A Murder after Church-Part B

If you don't learn to deal with your temper, it'll turn you into a monster. Now what can we do? What can we learn? What takeaway can we have from this so that we don't crash and burn like king? Let me give you a few quick takeaway things.

Number one, the basic problem we have, our basic problem is a worship problem. The Apostle Paul said in Ephesians, be angry and do not sin. Do not let the sun go down on your anger and give no opportunity to the devil. Today on Connect with Skip Heitzig, Skip shares about Cain's sinful anger and reveals how you can live free from that kind of anger in your own life. But before we begin, did you know you can get more inspiring teachings from Skip on his TV show? Here's how. Tune in for my program, Connect with Skip Heitzig on the Hillsong Channel on Saturdays at 4 30 p.m. Mountain Time, or watch it on TBN on Sundays at 5 30 a.m. Eastern.

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800-922-1888 or give online securely at connectwithskip.com slash offer. Now we're in Genesis chapter four as Skip Heitzig gets into today's message. Cain was very angry and his countenance fell. Now it tells us that in the process of time this happened. If your Bible has a marginal note like mine does, it will give you the literal translation of that, which is at the end of days, at the end of days. In other words, it's a precise period of time at the end of something, perhaps the end of the agricultural year when a sacrifice by God was in view. And this isn't necessarily the first time it happened. This could be something they regularly did and it would seem as though God had some means of showing His approval or disapproval, of receiving or not receiving, accepting or not accepting the sacrifice.

For example, when Elijah is on Mount Carmel in 1 Kings chapter 18, a fire comes down from heaven and consumes the sacrifice. It could be something like that. Now here's the question.

Everybody asks it. Why does God say yes to one offering, accepting Abel's sacrifice, and no to the other offering, not accepting Cain's sacrifice? Now the easy answer, and it's not really the accurate answer I don't think, is that, well, one was an animal, the other was a plant. God accepted the animal and wanted the blood sacrifice.

He didn't want the plant. I think that's a little too simplistic. In fact, it's not really a biblical answer. So the biblical answer is this. There's two reasons God did not accept Cain's worship. And first of all, it's the quality of the offering.

The quality of the offering. Notice in verse 4, there's a special note that Abel brought of the firstborn of his flock and of their fat. So there's a little note there that says, here's a guy who with intentionality wanted to bring the very best to God, the highest quality. All the rabbinical commentators say this shows that he is picking the very best, the first and thus the very best to the Lord. He is very careful about it.

Cain was indifferent. There's no mention at all about the quality of his sacrifice, probably because he didn't care about it. So it's the quality. The second reason is the character of the offeror. One is the quality of the offering.

Second is the character of the offeror. Now notice down in verse seven, I'm skipping ahead just a bit. God says to Cain, if you do well, or if you live right, will you not be accepted? In other words, you know, if you lived right, your offering would be acceptable to me. Why would God say that?

Here's the principle. God does not see worship apart from the worshiper. To God, it's not like, ooh, that's such a wonderful sacrifice.

He's looking over the person who gives the sacrifice. So if you're corrupt, so is your gift. Now why was Cain corrupt?

Here's the answer. He lacked faith. He lacked faith. The life transforming faith, saving faith that would motivate him to righteous living. I want you to listen to Hebrews chapter 11 verse 4.

It's a commentary on this section. By faith, Abel offered to God a more acceptable sacrifice than Cain. Notice it's by faith. Through which he, Abel, was commended as being righteous, God commending him by accepting his gifts, and through his faith, though he died, he still speaks. That was Abel. So with Cain, there was no real faith to produce righteous living. In other words, he was just going through the motions. What this means is, if you think you can live any way you want to live Monday through Saturday, you can live as though God didn't exist. You can live just like the rest of the world, dominated by all of the stuff that goes on in the world, and think that I can take one hour on Sunday and plop my sacrifice down, and God will say, that's awesome.

