The Good, The Bad, & The Ugly

Well, I'm not a big Clint Eastwood fan, but when I looked at how to approach Genesis chapter 4, I couldn't help but recalling one of his movies from the 60s and the title of that movie, so I just couldn't help myself, sorry about that. But in reality, when we come to Genesis chapter 4, what we are going to be looking at is the good, the bad, and the ugly. We are in a series of messages entitled Beginnings where we're going through the first 11 chapters of Genesis just taking them one by one. And the motivation for this series, as the word laid this on my heart, was that we are living in a culture that is quickly, enlightening speed, abandoning all of the foundational truths of the Word of God. And so as believers, sometimes as church, sometimes as people, we need to come back to those beginnings to those foundational bedrock basic truths. And they're all found in the first 11 chapters of Genesis, and so that's a good place to reestablish our foundations. In chapter 1, we saw the beginning of the universe and the earth. In chapter 2, we saw the beginning of mankind and marriage. In chapter 3, we saw the beginning of sin and death. Now we come to chapter 4 and we see some more beginnings. We see the beginning of human conflict, the beginning of violence, the first murder, and we see laid out for us the beginning, the first development of human culture, human society. And what we find in this chapter is some of the good elements of that beginning human society, some of the bad elements of that human society, and just some of the ugly consequences of Adam and Eve's sin. And so we're going to look at all of that today as we draw from chapter 4, foundational truths that help us to understand what it means to live in human society and culture today. What it means for us as believers to live out our faith in the culture where we find ourselves. Those are the foundational principles we want to come back to today. I want to begin with the good elements of human society that we find, find, describe for us in Genesis chapter 4, the first of which I believe is a dedication to love. There is a dedication to love on the part of Adam and Eve here that I think is commendable for us to see and to pattern our families after. First one says, Adam made love to his wife, Eve, and she became pregnant and gave birth to King. She said, with the help of the Lord, I have brought forth a man. Possibly in her mind, even thinking that she may be already seeing the fulfillment of the promise of Genesis 315 that God through her seed would crush the head of the serpent, of Satan himself. Now obviously we know the rest of the story. We know that did not happen. But she may have been expressing not just the help of God and enabling her to bring forth a child, but possibly her faith in that promise of God. But I'm interested in the first expression in verse 1. Adam made love to his wife, Eve. That's an appropriate translation of the word. But the word literally is Adam knew his wife, Eve. The King James version retains that word and I think rightly so, although that word is not used in the way that we think of it today here in this passage. That's the reason why most modern translations have translated something like Adam lay with his wife, Adam made love to his wife. But I think we need to retain that concept in the Hebrew word no. Because what it does is it lays the proper foundation to know your wife or to know your husband in this context. That was the common Hebrew expression for sexual union. But it frames it. It places it in an atmosphere of knowing one another. And so what it does, that word speaks of sex in a way that is clearly obscured in our culture. The word to know your wife or to know your husband contradicts the idea of casual sex. It contradicts the practice so common in our culture today of just hooking up with someone just for the experience. You don't have to know the person. You don't have to have any commitment at all. You don't have to have any desire to continue a relationship. You just get pleasure out of a hook up, out of coming together with someone. That's what our culture teaches. I would challenge you to name five TV programs or recent movies you've seen that show a healthy marriage relationship and the physical union of two people in the context of a healthy marriage. I bet you, I won't bet. But I would say that you will not be able to list five that you could think of. You watch it. Any program you watch basically has people who have been divorced and destroyed their marriages and are hooking up with anybody they can find or people who are living a single lifestyle going after anybody they can find. That's the way the culture sees sexual union. So let's go back to the beginning. Let's go back to the foundation. And the Bible says Adam knew his wife, rightly understood sexual union is the culmination. Not the end all, not the not the only purpose, but it is the culmination of the union of two people who are committed to thoroughly knowing