Shame, Sin & the Mercy of God (Chester UMC)

It is Father's Day if you, in case you forgot, it is Father's

Day. And as on Mother's Day, I, I

will say then what I say today, what I said then.

This may not look like a Father's Day message, but it is

a Father's Day message and just be patient and we'll, we'll get

there. We'll get there.

But it's not a message, of course, just for fathers, but

for anyone and for everyone. But we are talking continuing

this story as we're working our way through the Bible and and

still in the early parts of Genesis and looking at Genesis

Genesis 4 · chapter mention

chapter 4 today, which is the 1st chapter in the first place

in the Bible where the word sin is mentioned.

And although we often talk about, and rightly so, the fall

of Adam and Eve where they eat of the tree of the knowledge of

good and evil, which God commanded them not to eat as the

original sin. Sin is first mentioned in

chapter 4 in connection with Cain, their son.

And we're going to take a look at that today.

Shame, sin, and the mercy of God.

I want to just walk through the story again, though, before we

really kind of jump into any details, because again, this is

one of those stories in which if we've heard it a lot, we can

miss some of the details and some of the nuance.

And because of the cultural differences, it's also easy to

miss some of the very important shades of meaning that are here

in the story. So again we see Adam and Eve

coming together, having two children, first Cain and then

Abel. And then we hear how their

occupations differ and, and Cain is a tiller of the soil.

He grows crops, he grows grains, he grows wheat, barley, whatever

else they might have been growing in that time and in that

place. And, and Abel 10s flocks.

He's a shepherd caring for goats and sheep most likely.

And they bring their offerings to God.

Now God looks with favor on Abel's offering and he doesn't

look favorite with favor upon Cain's offering.

And this makes Cain angry and ashamed.

And we know he's ashamed. We know he's angry because the

Bible says he was angry. We know he's ashamed because the

Bible says his face was downcast.

And in contemporary American culture, a downcast face is a

way of talking about sadness, maybe a way of talking about

anger or resentment. But in ancient Middle Eastern

culture, almost everything having to do with face had to do

with honor and with shame. So when God looked with favor on

Abel's offering and did not look with favor, did not turn his

face toward Cain's offering, God, by turning his face toward

Abel's offering, was honoring Abel and his offering, and he

was dishonouring. He was shaming Cain and his

offering. And now Cain's face is downcast.

His face is turned down. And this is a symbol and a sign

in that culture of deep shame, of being deeply dishonored.

And so this is the context. This is the context of what's

happening now. One of the questions that so

often comes up in my mind and the minds of others when they

look at This is why, Why did God honor Abel and his offering,

look with favor upon them, but dishonor and reject Cain and his

offering? And we're not sure to be

perfectly honest. There are a lot of different

theories. I think the most plausible is

this. If you go back and and look at

that text, it's about the offerings.

It says in the course of time Cain brought some of the fruits

of the soil as an offering to the Lord.

In the course of time it just so happened eventually Cain brought

some of the stuff that he had grown as an offering to the

Lord. But it says of Abel's offering,

Abel also brought an offering, the fat portions from some of

the first born of his flock. We get the sense here there is

at least a hint that that Cain's offering is 1/2 hearted offering

of whatever he had, kind of whenever he thought to bring it.

There was no sense of urgency. There was no sense of priority.

We know that eventually, when God gave His law to the

Israelites through Moses, offerings given to God were

always of the first fruits. You bring the 1st.

And not only do you bring the first, you bring the best, the

fat portions and the first born. Now the law hadn't been given

yet, but Abel brought the best that he could bring in his

offering to God, Some of the first born of his flocks and the

fat portions of those. Whereas it seems that Cain,

whether he was acting out of duty or simply a lackadaisical

who really cares kind of attitude, seems to have just

brought something of what he had grown.

The fact that one was an animal offering and one was a grain

offering doesn't really matter. God later on, again through the

law of Moses reveal he he called for both animal offerings and

grain offerings, but it was always first fruits, it was

always the best. The animals that you brought,

you were to bring the fat portions and you were to bring

unblemished animals. So what is possibly going on

here is that God accepted Abel's offering because Abel gave the

best of what he had. It was a sense of urgency and

priority and what he was giving to God, whereas Cain seemed to

either not care, not be interested, be indifferent about

it. Of all of the theories that are

out there, I think that's the most likely.

But the there's another theory that's out there that I think is

worth considering is that God intentionally doesn't tell us

the reason why God rejected. Is it made known to us?