It's not true. God never looks at the worship apart from the worshiper. They're one and the same. Stephen Charnock, a Puritan author said, without the heart, it is not worship.

It is a stage play. It is acting apart without being that person, really. It is a hypocrite. We may truly be said to worship God, though we lack perfection, but we cannot be said to worship him if we lack sincerity. Worship is not about going through the motions, raising the hand, reading a text, singing loudly, going to church. It's not about the motions.

It's about the locomotion. It's about being moved forward in obedience to him. So he's a worker. He's a worshiper. There's a third title for him.

There's a third title for him. He's a waverer. Notice at the end of verse 5, Cain was very angry and his countenance fell. That is, he frowned. He had the pouty face.

He wore his heart on his sleeve. You knew he was bummed out because he just kind of pouted, got really bummed out. And so the Lord, verse 6, said to Cain, why art thou bummed out? Why are you angry and why is your countenance fallen?

If you do well, will you not be accepted? And if you do not do well, and he's given the reason why, it's because sin lies at the door and its desire is for you, but you should rule over it. Now, the real giveaway that Cain wasn't right with God was his response to God. He's mad. He's angry. He's angry at God. That's his response to God. He was mad when he should have been meek. He was angry when he should have been lowly. You know what the right response would have been? If God didn't accept it, he should have just said, oh Lord, I'm stopping in my tracks right now. I repent.

I want to do it right. I humble myself before you. It would have been good. But he got mad. He was mad at God. I meet people, as do you, who are mad at God. And the reason I know they're mad at God is because they discover, oh, you're a pastor. And they want to vent their anger at God at God's representative.

So I get it all the time. People are mad at God. And people are mad at God because God doesn't see things their way. They're mad that God doesn't accept people based on just sincerity or based on good behavior. They're mad about that. They're mad that God doesn't accept all religions as being equal, all religions being the same. They're mad that God would be so narrow and so restrictive as to say, it's only through my son Jesus that anyone can get to heaven.

They're mad at that. And he was mad at God. But Cain was also mad at his brother who brought an acceptable sacrifice to the Lord.

So his true colors are starting to show. And the seed of murder is growing in his heart. Do you know what the seed of murder is, right?

It's anger. Anger is what produces murder. Jesus said, you have heard that it was said by those of old, you shall not murder. But I say unto you, if you're angry at your brother without a cause, you're in line for the judgment.

That's where it begins. Cain was a murderer in his heart long before he was a murderer with his hands. And God knows this. God knows that Cain is struggling inside.

He's wavering back and forth. He is torn between doing right or letting the anger that he has toward God and toward his brother be fully vented by a murderous act. So God, knowing this, engages him. God doesn't walk away from him. God doesn't say, I'm done with you if you're angry with me. God talks to him.

He reasons with him. I love this about God. Isaiah chapter one, come now, let us reason together, says the Lord. Though your sins are as scarlet, I'll make them white as snow. And did you notice what God said in verse seven? Did you notice that God personifies sin like a beast crouching at his door, ready to pounce on him? If you do not do well, sin lies at the door and its desire is for you, but you should master or rule over it. Boy, if you know your Bible, a verse comes to mind about now. 1 Peter chapter five, where Peter says, the devil is like a roaring lion prowling around seeking whom he may devour. That's what sin is like.

Satan is like that and sin is like that. There was a book put out a few years back called Death in the Long Grass. A movie was made based on this book. Death in the Long Grass was written by a hunter, a big game hunter. And he was writing about lions who hunted men, who hunted human beings. That is, these lions get the taste of human blood and they sneak into a camp late at night in the bush. They'll pounce on their prey and drag that person out far away into the night and devour him. And there was one lion before it was caught and killed that devoured 100 men.

And he called these lions charging lions because they'll go around the periphery and they'll prowl and then late into the night they'll charge into the camp at a high speed, covering a hundred yards in three seconds. Satan is like that and sin is like that. And what Satan uses to destroy us, you know what he uses? He uses us. He uses our fallen nature, the fallen nature, the flesh that is in us to devour us, to master us. And what the Lord is saying to Cain is, if you don't become a virgin, if you don't become a victim of your sin, you're going to become a victim of your sin.

