Sermon Tone Analysis

February 17, 2012

By John Barnett

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Christ's words in Revelation 2:12-17, addressed to the locally assembled church in the geographic place called Pergamum: a place of Satan’s seat.

There we have heard Christ's words, which contain a warning about idolatry, Satan’s plan of false worship.

From those early days after Creation, when Adam sinned and all of mankind to follow also fell into sin: God made a way for mankind to come back.

The way back was to worship Him by a substitutionary, sacrificial, blood-sprinkled, way.

The key to understanding all of world history since the Fall of Humanity into sin comes from God's Word.

Always remember that the only absolutely trustworthy and accurate account of the earliest days of both the Universe and the human race is found in the inspired words from God in Genesis.

As we turn back to Genesis 4 we are seeing the very first description of the deadliest evil humanity has ever faced.

It is called: Religion.

Religion is mankind offering any kind of worship to God, other than what God’s Word has commanded.

Religion is the self-styled offering of a humanly designed worship, rather than the Spirit-prompted offering of strict obedience to God’s Word.

That means that there are only two choices in the Universe, for offering true and acceptable worship: God’s revelation of what He wants in His Word, and everything else.

Here is point number one:

*Satan Always Counterfeits God’s Plan*

When Satan as the Serpent in the Garden tempted Eve, he made her question whether God’s plan was best.

Satan always offers his own plan, a counterfeit that is meant to derail humans from what has been revealed in the Word of God.

In the account of Cain & Abel we find the first appearance of Satan’s plan to destroy the true worship of God after the Fall.

It is so clearly seen in the contrast between Cain’s response to God’s command for worship and Abel’s response.

Satan started a plan to counter God’s true worship, and Cain was his first convert.

Genesis 4:8 is what we could call the start of religion: Mankind trying to make his own way to worship God by self-effort.

Cain decided to give God what Cain felt like offering, not what God wanted.

In fact the inspired commentary from God about Cain’s life says:

1 John 3:12 (NKJV) /"not as Cain who was of the wicked one and murdered his brother.

And why did he murder him?

Because his works were evil and his brother’s righteous."/

Also the next book after John’s Epistles, called Jude, also has similar warnings:

Jude 1:11 (NKJV) /"Woe to them!

For they have gone in the way of Cain, have run greedily in the error of Balaam for profit, and perished in the rebellion of Korah."/

Cain’s life is forever tied to one of the most dramatic moments in sacred history.

Genesis 4:1-8, please stand with me as we listen to God speak:

Genesis 4:1-8 (NKJV) /"Now Adam knew Eve his wife, and she conceived and bore Cain, and said, “I have acquired a man from the LORD.” 2 Then she bore again, this time his brother Abel.

Now Abel was a keeper of sheep, but Cain was a tiller of the ground.

3 And in the process of time it came to pass that Cain brought an offering of the fruit of the ground to the LORD. 4 Abel also brought of the firstborn of his flock and of their fat.

And the LORD respected Abel and his offering, 5 but He did not respect Cain and his offering.

And Cain was very angry, and his countenance fell.

6 So the LORD said to Cain, “Why are you angry?

And why has your countenance fallen?

7 If you do well, will you not be accepted?

And if you do not do well, sin lies at the door.

And its desire is for you, but you should rule over it.”

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."/

Cain and Abel portray the eternal truth that there are:

*Only Two Choices, Only Two Destinations*

Two lines run through the history of mankind: the line of Christ and the line of Antichrist, the line of the Woman’s seed and that of the serpent.

So, there are only two groups of people always on Earth, and they are heading to very different destinies:

1.

The Way of God-Followers: like Abel example, they kneel before a substitutionary, blood sacrifice pointing at Golgotha, and justified by faith, they go to Heaven.

2. The Way of Satan-Followers: like Cain, they kneel at the altar of their good works pointing at Babel, and condemned by their own sins they go to the Lake of Fire.

There are only two families that everyone is a part of: (God's or Satan’s); there are only two destinies that are ahead of every human that has every lived: (Heaven or Hell); and life is really reduced to only one or the two choices: (repent or reject).

Each of us today belongs to one family or the other.

You are choosing your own future.

