Read with Me
Genesis 4:9-16 (HCSB)
Then the LORD said to Cain, “Where is your brother Abel?”
“I don’t know,” he replied. “Am I my brother’s guardian?”
Then He said, “What have you done? Your brother’s blood cries out to Me from the ground! So now you are cursed, alienated, from the ground that opened its mouth to receive your brother’s blood you have shed. If you work the ground, it will never again give you its yield. You will be a restless wanderer on the earth.”
But Cain answered the LORD, “My punishment is too great to bear! Since You are banishing me today from the soil, and I must hide myself from Your presence and become a restless wanderer on the earth, whoever finds me will kill me.”
Then the LORD replied to him, “In that case, whoever kills Cain will suffer vengeance seven times over.” And He placed a mark on Cain so that whoever found him would not kill him. Then Cain went out from the LORD’s presence and lived in the land of Nod, east of Eden.
Listen with Me
Just as God had done with Adam and Eve, so now he confronted Cain with his sin. At the start, God asked a question designed to give him a chance to confess: “Where is your brother Abel?”
Sadly, Cain does not take the advantage the opportunity, but instead tries to evade: “I have no idea where he is. It’s not my day to watch him.” That answer betrayed very pointedly the hardness of Cain’s heart. He had killed his own brother, but rather than remorse and repentance, he allowed himself to feel justified.
Since there was no repentance, there could be no forgiveness. Instead, punishment was issued. First, God revealed that he not only knew where Abel was, he had seen all that had transpired. He had watched as his blood was spilled on the ground and his lifeless body callously deserted by his brother.
The punishment was designed to fit the crime. Since Cain had spilled his brother’s blood on the ground, the ground itself would now be cursed for him. Nothing would grow for him. He would be dependent on others to grow food so that he and his family could eat, or he would simply have to wander, looking for what grew by itself.
For Cain, who had been a farmer since he was a child, this seemed like an unimaginably harsh blow. He knew how to coax plants from the soil, but he knew little else. Not just his livelihood, but his whole identity was being taken away.
In addition, Cain suddenly realized that if God knew what he had done, it wouldn’t be long before his actions were discovered by the rest of the family. Because only Cain, Abel, Adam, and Eve are named thus far in the narrative, some people believe that that was all that were alive at the time. But that is not true. Genesis 4:25-26 and 5:3 show that Seth, who was born shortly after Abel was murdered, was born when Adam was a 130 years old. That means that Cain, who was conceived very shortly after the expulsion from Eden, would have been about 128 or 129 years old. In those 130 years, Adam and Eve had produced many children, both sons and daughters. Many of those had, in turn, had children of their own. In fact, there were five generations of people on the planet, numbering thousands. And of those thousands, it was very likely that some of them would seek to avenge Abel’s murder. Cain’s fears were very well founded.
God’s response was not a reversal of his judgment, but a method to protect Cain from the revenge of the other family members. The punishment He had issued was adequate, so nothing people could do to him in retaliation would add to it, but would only blunt its effect by putting him out of his misery early. So, God put a mark on Cain to make it very obvious who he was, and then He let it be known that if anyone retaliated against him, God would personally punish them seven times over.
This mark on Cain, by the way, was non-transferable. Despite the teaching of some, it was not genetic, and thus it was not passed down to his descendants, since they were not subject to retaliation for the killing of Abel.
Pray with Me
Father, this is a crucial reminder that nothing is hidden from You, that even though Your judgment might be tempered by mercy, we won’t escape the consequences we have earned, the horrible effects of our sin. Thus, we need to be very careful about our choices, never downplaying the consequences of our sins that will ensue, even if our sins themselves are forgiven. Thank you, Lord, for this essential clarity. Amen.