Sin: A State of Self-Centredness and Lost Shalom

I'm gonna get us to open to Genesis chapter four this morning, and we're gonna read about the story of Cain and Abel. Genesis chapter four, verse one. Now Adam knew Eve his wife and she conceived and bore Cain saying, I have gotten a man with the help of the Lord. And again she bore his brother Abel. Now Abel was keeper of sheep and Cain a worker of the ground.

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. 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. Cain spoke to Abel his brother and when they were in the field, Cain rose up against his brother Abel and killed him. Then the Lord said to Cain, where is Abel your brother? He said, 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 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. 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 anyone who found him should attack him. Then Cain went away from the presence of the Lord and settled in the land of Nod, east of Eden. So far, our reading. In the third movie of The Lord of the Rings, the one entitled The Return of the King, there's a great scene at the end of the movie.

I don't know if you have followed or read the books, Lord of the Rings, where Frodo Baggins, the hero of the story, and his trusty sidekick, Sam Gamgee, are making their final climb up the mountain, the volcano, Mount Doom, where they were to destroy the ring that had brought chaos into their world. It had been an epic journey of three books to get to this point. And these two little hobbits were absolutely exhausted. Carrying the ring had been the hardest thing that they had ever had to do in their life. And as they near the summit, Frodo collapses with exhaustion.

He just can't keep going. He had been the one that had been entrusted to carry the ring, and he suffered incredibly for having had that responsibility. But the ever faithful Sam Gamgee at his side gave Frodo one last injection of courage and motivation to keep going. He talked of home. He talked of finishing this task and going back to the place that they missed so dearly.

To quote the movie, this is what he said: "Do you remember the Shire, mister Frodo? It'll be spring soon and the orchards will be in blossom. And the birds will be nesting in the hazel thicket. And they'll be sowing the summer barley in the lower fields, and eating the first of the strawberries with cream. Do you remember, mister Frodo, the taste of strawberries?" I can see the Shire, Frodo says.

The Brandywine River, Bag End, Gandalf's fireworks, the lights of the party tree. And Rosy Cotton dancing, Sam responded. She had ribbons in her hair. If I ever was to marry someone, it would have been her. The memory of home, of strawberries and hazel thickets, of barley fields and blossoming orchard trees.

These memories were so powerful that these little hobbits pushed on to finish this enormous task that the world depended on them to finish. The memory of home became a mighty thing. The desire and longing for home is the same for us. It can be formidable. We often hear of stories of survivors who have survived incredible things like being prisoners of war, being shipwrecked on floating rafts for weeks at a time.

The memory of home driving them to survive. This morning, we're continuing our series on that very theme, home, a gospel narrative of belonging, where we trace through the Bible the grand sweeping theme of mankind's search for home and God's plan to bring His people home. Last week, we looked at the story of Genesis one and two where we saw this home that God had created. This perfect harmonious relationship that God had originally designed for us. A place of finding full satisfaction and joy in relationship with God, with one another as human beings, and with the natural world around us.

A perfect harmonious relationship. As the Hebrew word puts it, a place of shalom, peace. Specifically in Genesis two, we saw the original state that was created for us. We have mankind having been created to exist with God, with man, and with nature. Through worship to God, through fellowship with man, and stewardship of creation of nature.

And as we saw, we realised that this community, this home was God appointed. This relationship between man and woman, Adam and Eve was given for us. We weren't sort of we didn't fall into this by accident. It wasn't something that was evolved in us. We were hardwired to have this sort of relationship.

And we see this specifically with Adam and Eve who are shown to be complementarian. That they are two parts that fit together. As we read Genesis one, we see a creation making process where God keeps repeating the words, "It is good" after He's designed it. He sees the stars and the moon. He says, "It is good."

He sees earth and He sees the animals and He says, "It is good." And the one thing in Genesis two that is not good is where He says, "It is not good for man to be alone." And then God says, "I will make a helper or a companion suitable for him." And so God gives Adam Eve, and everything is good again. This structure, this environment is home.

The home that we were designed for. But today, we see the consequences of humanity having lost that home due to a thing called sin. This thing called sin is in its most basic definition a rebellion against God and His rule. The way that rule, that kingdom, that God intended things to be under. In Genesis three, we haven't read this morning, but in Genesis three, we see that Satan in the form of a snake persuades Adam and Eve into disobeying God.

Eating of the fruit of the knowledge of good and evil. Something God gave clear instructions for Adam and Eve not to do. With that action comes a consciousness of what is evil. Comes a consciousness through this knowledge in the first step of disobedience. Sin, therefore, enters into the understanding of mankind.

Sin enters the hearts and the minds of humanity, and immediately, we see the effects. Immediately, we see Adam and Eve when they are confronted by God of their actions, trying to blame each other. "It was you that persuaded me to eat it." "No, it was you that didn't tell me we weren't supposed to."

