Good morning. It is good to see you guys. Good to hear your voices. My name is Travis. Um, it is good to be with you again this morning. I'm going to read you a news story that took place mid-90s. Some of you may recall it. Years ago, the Chicago Tribune carried a news brief and it began like this. A Texas mother was so intent on making sure her daughter made the cheerleading squad that she was willing to hire a hitman to kill a competitor's mother, police said Friday night. The woman's hope was that her daughter's 13-year-old competitor would be so overwhelmed with grief by her mother by her mother's death that she would drop out of the competition for the cheerleading spot. Detectives said that at first the woman plotted to hire a hitman to kill both the girl and her mother, but decided the double murder was too expensive. So, she opted for the girl's mother for $2,500. Cheerleading on the cheap. Give me an M. No, I'm kidding. That's terrible. And you might be thinking, well, you know, cheerleading in Texas can get a little bit crazy. Well, let me read you another one a little bit closer to home. This is from the Spokesman Review out of Spokane. Again, from years ago, a man who lost an early morning Bible quoting contest killed the man who beat him. Police said,

"By the way, there will be no guns when we do Awana contest. Let me read it again. Uh, this is terrible. All of this is terrible. And we're laughing. Uh, "A man who lost an early morning Bible quoting contest killed the man who beat him." Police said. "The victim was shot once in the face after he and the suspect were comparing comparing their Bible knowledge outside an apartment complex." Apparently, they did not quote the sixth commandment. You shall not murder. Talk about missing the point of the scriptures completely. But you know, we read stories like this or we hear stories like this and it doesn't even surprise us. I mean, we hear it and we're just like, man, that's completely insane. But it doesn't surprise us because humans have been finding new ways of killing themselves for thousands of years. The 20th century it stood as the unchallenged century of violence and the 21st century is following in the same vein. Abortion is booming with over 1 million abortions taking place last year in the United States which is the highest number and the highest rate measured in the United States in over a decade despite the Supreme Court ruling. And most of us know someone personally who has suffered a violent death either at their own hands or at the hands of another.

I know of several throughout the years as a minister. And so we as a culture and especially we as Christians, we cannot turn our back to these grim realities. And in Genesis chapter 4, what we're going to see this morning is the very first homicide. But here's the deal. The account is far more than a record of the first murder. It's a picture of the spread of sin and the slide of a heart away from the worship of the true God. And right and when you start sliding it, you slide right into sin. So if you have your Bibles with you, you can open them to Genesis 4. And if you're new to the Christian faith and therefore new to the Bible, and I always hope, by the way, that I always hope we have people who are either exploring the Christian faith or are new to the Christian faith. Um, the book of Genesis is the very first book in the Bible. And again, we're in Genesis chapter 4 this morning. And the backstory uh to Genesis chapter 4 is the sin of Adam and Eve that we've been looking at the last couple of weeks. When Adam and Eve chose to trust another word over the word of the Lord, paradise was lost and their full orbed relational harmony that they had had known since they were created, it was broken. Their relationship with God went from confidence and loyalty to skepticism and sin. Their relationship with each other, their horizontal relationship with went from cooperation to competition. their relationship to themselves inwardly and went from wholeness to shame which gets expressed outwardly by covering covering themselves which is why they made the the fig leaves and we do it too. We have the proverbial masks that we wear. The creation their relationship with the creation was broken. It went from very good to thorns and and thistles and painful toil the labor of their hands. And as chapter 3 comes to a close, paradise is lost as Adam and Eve are cast out of it. They're cast out east of Eden. And now as we come to chapter 4, Moses who writes Genesis is very deliberately, he wants us to see the connections between chapter 3 and chapter 4. And chapter 4 is what the world looks like because of chapter 3, its life East of Eden. And just like Stein Steinbeck's novel which bears this name and Steinbeck's novel is a retelling a modern retelling of the story of Cain and Abel. This is life outside of the garden where there's open conflict there's hostility the disintegration of the way life was supposed to be. And again it's a story of Cain and Abel. And it connects chapter 3 with uh with chapter 4 because we see the continuation of the de devastation all of the devastating effects of sin. And it starts first in relationship a brother to a brother. But what we'll see next week is it goes all the way down to the culture. You get the way of Cain this week between two brothers and next week you get a culture of Cain. And it's a terrible culture. So, let's pick up the story. Um, and what we'll do is we'll read verses 1-6. I'll point out a couple things as we go, and then we'll come back and we're going to see three things that this passage is teaching us. So, verse one in Genesis chapter 4. Adam knew Eve, his wife, and she conceived and bore Cain, saying, "I have gotten a man with the help of the Lord." Now, put this in its context because almost daily or at least weekly in our lives, uh, we hear about loved ones who have gotten pregnant, hopefully after they're married. That's the order in which this is supposed to go, in case you're confused about that. Some marriage first and then the pregnancy. Um, and so this was the case. She gets they're they're already married. She gets pregnant. And remember, they they've never seen this before. They've never seen this. They have no nothing. They've they've never seen a gender reveal before. This is the first of its kind. But you got to think, they have something to compare it to. They've had the gestation process that they seen of of animals. And Adam's looking at Eve thinking, hm, is this going to be the gestation process of a bunny, or is this going to be the gestation process of a zebra? And Eve's looking at Adam thinking, "What have you done?" I mean, this whole process, they're this is the very first one. They're first time parents, but they're also their very first first-time parents. And so, they're joyous and they're nervous all at the same time. And they got to be wondering, they've got to be wondering, is this child the one who will crush the head of the serpent? Is this child the one who will restore us to paradise and reconcile us with God? They have high hopes for their kids. And all first-time parents have high hopes for your kids, do you not? You know that feeling? You're like, "Oh, hopefully my child will do something great." They're hoping their child will grow up and will do the ultimate thing. So, she gives birth to Cain. And then we're told in verse two, "And again, she bore his brother Abel."

