Genesis 4:7-17

We are in the fourth chapter in the aftermath of the fall.
We yesterday met the two new characters in this part of the story,
Cain and Abel.
You’ll remember that Cain and Abel both bring an offering to God,
and for reasons only God understands,
or perhaps the writers,
but are a little more confusing to us.
God has preferred Abel’s sacrifice and has warned Cain about the danger of his anger
and that it could lead him to sin.
Today we see what happens when God’s warnings go unheeded.
So we pick up the story in verse 8.
“Cain said to his brother Abel,
‘Let us go out to the field.’
And when they were in the field,
Cain rose up against his brother Abel and killed him.”
So here again, we have the kind of,
we’ve been talking the last few days,
maybe the last week or so,
about the escalation of sin in the early chapters of Genesis.
We will continue to see that into the next series of stories,
which are the Noah stories.
But here we go very quickly from disobedience,
to hiding,
to shame,
to deceitfulness,
to jealousy,
to rage,
and now all the way to murder,
the sort of natural progression that sin has taken in this story.
And Cain,
so angry with his brother Abel,
that he takes him out,
lures him out essentially,
which is a pair of this word we saw yesterday,
this idea of lurking.
He lures him out and he kills him.
Then the story goes on.
“The Lord said to Cain,
‘Where’s your brother Abel?’
Cain said, ‘I do not know.
Am I my brother’s keeper?'”
Now,
the sort of irony of this story is,
yes,
as one who is living in the world,
he in fact, as we know, is his brother’s keeper.
But here he avoids the question.
It’s not quite a lie.
Well, actually it’s fairly dishonest.
I do not know,
which is not true.
Am
I my brother’s keeper?
Is it my job to watch him?
And the Lord says,
“What have you done?”
Listen, your brother’s blood is crying out from the ground.
And now you were cursed from the ground,
which has opened its mouth to receive your brother’s blood from your hand.
When you till it,
it will no longer yield to you its strength.
You will be a fugitive and a wanderer on the earth.
Very interesting here.
The penalty for what Cain has done is that he will no longer see meaning or see success
in the thing that God has put them out there to do.
Remember,
the punishment for leaving the garden was that the ground would be difficult.
Now,
the very ground that they rely on is cursed to Cain because of his actions.
When you till the ground,
it will no longer give its strength to you.
You will be a fugitive and a wanderer on the earth.
Now, keep in mind that in the context of an ancient society,
not having a place,
not having the security of a people and a land,
not having a home,
to be a nomad,
to be a wanderer is a lost existence.
It is to be disconnected,
to be out of relationship,
which is why exile is so difficult,
which is why excommunication,
which is why being sent away is such a painful and such a serious punishment.
Here,
God punishes Cain for his actions by telling him,
“You no longer have a place.
You will be a wanderer.
You will move without people, without purpose.
You will wander the earth.”
And Cain responds to the Lord,
we’re in verse 13 here,
“My punishment is greater than I can bear.
Today, you’ve driven me from the soil,
and I shall be hidden from your face.
I’ll be a fugitive and a wanderer on the earth,
and anyone who meets me may kill me.”
Now,
these are the kind of verses that have drawn a lot of attention and a lot of
well-meaning but not particularly helpful questions,
like who’s going to kill him.
That’s only a problem if you want to read this text that it’s most literal and say,
“Well, there can’t be anyone else out there.”
That’s not an assumption this text makes.
This text makes the real assumption that outside of this first and nurtured family,
there have grown to be other groups, other peoples.
How they got there is not really the concern of this story,
but they are out there.
This is a real threat.
This is part of the threat of being exiled,
of being sent out,
that now he no longer has protection.
So then again,
the Lord responds.
And we see this with the same kind of pattern we saw in the last chapter in Genesis,
where God sends Adam and Eve out,
but provides for them, punishes them,
but is also merciful to them.
Here,
the Lord says,
“No,
not so.
Whoever kills Cain will suffer sevenfold vengeance.”
And the Lord put a mark on Cain so that no one who came upon him would kill him.
So even in his exile,
even in his punishment,
Cain bears the literal mark of God’s protection.
God identifies him as someone who is protected by the power of God
so that anyone who would harm him would receive seven times
that harm back on themselves.
And this is a sign of God’s continued care,
though it happens in the midst of God holding Cain accountable for his sin.
And we will see the tension in these two realities throughout the rest of the scripture,
being held accountable for sin and being loved by God and receiving mercy.
And it is this justice of God and the mercy of God
that are going to form two of the major themes of the rest of the story,
both the Old Testament and throughout even the New Testament.
Then verse 16,
“Then Cain went away from the presence of the Lord
and settled in the land of Oud,
Nod,
east of Eden.” This word, Nod, is interesting because in the very last part of this story,
it’s used as a noun,
as a place,
but it’s the word wandering.
It’s already been used twice in the passage,
verse 12 and verse 14.
So if you read this literally,
it says, “Cain went away from the presence of the Lord
and settled in a land of wandering east of Eden.”
It may or may not be that Nod was understood to be a particular city,
and it may just be a reference to him living out
the punishment that has been cast on him.
So now here, as we come very close to the end of this chapter,
this is where we’ll end the study.
When we pick up Monday,
we’ll pick up in chapter five.
The rest of chapter four is a kind of condensed genealogy
of how this family expands,
of where more people come from.
It’s really just a very quick rundown on the bridge from Cain to Noah,
and there’s not much in it that’s going to be really helpful in terms of content.
So this is where we end this chapter,
and we end it again with this sense that the human story
has devolved very quickly downhill.
There has been violence.
There has been jealousy.
There has been murder.
And now,
at least Cain,
who now doesn’t really exist
as a character throughout the story anymore,
but as one who is an example of both the sinfulness of people
and the punishment of God,
and he is out there
wandering,
marked with this mark,
protected by God, but held accountable by God.
And then the rest of the story is going to flash back.
Cain then gives birth to people,
and we’re going to be told where they live.
And then the chapter ends,
the fourth chapter is going to end,
with Adam again knowing his wife,
who bears a son,
Seth.
And it is to Seth that this lineage that we’re going to follow
shows up.
So at an explanation level,
where do some of the other people come from?
They come from Cain.
Why are they not as favored as Israel?
Because Cain was a sinner,
because Cain was marked,
because God cared for Cain,
but he punished Cain
for the wrong that he did.
And so here we go,
and we’ll move into this story next week
as we focus for a couple of chapters
on the particular story of Noah.
And this sets the stage.
But as the early parts of Genesis are inclined to do,
we’re going to jump multiple generations at that point.
There are huge time gaps in these early chapters of Genesis.
The timing of
the dating of this is not very important
to the story.
This is very much trying to hit the high points of the characters
and the background to move into the next parts of the story.
And that next part,
we’ll start with Adam on Monday.
I’m sorry, with Noah on Monday.
So that’s what’s going on today.
Thanks for joining us.
We hope to be back to our regular format next Monday.
But regardless,
somebody will be here.
And we’re glad that you’re here.
Hope you all have a great weekend.
Thanks for joining us.