They make excuses for their sin and they begin lying to God. And then God says, "Cursed is the ground because of you." Through this rebellion, the natural world even is corrupted, is cursed. And since because mankind was the custodians, mankind are the stewards and the kings of this natural order.

And Adam and Eve and their God-given mission to subdue the earth, to have dominion over it, to fill it, that's immediately compromised. Because now work, that work will become hard. There will be thorns and thistles in working the soil. There will be natural disasters that will come upon the earth that will hinder all of that process. And so almost immediately, we see the consequences of sin corrupting every part of God's design.

Adam and Eve are exiled away from God. There is enmity. There is strife. There is disagreement between one another, and there's curse on the earth. They have left home.

God exiles them. God takes them out of the garden because God cannot stand the sin now that has entered and corrupted His creation. And all of this happens in the first three chapters of Genesis. You can read it in one go, in fifteen, twenty minutes. They are extremely important chapters for us to understand our existence.

But now, if you are tempted to think after having read that and having understood all of that, "Well, come on. It's a little bit of fruit. It's a little bit of a rejection. Why is that so harmful?" Well, God gives us Genesis chapter four to show just how harmful this decision has been. Because of our exile from God in our true home, we have entered an existence of self centredness.

An existence of restless wandering. We have lost the shalom that God created us to exist in. In Genesis four, we read the story of Cain and Abel. We see the consequences immediately of sin. Sin is choosing self over God.

This is the choice Adam and Eve make in the beginning, and this is felt most acutely in this breakdown of the relationship between Cain and Abel. In the person of Cain, we see the quintessential lost person. A person of restless wandering, Genesis four verse twelve calls him. And so from this passage that we've just read, there are at least two points, three points perhaps that we have to reflect on. Firstly, we see that sin is now our constant enemy since we have lost the shalom of God.

We see that Cain and Abel, they know God. Cain and Abel are aware of God. That's sort of been passed on, I guess, from Adam and Eve. They still have some sort of relationship with Him, and yet they are living east of Eden. They are living away from the garden in separation to God.

However, in order to continue that relationship with Him, they bring the fruits of their labour to say to honour Him, to honour God, to say that you still are very, very important to us. You see Cain bringing the fruit of his work as a farmer and agricultural man who brings the crops that he has. And then Abel who was a shepherd who worked with animals. And he brings the firstborn of his sheep. But for some reason, God looks favourably upon the sacrifices of Abel, but not of Cain.

Now we aren't told the reason. There are commentators that speculate about that. Some say, "Well, one brought animal sacrifices which, you know, later on in the time of Moses is what is brought before God to bring forgiveness of sin. And so the animals are better quality in sort of mending a relationship with God than vegetation was." But that's not in the text.

Probably, it wasn't the main issue. Probably, it wasn't the issue at all. It probably comes down to, if you read the story again, it was the heart by which Cain came to God with his sacrifices. One brings their sacrifice with love, and one brings it out of some sense of obligation. Ever, Cain becomes resentful that Abel appears to have a closer relationship with God.

It's a struggle in Cain's heart. And look back at these words again in verse five. It says that Cain became angry and his face fell. The NIV translation says his face became downcast. In a moment of grace and counsel, however, knowing where this may lead, God comes to Cain and says, "Why are you angry?

Why has your face fallen? If you do well, ESV says, NIV, if you do what is good, 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." What does it mean for God to say, "If you do well, will you not be accepted?"

God is saying to Cain, "You have to deal with the issue here. Deal with your heart. This is not about Abel's offering. This is not about what he's doing. It is about what's going on with you."

It is not about favouritism. It is about the condition of the heart. Cain, God says, "Look within. Deal with what needs to be dealt with." And then God gives this very prominent, very pointed warning.

He says, "Sin is crouching at the door, Cain. Its desire is to have you, but you must rule over it." This comes to the core of the human predicament. This comes to the core of humanity's fate after the fall. It's the result of our rebellion.

Sin becomes like a crouching tiger. Who's seen the movie Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon? It's like the tiger waiting to pounce in the scrub. It has a ravenous appetite. It is an appetite that can never be satisfied, never fulfilled.

It wants to devour you and then your loved ones as well. Sin has become a threat constantly. Most of us have probably seen a bit of David Attenborough. Who doesn't love his documentaries? Now the great African Savannah or the great rainforests of South America.

You've probably watched some of those documentaries where we've seen a pack of lions or a group of hyenas or something chasing after a poor little zebra. And these lions, this pack, they chase and chase and chase until this little zebra is so exhausted from running that it collapses. It just falls over. Its little legs give way. And as soon as that sort of rest happens, that sort of giving over to fate, you see that almost in the body language of this zebra, they pounce and it's all over.