Here in Genesis 4 we see that Cain and Abel are not only two actual people who lived and walked on earth a few thousand years ago.

They also represent the two roads that head out from the Garden of Eden.

Everyone who has ever lived has chosen one of those two paths.

Each of us, are on one path, or the other.

Watch the choices made by Cain and Abel.

Both were born outside of Eden.

Both were sinners and fallen.

Both were lost and guilty of each sin they had committed.

Neither were innocent, but only Abel would confess that!

That is what:

*Genesis 4 Contrasts: Satan’s Followers (Cain) vs. God’s Followers (Abel)*

To help us understand the magnitude of this doctrinal lesson that Cain and Abel portray, we need to look at their lives, and the lessons from those lives, one at a time.

First we can see:

*SATAN’S RELIGION: THE WICKED WAY OF CAIN*

• Cain neglected God’s example of a bloody substitute for covering sinners; and got angry when God corrects him.

• Cain portrays a salvation based on human merits—the natural, self-righteous, self-sufficient, and lost person; the formal, external-only professors, who are trusting their works.

• Cain was rejected and cursed by God; denied his lost ruined condition; refused the Divine remedy; and became a merely religious, but lost person.

• Cain looked for help from within himself to please God; he makes an un-bloody offering; and ignores the curse removing, substitutionary, blood sacrifice offered by Abel.

• Cain was the father of all those who seek earthly security; and those that God calls “Earth-Dwellers”.

• Cain turned from the true altar of worship to God, ignored the message and founded the first earthly city (Genesis 4:17).

*GOD’S REVELATION: THE RIGHTEOUS FAITH OF ABEL*

• Abel followed God’s example and offered a bloody substitute as an offering for sinners; humbly gave God what He asked for:

• Abel portrays a salvation only by Divine grace—the Spiritual Person, who is broken-spirited, taking God's side against themselves; the saved, genuine believer and possessor of faith in Christ's finished work alone.

• Abel was accepted and blessed by God; he acknowledged his personal sins; he believed God's testimony, placing faith in the substitute and was accounted righteous; and was a genuinely saved person

• Abel looks for help from outside himself to please God; he makes a bloody offering; and trusts the curse removing, substitutionary blood sacrifice he offered

• Abel was the father of all those who seek God as their refuge; and those that God calls Citizens of Heaven

• Abel came to the true altar of worship to God, heeded God’s message, and founded a grave stained with blood, on his way to the heavenly city.

The ways of Cain and the faith of Abel go on until the time of the Global Flood of Noah.

But notice that there is no mention of any idolatry in these early chapters of human history, until after the Flood.

Sin was so bad, humanity was so corrupted, and the demons had made such complete inroads in humanity: God said, that’s it.

Turn with me in your Bibles past those days recorded in Genesis 5-8, where God wipes out everyone but the eight in Noah’s family.

But as we do so, remember:

*GOD DESTROYED THE WHOLE EARTH IN THE FLOOD*

Pause with me in Genesis 7:21-23, note that God’s Word says that every human and air-breathing animal not on the Ark was killed in the Flood.

That was not a local flood as some try to make it.

You may want to mark some of these words in your Bibles as you follow along.

Genesis 7:21-23 (NKJV) /"And all flesh died that moved on the earth: birds and cattle and beasts and every creeping thing that creeps on the earth, and every man.

22 All in whose nostrils was the breath of the spirit of life, all that was on the dry land, died.

23 So He destroyed all living things which were on the face of the ground: both man and cattle, creeping thing and bird of the air.

They were destroyed from the earth.

Only Noah and those who were with him in the ark remained alive."/

Moving on to God gives mankind a fresh start in learning how to seek Him correctly in Genesis 8:20, there God is worshipped in the true and proper way by the substitutionary, blood sacrifice upon an altar.

Note the re-affirmation with the family that would restart humanity upon the Earth.

God says to Noah:

*Worship God First, Worship His Way*

The very first thing as soon as they landed, the ground dried, and the ark was emptied: was a bloody, substitutionary sacrifice on an altar, the way God asked for it to be done.

Follow along with the words God gives us:

Genesis 8:18-22 (NKJV) /"So Noah went out, and his sons and his wife and his sons’ wives with him.