Jan 26
27
“Abel was a keeper of sheep.” Genesis 4:2
Octavius Winslow
As a shepherd, Abel sanctified his work to the glory of God, and offered a sacrifice of blood upon his altar, and the Lord had respect unto Abel and his offering. This early type of our Lord is exceedingly clear and distinct. Like the first streak of light which tinges the east at sunrise—it does not reveal everything—but it clearly manifests the great fact that the sun is coming.
As we see Abel, a shepherd and yet a priest, offering a sacrifice of sweet smell unto God—we discern our Lord, who brings before His Father a sacrifice to which Jehovah ever has respect. Abel was hated by his brother—hated without a cause; and even so was the Saviour. The natural and carnal man hated the accepted man in whom the Spirit of grace was found, and rested not until his blood had been shed. Abel fell, and sprinkled his altar and sacrifice with his own blood, and therein sets forth the Lord Jesus slain by the enmity of man while serving as a priest before the Lord.
“The good Shepherd lays down His life for the sheep.” Let us weep over Him as we view Him slain by the hatred of mankind, staining the horns of His altar with His own blood. Abel’s blood speaks. “The Lord said unto Cain—The voice of your brother’s blood cries unto Me from the ground.” The blood of Jesus has a mighty tongue, and the import of its prevailing cry is not vengeance—but mercy. It is precious beyond all preciousness to stand at the altar of our good Shepherd! to see Him bleeding there as the slaughtered priest, and then to hear His blood speaking peace to all His flock, peace in our conscience, peace between man and his offended Maker, peace all down the ages of eternity for blood-washed men. Abel is the first shepherd in order of time—but our hearts shall ever place Jesus first in order of excellence. Great Keeper of the sheep, we the people of Your pasture bless You with our whole hearts—when we see You slain for us!
Not what my hands have done
Can save my guilty soul
Not what my toiling flesh has borne
Can make my spirit whole
Not what I feel or do
Can give me peace with God
Not all my prayers and sights and tears
Can bear my awful load
Thy work alone, O Christ
Can ease this weight of sin
Thy blood alone, O Lamb of God
Can give me peace within
Thy love to me, O God
Not mine, O Lord, to Thee
Can rid me of this dark unrest
And set my spirit free
Thy grace alone, O God
To me can pardon speak
Thy pow’r alone, O Son of God
Can this sore bondage break
No other work, save Thine
No other blood will do
No strength, save that which is divine
Can bear me safely through
I bless the Christ of God
I rest on love divine
And with unfalt’ring lip and heart
I call this Saviour mine
This cross dispels each doubt
I bury in His tomb
Each thought of unbelief and fear
Each ling’ring shade of gloom
I praise the God of grace
I trust His truth and might
He calls me His, I call Him mine
My God, my joy, my light
‘Tis He who saveth me
And freely pardon gives
I love because He loveth me
I live because He lives
Horatius Bonar
Lessons from Cain and Abel
Heb. 11:4 By faith Abel offered unto God a more excellent sacrifice than Cain, by which he obtained witness that he was righteous, God testifying of his gifts: and by it he being dead yet speaketh.
There are some very important lessons for us in the things recorded in the Book of God about Cain and his brother Abel. They are important and practical.
1. Public worship is now and always has been the ordinance of God. — Let self-serving men say what they dare against it. God has always ordained the assemblying of sinners in the name of his Son for worship. Adam and Eve set a time and place for public worship, and taught their children to do the same.
2. The only way sinners can approach and find righteousness with God is by the shed blood of the Lord Jesus Christ, by faith in him. — Cain was rejected of God because he trampled under his feet the blood of Christ and sought to climb into heaven by the merit of his own works. Abel was accepted because he trusted Christ alone.
3. There are only two religions in the world. — The Religion of Cain and The Religion of Abel. – Works and Grace. – Carnal and Spiritual.
4. Our acceptance with God precedes our faith in Christ. — Abel did not earn divine approval by bringing his sacrifice of faith. His sacrifice of faith was the witness of his righteousness, not the cause of it.
5. Salvation is by grace alone. — Grace does not flow in bloodlines. Grace does not depend upon works. Grace is the sovereign prerogative of God and the work of God (Rom. 9:15-18).
6. “Whatsoever is not of faith is sin.” — Cain’s worship, his sacrifice, that very thing by which he hoped to be accepted of God, was as much an act of sin as rape and murder, a sin of much greater portion than rape and murder. His worship was and act of defiant unbelief and rebellion.
7. That which distinguishes one man from another is the grace of God and the grace of God alone (1 Cor. 4:7)— Electing Grace! – Redeeming Grace! – Regenerating Grace! – Keeping Grace! All believers gladly acknowledge, “By the grace of God I am what I am!”
“Naught have I gotten, but what I received,
Grace hath bestowed it since I believed.
Boasting excluded, pride I abase,
I’m only a sinner saved by grace!”
Don Fortner
Christ Is Better
Hebrews 12:24
Throughout the Book of Hebrews the Holy Spirit’s purpose is to show us the superiority of this gospel age to that of the Old Testament. A key word in these 13 chapters is the word “better.” It is used repeatedly.