Now Abel was a keeper of sheep and Cain a worker of the ground. Now, we don't know how much time is is separated between the birth of Cain and the birth of Abel, but but they're born and they grow into adults. And no doubt, no doubt Adam and Eve have other children. We're just not told about them here because um Moses's point isn't tell isn't to tell us about all of their family, but it's to trace the story of these two children. And so they grow into they they grow into auh into adults. And Cain goes on to become a farmer. He's working the soil and Abel tends the flocks. He's a shepherd. both good, honorable careers, both participating in the cultural mandate to make the ground productive and profitable. And in the course of time, and we again we don't know how much time, maybe it's days, maybe it's weeks, maybe it's years, but at some point they bring an offering to the Lord.

Look at verse three. "In the course of time, Cain brought to the Lord an offering of the fruit of the ground. And Abel also brought of the firstborn of his flock and of their fat portions. And the Lord had regard for Abel and his offering, but for Cain and his offering, he had no regard. So Cain was very angry and his face fell. And then the Lord came to uh the Lord said to Cain, "Why are you angry? And why has your face fallen? If you do well, will you not be accepted? And if you do not do well, sin is crouching at the door. Its desire is for you, but you must rule over it. And so Cain spoke to Abel, his brother. And we don't know what he said. Um maybe he said, 'Brother, let's go on a little walk here.'" He maybe he said, "I have some stuff out in the field I want to show you. I have a question for you about your flocks. Could you go on a walk with me?" Whatever does.

They found themselves out in the field. Look, at the second part of verse eight. "Cain rose up against his brother and he killed him." Premeditated murder right here. And look at how the Lord responds. Verse 9. Then the Lord said to Cain, "Where is Abel, your brother?" He said, "I I do not know. Am I my brother's keeper?" And the Lord said, "What have you done? The voice of your brother's blood is crying out to me from the ground. And now you are cursed from the ground, which has opened its mouth to receive your brother's blood from your hand. When you work the ground, it shall no longer yield to you its strength. You shall be a fugitive and a wanderer on the earth."

Cain said to the Lord, "My punishment is greater than I can bear. Behold, you have driven me today away from the ground, and from your face I shall be hidden. I shall be a fugitive and a wanderer on the earth, and whoever finds me will kill me. And then the Lord said to him, 'Not so. If anyone kills Cain, vengeance shall be taken on him sevenfold.'" And the Lord put a mark on Cain. And nobody knows what the mark is. Some people say it's a tattoo. Some people say it's something else. It doesn't really matter. But "the Lord put a mark on Cain, lest any who found him should attack him. And then Cain went away from the presence of the Lord and settled in the land of Nod, East of Eden. This is the word of the Lord. Okay. This passage, what it does is it teaches us three incredibly important truths. It teaches us the importance of the posture of our heart. It teaches us the potency of sin within us. And then it teaches us the character of the person of the Lord. The per the person of the Lord."