You need to master it. If you don't master the beast, the beast will still the best of your life. It's like what Martin Luther used to say. He said, you can't stop birds from flying over your head, but you can certainly stop them from building a nest in your hair. And if you don't have any hair, you can still stop them from building a nest.

And if you don't have any hair, you can still stop them from building a nest. So there's that wavering that goes on, that struggle between the flesh and the Spirit. He went from worker to worshiper to waver. Fourth title for Cain is he was a wrongdoer.

That takes us to the deed itself. Verse 8, now Cain talked with Abel his brother and it came to pass. When they were in the field, that Cain rose up against Abel, his brother, and killed him. And the Lord said to Cain, where is Abel your brother? He said, I don't know. Am I my brother's keeper?

Hear how sarcastic that is. And he said, what have you done? The voice of your brother's blood cries out to me from the ground. So the beast won. Sin has mastered Cain.

Cain crashed and burned. This is not involuntary manslaughter. This is murder one. He killed him. We don't know how he killed him. Maybe he killed him. He killed him. We don't know how he killed him. Maybe he got a stone. Maybe he took Abel's own sacrificial knife and killed him. Maybe he cut and bled him like an animal, like he and offering his animal to God did. Maybe he used his own bare hands. We don't know.

But I know this. It felt good. For a brief moment, he felt vindicated. He felt justified. He felt good. Revenge always feels good at first.

It's like, yeah, they deserve that. But it didn't last. Because now we move to the fifth designation of this man, a wanderer. God meets up with him. In verse 11, God tells him, so now you are cursed from the earth, which has opened its mouth to receive your brother's blood from your hand.

When you till the ground, it shall no longer yield its strength to you. A fugitive and a vagabond, you shall be on the earth. And Cain said to the Lord, my punishment is greater than I can bear. I don't know.

I don't feel sorry for him right now, do you? Surely you have driven me out this day from the face of the ground. I shall be hidden from your face. I shall be a fugitive and a vagabond on the earth.

And it will happen that anyone who finds me will kill me. And the Lord said to him, therefore, whoever kills Cain, vengeance shall be taken on him sevenfold. And the Lord set a mark on Cain, lest anyone finding him should kill him. Then Cain went out from the presence of the Lord and dwelt in the land of Nod on the east of Eden.

So he confronts Cain. God confronts him and consigns him to this. Now he said, am I my brother's keeper? And God causes him now to wander from his family and from his homeland. Since you're not going to be your brother's keeper, no one's going to be your keeper.

He becomes a fugitive. Notice in verse 11, it says, so you are now cursed from the earth. You know, this is the very first time where a human is cursed in the scripture by God. Up to this point, the only one cursed is whom? The serpent. The serpent was cursed in Genesis three, but now Cain joins this wretched distinction of a man cursed by God.

And he's wandering, and this isn't just like a Bedouin wandering for grass for his sheep. Now all relationships are broken with his family. He's in lifelong exile. And he says to God in verse 13, my punishment is greater than I can bear.

Oh, really? Because what did he deserve? He deserved to die. Genesis nine will tell us, whoever sheds man's blood, by man his blood shall be shed. So God now preserves him and protects him from death. This is an act of grace.

I want you to think about this. This is grace upon grace upon grace. First of all, when Cain got angry, God didn't abandon him, but engaged him in conversation to dialogue and talk this through. That was grace. Second, when Cain struggled within himself of what to do, good or evil, God encouraged him to withstand pain. That's grace. And having succumbed to it and murdering his brother, God doesn't kill him. God protects him with a mark.

That's grace. Now people will ask me, what is the mark of Cain? My answer, so we can get it out there, I don't know. You know why I don't know? We're not told.

