The First Angry Man

...For Cain and for his offering [God] had no regard. So Cain became very angry and his countenance fell. Then the Lord said to Cain, “Why are you angry? And why has your countenance fallen? If you do well, will not your countenance be lifted up? And if you do not do well, sin is crouching at the door; and its desire is for you, but you must master it” (Gen. 4:5-7).

These verses recount what happened BEFORE Cain killed his brother, Abel. Cain had prepared an offering for the Lord. The details are somewhat sketchy, but based upon God's response, we can be sure that Cain's offering deviated from what God desired. Perhaps, when God covered the nakedness of Adam and Eve using animal skins, He made it clear that innocent blood must figure into a man's offering. Perhaps, Cain's offering deviated by putting emphasis on himself and what he could produce. Regardless of the reasons that lay behind God's response, Abel's offering was accepted; Cain's was rejected. And this made Cain mad.

For anyone who wants to conquer anger, there are two key lessons in this passage. First, it tells us something about WHY men get mad. Cain is angry because God has not honored HIS plan. Cain had already worked out in his mind how things would go. He had prepared an awesome offering of fruits and vegetables; God was supposed to say, "Wow! Thanks, Cain. You're swell!" But God didn't come through with high fives - He showed complete disinterest.

Cain's face clouded with disappointment. God responded, "If you do well, will not your countenance be lifted up?" God is intimating that Cain has not done what is right, and this is the source of his problem. Like Sinatra, Cain "did it my way" but wants God to respond as if he did it GOD'S way. Cain is angry for the same reason men get angry today: We want to do things our way AND want God to bless us for it.

When you get angry, ask yourself these two questions:  Have I done something wrong? Am I mad because I am reaping the consequences of my poor choices? If the answer to both questions is "yes," there is a simple solution. Change course and do what is right! Your anger will evaporate.

When God warned Cain, "sin is crouching at the door," He was alerting Cain to the fact that his rage had increased his vulnerability to sin. An angry man can do something he would never otherwise think of doing. Cain's anger made him an easier target for sin's impulses.

Knowing this ought to give us a healthy fear of becoming angry. Like drunkenness, so anger can distort our vision and weaken our resistance against sin. Look what happened to Cain! His brooding anger made him a sitting duck when the impulse to kill his brother asserted itself. When you are angry, sinful words and deeds which would otherwise make no sense at all will seem perfectly reasonable. Don't give sin such an advantage. Lay off the anger to get things into their proper perspective!

Comments

[AC]

Your post made me think of something I never really considered before: the similar way in which the Jews and Cain respond to God.

Comparatively speaking, Cain seems far from religiously ignorant: he believed in God, and, more than that, believed that God was good. Why else would God's approval have motivated him? Even in "religious" circles, how many people take action motivated by a desire for God's approval, as Cain did? At first glance, he seems to have some thoroughly good qualities...

And yet, he 1) apparently didn't tender an offering to God on God's terms, and 2) let his ardor for God's blessing and approval be commandeered by murderous impulse.

This, to me, seems eerily similar to what Paul wrote about his Jewish brethren, the pharisees: Romans 10:2-4 "For I testify about them that they have a zeal for God, but not in accordance with knowledge. For not knowing about God's righteousness and seeking to establish their own, they did not subject themselves to the righteousness of God."

Anyway, I think it's interesting that both the Jews and Cain wanted something from God: for Cain, approval; for the Jews, political messiah. What's even more interesting to me is that both of these desires have sound underpinnings: a belief in God's good plan and a belief that his approval matters.

And yet, each had a "righteousness of their own" that wouldn't yield to whatever God had in mind. The Jews declined to accept Jesus as more than a political messiah, and Cain declined to tender a sacrifice according to God's guidelines. Both seem to have ultimately committed murder under the banner of zeal for God.

I guess I'm left wondering whether to conclude that Cain and his Jewish descendants insincerely laid claim to Divine motivation, or if the abyss of man's fallen nature is so dark and terrible that even his best efforts at living and loving God's law come out horribly wrong.

[Jim Fleming]

AC:
Astute observations! A striking parallel, indeed! As to your question, if you read God's appeal to Cain in Genesis 4, it appears that Cain's was a conscious failure. Cain wanted God's approval, yes, but chose to willfully defy God by seeking it on his terms.

By the way, the Jews are NOT descendants of Cain but of his younger brother, Seth.