each other in every dimension of life. So sexual union is designed simply to be the culmination of the expression of knowing each other in every dimension of life, in every aspect of life. It is not just a casual hook up. It is not just meeting someone and getting whatever you can get from that person and then moving on with your life. That is an unbiblical, damaging relationship, shattering view of sexual union. And it is clear from what God and how He describes it here. What He says and how He describes this union of Adam and his wife Eve. It is clear that this is exclusively restricted to marriage. Now we know that the rest of the Bible teaches that, but even in the way this is stated, it's clear that this sexual union is designed to be only consummated within the marriage relationship. Within a relationship where two people have committed their lives to each other and have a commitment to grow in knowing each other fully. Notice how God expresses it. He says, Adam made love to his wife Eve, clearly in the context of a marriage relationship. Now I know what some of you are thinking. He didn't have any other choices, did he? They are not anything about it else. They are just Eve. Okay? I understand that. But God could have said, Adam made love to Eve. He did not. He said, Adam made love to his wife. His wife Eve. Everything the purpose of that one flesh relationship in the context of husband and wife. But there's something else here that encourages me. And that is, I'm encouraged to see that although Adam and Eve's relationship had undergone terrible strain, they are still together and they are still committed to loving each other. I don't know that we can possibly imagine the strain that their relationship was under as a result of their actions in chapter 3. Already we know that Adam was blaming his wife for the whole thing. So you see some strain there. And no doubt that strain was very deep once they recognized the consequences of their actions. They lost pretty much everything. They lost the garden. They lost their innocence. They lost their holiness before God. They lost that relationship with him which he would restore through the sacrifice of an animal. But they lost pretty much everything and they realize it now and that could have deeply scarred their relationship. But they are still committed to each other and they are still committed to love. There is a dedication to love which I think is admirable here. Now please don't misunderstand me. I recognize there are some marriage relationships that are absolutely shattered by the sinful actions of one or both of the spouses and are irremediable. I understand that. I know that happens. So I don't want to put any of you who have been the victim of that under a guilt trip today. But what I do see here is that no matter what the strain is on their marriage, they are committed to working together and loving each other. Dr. Richard Celser was a well-known surgeon a few years ago. He became a professor at Yale University in surgery. In 1976 he wrote a book entitled Mortal Lessons. It was just various stories about surgery he had performed and he tells this story. He says, I stand by the bed where a young woman lies, her face, post-operative, her mouth twisted in paulsy, clownish. The tiny twig of the facial nerve, the one of the muscles, the one to the muscles of her mouth has been severed. The surgeon had followed with religious fervor the curve of her flesh. I promise you that nevertheless to remove the tumor in her cheek I had to cut the little nerve. Her young husband is in the room. He stands on the opposite side of the bed and together they seem to dwell in the evening lamp light isolated from me, private. Who are they I ask myself? He and this rye mouth I have made, who gaze at and touch each other so generously, so greedily. The young woman speaks. Will my mouth always be like this? She asks. Yes, I say it will. It is because I had to cut the nerve. She nods and then is silent. But the young man smiles. I like it, he says. It is kind of cute. All at once I know who he is. I understand and I lower my gaze and this is the way Dr. Selzer describes it. One is not bold in an encounter with a god. Unmindful he bends to kiss her crooked mouth and I am so close I can see how he twists his own lips to accommodate hers to show her that their kiss still works. I think of something like that when I think of Adam and Eve here and what they have been through. Their lives have been shattered and yet they come back together and are committed to loving each other as a family. As husband and wife, continuing to live on beyond the trouble and the disgrace and the hardship and the heartache that they themselves have brought on themselves, they are continuing to love each other. There is a dedication to love in the family, particularly in the marriage that is foundational here that is so instructed to us today no matter what we are going through in our lives. There is not only a dedication to love in human society here in this first