The character of the person of the Lord. So the posture of our hearts, the potency of sin and the person of the Lord. So let's go one at a time. The first, the posture of the heart. Now notice in verses 3 and four, we have this super interesting scene. We're told in the course of time that both Cain and Abel bring an offering to the Lord. And again, we don't know how old they are. We don't know any of those little details that we may want to know. But what we do know is that they both bring an offering to the Lord. Cain an offering of the fruit of the ground while Abel, we're told, brought an offering of the firstborn of his flock and of their fat portions. And then we're told that the Lord accepted or some of your translations will say he looked favorably upon or he had regard for Abel's offering but not Cain's. Well, what's that about? Why did the Lord look favorably upon one looked favorably upon Abel's offering but not Cain? Well, there's been all sorts of speculation all over all over the place. All sorts of opinions over the years. Some people say it was because Abel's was a blood sacrifice because he sacrificed an animal. But later in the Mosaic covenant, we'll see that grain offerings off fruit offerings and animal sacrifices, they were all pleasing to the Lord. So I don't think it I don't think it uh it was because it was a blood sacrifice. So if it's not that, well then what is it? Well, I think in the text it gives us clues. Look again closely at verse three. Look at how it's recorded. In the course of time,

Cain brought to the Lord an offering of the fruit of the ground. He says, "Here's what I've done." He gives it to him. And Abel also brought of the firstborn of his flock and of their fat portions. And so it appears Cain's offering is a self-righteous attempt to earn God's favor, while Abel's offering is a grateful offering in response to God's favor. Abel's offering is the very first of his calfs. He doesn't know how many more he's going to have. He knows how many calfs are supposed to be born. He's preject checked them all, but he doesn't know how many wolves are going to get them all. So, he brings his very best. He brings his very first. Abel is giving what's best and what is most costly from his occupation. Cain, it simply says, brought an offering of the fruit of the ground. And so it seems, if you're reading between the lines that Cain, as an expression of his heart, is giving a mere tokenism, a prefuncter obedience, not really giving his best, not giving, not giving of his very best, sort of going through the motions religiously, but holding back for himself what's the most valuable. Whereas Abel, he's bringing the very best from his flock. It's hinted at in the text. But then in Hebrews chapter 11, I won't make you turn there. We're given the explicit answer because in Hebrews chap 11, we read, "By faith, Abel offered a better sacrifice than Cain." So the heart of the matter for Cain is that the sin of the heart, it's it's the sin of the heart that begins his ruin. He looks religious. Here's the deal. He looks religious, but in his heart, he's just going through the motions. He's just going through the motions. Not giving the Lord his best. Not giving the Lord what's most costly. And here's the deal. The Lord is not pleased with mere tokenism. He's not pleased with our prefuncterary obedience.