Because we don't really need to know it.

Because God is God and and what matters is not why God accepted

1 and rejected the other, but simply that God accepted 1 and

rejected the other. That Cain was mad because God

didn't do what God what he wanted God to do.

God didn't give him the honor that he wanted, instead he

honored his younger brother and shamed him.

And why God did it, we don't know.

And Cain doesn't even seem to ask.

God makes it clear, Look, if you do what is right, things will go

well for you too. But if you don't do what is

right, and we don't see Cain going God what is right, There's

no he's not seeking God. He's not looking for

clarification. He's not looking for

understanding. He's not looking for wisdom.

What we ultimately see that Cain is looking for is Cain is

looking for revenge and a means by which he can regain his own

honor. The murdering of Abel, The

killing of Abel seems to be a a an attempt by Cain to establish

and gain his own honor and his own respect.

That might seem an odd thing, but you don't think of it this

way. If you're in a sports team and

you're out practicing and scrimmaging and doing what you

do, and you, you, you keep getting beaten by the person

opposite you. It's on the same team, but

they're playing the other side. Whether it's basketball,

volleyball, you know, football, whatever, they keep you.

They keep getting the best of you.

You're going to get angry, you're going to get frustrated.

You're going to be shamed. How do you gain honor?

How do you regain respect on the team?

By defeating your opponent, By getting the best of them the

next time, by standing up and showing them who's better.

That mindset is not, you know, Cain's mindset here is not

alien, and most of us would not go so far as to kill our

opponent in order to regain our honor.

But on the other hand, you remember Tonya Harding, remember

Nancy Kerrigan, right? For those of you who you know, I

was, you know, someone told me today that my shirt looked like

laugh in. I said I've never seen laugh in

and they were shaking their heads because they're all I

know. There's a lot of folks here that

don't know who Tonya Harding is and don't know who Nancy

Kerrigan is. Back in, I think it was in the

90s and they were both American figure Figure skaters.

They were both very good. They both had Olympic

aspirations and and Nancy Kerrigan seemed to be doing a

little better than Tonya Harding, Tonya Harding's

ex-husband and Tonya Harding's trainer hired essentially a hit

man to ambush Nancy Kerrigan after practice one day and whack

her in the leg with a baton whack and and injure her enough.

It was done right before the American Championships as a way

of keeping her out. Nancy, out of the championships

and therefore out of the Olympics.

Removing a competitor from Tonya Harding's path to Olympic glory.

Gaining honor by doing violence against your opponent.

We do this as human beings. Seek respect, seek honor, seek

glory by stomping on and climbing over and standing on

the backs of those who are weaker or more vulnerable in

some way or another. And that's what Cain did.

That's what Cain did. He killed his brother Abel.

And then we'll get to the rest of the story in a minute.

But I want to talk about Cain's way here, Cain's way of

regaining honor, Cain's way of dealing with God's rejection of

him and his offering. Cain's way of dealing with his

shame was to lift himself up by standing on the back of someone

who was weaker than him, someone who was less than him.

We don't know much about Cain. We know even less about Abel.

We do know that Abel's name means nothing.

Now, let me be clear. His name means something, but

what it means is nothing. All right, that's kind of fun,

isn't it? Yeah.

There you go. You remember in in Ecclesiastes

where the the writer of Ecclesiastes begins.

Vanity of vanities, all is vanity.

And that word vanity there means it's, it's something similar to

soap bubble. It's something, there's no

substance to it. There's nothing to it.

That's vanity. That's Abel's name, the same

word. Why his parents gave him that

name, we have no idea. Cain was hailed and celebrated

by Eve. I have made with God's help, I

have made a human, I have made a man.

And they were proud of Cain, that Abel, Abel was nothing to

them. Cain had all of the honor from

the beginning. As the eldest child, he had all

of the glory. He had all of position.

And when he was pushed off that pedestal, he saw the way to get

back on that pedestal was to attack his rival, attack another

human being. I'll gain my own honor, I'll

gain my own respect. I'll gain my own glory by

besting my rival, by being the best and showing that I'm the

best, I'm the strongest. I'm the most able to achieve in

this world. That was Kane's way, and Cain's

way is the way of death. That way of gaining honor, that

way of gaining respect doesn't lead to life, it leads to death.

And what did we see in the previous chapter?

In the Garden of Eden there were two trees that were named by

name, the Tree of Life, the Tree of Life and the Tree of the

Knowledge of Good and Evil. And God had told Adam and Eve,

don't eat for fruit from the tree of the Knowledge of Good

and evil or you will surely die. They ate of that and they

brought death into the world. And so God cast them out of the

garden and cut them off from life.

