THE FAITH OF ABELPRIVATE 

Genesis 4:1-26

Key Verse Hebrews 11:4

By faith Abel offered God a better sacrifice than Cain did. By faith he was commended as a righteous man, when God spoke well of his offerings. And by faith he still speaks, even though he is dead.

Last Sunday we studied Mark 11:22, in which Jesus taught his disciples to have faith in God. Jesus taught us the faith that can accomplish what is impossible on our own. With human abilities we can accomplish many things. But we cannot overcome our sinful nature. By faith in God we can overcome the sinful nature and develop a godly character. 

In today’s passage, Abel set a good example of faith. By faith he overcame himself and the world. Through the victory in faith, he got his name at the top of the list of the heroes of faith recorded in Hebrews 11. Let us see how he did it. 

I. By faith he offered a better sacrifice

The Lord God created a beautiful universe. He made the earth harmonious. He made the Garden of Eden for Adam and Eve. In the Garden of Eden they could have enjoyed a blessed life with the blessed Lord for all eternity.

But one day, through temptation by a serpent, the agent of the devil, Adam and Eve lost faith in the Lord. Doubt about God’s love arose in them. They ate the forbidden fruit. They broke God's command. Then they found themselves to be no good. Misery then began. 

Despite their unfaithfulness, however, the Lord God did not give up on them. Rather, in his tender mercy, God provided Adam and Eve with a way for their sins to be forgiven. The Lord gave them the way to overcome their sin problem, come back to him, and continue to have fellowship with Him. How did he do this? The means for them to come back to the Lord did not rest on man's merits. Rather, it rested on man's faith in the Lord. The solution to man's problem is always compatible with the way in which the problem developed. Man fell into trouble because of his loss of faith in the Lord. The solution was found in the recovery of faith in the Lord. Hebrews 11:4 says that by faith Abel approached God and recovered a blessed relationship with the Lord. 

At first it sounds easy for one to have faith in the Lord's perfect goodness and remain in fellowship with Him in a perfectly harmonious way. But in actuality, it is not as easy as it seems. In fact it requires a lot of struggling on our part, particularly the struggle to overcome all obstacles that stand in the way of our coming to the Lord. 

What stands in the way? There are many things. But in view of the way in which the Lord God trains his children, like Abraham, Isaac, or Jacob, we can see that the first stumbling block is materialism. What is materialism? It is to put created things above God. It is to put money before God. It is man’s worship of material things rather than God. In today’s passage, Abel overcomes the power of materialism. 

How did he do it? Let us open the Bible to Genesis 4 and read verses 1-4. “Adam lay with 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.  In the course of time Cain brought some of the fruits of the soil as an offering to the LORD. But Abel brought fat portions from some of the firstborn of his flock. The LORD looked with favor on Abel and his offering.”  

Hebrews 11:4 says that Abel brought to the Lord a better sacrifice than Cain did. Here a “better sacrifice,” especially the word “sacrifice,” indicates that unlike Cain, Abel won a clear-cut victory over the power of materialism. He sacrificed the best of his best for the sake of worshiping God. 

Money can be useful. It has its own purpose. What is money's purpose? Genesis teaches us that the material world was made to be the environment for man. It is to remain subservient to man’s need. Its purpose then is to serve man. So, man's position is above materials but below God. The world was made for the glory of God. Man was made to rule over and manage the world. So we have a three-tiered order: God first, man second and the world third. This order puts money in the right perspective. Money is to serve man who serves God. 

With this in mind let us now put into perspective what Abel did. What did he do? He brought to the Lord a better sacrifice. That is, he brought fat portions of the firstborn. He brought to God the best of the best. This is a classic example of overcoming materialism. It is a Biblical example of the right use of money. 

With money you can open a liquor store. With money you can build a church. With money some people make movies that promote evil. With money some make spiritual movies like The Passion of the Christ. Mel Gibson is from Australia. He lives not far from Melbourne. He used $50 million of his own money to make The Passion of the Christ.

In this materialistic society, it is not easy to sacrifice money for God's glory. Of course some do sacrifice money for Gods' purpose, but not as wholeheartedly and sincerely as Abel did. Some are willing to sacrifice their leftover money. But Abel did not do so. He brought to God what is best. He is like a man who, after getting a job, brings to God all of his first month's paycheck. 