And that type of attitude, by the way, the type of attitude that came here is alive and well in many churches today where people are more consumers than contributors to the work of the gospel where they have an attitude of I got to do this for an hour and a half a week so that God can be pleased with me and he can get behind my business ventures. But it's not really out of a heart that says, God, you deserve all that I am. You deserve every bit of I who of who I am. I want to love you and I want to serve you with all my heart, soul, strength, and mind. The ruin of Cain begins with the sin of the heart. A mere tokenism of peruncter obedience, not genuine faith towards the Lord. And the Lord, he knew Cain's heart attitude of worship. And by the way, the Lord knows your heart attitude in regards to worship. if you're giving him the best of you or if you're just going through the religious motions, paying him lip service while your hearts are far from him. He knows. He knows. And he knew it in Cain. And what this tells us, what this teaches us is the posture of our heart matters in worship, does it not? The posture of our heart matters in worship. It teaches us that God deserves our very best. Abel offered his best. the very best, the firstborn of his flock. Cain did not. God received Abel's offering. He didn't receive Cain's. And again, it teaches us that God deserves our very best. This means we're to give our our very hearts to the Lord, the very the the the innermost part of who we are, our entire lives. Remember Romans 12:1 Paul writes, "I appeal to you therefore brothers by the mercies of God to present your bodies as a living sacrifice to God, holy and acceptable, which is your spiritual worship." He says, "Your whole life should be given to the Lord in worship." And over and over again in scriptures, God's to receive what's first, what's best, the first fruits, the firstborn. He's to receive the priority of our time, the priority of our affections, the priority of our love. God deserves our very best. Not our leftovers, not our second best, but our very best. And so, the first thing this passage teaches us is the importance of the posture of our heart. But then secondly, it teaches us the potency of sin. And I want you to see this. I mean, it drives so much of the narrative. It teaches the potency of sin. In verse seven, God's speaking to Cain. Go ahead and look at it. In verse 7, God's speaking to to Cain and he uses this really vivid imagery to describe the potency of sin. He says he says, "If you do not do what is right, sin is crouching at your door. It desires to have you, but you must master it." That's a remarkable image. It's crouching at your door. It's an image of like a lion or a tiger crouching below the line of sight coiled and ready to spring and kill. That's the imagery and it teaches us quite a bit about the nature of sin. What does it teach us? First of all, it teaches us the seriousness of it. It teaches the seriousness of sin. And again, the the the image is a predatory animal. You ever been near a predatory animal? Something that could kill you instantly? Years ago at our house, I was working on a message and as I'm sitting there typing, I can feel the hairs on the on the back of my head start to stand up. And I look over and there's a cougar right outside on our back deck looking at us or looking at me. Nobody else was home. And I look over and I I'm looking this cougar in the eye. And all of a sudden I thought, well, I can't tell you what I actually thought, but it was something along the lines of, "Oh crap." Um, and I didn't own a gun at the time. I got a gun later that day. Um, Tria was pregnant at the time. And I remember thinking, "Oh, this is very, very serious." Um, and it was sitting there and I remember I scared it off and I started to go down the hill and our neighbors started going down towards our neighbors and our neighbors had two young girls and I could hear them outside. So I had to instantly I got on the phone and tried to tell his name next door neighbor was bud calling Bud saying no there's a there's a cougar on the loose here. You need to get your kids inside. the seriousness of this situation. That's that's exactly the type of situation because this thing, what the sin, the the power of sin, the potency of sin, it's seeking to destroy you. It's seeking to dominate you. And did you notice the word that was used to describe it? We're told in verse 7, look at it again. Sin is crouching at your door. It's desire is to have you. that word desire. It's the same word that we looked at last week in relation to Eve's relationship to Adam after the fall. And again, the word implies domination. That's the potency of sin. It wants to rule you. It wants to master you. It wants to throw you on the ground and take over. It's so it's serious and we can't play around with it. It's completely foolish to play around with sin. That's why the great Puritan author John Owen in his classic book, The Mortification of Sin, he famously wrote, "Be killing sin or sin will be killing you." That's exactly right. The potency of sin. And for Cain, it was his anger. But for you, it might be something else. Maybe your besetting sin is lust or greed or your looks. Whatever the case, the Lord says to Cain and to us, it wants to master you. It wants to devour you. It wants to rule your life by enslaving you. So, you see the seriousness of sin, but we also see the subtlety of it. It's very subtle because when the predator sees its prey, what does it do? It crouches down. Meaning it gets out of the line of sight so that you don't see it coming. That's what they do. So what the Lord's saying here is the nature of sin is that it crouches. It insists. Here's what it does.