And now they have passed this legacy of death onto their

children. Cain once again choosing the way

of death once again instead of turning to God and saying to

God, God, what can I do to regain your favor?

What can I do to regain the honor that I can only get from

you? He said, how can I get my own

honor? How can I get my own glory?

Not content with the glory of God, not desiring to seek God's

glory in his life and to share in God's glory in his life, He

was determined to get glory and honor on his own.

And when we do of that as human beings, when we make that our

goal, when we make that our mission to give glory and honor

to ourselves and achieve that on our own, that is the way of

death in one way or another. It always leads to death,

whether it's sibling rivalry or ice skater rivalry or the

rivalry in schools or at work or in politics.

When the goal is to achieve for ourselves honor and glory, we

end up standing on the backs of others to get it.

And we're simply living out that legacy of the Garden of Eden

that we know ourselves the best way to get honor and glory and

position and status and respect for ourselves.

Cain's way is the way of death. Cain's way is the way of death.

What is God's way? What is God's way?

He said to Cain, If you do what is right, let me just read it

again. The Lord said to Cain, Why are

you angry? Why is your face downcast?

If you do what is right, will you not be accepted?

But if you do not do what is right, sin is crouching at your

door. It desires to have you, but you

must rule over it. Do what is right, God says.

And this is simply more than just doing the right thing.

It's it's, it's more than just follow the rules.

God is not saying to Cain, if you just follow the rules, there

was no rules at this point. God had only given one rule that

we know of to this point, which was don't eat from the fruit of

the tree of the knowledge of good and evil that had already

been done. The law hadn't been given.

There were no commandments that have been given about offerings

to give to God. No commands.

It's even to bring offerings to God, but God says to Cain do

what is right. That word there in in older

translations is is sometimes translated as righteous do

righteousness and righteousness is much more than just following

a moral code or ethical rules or religious rules.

Righteousness has to do with living and right relationship.

In the Old Testament it was a covenant of with God and

covenant relationship with God and with other people that was

based on the justice and the peace of God.

Treat each other rightly, honor me rightly and I will give you

and all that are around you peace.

You will share in my honor and my glory.

God says I will give you all the honor.

I will give you all the glory as my people that anyone could ever

want or need. You will share in my honor and

My glory if you live in right relationship with Me and right

relationship with each other. That's what righteousness was.

That's what doing what right doing right meant to God.

Humble yourself before me. Seek my honor and My glory as

your Creator and your Sustainer and your Redeemer, and you will

share in my glory. If you try to get it on your

own, you're only going to create more death.

And so when God asked Cain where is your brother, he wasn't

looking for information. God knows everything.

He wasn't looking for information.

He was, He was helping, still trying to help Cain see the

importance of relationship. Cain was having none of it.

His answer am I? My brother's keeper?

Gets to the heart of what's wrong in Cain's life is that he

sees himself as the top. He sees himself as the standard,

and he has no responsibility whatsoever for his brother.

Why should I care about my brother?

Why should I care about him? He's nothing to me.

And that was the problem. That was the problem.

Jesus clarified the ancient notion of righteousness when he

says things like this. The law and the prophets are

summed up in this. Love God.

Love God with all your heart, soul, mind and strength and love

your neighbor as yourself. You have a responsibility to

love your neighbor, to love your and, and he didn't.

He didn't water it down, he expanded it and made it even

more profound. Because it isn't just love your

brother as yourself. It's not just your family, it's

your neighbor. It's anyone you encounter.

Love them as you are supposed to be loving your brother and your

sister. Love them as your own family,

and you'll fulfill all the law and all the prophets.

A new commandment, a new covenant.

Jesus said I give to you the night before he died, a new

covenant. Love one another as I have loved

you. We have a responsibility toward

our sisters and our brothers, our family and our neighbors to

love them, not to use them, to gain glory and honor and respect

for ourselves. Cain's way, Cain's way, the way

of death is far too prevalent in our world.

In all corners of our world. We say people see people living

by the rule. My dad used to tell us when we

were at a family reunion and there was food out or at a

church gathering, it was food out.

It was like, you'll get it. Root hog or die was his was his

phrase. Our root hog was fun.

He didn't expect us to actually kill anyone to get the food.

Just a fun saying. But we got way too many people

living like that's the rule in the law of the land.