I have a friend who is familiar with Hasidic Judaism. He shared this with me:  in Jewish tradition, if anyone is to be regarded as “sacrificial” to the Lord in making material offerings, the minimum percentage will have to be 47%! There is no law in the Bible that demands that you must pay 47% of your gross income as an offering to the Lord. But still some do. In Jesus’ day there was a poor widow who brought not only 47% but 100% to the Lord's temple. While some rich people were throwing big piles of leftover money into the offering box, she donated two pennies, all she had to live on. Jesus was so moved by what she had done that Jesus told his disciples about it and commended her faith. There is no law that says you have to make offerings of all you have to live on. But God wants us to offer willingly by faith what we have. Students don’t have much money. But they have time and youthful energy. In fact these things are more precious than money. Shepherd Jay Irwin set a good example. Although he was financially strapped, in order to serve the Lord’s world mission purpose, he took many days off, went to Bolivia, and served Bolivian students. And he did it by faith. 

In today’s materialistic society it is not easy for us to bring a better sacrifice to the Lord. And I do not think that the situation was any easier for Abel or Cain. Having been recently evicted from the Garden of Eden, Abel’s life as a shepherd was not as prosperous as we might think. Like many of us, living in a cursed world, he had to work hard to keep the flocks and get them to multiply. Yet, when the first lambs were born, the first thing he did was to bring some of the best ones to the Lord. He kept his priorities straight. He expressed his thanks first to God. 

Then the question becomes this: How did he do it? The answer is clear: He did it by faith. What then do we mean by faith? What did he believe about the Lord that Cain didn't? Well, it is anyone's guess. But we find a clue in Hebrews 11:1-3. Let us open the Bible, look for this passage and read it. Here, Abel saw the invisible God. He also believed in God, who created the universe and everything in it. This faith sounds simple and easy enough for everyone to understand. But in reality few people believe and practically live by this faith. For example, suppose your boss pays you $10,000 a month as a salary. To earn this much money, maybe you had to work hard. You might have even worked overtime, sacrificing your weekends. You also might have spent sleepless nights to earn that much money. Suppose God says out of the blue in a thunderous voice, “Hey, I know you just deposited your paycheck into your bank account. Why don’t you make an offering of $2,000?” What will you say? Probably, you will be tempted to say, “Who, me? Are you talking to me? Who are you? This is my money. Why do I have to give it to you?” But, if indeed God is the Creator of everything, simple logic says that “There is nothing we can claim as our own: everything belongs to God.” Even what you worked for and what you earned is not yours. God made you in such a way that you are able to earn what you have earned. So who are you to talk back to God, saying, “Who are you?” 

Indeed, Abel had creation faith. By faith he understood that all material earnings, like the fat portions of the firstborn, come from God. Then he was deeply thankful to God. And he offered it by faith in the Lord who provided him with all that is good. And as he brought what he brought, perhaps he felt sorry for not being able to bring more. 

But this is not the real point of the message. What is the real point of the message? The real point is that Abel himself was greatly blessed by his act of faith. Abel set the correct spiritual order: God first, man second, and material third. In doing so he prepared the environment for God's absolute blessings to thrive in his life and in the lives of many through him. This is the beauty of Abel's sacrifice. Let us never misunderstand. Although money is morally neutral, it is so attractive that many fall victim to the love of money. Paul writes in 1 Timothy 6:10, “For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil.” In this materialistic society so many people are addicted to money. Because they are hooked on it, it is hard to say who the boss is: money or man? But by faith Abel conquered materialism. He kept money in the right place by positively dedicating the best part of his possessions to God! And he did it by faith in the Lord!                                      

                           

II. By faith he was commended as a righteous man

Another victory Abel achieved through his faith in the Lord is the victory over his sinful self. Then the tree of his faith bore a beautiful fruit: a righteous standing before God.

Since the fall, man's relationship with the Lord has been broken. This is the tragedy of tragedies. Since the fall, man started to hate himself. This hatred expresses itself in many ways: a sense of guilt, fits of anger, depression, and so on. Sin causes man to malfunction in all faculties of his existence. His spirit becomes warped. His way of thinking goes crooked. His emotion, will power, and intellect start operating in a disorderly manner. His eyes, particularly spiritual eyes, start seeing in a distorted way. His tongue gets sharp. His view of God, men, and nature turns corrupt. In this way, all faculties of his life, including imaginative and illuminative functions, go awry. The Bible has a simple way to label these symptoms. Romans 3:23 says, “…for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.” 

The most tragic consequence of man's fall is man’s inclination to unplug himself from his relationship with the Lord and run away from the Lord. Sinful man keeps hiding from the Lord’s presence. Although the Lord keeps extending his hand of invitation, man keeps distancing himself from the Lord. This is what we see happening in the life of Adam and his descendants.

But Abel overcame this sinful nature. Abel rather was commended by God as a righteous man. The word “righteous” means to be right with God. It refers to the standing of a man who can approach God without shame or guilt. The Bible says that God is surrounded by inapproachable light.  He is too holy for anyone to even consider exposing oneself to his presence. But Abel got himself qualified for fellowship with the Lord. Between God and Abel, there was no separation. When you think about it, this righteous standing is the foundation of all the blessings from God – the joy of life, the sense of wholesomeness, peace flowing like river, and much more. God is the ultimate provider and sustainer. By him all things are held together. All glories and blessings stem from God. And in his presence are found the eternal pleasures. 

