Cornerstone Curriculum, Official Certification Edition

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The voice of your brother’s blood is crying to me from the ground. [11] And now you are cursed from the ground, which has opened its mouth to receive your brother’s blood from your hand. [12] 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.” [13] Cain said to the Lord, “My punishment is greater than I can bear. [14] 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.” [15] 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, lest any who found him should attack him. [16] Then Cain went away from the presence of the Lord and settled in the land of Nod, east of Eden. What is ultimately our responsibility for the well-being of others, whether they are friends, family, neighbor or stranger, alien or kinsman, enemy or beloved? It appears in all of us that there is an inclination to only love those who are “near by,” those people whom we count as friends, or immediate family. Why ought we to sacrifice our precious few resources and opportunities on behalf of people we either don’t know well, on those who are inclined to waste our good will or abuse our kindness, or worse yet, on those who actually and indeed hate us? Ultimately, who is the neighbor that we are called to love even as ourselves (cf. Lev. 19.18)? Genesis 4 contains one of the great but tragic episodes of the entire Scriptures. Occurring on the heels of the great Fall of the first human pain whose voluntary and unfortunate rebellion produced the curse and death on humankind, we see tangibly one of its results. Alienation. Jealousy. Hatred and malice, which lead to violent murder and justification. While this story appears on the surface to be about the conflict between two brothers, upon a closer look we see greater meaning. In this story of conflict between Cain and Abel in fact the prophecy of Genesis 3.15 is concretely played out: the seed of the woman meets the seed of the serpent. Cain yields to the evil that crouches at the door, brutally murders his very own brother because of jealousy and malice, is cursed, and becomes the original creator of the godless city and its godless society. This way of rejecting God’s will, of hating those who in fact keep it, is referred to in the New Testament as the “way of Cain” (Jude 11), or as “sin against one’s brother” (1 John 3.12, 15). All in all, this story reveals the kind of profound and cancerous lack of trust and obedience to the Lord which results in a dangerous envy of God’s own people. This envy is deadly, and leads to violence, murder, alienation, and finally to the very judgment of God himself.

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