Rude hog or die. Get all you can living by some

sort of bizarre notion of Darwinian social theory that

that that the fit the survival of the fittest.

Fight for what you get and it's better for everyone if we stomp

on the weak to strengthen the strong because that will make

the species stronger. Funny how it's always the people

on the top that seem to be living by that creed.

God said that's not my way, that's the way of death.

God's way is the way of life. Love each other is I have loved

you. Love your neighbor is I?

Who's your neighbor? You remember that story?

Jesus told that story because they asked him.

I said, well, who's my neighbor? I'm supposed to follow this

rule. Who's my neighbor?

Jesus told about the man traveling from Jericho to

Jerusalem. He was attacked by bandits.

He was robbed, beaten, and left for dead on the side of the

road. And the priest and the rabbi

went by, and they did nothing to help.

And then the Samaritan came. The hated Samaritan, the

ethnically, culturally, religiously, politically

different Samaritan came by and he got down from his animal and

he tended the man's wounds and he poured wine on them to

disinfect medicine of the day. And he put him on his own animal

and he took him to an end and he paid for his care.

And he told the innkeeper, do whatever it takes to take care

of this man. When I come back, I'll pay

whatever else is owed. And Jesus said, who was the

neighbor to that man? And they got that.

That other guy, the guy that asked him, he couldn't bring

himself to say the word Samaritan.

He despised the Samaritans and all he could say was the one who

showed mercy. And Jesus said you do the same.

That's how to live. Not asking who is my neighbor

that I must love, but living with the responsibility of being

a neighbor to everyone we encounter who is in need.

Whatever their need, whatever their politics, whatever their

philosophy, whatever their lifestyle, whatever their

background, whatever their gender, whatever their skin

color, be a neighbor and love them in the name of Jesus.

This is the righteousness. This is the right thing that

Cain couldn't see, because Cain was obsessed with achieving his

own righteousness, his own glory, his own status at the

expense of anyone who stood in his way.

But even in the end, even in the end, God's way, God's way of

mercy, God's way of compassionate love for those

around us, even even after Cain spilled his brother's blood and

God cast him out and cut him off, God still showed him mercy.

Cain said. I'll be an outcast.

Everyone I see will try to kill me.

This would be a great spot to remind ourselves that we can see

this historically. We can see this as as a, as a

parable, as an allegory and, and, and you know, you're going

to see it historically. The challenge is, is where we're

all of these other people that we're going to kill Cain.

And when he goes and starts to join and moves into a city,

which we see in a few verses later, where'd the city come

from? We don't want to get caught up

in those kind of details. However you see it.

Cain was afraid to be cast out of God's presence, mean to be

removed, meant to be removed from God's protection.

And so God put his protection upon Cain, a mark.

We have no idea what the mark was, but it wasn't a curse.

It was a sign that even though this man is no longer in my

presence, he's still under my protection.

God's still extending mercy, still extending grace, even to

the first murderer who killed his own brother.

God's way is the way of life. God shamed Cain in the

beginning, but God didn't shame Cain to punish Cain.

God shamed Cain to restore Cain so that Cain would come back to

him and say, God, how can I restore my honor?

What can I do? How can I do rightly?

How can I be? The function of shame in the

Bible is not punitive. That's one of the worst things

about our culture right now is the way shame is used 100%

punitively. And if someone ever does any

wrong, they get shamed and cut off and cast out and removed,

and there's no hope no matter what they do from that point on,

can they be restored? That's how cancel culture

functions, and people were playing the cancel culture game

long before social media. There were things that people

could do that would so shame their family and their friends

and their community that they could never be restored.

But that's never how God used shame.

The purpose of turning away from Cain and his offering was to

restore Cain so that Cain would know he had done wrong.

That he was going down to the wrong path.

That pushing God to the back burner and making him a low

priority and being unconcerned with God's honor and God's glory

was putting Cain on the way to death that would control him for

the rest of his life if he didn't course correct.

And to the very end, God was trying to bring Cain back, to

show him mercy, to give him opportunity for repentance.

We don't know for sure, but I don't think Cain ever took God

up on that. We do know that several

generations later, 1 of Cain's I did the counting before and now

I can't remember it was a great great great grandson or great

great great great grandson is a few generations down.

Lamech, a descendant of Cain had taken 2 wives, Ada and Zilla.