How could Abel acquire this standing? One may think that Abel gained it because he was inherently a better person than Cain. One might think that Abel’s genetic combination might have been better than that of Cain. But this is not true. Romans 3:23 says that all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. Psalm 53:2-3 says, “God looks down from heaven on the sons of men to see if there are any who understand, any who seek God. Everyone has turned away, they have together become corrupt; there is no one who does good, not even one.” Jeremiah 17:9 says, “The heart is deceitful above all things and beyond cure. Who can understand it?” These statements affirm one truth: Abel was born as rotten a sinner as Cain. After all, even the name Abel means "futility" or "emptiness." He was an empty person. But he overcame this rotten status. He rose from a totally broken condition to a brand new condition. He became a new creation. 

How did it happen? The answer is the same: by faith. Faith in what? Faith in God’s love and power, especially the love that forgives man of his sins. Perhaps he must have learned from his parents how the Lord God killed animals, shed blood, and made a covering for his parents (Gen 3:21). In Genesis 3:21, we see the Lord granting the first fallen family the gospel of Jesus in a primitive form, by killing animals, shedding their blood, and thereby atoning for the sin of Adam and Eve. Abel must have been taught God’s way of atonement for man’s sins. He must have then approached the throne of God's grace with this faith, the faith that believes in the Lord's sin-forgiving love. I think that even before approaching the Lord with the choice offering, he must have repented a lot. As he sincerely repented of his sins, perhaps confessing all the sins he ever committed, he made a sacrifice to the Lord. The Lord saw the contriteness of Abel's heart. The Lord then forgave all of his sins. He thus was commended by the Lord as a righteous man. In short, we can say that by faith Abel won a victory over his sinful self. 

There are many people who are smart and able. In their pride they do not fully admit that they are sinners. These people may never think that they need a Savior. They then never approach the throne of God's grace for forgiveness either in public or in private. Does this mean that they are all right? No. God knows that they are not. Unless and until you are right with God, you will never be right. If you think otherwise, then what the apostle Paul says in Romans 3:4 is true: “Let God be true, and every man a liar.” 

III. By faith he still speaks even though he is dead

Genesis 4:5b-26 records a tragic story about the conflict between Cain and Abel. As tragic as this story is, we still find one powerful victory in the life of Abel, that is, Abel did not retaliate. He died in defense of his gospel faith. He became the first martyr in the entirety of human history. He then reminds us of our Lord Jesus, for referring to Jesus, 1 Peter 2:23 says, “When they hurled their insults at him, he did not retaliate; when he suffered, he made no threats. Instead, he entrusted himself to him who judges justly.” Like our Lord Jesus he endured a brother who was sinning. Being a shepherd for the flock, he could have wielded his club or staff and struck Cain back in self- defense. But he did not do that. Rather, while blow after blow were being leveled at him, he might even have been praying for Cain saying, “Father! Forgive him.” How could he do that? Again, he was able to do it by faith. He believed in God, who is the judge of all. He was conscious of the one who can even raise the righteous from the dead. He believed in God, who will fully reward those who earnestly seek him. 

In contrast, Cain had no faith in the Lord. Although he might have been endowed with many good privileges as the eldest son, he not only became an unbeliever but the first murderer. Since then, he remained a fugitive. 

Cain's example shows us the tragic consequence of humanism - humanism in the sense of man putting himself above God. First, Cain became angry with God when God saw Abel and his offering with favor but not Cain himself and his offering.  The fact that he was angry with God shows that he put himself above God. Then he murdered Abel. Cain had no right to kill Abel. But he murdered Abel and thereby defied God's will to keep Abel alive. The Lord could have gotten rid of Cain. But in his mercy and long-suffering patience, the Lord kept bearing with him, waiting ever so patiently so that he could come back to his senses, repent of his pride, and ask God for the forgiveness of his sins. But still Cain did not repent. He kept rebelling against God. 

As he shut God out of his life and went away from the presence of God, he ended up bearing only bad fruit. Literally, he became like a branch cut from a tree.

But Abel is different. Physically Abel is dead. But God blessed his faith in the Lord. In his place God granted a new son named Seth. Seth also had a son. Then people from Seth's line began to call on the name of the Lord; they started having fellowship with the Lord. This shows that the seed of faith was still alive and bearing fruit through the descendants of Seth.

When we have Abel's faith, then we too can outlive the limitations of our physical body. Even though we may die physically, the seed of faith we leave behind will continue to bear fruit in the lives of those who see and learn from the example of our faith. 

One word: The faith of Abel

 

 

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