human society. There is also a dedication to labor. Several times in this chapter work is brought up and the good labor of people is mentioned. First of all in verse 2, later she gave birth to his brother Abel. Now Abel kept flocks and Cain worked the soil. So Abel was a rancher, Cain was a farmer. When you go down to verse 17, Cain also is a builder. He is building a city, names it after his son, Enoch. What all it took to build a city, Cain was involved in, productive with his hands, involved in labor, planning and carrying out the work of his own hands and his mind. And then the tracing of human labor in society comes through the line of Cain. Five generations down from Cain, Lamek is born. Like in verse 19, married two women, one named Adah, the other named Zella, we'll come back to that later. But notice verse 20, Adah gave birth to Jebal. He was the father of those who live in tents and raise livestock. Now to say he was the father of those who, who, who, well intense and raised livestock, means that he invented the tent. He was the one who invented this kind of agrarian culture, this developing of a system of, of domesticating and commercially producing animals. It's not just the adicouple of cows out back. He is making this his vocation. He is, he is beginning this kind of endeavor in human society, this kind of labor. But then notice verse 21, his brother's name was Jebel. He was the father of all who played string instruments and pipes. Jebel evidently didn't care much about livestock. He had an ear for music. And so Jebel is the one who invents both stringed instruments and wind instruments and adds that element to human society and culture. And then notice verse 22, Zella also had a son, Tuvolcan, who forged all kinds of tools out of bronze and iron. So Tuvolcan is the inventor of metallurgy. He's, he's working with his hands in regard to metals and making objects of bronze and iron. I think it's interesting to see that we're already seeing develop here a, a highly developed, well skilled civilization. And what I find even more interesting is that it develops from the line of cane, which I think is instructive and good for us to remember the godly do not have all the skills. We are indebted in many ways to the abilities of people who do not even know god. There are people who do not know god or honor him with their lives who contribute much to human society and culture with their labor. We have to be careful not to overvalue that. Lomics, family could control their environment, but they could not control their own lives. We'll be obvious from what we see later. But it's important to understand the concept, the importance of the place of labor in any society. It is important to work with our hands. It is important to do whatever god gives us to do by way of labor. Dedication to labor to our work that god gives us is beneficial both for us individually for our families and for society. God expects us to work. I read one time about a couple of three guys who were fishing on a bridge. A guy wondered up, it was clear that maybe he was homeless, he certainly did not have much. He kind of wonders up on the bridge. He says, wow, you are catching a lot of fish here. I wish I could catch fish like that. I wish I had that many fish. If I had that many fish, I would go sell them and buy myself some food and some clothes. The other guy who was fishing said, you take my pole for a little bit. If you would please, I've got to go into town here just across the bridge and do a couple things. I'll be back in just a little bit. So the guy grabs his pole and the fish are still biting and he's reeling them in one by one. He's getting excited. He's happy about what he's doing. The fisherman comes back. He says, hey, I see you caught a bunch of fish. Yeah, man, this is great. He said, I'll give you all the fish that you caught with my bait, my pole. But I hope you've learned a lesson. Don't stand around wishing for what you want. The next time bring your own pole and cast your own line into the river. What he was saying was there's an important lesson to be learned about the value of labor, the value of hard work, the value of doing whatever God puts. In our path and our hands to do, rather than depending on others, which obviously sometimes is necessary. But God expects us if we are able to do so to work. That's at the very beginning of human society. People work. They made a living. And God expects that to be a part of our experience. There's a dedication to love within the context of marriage in the family. But there's also a dedication to labor. But then third day I want you to notice another good element of human society is a dedication to the Lord. You find it in a couple of ways in this passage. First of all, verses three and four. In the course of time, Cain brought some of the fruits of the soil as an offering to the Lord. And Abel also brought an offering, fat portions from some of the firstborn of his flock. And we're going to see it in a little bit why God rejected