And Lamech said to his wives, Listen to me, wives of Lamech,

hear my words. I have killed a man for wounding

me, a young man for injuring me. If Cain is avenged 7 times,

Lamech is avenged 77 times. God said to Cain, you need to

deal with your behavior, need to deal with this unrighteousness,

this wrongness in your relationship with me and with

others. If you don't, sin will rule over

you, but you need to master it. It appears that sin ruled over

Cain was now ruling over Cain's descendants.

There is an amazing passage in the Bible at the beginning of

the 10 commandments, did I not? Oh, I thought I copied and

pasted that. Doggone it, I got to go.

I got to change apps. I'm sorry, because I got to read

this. I stop being difficult

technology. OK, I could have sworn I copied

and pasted that into my notes and I did not.

I would say smoke them if you got them, but that would be

inappropriate. Exodus 20.

All right, And we'll just start at verse one.

The 10 Commandments You shall have no other God before me.

God said you should not make for yourself an image in the form of

anything in heaven above or on the earth beneath or in the

waters below. You shall not bow down to them

or worship them. For I, the Lord your God, am a

jealous God. God is saying I created you,

I've sustained you. I, I, I brought you out of

slavery in Egypt. I shamed and defeated the most

powerful Kingdom on earth just to redeem you.

I brought you through the wilderness.

I'm taking you to a promised land, a land flowing with milk

and honey to give to you as your inheritance, as my children.

I am honoring you and glorifying you.

Honor and glorify me. Surrender to me, serve me, bow

down to me, give your allegiance to me, and I will give you all

of the honor and glory you need. Don't turn to other sources for

that. That's what idolatry was about,

to turn to other sources for salvation, for hope, for relief,

for honor, for glory. God said get that from me.

And God then says this curious thing.

I am a jealous God punishing the children for the sin of the

parents to the 3rd and the 4th generation of those who hate me.

I don't think God is saying that He's just going to take

retributive justice against grandchildren and great

grandchildren because of the sins of their parents.

What God is saying is as parents, what we do not only

effects those around us now, it is part of the legacy that we

leave to our children and to our grandchildren and to our great

grandchildren. As fathers on Father's Day in

particular, me, talk to the dads.

This is for moms too. And, and, and for anybody, talk

to the fathers. We're going to leave a legacy to

our children, a right or wrong. They will inherit some sinful

patterns and sinful ways of thinking and mindsets and

behaviors from us. And you can go back and look at

your own family history and your own see different kinds of

dysfunction and brokenness that have repeated themselves across

generations in your family. We have a responsibility and our

right relationship with God and others includes our descendants

who have not yet even been born and won't be born until well

after we've died. The life that we live and the

legacy that we leave behind will affect children who aren't a

twinkle in their grandparents eyes yet.

And that's part of our responsibility to to establish

this righteousness in our lives so that we can pass that on.

And God says that. God says that, says punishing

children for the sins of the parents to the third and 4th

generation of those who hate me, but showing love to 1000

generations of those who love me and keep my commandments,

showing love to 1000 generations.

When you live righteously and right relationship with me and

the people around you, that's the legacy.

That's the legacy that endures. That thousand generations could

be a literal 1000 generations. It could be a a figurative 1000

generations in the sense of it'll just go on and on and on

for a long time. But there's sometimes when that

thousands, that #1000 is used as an equivalent to forever, for

all eternity, that the goodness and righteousness that we do as

fathers, as mothers, as as as parents, grandparents, that

that's a legacy that lasts and endures forever and ever.

That's God's way, that way of life.

And it begins, it begins with honoring God.

That's why the first of the 10 commandments, the first 4-5 of

them I should know that are all about how we honor God before we

get to the commandments about honoring other people and loving

and serving and caring for other people.

The first are all about our relationship with God because

that's the priority. We get that relationship right.

We get that relationship right so that we're, we're trusting in

God for all the honor and glory and respect and dignity that we

need, all that we need coming from God.

Now we're free to live and love and and and humility and peace

with our neighbors, with our family, with our friends, and

even with our enemies. And that's God's way.

It's the way of life. Which way will you choose?

The other thing that's clear in the story is that Cain had a

choice. Cain had a choice.

We all have that same choice, every single one of us.

Which way will we choose? We will we choose Cain's way,

where we make our own way no matter what the cost to others?

Or will we choose God's way and which we make God a priority,

receive all that we need from Him, and live in humility and

peace and love and service with those around us.

Shame, sin and the mercy of God. We all have to do.

We all have to deal with shame. We all have to deal with sin.

Thank God we can all receive the mercy of God.

Let's choose to receive it and choose to live it with others in

Jesus name, Amen. Amen.