That's why. You can guess. Some people think it was a tattoo. Others people mention it some way.

Why? You can guess. Some people think it was a tattoo. Others people mention it some weird hairdo or something. The rabbinical commentators used to say it was a dog, that God gave him a dog, to assure him of protection and to keep strangers away.

We're not told. I think it's ridiculous. So let me take you back to something else ridiculous. How many of you remember, and I want an honest show of hands because I want to see your age, how many of you remember that television show, The Incredible Hulk? Honest show of hands, okay. Very good.

Others of you have honesty issues to deal with. So The Incredible Hulk was a television show that was, used to be a comic, turned into a television show, turned into a movie years later. And the premise is there's a doctor, Dr. David Banner is the character. And David Banner was a very kind and sweet research scientist, doctor. Except when he got angry. And when he got angry because he had been exposed to gamma radiation, excessive amounts, his eyes turned green and he grew in size and he became this horrible monster who could throw people around like they were a rag doll. And so the whole premise of the show after show after show was Dr. Banner's desire to find a cure so this won't happen anymore.

So the moral of the television show was that if you don't learn to deal with your temper, it'll turn you into a monster. Now what can we do? What can we learn? What takeaway can we have from this so that we don't crash and burn like Cain?

Let me give you a few quick takeaway things. Number one, the basic problem we have, our basic problem is a worship problem. Our basic problem is a worship problem. Most people are worshippers of themselves. It's about them.

They are consumers only. What does this do for me? Our basic problem is a worship problem. Cain didn't give his best and sometimes people go, yeah, you know, there's a beat up old thing.

I don't use it anymore. Let's give it away to the church. Give God your best. Give God your best self, your best energy, your best time. The second takeaway is that don't let the root produce its fruit. Don't let the root, the root of sin, produce its fruit. The root from the fall is what he was struggling with within himself in this chapter and he let the root produce the fruit which was sinful anger turned into murder.

All of us have a wrestling match inside of us. All of us know what it's like to have the flesh warring against the spirit and what God says to him and he says to us is you must master it and we have the power of the Holy Spirit to be able to do that. Don't let the root produce its fruit. The third takeaway is sin always brings separation. It separated him from God, separated him from his family, separated him from fellowship.

Sin always brings separation and it creates lonely people, isolated people, who because there's a barrier erected of sin or unforgiveness or undealt with anger pushes people away and it's the worst way to live. So the key is always back to worship, letting the Lord take the first place in our lives. You know those crazy little letters to God that kids write from time to time? I have a book of these I've told you over the years. I found one little letter to God from a kid named Larry who said, dear God, maybe Cain and Abel wouldn't kill so much if they had their own rooms.

It works with my brother, sign Larry. Well, Larry, that's a nice way of looking at things but the problem isn't having room in your house. It's making room in your heart for the God of this universe to take over and be the king supreme in your life and in mine. That concludes Skip Heisek's message from his series Crash and Burn.

Now here's Skip with an important message for you. Did you know that Christianity is all about redemption? God redeemed us. He bought us out of slavery.

He took us from our sins and he sent Jesus to pay for those sins on the cross. Now that's good news and we want to share that with as many people as possible and you can be a part of letting others know about this abounding love of God. Here's how you can give today to reach others with the gospel. Give us a call at 800-922-1888 to give a gift today. 800-922-1888 or visit connectwithskip.com slash donate. That's connectwithskip.com slash donate.

Your generosity will keep this biblical encouragement coming your way and help change lives. Now, before we go, did you know that you can watch Skip's messages from the comfort of your home with your Roku device or Apple TV? Just search for his channel and watch thousands of powerful Bible teachings and live services. Find more information on the broadcast page at connectwithskip.com. Join us next Monday as Skip Heisig shares from the story of life, how you can achieve spiritual victory by keeping your eyes set on what really matters. Connect with Skip Heisig is a presentation of Connection Communications, connecting you to God's never-changing truth in ever-changing times.