Cain's offering and accepted Abel's. But my point here is that both of them were bringing an offering to the Lord. By the way, same word is used for both. It's a word that's used in the book of Leviticus for offerings that are legitimate to bring to the Lord. Come back to that later too. But both of them are bringing in gratitude to the Lord something to offer to Him. God expects us when we labor to bring the first fruits of that which He has given us to dedicate to Him. That's instituted from the very first family. And He still expects that today many other scriptures teach the same thing. But then skip down a few other verses 26, the very end of the chapter. Seth, who is Adam and Eve's third son, Seth also had a son and he named him Inosh. That time people began to call on the name of the Lord. What does it mean to call on the name of the Lord? Well, there are some who say it just simply means they started using various elements of God's names in their names. And that's true in the Old Testament. Names like Elijah, Elisha start with the letters E-L, which is one of the names for God in the Old Testament. That's true. But most of the time when this expression to call on the name of the Lord is found in the Old Testament, it has to do with worship. It typically has to do with public worship. I think what we may be seeing here is the beginning of corporate public worship. At this time, as society is growing, as more and more people are being born and growing up on planet earth, people began to gather to worship God. They began to call on the name of the Lord. So what you have here is quite possibly, I believe, the beginning of corporate body worship coming together to worship the Lord like we're doing this morning. So you see what you have in the very beginning of human culture, in the very beginning of human society, you have the three elements that make up what God wants human culture to be about. A dedication to love within the context of the family, a dedication to labor, doing the job's God has given us to do, and a dedication to the Lord. We've been assigned some time to give him of the first fruits of our labor and to gather together to worship him. All three of those elements are foundational to a functioning society, to human beings living well on this earth. All three of those are important. Love in the family, labor in the workplace, the Lord at the center of our lives, the first fruits of our offerings to him and our worship given to him. And if you're going to live life as God intends you to live, he expects us to incorporate all three of those parts of our lives together and keep a healthy balance in those three areas of our lives. Gordon Dahl was an economist and a professor at University of California, San Diego. Back in 1972, he wrote a book, interesting title. This book wrote a lot of books, but this one, he wrote one of his first ones, was, work, play, and worship in a leisure oriented society. Work, play, and worship in a leisure oriented society. And there's one quote out of that book that has been used by many people that he's most well known for. You may have heard it. He says, most middle-class Americans tend to worship their work, to work at their play and to play at their worship. Now, that's the kind of expression that I find I need to turn over in my mind two or three times before I really get it. There's a lot of wisdom in those words. Middle-class Americans tend to worship their work, to work at their play and to play at their worship. As a result, he says, their meaning and values are distorted. Their relationships disintegrate faster than they can keep them in repair and their lifestyles resemble a cast of characters in search of a plot. There was no real direction to the story of your life. And what he's saying basically is what God paints for us in this picture in Genesis 4, and that is that functioning in this world is intended to be a balance, a healthy balance of love within the family, labor in our jobs, and the Lord in our worship. That is the healthy balance of life. Those are the good elements of human society found in Genesis 4. But we have to admit, and this is what the chapter is most well known for. There are some bad elements of human society also found here, and they all focus on one character, his name, King. What you see in this chapter is at least three things about King that indicate bad elements of society that come from bad hearts. And that's the problem, not the actions, the heart. Okay? Now let's take a look at it. First of all, let's look at King's heart toward God versus three through seven. Again, verse three, in the course of time, King brought some of the fruits of the soil as an offering to the Lord, and Abel also brought an offering fat portions from some of the first born of his flock. The Lord looked with favor on Abel and his offering, but on Cain and his offering, he did not look with favor, so Cain was very angry, and his face was downcast. Then 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. Cain