It insists mentally to you that it's much much smaller than it really is. It's actually benign. It's not a real thing. It's much smaller. It It tells you this. Your sin tells you. It has a power all its own. It tells you that it's much smaller and much less than you think it is. That's the nature of sin. It crouches down out of your sight. And here's the thing. Here's the deal. If you don't think a predator is crouching at the at your door, if you don't think a predator is crouching at your door, you're dead meat. You have no chance. If you know a predator is crouching at your door, at least you have a chance. At least you have a way to defend yourself. And now remember, in our culture, we don't even like to acknowledge sin. Remember last week we talked about Carl Meninger's book, Whatever Happened to Sin. Whatever became a sin is the name of the book. where he describes our culture is the first culture who won't even acknowledge sin. He says the word sin and the notion of it has disappeared in our culture which means in the 21st century sin is crouching down and it's saying to you I'm not really here and if you buy that if you buy what the average American believes we're not really that bad. We're basically good people. We don't really believe in original sin. We don't really believe in the sin nature. If you buy that, you'll definitely be killed by sin. There's a potency to it. There's a power to it. You'll definitely be killed by it. So, we see the the seriousness of it. We see the subtleness of it. Thirdly, we see the suddenness of it. Again, it crouches down so that it can spring to life. It gets below the sight so that in a moment when you're least prepared, it'll spring to life. And if you minimize the reality of of our sin nature, if you think your sin is just going to sit over here idly in the corner, what it's doing is it's sitting there lying in weight so that at the right time it can spring to life and take over your life. That's the image. If you leave sin alone in any part of your life, if you think it's no big deal, if you think it doesn't have to be dealt with, the moment you turn your back on it, it's on you and it'll devour you. And here's the deal. It's not just the bold letter sins that we're talking about. Not the bold letter sins, not it's not just the bold letter sins like murder, like pornography, like alcoholism. It's also the sins of the heart as well. Like if you're a person who worries about money all the time, you're always worrying about money, the sin just crouches down. And what it tells you is, oh, it's not stinginess. It's not materialism. It's just prudence. But if you don't deal with that sin at the heart level, it's going to take over the rest of your life. If you don't get get to the heart of that issue and say what it actually the sin that is actually consuming me the worrying about money all the time it's actually a hard attitude that says I won't trust the Lord. I don't trust the Lord as the provider for me and my family. I won't trust that he will meet my needs at every occasion of our life. That's the heart level sin. And if you don't bring that out into the open and deal with it, that worrying will consume you. Let's say you're a person who's driven by work. That's where you find your identity. Sin is crouching down and saying it's not workcoholism. It's just a work ethic. But if you don't take it out and examine it, if you don't get be below the heart level sin and saying, "Why are you working all the time to to build an identity? You already have an identity in Christ." If you don't take that out and examine it and have somebody else help you examine it, that workcoholism will take over your life. It'll ruin your life. See, sin is hiding. It's always hiding, but it's ready to spring to life. And it's ready to take over your life. And that means this. We're all in danger of it. Every single one of us. Because we all have sinful attitudes of our heart. Do we? Is this true? Okay. Want to make sure I wasn't just preaching to myself. We all have sinful attitudes of our heart, which means every single one of us is danger. And that means at least two things. What it first it means um it first first it means we need to acknowledge that we all have crouching sins. Every single one of us have crouching sins and we ought not to hide that from one another. We all have crouching sins. Sinful attitudes and actions that you know aren't right but you consider them small things. You think they're just going to sit there in the corner. Ah it's just a little sin over here. Then every once in a now and again I I indulge in it but just a little little sin over here. But it's going to take over your life. This passage is telling you they're much much bigger than you think and they're not going to sit idly by if you don't bring them out into the open and deal with them now. Over time the potency of sin will just continue to grow. They're not going to sit idly by. Second, here's the second thing this teaches us. We need deep, deep Christian friendship that can see the sins that hide from you because we're all limited. We all have blind spots. The sin gets below us. We can't see it. It's crouching at the door. We can't see around the door, but somebody who's on the other side of the door, they can see it. And they can say, "Whoa, brother, you need to stop right there." So, what you need, you have to work to develop Christian friendship. You have to work to develop Christian community. who we're actually accountable to because sin is crouching at the door. And again, you might not be able to see it, but somebody on the other side who has a different perspective than you, they can see it. And you need someone who you're willing to be accountable to. Because accountability only works if you're actually willing to be accountable to somebody. You need to have somebody who you're willing to be accountable to. someone in a life group, someone in a one-on-one relationship, someone who's older, wiser, has been around the block more than you that will help you see that sin is crouching at the door. And if you don't have these things in your life, then sin will have your life. You need deep Christian friendship. So, what do we see here? What are we seeing? We've seen the posture of the heart. We've seen the potency of sin. Lastly, we see the person of the Lord. How much time do I have? I have plenty of time. This is good. We see the person of the Lord. Well, what do you see about the character of the Lord in this passage? What do you see? You actually see two really remarkable things. First, you see that he's incredibly gracious. Incredibly gracious. The second thing you see, and I'll put it up in a second, but he's absolutely committed to justice. First of all, though, notice his grace. What does he do? He's asking questions again, just like last week. Remember last week, if you were here, God doesn't show up after Adam and Eve sinned and said, "How dare you do what I not told you to do? How dare you do what I told you not to do?" Instead, he comes and he says, "Where are you, Adam? Where are you? What's going on? What have you done? And here after the Lord doesn't accept Cain's offering, the Lord doesn't say, "Grable before my glory." He doesn't say that. He inquires. He says, "Why are you downcast?" And even after the murder of Abel, the Lord shows up and he says, "Where's your brother Abel? Where's your brother?" And after the Lord lays out the consequences for Cain's sin, Cain then says, look at verse 13,

