructed in regard to the Son of God, who was
to die man’s sacrifice, and was shown the coming of Christ in the clouds
of heaven, attended by the angelic host, to give life to the righteous dead
and ransom them from their graves. He also saw the corrupt state of the
world at the time when Christ should appear the second time—that there
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would be a boastful, presumptuous, self-willed generation arrayed in
rebellion against the law of God and denying the only Lord God and
our Lord Jesus Christ, and trampling upon His blood and despising His
atonement. He saw the righteous crowned with glory and honor while the
wicked were separated from the presence of the Lord and consumed with
fire.
Enoch faithfully rehearsed to the people all that God had revealed to
him by the Spirit of prophecy. Some believed his words and turned from
their wickedness to fear and worship God.
Enoch Translated
Enoch continued to grow more heavenly while communing with God.
His face was radiant with a holy light which would remain upon his
countenance while instructing those who would hear his words of wisdom.
His heavenly and dignified appearance struck the people with awe. The
Lord loved Enoch because he steadfastly followed Him and abhorred
iniquity and earnestly sought heavenly knowledge, that he might do His
will perfectly. He yearned to unite himself still more closely to God,
whom he feared, reverenced, and adored. God would not permit Enoch
to die as other men, but sent His angels to take him to heaven without
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seeing death. In the presence of the righteous and the wicked, Enoch
was removed from them. Those who loved him thought that God might
have left him in some of his places of retirement, but after seeking him
diligently, and being unable to find him, reported that he was not, for God
took him.
The Lord here teaches a lesson of the greatest importance by the
translation of Enoch, a descendant of fallen Adam, that all would be
rewarded, who by faith would rely upon the promised Sacrifice a