desires to have you, but you must rule over it. Now why did God not accept Cain's offering, but accept Abel's offering? It's been very popular to theorize, this was made popular by the Scofield Bible, by the way, that the reason for the acceptance of Abel's offering is that he brought a blood sacrifice, and Cain was producing the work of his own hand. So you got works religion as opposed to blood sacrifice. Well that's true when you get to the New Testament. By the time you get to the New Testament, we know that the only proper approach to God is through the blood sacrifice of Christ, and so the only way we can be saved is through what Jesus did when He shed His blood for us on the cross, and we do not bring Him anything to offer Him to get saved, but that's not really the issue back in Genesis 4. Like frankly, an honest dealing with the text does not lead to that. And there are several reasons for that. There is no command recorded by the Lord that there was only one appropriate way to approach Him with offerings, and that is through a blood sacrifice. Some people say, wait a second, and we talked about this last week, God killed an animal for Adam and Eve and made skins to close them to bring them back into relationship with Him, but there is no indication that he explained to them what the New Testament significance of that would be. And so really to say, God commanded that you bring a lamb and that you use the blood and so forth, there is really no such command in Scripture. We can assume that, maybe we can read the New Testament back into it, but there is no command like that here. Secondly, the word for offering here is the same word that used in the book of Leviticus for all of the offerings, some of which were grain offerings, were offerings from the fruit of the ground. In the book of Leviticus, it was legitimate to bring grain offerings, the first fruits of your crops as one of the offerings to the Lord. And that is exactly what Cain is doing. I don't think that is the issue. By the way, if you really understand the Old Testament, particularly when you get to the prophets, it's not the offering that makes you right with God anyway, regardless of what the offering is. Even if it's a blood sacrifice, that's not what makes you right with God. The prophets railed on this because by the time the prophets come along, Israel is doing all the right stuff. They're killing all kinds of oxen and lambs and goats and stuff and offering them through under blood all over the place. And the prophets say, you don't know God. What's wrong? It's your heart that's wrong with God, not right with God. So whether it's a grain offering or a blood sacrifice, it is not the actual offering itself that pleases God and makes you right with God and get you into heaven, it is the heart response of faith to God. And what seals that for me is Hebrews chapter 11, verse 4. Look at this verse on the screen. By faith, Abel brought God a better offering than Cain did. What's the issue here? The way he brought it, it was by faith. It doesn't mention the actual nature of the offering. It was by faith. That's the reason why it was a better offering in God's sight. By faith, he was commended as righteous when God spoke well of his offerings. And by faith, Abel still speaks even though he is dead. The issue was God looking down into the heart and seeing that Abel was coming through faith and Cain was not. Cain's heart was hard against God and it is clear in Genesis 4 that the real problem was Cain's heart attitude toward God. The problem with Cain in verse 5, when God does not look with favor on his offering, notice the end of verse 5. So Cain was very angry and his face was downcast. Did God say, okay, you're out of here because of your heart attitude toward me. You're not coming in any spirit of faith or recognition of my goodness to you. Because your heart is hard. Did God just say, get out of here? No, God responds to him with grace, verse 6. Then the Lord said to Cain, why are you angry? Why is your face downcast? You know this by now. We talked about it last week. God never asks a question to get information. God doesn't need the information. He knows all things. He always asks a question to get the person he's questioning to think deeply about what's in their heart. So why is he asking Cain? Why are you angry? Why is your face? He's wanting Cain to look deeply into his heart and understand what is the heart issue that is causing me to be angry and my face downcast against God. Verse 7. If you do what's right, will you not be accepted if you do not do what is right? Sin is crouching at the door. In other words, Cain, if you don't clear up the issue in your heart, Abel's coming by faith, you're coming with anger. If you don't clear up the approach to me through faith, if you don't get that right, then you are in danger of being overtaken by sin. He says, Sin is crouching at your door. It desires to have you, but you must rule over it. The problem with Cain was a heart that was far from