Cain then says in in verses 13 and 14, my punishment is greater than I can bear. Behold, you've driven me today away from the ground, and from your face I shall be hidden. I shall be a fugitive and a wanderer on the earth, and whoever finds me will kill me." And the Lord says, look. Not so. You want to talk about mercy? Not so. If anyone kills Cain, vengeance shall be taken on him sevenfold. And the Lord put a mark on Cain, lest anyone who found him should attack him. So he went out from the Lord's presence. But look at the Lord's mercy here. And I want I recognize everybody might be thinking right now, well, who would Cain go out and meet that he's afraid of? Well, again, we're not told of all of Adam and Eve's offspring. There's probably more of them. And he's probably also thinking about future generations who are going to hear about Cain. He says, "I'm I'm going to be I'm going to be they're going to take vengeance upon me." Um,

we don't really know exactly who he's fearing, but we do know this. This reveals something about the Lord's character, his unbelievable mercy. Derek Kidner in his commentary, he writes this. He says, "God's conf God's concern for innocent Abel is matched only by his care for the sinner." Even the quirless prayer of Cain had contained a germ of entry in entry. God's answering pledge together with this mark upon Cain, not a stigma, but a safe conduit is almost a covenant making him virtually Cain's protector. It is the most that mercy can do for the unrepentant. I love that the Lord in his mercy is caring even for a sinner. Look at how merciful the Lord is towards an unrepentant person. And make no mistake, Cain is completely unrepentant because the mark of a truly repentant person will say, "My punishment is just." But Cain says, "My punishment is more than I can bear." So he's not repentant, but the Lord still deals with him mercifully. He can't bring him into his presence. That's why he sends him out east of Eden, but he deals with him mercifully. Now, think about that. Think about that for a second.

Because if God is merciful to Cain who shows no repentance, if God does not give up on Cain, if God is protecting Cain, if he cares that much for Cain, here's what we know. He cares that much for you. No matter what you've done, if he cares this much for Cain of all people, he cares this much for you. And if you're here and you're actually repentant of your sin, you're way ahead of Cain. way ahead of Cain. The Lord is incredibly gracious. We see that. But here's the second thing we see. We see he's absolutely committed to justice. Absolutely committed to justice. Well, where do we see that? After Cain kills his brother, the Lord comes to Cain in verse 9 and he says, "Where is Abel, your brother?" And Cain says, "I don't know." Liar. He says, 'I don't know. Am I my brother's keeper? And then the Lord says in verse 10, "The voice of your brother's blood

is crying to me from the ground." You know what that is? That's a cry for justice. The voice of your brother's blood is crying to me from the ground. And God is a God of justice. And the first injustice was done. And it cries out to God. And here's the deal. God can't shrug at sin. He can't just ignore it. He can't just wink at it and pretend that it didn't happen. He's a righteous God. He's a just God. Injustices cry out to him all the time. innocent shed blood always cries out to him to set things right. He can't just turn away from it, which then begs this question. How will he fulfill his promise of Genesis 3:15?