And I hate watching that. It upsets me so much. But that is the image here of Genesis four. A crouching lion waiting to pounce. The sad consequences of mankind's exile from Eden is that we can't relax.

We can never relax. Until God has fixed us completely, we've always got to be aware of the struggle within. And it comes in every part of our lives. Look at Cain. It came to him in the moment of worship. The thing you would think, "No.

That's definitely out of bounds. That cannot be touched." Every part of us can be corrupted. Cain comes to God hard and angry. And even while God warns him of the lurking monster, he doesn't take heed and he is consumed by it.

We must remember that sin is now part of us. Until we are fully and finally cleansed at the new heavens and the new earth with brand new bodies and a new existence under God's complete and full reign, this is the crouching tiger. So we cannot be naive. We must never think we are above falling. Don't believe that you are immune.

The oldest and the wisest Christians here can never think that way. And who of us have never been tempted to think that way? That I know better. We are not immune. Sin is our constant enemy.

The second thing we see from this passage is also that we have become restless. We are searching for a home. A man by the name of Albert Camus, he's a French philosopher, once wrote about the strange existence of the heart. He's an existentialist philosopher. And he writes about the existence of eternal things.

Things related to our eternal home. Even though he doesn't necessarily believe in those things. And he writes of our heart desiring these things at the same time as we live in a state of existence marked by the consequences of sin, which is death and disease. And he says, "These two are frustrations of one another." This is how he puts it.

"Beauty is unbearable," he writes. "Beauty is unbearable because it drives us to despair. For it offers us for a minute the glimpse of an eternity that we desperately want to stretch out over all time, but we don't have that consolation." "Why this and not that is the question we ask ourselves. Why this woman?

Why that job? Why not that woman? Why not that job?" To put it into a nutshell, "Why do we have an eagerness to live in limbs that are destined to rot?" "For most men, the approach of dinner or the arrival of a letter or a smile from a passing girl are enough to help them get around it.

But the man who digs into ideas finds that being face to face with the fact of death gives rise to disgust and revulsion." This is what he's saying. He says, "Hardly anybody wants to actually face the implications of sin. And the implications of sin is death." Nobody wants to face that music.

Nobody wants to face the reality of death. Most people don't dare to think about it. So instead, they chase after these things. They chase after women. They chase after guys.

They work for a certain lifestyle their entire life. They're constantly looking over their shoulder to see that they are keeping up with whatever everyone else is keeping up with. And this is called restlessness. And this restlessness is all there so that they don't have to think about the inevitable. The curse of sin.

That our limbs will rot. That our bodies will die. Now if you ask some of our friends, and I'm sure you've had these conversations, "If you ask them what happens to us when we die, some of our friends will tell us we just turn into fertiliser, worm food, Circle of life mate," they tell us. "Just keeps going."

But this dismissive statement is simply superficial. No one cares so little about life that they wouldn't be concerned about death. How do I know this? Because no human being wants to live in a world where things like love, and legacy, and friendship, and joy are pointless. Many people do say, "I don't care about death."

But ask them about the thought that their wife simply becomes useless fertiliser. The kids. That their memory is pointless. That nothing they ever did. Nothing your wife ever meant to you means anything.

That her existence, her life was meaningless. And I want to bet that if they were truly honest, they would not be able to say hand on heart that is how they feel. That their most cherished and loved ones don't matter at all. They don't matter. Why?

Because our basic human desire is for love to last for eternity. Show me someone who has ever loved anyone deeply and I will show you how they hope that the love they have meant something. And something of that love, they hope will continue after life. And yet, we find ourselves in a world that cannot sustain this love.

We find ourselves in a state of existence of strife and battle and enmity. We find ourselves physically cut off by death from one another. And we see it here in Cain and Abel. The existence outside of paradise meant that relationships between these two brothers break down because of envy. And even if Cain loved Abel, that love couldn't last because one day Abel or Cain would die anyway.

And the question is, "Why can't this world sustain our love?" Because this is not our home, is the answer. The world can't sustain love because in this world, we die. We were designed to know beauty and this world cannot sustain beauty because beauty fades. Yet when we see something truly beautiful, we are transported for a second, just a split second to something divine, something transcendent, something in us hopes that this may go on forever.

So we need to hear two things this morning. Firstly, don't be so naive as to think that you can permanently mask or glaze over the profound spiritual homelessness which each of us faces. That we can somehow cover it up by pursuing something else other than God. "If I can only get a good family, a whole family, then I will be fulfilled." "If I can get the perfect home with the perfect backyard and the greatest pool, then I'll find satisfaction."

"If I can find this or that woman or this or that man to satisfy my needs, then I will have joy." The Scripture says these are empty deceptions. You will never find lasting rest. You will never find satisfaction or joy in pursuing those things, at least not for very long. The second thing we need to learn from this, maybe the flip side is we don't lose hope.