God. Evident his heart was not filled with faith toward God, but his heart was against God. His heart was far from God. And even when God reaches out to him in grace, he rejects it. And that's clear by what happens next. In verse 8, Cain's violence toward his brother, verse 6, then the Lord said to Cain, or verse 8, excuse me, now Cain said to his brother Abel, let's go out to the field while they were in the field, Cain attacked his brother Abel and killed him. I think it's hard for us to really grasp this because we are so accustomed to violence in our culture. But what you find here is that rather than responding to God, God has graciously reached out to Cain, but rather than responding to him in faith and humility and worship, he reacts violently with rage, jealousy, rebellion against God, unbelief, he reacts and carries out his anger by attacking his brother and killing him. Again, we see it all the time on the newspapers. We are so desensitized of violence because of the entertainment that we watch. It's hard for us to grasp what's happening here. This has never happened before and this is his own brother. Can you imagine how hard this hit Adam and Eve? Can you imagine what this did to them as parents? God had told them, you disobey me, you will surely die, they expected to die. They did not expect for one of their children to die first and no parent does. Adam and Eve knew the heartache of a parent who has a child to die. But they also knew the heartache that many parents know today and that is of raising two boys in their family. No doubt raising them in the same way, but seeing them choose very different paths in life. Seeing one develop a sensitive heart toward God and desire to approach him in faith and seeing one who grew up angry and bitter and hard-hearted and turned his life toward violence. Can you imagine the heartache of Adam and Eve some of you can? Some of us know that heartache of children who have gone away from the Lord and what it does to your heart, it started in the beginning. It started with Adam and Eve. That element of society canes heart toward God, canes violence toward his brother, but then notice if you will canes reaction toward God's judgment. This is what really shows the nature of his heart. What we are going to find next does not develop in an instant. This has been developing over a period of time in Canes heart. His response toward God's judgment, notice beginning in verse 9, then the Lord said to Cane, where is your brother able? He is in God knows where he is, God knows what is happening, doesn't need the information. He is probing Canes heart to get at the truth and to bring guilt, conviction, repentance, restoration, faith. He is going after Canes heart and notice Canes response, I don't know, he replied. That is a bald-faced lie. So he responds by lying and then he responds with a sarcastic question. Am I my brother's keeper? Who do you think I am God? Do you think I'm supposed to tell my brother around all the time, keep track of him? Am I my brother's keeper? That arrogance, sarcasm, to even think of approaching God in that way shows the nature of a hardened heart. So God continues to dig for the truth and announces His punishment verses 10 through 12. The Lord said, what have you done? What have you done? Again seeking to penetrate the hardness of that heart to get Cane to realize what he's done, what it means, a recognition of sin. He says, listen, your brother's blood cries out to me from the ground. Now you are under a curse and driven from the ground which opened its mouth to receive your brother's blood from your hand. When you work the ground it will no longer yield its crops for you. You will be a restless wanderer on the earth. There's the judgment, there's the sentence passed down. And how does Cane respond? Does he respond by saying, oh Lord, I realize what I've done. I'm wrong, I'm a sinner, I'm a murderer. Please forgive me, accept me. No, notice how he responds. Cane said to the Lord, my punishment is more than I can bear. Today you are driving me from the land and I will be hidden from your presence. I will be a restless wanderer on the earth and whoever finds me will kill me. Is there any remorse at all for what he's done? No, none. Zip zero, nothing. There's nothing in his heart that expresses any remorse. You know what his concern is? How's this going to affect me? And that spirit of rebellion against God is still very much in favor today. Not only by those who commit crimes and then rail against the system for being so hard on them, regardless of what they've done to their victims, but it also occurs in our lives. And we sin and rebel against God and God lovingly seeks to chase us, to bring us back to him. How often do we come in repentance to the Lord or how often do we rail against our circumstances and get angry at life and others and God? We're no better than Cane in our reaction against God sometimes. You know when I get to this point in the story, I'm about ready to say, okay, God, just deal with