A promise has been made. How will he fulfill the promise of Genesis 3:15 to save us? I I I mean, we know he's incredibly gracious, but how will he also be just to a human level that everywhere it turns is sin? How will he fulfill this promise? Only if one who is truly innocent comes from the line of Eve, who lives the life you and I were supposed to live but couldn't because of our sin nature, and then dies the death that we deserve to die under God's judgment for our sin. Only if one would come along like that. And this is exactly what Jesus does at the cross by the shedding of his blood. God in Christ satisfies God's justice. The wages of sin is death. And Jesus pays that upon the cross. And then he gives his grace to anyone who comes to him in simple but genuine faith. This is why this is why in Hebrews chap chapter 12, the writer to the Hebrews says this. He says, "You've come to God, the judge of all men, to Jesus, the mediator of a new covenant, and to the sprinkled blood that speaks a better word than the blood of Abel." Speaks a better word than the blood of Abel. The blood of Abel, it cried out that an injustice had been committed. And the blood of Jesus, it shouts that Jesus has paid for all of our injustices and all of our sins and that forgiveness is now available to anybody and everybody who comes to Christ Jesus as Lord and Savior. Amen. Now listen, listen to what this means. Here's what it means. It means the deep forgiveness of God is available to you right now through faith in Jesus Christ. But that's not all. I feel like a car salesman right now. That's not all. There's so much more. What it means is his lasting security is yours forever. Forever. Why? Here's what I would say. How much time I got? Some of you, some of you are deeply afraid that you can lose your salvation. You're deeply afraid. You have this besetting sin, a besetting sin that you struggle with and you struggle with and you struggle with and you you confess and you confess. You go back to the Lord. asking for his for his forgiveness, his forgiveness, his forgiveness. And you think to yourself, how long will the will the Lord be merciful to me? How long I mean, there's got to be a point where he finally reaches his limit and says, "Forget this guy." You're struggling with it. You're thinking, "There's no way he can continue to forgive me." But don't you see, we've already said that God is a God of justice.

He's a just God and he's already paid the penalty for your sin and for my sin. And if he were going to make you pay again, that would make him unjust because he's already paid for it. What that means is you're completely secure in your forgiveness forever. And again, you may wonder, but I'm still struggling with sin. Will will God always be merciful to me? Is is he going to say to me, I'm done being merciful to that person? No. Why? Remember in 1 John 1:9, remember 1 John 1:9, it doesn't say, it doesn't say if we confess our sins, he is faithful and merciful. Although he is that. It doesn't say that. Well, what does it say? It says if we confess our sins, he is faithful and just. faithful and just to forgive us of our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. He's faithful and just. So every time, here's what it means. Every time we sin and then we go to the Lord, we confess it to Jesus and we ask for his forgiveness. Jesus is standing before the father interceding for you saying, "On account of my blood, they're not condemned. They're forgiven because my blood speaks a better word than Abel's. My blood has paid for all injustice, for all sin, for all time on account of who I am and what I've done. They're forgiven. That's astonishing. That's astonishingly good news. Forgiveness, security forever. If you know, if you know that you're really secure in his love, you know what it does? What it should do? It should move you to tears of joy for what Jesus has done for you. And it should, Here's the other thing it should do. It should give you the deep security you need to deal open and honestly with your sin, knowing that you're not going to be condemned, but forgiven. If you know he's already paid for my sins and he's going to continually be merciful to me because of my sin, well then I can bring it out into the open with another brother or sister in Christ and I can deal honestly with it because it has the potency to kill me. Now look at you guys. Look at the Lord's character. He's incredibly gracious, absolutely committed to justice. And in Christ, his justice doesn't work against you. It starts working for you. That's amazing. Now, if you don't know Jesus as your savior, if you don't know him as your Lord,

please know that you right now you can go from alienation from God to full life with God through simple faith in the Lord Jesus Christ, believing that Jesus's blood was shed for you and that his heart is wide open to you and that his blood speaks a better word than Abel. And if you want to be you want to give your life to the Lord when I'm done praying here and when we're done singing, come up front. We'll have people up here who would like nothing more than to pray with you and for you. Okay, why don't you stand and I'll pray and then we'll worship the Lord in song.

Father, we thank you that the blood of Jesus Christ speaks a better word than Abel's. It does not shout vengeance. It shouts forgiveness. It shouts the way of mercy has been made available to anyone and everyone. And so, Father, we pray that those of us who are Christians would come back again and again and again to what all of this means. That we are completely forgiven and we are completely secure in your love. There's nothing we did to earn it. There's nothing we can do to lose it. And for those who have not yet trusted you as their savior, Father, would your Holy Spirit speak into their hearts and minds this morning, reminding them, telling them, shouting at them that they can pass from death to life this morning simply by believing in the person and the work of Jesus Christ that he has shed his blood to forgive them of their sins and to bring them into the family of God. We trust you, Lord. And as we begin to sing, we we lift up our hearts and our minds to you, knowing that you don't want tokenism. You want all of us, Father. You want our hearts to be engaged in active worship of you. We love you in Jesus name. Amen.