Christ is better than the angels. “Being made so much better than the angels, as he hath by inheritance obtained a more excellent name than they” (1:4). ― Christ has given us better things, things that accompany salvation. “But, beloved, we are persuaded better things of you, and things that accompany salvation, though we thus speak” (6:9). ― Christ, our Melchizedek, is better than Abraham. “And without all contradiction the less is blessed of the better” (7:7). ― Christ gives us a better hope (“a good hope through grace”), than the law could ever give. “For the law made nothing perfect, but the bringing in of a better hope did; by the which we draw nigh unto God” (7:19). ― Christ is the Surety of a better covenant. “By so much was Jesus made a surety of a better testament” (7:22). ― Christ is the Mediator of a better covenant. “But now hath he obtained a more excellent ministry, by how much also he is the mediator of a better covenant, which was established upon better promises” (8:6). ― Christ is a better sacrifice. “It was therefore necessary that the patterns of things in the heavens should be purified with these; but the heavenly things themselves with better sacrifices than these” (9:23). ― Christ gives us a better, enduring, heavenly inheritance. “For ye had compassion of me in my bonds, and took joyfully the spoiling of your goods, knowing in yourselves that ye have in heaven a better and an enduring substance” (10:34). ― In Christ we are made citizens of a better country. “But now they desire a better country, that is, an heavenly: wherefore God is not ashamed to be called their God: for he hath prepared for them a city” (11:16). ― Christ gives us hope of a better resurrection. “Women received their dead raised to life again: and others were tortured, not accepting deliverance; that they might obtain a better resurrection” (11:35). ― God has provided for us better things in Christ. “God having provided some better thing for us, that they without us should not be made perfect” (11:40). ― Christ’s sacrifice and blood speaks better things than the blood of Abel and his sacrifice. “And to Jesus the mediator of the new covenant, and to the blood of sprinkling, that speaketh better things than that of Abel” (12:24).
Coming to Christ
“And (ye are come) to Jesus the mediator of the new covenant.” ― Faith is coming to Christ. All who are born of God and taught of him come to Christ. But coming to Christ is not at all what people imagine it to be. Coming to Christ is an act of faith. It is altogether something that is done in the heart. It is altogether a spiritual thing. Many came to Christ physically, touching him, and being touched by him, who never came to him. – “It is the spirit that quickeneth. The flesh profitteth nothing.” Multitudes come to Christ outwardly, by profession, in the place of public worship, who never come to him (Ananias and Sapphira — Simon Magus). Faith is a heart work. It is coming to Christ with a sense of need. It is coming to him as the One, the only One, who has infinite fulness to meet our souls’ need. This faith is the gift and operation of God’s almighty, omnipotent, irresistible, efficacious grace. Faith is coming to Christ and no one else. It is coming to him alone for everything (1 Cor. 1:30-31). It is coming to Christ as a poor, helpless, bankrupt, naked, needy sinner. It is coming to Christ with no aide, no assistant, no mediator, no priest, and no sacrifice. It is coming to Christ bringing nothing of your own to ingratiate you. It is coming to Christ bringing nothing but your filth for him to cleanse, your sin for him to forgive, your nakedness for him to cover, and your need for him to meet. To all who come, our Savior promises, ― “Him that cometh unto me, I will in no wise cast out!”
A Divine Gift
This gift of faith is the great privilege of God’s elect. It is the blessing of blessings. All who are given this great boon of grace are saved, safe, settled, secure, and at peace. They can want no good thing, for all things are theirs. We have free access to God through Christ, and a right to all privileges of the sons of God in him!
Don Fortner
Cain, Esau, Saul, Ahab, Judas
(J.C.Philpot)
“For godly sorrow worketh repentance to
salvation not to be repented of: but the sorrow of the world worketh
death.”
2 Cor. 7:10
These two
kinds of repentance are to be carefully distinguished
from each other; though they are often sadly
confounded. Cain, Esau, Saul, Ahab, Judas, all repented. But their
repentance was the remorse of natural
conscience, not the godly sorrow of a broken heart
and a contrite spirit. They trembled before God as an
angry Judge, but were not melted into contrition
before Him as a forgiving Father.
They neither hated their sins nor forsook them.
They neither loved holiness nor sought it.
Cain went out from the presence of
the Lord.
Esau plotted Jacob’s death.
Saul consulted the witch of Endor.
Ahab put honest Micaiah into prison.
Judas hanged himself.
How different from this forced and false repentance of a reprobate, is the repentance of a child of God; that true repentance for sin, that godly sorrow, that holy mourning which flows from the Spirit’s gracious operations!
Godly sorrow does not spring from a sense of the wrath of God in a broken law, but from His mercy in a blessed gospel; from a view by faith of the
sufferings of Christ in the garden and on the cross; from a manifestation of pardoning love; and is always attended with self-loathing and self-abhorrence; with deep and unreserved confession of sin and forsaking it; with most hearty, sincere and earnest petitions to be kept from all evil; and a holy longing to live to the praise and glory of God.