Cane. Just get him out of here. Take him out. God doesn't react that way. Again, grace, verse 15. But the Lord said to him, not so. Anyone who kills Cane will suffer vengeance seven times over than the Lord put a mark on Cane so that no one who found him would kill him. Now, a lot of people spend more time trying to figure out what the mark is, than really what's going on here. I read one God said it was a horn coming out of his forehead. I don't think so. I mean, why write about that? What's really happening here is that God is offering grace. God is saying, I will offer you a measure of protection. Even though I've passed judgment, you're going to be out of my sight. You're going to leave mankind, if you will, society. I will protect you. Does Cane then bow before the Lord and say, thank you, God, I don't deserve that. Thank you for your grace, no, for 16. So Cane went out from the Lord's presence. And the idea is not just that he made his exit, you know, kind of sheepishly. The idea is that he bolted out the door and put God behind him. He got out of there. Get away from God's presence. That's the idea. And lived in the land of not. And then the fact that he builds a city in verse 17 is his attempt to mitigate the consequences of God's punishment. You send me out from your presence. Then I'll surround myself with everybody else. Who needs God anyway? I'll build my own city. It's that rebellious spirit against God. Cane again, showing his hardened heart. My friend has God ever spoken to you about something in your life. Has God ever addressed you about a need in your heart and life? Convicted you about a sin in your life? Convicted you about something you've done, said, thought that was wrong. Are you responding to him with sensitivity, with humility, bowing in his presence and admitting you're wrong, repenting of that sin and turning back to him in faith, or are you hardening your heart against God like Cane did? Cane's reaction shows where his heart was. Jesus would say it this way, out of the abundance of the heart, the mouth speaks. What comes out of your mouth and a lot has come out of Cane's to show us where his heart was. What comes out of your mouth shows where your heart is. The problem with Cane was his heart. Calist, rebellious heart against God. Those are the bad elements of human society. And the bad elements of human society today are not necessarily people's actions. They are where people's hearts are. And until you deal with the heart issue, the actions will never change. I don't know that I expect our unsaved politicians to see that. But the problem is not people's actions. The problem is people's hearts. And the only remedy for people's sinful hearts is the gospel of the grace of God, that Jesus sent his son to die for us. And when we humbly bow the knee and recognize that we were a sinner and that Jesus died for us and we need him as our savior, our hearts are transformed. And that gives the only potential for transforming human culture and society. His changed hearts. Cane needed a changed heart. But quickly there's one other element here that we need to see. The ugly consequences of sin. And they're seen in the Lamaq in verses 19 through 24. Let me just summarize this. Lamaq is the fifth generation down from Cane. And he shows the ugly consequences of sin. He really demonstrates for us how far sin has brought mankind in five generations. Five generations from Adam and Eve's son. This is how far sin has brought humankind. And it's seen in Lamaq, first of all in the polygamy of Lamaq in verse 19, he married two wives. Why he would do that? I don't know. I think maybe I should just stop there with that. But I don't know why he married two wives. He did. One thing we know is this. Some of you are looking at me really funny. All I was going to say was the Bible says no man can serve two masters. Right? So I don't know why I would want to have two wives. What's clear is this. He deliberately violates God's design for marriage and that was monogamy. One man, one woman, together in marriage. That's the way God established marriage. In Genesis 2 and Lamaq says, who cares about what God thinks? I'm going to do what I want to do. So I'll have two wives. God never approved of polygamy in the Old Testament. I know there were some godly men in the Old Testament who adopted the culture around them and practiced that, but God never approved of it. And it always brought trouble. God's design, one man, one woman, together. And God wants us to be committed to our mates regardless of imperfections. He wants us to be committed to our mates. One man, one woman, together for life is his design. I understand sometimes sin crashes that design and makes it impossible to continue in a marriage. I understand that, but God's design. As Jesus said in Matthew 19, it was not so from the beginning. From the beginning God wanted one man, one woman, together in a monogamous relationship. Do you hear about the couple that went on their honeymoon and the groom turned to his bride and