See, the temptation can be, you might say, "Well, I'm not so naive as to chase these things cause I know they don't give me rest." But on the other hand, we may be tempted to say, "Well, it's all pointless then. I hate this universe. I hate this life. It's given me nothing.

It is all without meaning." And we become fatalistic. We become nihilistic in our view of life. Well, C.S. Lewis, the great Christian thinker said, "We have to think harder than that. We have to think beyond that.

To crumble into a heap and say, 'I guess it's all pointless,' is not to be very thoughtful at all." Instead, we should ask the question, "Why do we sense that this place is not our home? Why are we looking for meaning in the first place?" That is a very good question to ask. And when we don't find or where we seemingly don't find this meaning, why are we so frustrated by that idea?

Lewis writes, "Though being hungry does not prove I will get food, surely being hungry proves that there is such a thing as food." He goes on. He says, "You say the material universe is ugly, unjust, that you don't like it. But if you are just a product of a material universe, if that is all you are, why don't you feel at home in it?" Do fish complain about the sea for being wet?

When we get wet, we feel that because we get into water and we are not aquatic creatures. We know what wet feels like because we don't live there. So then the reason you don't feel at home here, well, the only possible explanation is that our real home is somewhere else. And so because of sin and the state of self centredness and lost shalom, we become restless searching for a home. The story of Cain and Abel ends in tragedy.

One person's life is unjustly cut short and the other person is banished even further away from God. God says to Cain in verse twelve that you will be a fugitive and a wanderer on the earth. In stark terms, it marks the lostness of Cain. Even the secondary home that God allowed them just outside the Garden of Eden cannot be his anymore. He must move even further east of Eden.

And his alienation is now complete. He will be a restless wanderer literally, physically for the rest of his life. The root cause of it all, sin. But this is the amazing thing that God also did when Jesus came. Jesus changed the whole downward spiral of that restlessness of humanity.

The apostle Paul writes that Jesus didn't just save a few people from an eternity in hell as if He was sort of just giving them a one-way ticket. He creates, Jesus creates a new world order. To put it even more accurately, He restores the old order. We have a foretaste of this order, of this reconciliation in the church. This very thing that we are a part of right now, this very group of people that we are sitting around this morning, that is a foretaste of what God is doing in restoring the world, in saving a people.

Two Corinthians five, Paul says this: "For Christ's love compels us because we are convinced that one died for all and therefore all of us died. And Christ died for all that those who live should no longer live for themselves, but for Him who died and was raised again. Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old is dead. The new has come."

Paul concludes, "All of this is from God who reconciled us to Himself through Christ." In Jesus, we see the opposite example of Cain. Don't we? Where Cain had succumbed to the selfishness of sin. Jesus is the ultimate example of self sacrifice, of selflessness.

Where Cain gave an inadequate sacrifice, Jesus becomes the sufficient sacrifice given with a heart of worship and obedience to God the Father. The motive of Cain was to give God the crumbs and make it look holy, but Christ's motive was to reconcile, was to restore all things back to God once and for all for His glory. This is how much He loved us. He didn't count our sin against us, the Bible says. He didn't turn His face away with clenched fists at anger.

He came to us. He addressed our problem, the sin that crouches at our door. The consequences of lives that have been consumed by that sin. And this is perhaps our even greater joy, that when He enters our hearts through the Holy Spirit, He starts recreating us so that we find home, that we can taste at least just in part, shalom. And our hearts know, when you have tasted that, our hearts know that this is fair dinkum. This is true.

The old is gone. The new has come. We are new creations as though He is reversing time. The old has gone. The new is arriving.

Hallelujah. Let's pray. Lord, in so many deep and profound ways, we are aware of our restlessness. In so many ways, we know that there is something more than this. Thank you, Lord, that for some of us, have come to that realisation, perhaps long ago, perhaps not so long ago.

But as we grow, as we reflect on You, as we hear Your word, there's something in us that just misses it even more. And so Lord, we miss You, and we miss that home, that existence that we had with You. In our collective memory as mankind, there is something in us that pines after You. As David says, "In Your presence, there is joy and pleasures forevermore." Thank you, Lord Jesus, that you have come to make a way for us.

Thank you that the crouching tiger that consumed us, even the little tiger now that bites at our heels as Christians. Thank you that it will never separate us from that home. I pray that each of us may remember that. I pray that we may all live in light of that. And as our elder Brendan pray that we may go into our week to weeks always knowing, always believing, always trusting that this is true, that this is real, and that our hearts never need to be tied with anything or anyone other than You.

We pray for the strength. We pray for the memory. We pray for the desire to have these things in our hearts. First and foremost, front and centre. And we pray it in Jesus' name through the power of His spirit active and working in us. Amen.