1. THE LORD PUT A MARK ON CAIN (God’s Patient Love)

2. THE LORD PUT A MARK ON CAIN (God’s Patient Love)
Genesis 4:1-5:32
Key Verse 4:15
“But the LORD said to him, ‘Not so, if anyone kills Cain, he will suffer vengeance seven times over. Then the LORD put a mark on Cain so that no one who found him would kill him.’”
Through today’s passage let us learn God’s patient love for men.

3. I. Cain and Abel (4:1-8)

4. God Instituted the System of Making Offerings
To bring an offering to God is an institution that God established for sinful men.
The system of making offerings was completed through Jesus Christ.
In the New Testament, to make an offering was equivalent to worshipping God.

5. God Accepted Abel and His Offerings, but He Did Not Favor Cain and His.
Hebrews 11:4 reads, “By faith Abel offered God a better sacrifice than Cain did. By faith he was commended as a righteous man, when God spoke well of his offerings.”
When he sacrificed animals’ blood to clothe men with garments of skin, God showed that man must make a sacrifice in order to redeem his sin.
This implies the principle that a sinless man must assume sins of other men in order to allow a sinful man to come to God.

6. Why?
The fact that Cain brought fruits of the soil as his sacrifice shows that he brought offerings in his own way rather than in God’s way;
but when Abel brought the fat portions of the first fruit of animals, he had clearly thought about the mind of God and brought his offering in obedience to God’s way.

7. Why?
To bring an offering to God means to accept one’s own wickedness and powerlessness and obey God in God’s way.
Abel accepted his wickedness and powerlessness and obeyed God, but Cain did not obey God.
Abel faithfully depended on God’s righteousness but Cain relied on his own righteousness.

8. What Was Cain’s Response?
Cain was angry, and his face was downcast.
Cain should have accepted God’s sovereign will and changed his wrong attitude toward God.
But he did not want to repent.
He thought that God was not fair in not accepting his offering.
In his rebellion he challenged God’s sovereign will. This was a serious sin.

9. Accept God’s sovereign will
When we accept God’s sovereign will over our lives, our lives become totally different. 
Job
Joseph
Jonathan
To believe in God’s sovereignty makes us mature.

10. Do What Is Right
“The Lord said to Cain, ‘Why are you angry? Why is your face downcast? If you do what is right, will you not be accepted? But if you do not do what is right, sin is crouching at your door; it desires to have you, but you must master it.’”(6,7)
“To do what is right” means “to obey God, who is righteous.”
It means to establish a right relationship with God through faith.
The most important thing for a man is to establish a right relationship with God.

11. Do You Go Well with Your God?
“How are you doing with your God?”
To have good intention in one’s heart means that one’s heart is open to God and one wants to live a righteous and truthful life.

12. How can we master our sin?
The secret of mastering our sinful desires is to live according to the Spirit.
This means to offer our bodies as instruments of righteousness.
Then sin cannot master us.

13. God Gave Cain Directions for Mastering His Sin, But…
Cain did not want to repent.
When he did not repent, his heart became harder and burned with jealousy against his brother.
The jealousy turned into hatred and hatred turned into a burning desire to kill his brother.
Cain deceived Abel and asked him to go out in a field, and there he killed him.
If we have even a little bit of hatred, jealousy or desire to ignore others we should repent immediately.

14. II. Sin and punishment (4:9-15)
“Where is your brother Abel?”
The question was in the voice of God, which prompted Cain’s repentance.
But Cain became rebellious and said, "I don't know, am I my brother's keeper?“
He lied to cover up his murder. He compounded his murder with a lie.

15. Sin and Punishment
Verse 12: “When you work the ground, it will no longer yield its crops for you. You will be a restless wanderer on the earth."
He would, indeed, become a restless wanderer and could not find rest wherever he went.
All descendants of Cain who live without God become restless wanderers.

16. Crucify Our Disobedience and Our Rebellious Heart
The basic nature of Adam’s sin is disobedience, and the basic character of Cain’s sin is rebellion.
In our blood we carry the blood of Adam’s disobedience and of Cain’s rebellion.
If we want to grow spiritually and learn spiritual secrets we should crucify our disobedience and our rebellious heart on the cross and learn obedience.

17. The Mark of God’s Love
Verse 15: “’Not so; if anyone kills Cain, he will suffer vengeance seven times over.’ Then the Lord put a mark on Cain so that no one who found him would kill him.”
God valued Cain’s life and he did not want anyone to take revenge on Cain.
The mark on Cain was not the mark of a murderer but the mark of God’s love.

18. III. Cain’s descendants and Seth’s descendants (4:16-5:32)
When we consider Cain’s descendants we cannot see hope in the world.
But beginning with 4:25 we see the history of Seth’s descendants.
God gave Seth in the place of Abel so that the line of righteousness would not cut off in the middle.
The word “Seth” means “appointed” or “replaced”
Seth’s descendants called on the name of the Lord.

19. In Conclusion,
God leaves remnants here and there and carries out his work of salvation and righteousness.
The battle between the offspring of woman and the offspring of the serpent is still going on and it will reach a climax.
Outwardly, Satan seems to be winning, but Satan will be completely defeated with the glorious coming of Jesus.