said, took her hand and said, now honey, now that we're married, would you mind if I just explained to you some of the defects that I have seen in you? And she smiled and very sweetly said, no honey, that would be fine. It's those very defects that kept me from getting a better husband. Regardless of what the defects are and we all have them, one man, one woman, together for life. That's God's design. And Lomack violated that, flagrantly. But there's not only his polygamy, there's the sinful arrogance of Lomack in verses 23 and 24. He composes a little song that he sings to his wife. Wives. Try that sometime, guys. You want to tell your wife something? Just compose a little poem and sing it to her. You say, well, how do you know this is a song? Do you see verses 23 and 24? They're kind of set off. Probably most of your translations. They're set off in a different kind of setting here. And the reason is it's written in poetry. It's Hebrew poetry. And so he sings this little ditty to his wives. Ada and Zilla listened to me. Wives of Lomack hear my words. I have killed a man for wounding me, a young man for injuring me. The cane is of any seven times, then Lomack 77 times. Now that may sound like a clever little song, but it expresses the sinful arrogance and rebellion of his heart. What he's saying basically, I'm serving notice on anybody who tries to hurt me. I'll kill you. Anybody even tries to hurt me. I'll kill you. I've done it and I'll do it again. I'm serving notice. And by the way, God, you thought you protected cane by offering him sevenfold protection. I'm letting everybody know I can do better than you. Anybody tries to hurt me 77 times. Vengeance on them. In other words, God, you didn't do it good enough. I can take care of myself better. I do not need you. Anyone who hurts me, I'll kill them at the drop of a hat. And anyone who tries to hurt me, I'll do better than God. 77 times the vengeance. I don't need God's protection. I take care of myself. It's that sinful arrogance, that spirit of arrogant presumption and self-sufficiency that come straight from the pit of hell and does not come from God's heart. I don't care what movie character you value, this kind of spirit in. It is not from God. Now I understand the concept of wise protection. But the sinful arrogance that says, I don't need God to take care of me. In fact, I'm stronger than God. I can do better than God. I can take care of myself. Get out of the way because if God promises this, I promise more. That kind of arrogance and self-sufficiency leads to violence and looking for a fight. That kind of spirit that Lamaic had. This is the kind of society we live in. They're good elements of society. And what God wants us to do is we live in this world and live in the culture where we find ourselves is to dedicate ourselves to a healthy balance of loving our families, laboring with our lives and work that blesses and helps others and glorifies God, and then giving him the first fruits of that and worshipping him as the center of our lives. That healthy balance is the way to live. But we definitely live in a culture and we are susceptible to the way of Cain and the way of Lamaic. The way of Cain that says, I will resist God's gracious entreaties to me. My heart is hardened toward him and his love and grace. And when God speaks, I shut out his voice and decide, I'll go my own way. It's the way of Cain. Or the way of Lamaic is also enticing an arrogant self-sufficiency, the self-made person who does not need God or his protection. I can protect myself better than God can. That kind of arrogant self-sufficiency. You can go that way too, if you want. God's path for us begins at the cross with a humble recognition that Jesus died for our sins so that we could be right with him. We could be a part of his family. And then as we live this life to live it with that healthy balance of love for family and the labor that pleases our Lord and worship that honors and glorifies him, we have choices to make every day. Will we live that way or will we live like Cain or will we live like Lamaic? Let's pray together. We are really, and what we've seen this morning, human culture society has not changed. Hasn't really, at its root, changed at all. Technology may have changed and other things, but Lord, we haven't changed. And so Lord, I pray that you help us to learn from the beginnings, the beginning of human civilization, how you want us to live. Most of all, in relationship with you, then loving our families, laboring with our lives and hands, and loving you with all of our hearts, worshipping you. Lord, help us to be careful about the temptation to harden our hearts against you when things don't go our way as Cain did. Lord, to have an arrogant self-sufficiency about life like Lamaic did that really says, I don't need God and take care of myself. Lord, help us to be sensitive to the subtle ways in which we live out that kind of lifestyle and do not look to you and depend upon you. More hearts to you in Jesus' name, amen.