Sermon Tone Analysis

Genesis 4:1‑7

Unacceptable Worship

 

/Adam lay with his wife Eve, and she became pregnant and gave birth to Cain.

She said, “With the help of the LORD I have brought forth a man.”

Later she gave birth to his brother Abel.

/

/Now Abel kept flocks, and Cain worked the soil.

In the course of time Cain brought some of the fruits of the soil as an offering to the LORD.

But Abel brought fat portions from some of the firstborn of his flock.

The LORD looked with favour on Abel and his offering, but on Cain and his offering he did not look with favour.

So Cain was very angry, and his face was downcast.

/

/Then 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/.

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fear that the average professing Christian has never had a worship experience.

Asked to define worship, the average Canadian would be unable to offer a suitable definition.

Perhaps the greater tragedy is that the average professing Christian is ill equipped or even incapable of providing a definition.

You must bear in mind that God is not obligated to accept all that we proffer as worship.

Not all that parades under the guise of worship is worship, nor is it acceptable to God as worship.

What is worship?

The definition grows out of the heart.

As with so very much of that associated with the Spirit of God, worship must be experienced rather than explained.

Worship is that intimate time one spends in the presence of the Living God.

There the worshipper will quietly adore Him in wonder, admiration and awe.

Worship is the continuing experience of waiting in boundless confidence as one marvels in His power and grace.

Anything less is not worship.

In the *fourth chapter of Genesis* we learn for the first time that not all which man offers is acceptable to God as worship.

What elements are to be avoided if we will please God in worship?

Worship involves the whole being—attitude, action and ascription.

Therefore, unacceptable worship would be any effort that fails in one of these areas—attitude, action or ascription.

*Unacceptable Attitudes* — God rejected Cain’s worship.

The text illustrates that Cain exhibited at least three attitudes unworthy of God and thus unworthy to be recognised as worship.

The attitude is the most difficult part of our worship to control because it challenges our very being.

If our attitudes will honour God we must ruthlessly confront our own desires and our own thoughts, compelling each to submit to the Mind of Christ.

Cain possessed an attitude of self.

He was concerned with how he could promote his own interests instead of discovering what would please the Lord.

*Verse three* reads: /In the course of time Cain brought some of the fruits of the soil as an offering to the LORD/.

At first glance this appears to be a noble and commendable action on the part of Cain.

However, it was an unacceptable sacrifice to God.

We must see his actions as God saw.

There are several reason why this sacrifice was unacceptable and we need to think carefully about each of these reasons.

Each of the reasons I shall shortly provide will reveal an expression of *self*.

Cain attempted to avoid responsibility for his own particular sin.

Cain tried to provide his own justification.

Cain attempted to gain entrance into the presence of the Living God through His own efforts.

Cain attempted to avoid responsibility for sin.

Note the Word of God in *Hebrews 9:22*.

/The law requires that nearly everything be cleansed with blood, and without the shedding of blood there is no forgiveness/.

God Himself instituted the sacrificial system, a system that always pointed forward to the perfect sacrifice that He Himself would provide.

When God made coats of skin for Adam and Eve He slew the animals, teaching them that it was their sin which caused death.

His action also compelled them to acknowledge that only through the shedding of blood would atonement be provided for sin.

They knew, and Cain knew, that only through shedding blood could a way into the Divine presence be secured.

Two major sacrifices were given Israel under the Law.

One was a sweet savour offering and the other was a non-sweet savour offering.

The sweet savour offering was, in general, to provide reconciliation between man and God.

It was to provide a way for man to come into the presence of God that they might fellowship together.

The non-sweet savour offering was designed to remove sin from man, making him acceptable before God.

The non-sweet savour offering was to make man guiltless and pure before God.

Both offerings required the death of another in order to be effective.

A /burnt offering/ was to be /a male without defect/—a perfect young bull.

It was to be presented /at the entrance to the Tent of Meeting so that it will be acceptable to the LORD/.

The one making the sacrifice was to lay his hand on the head of the burnt offering, and it [would] be accepted on his behalf to make atonement for him.

He is to slaughter the young bull before the LORD, and then Aaron’s sons the priests shall bring the blood and sprinkle it against the altar on all sides at the entrance to the Tent of Meeting [*Leviticus 1:3-5*].

A fellowship offering was to be an animal from the herd without defect, either male or female, presented before the LORD.

The one presenting the fellowship offering was to lay his hand on the head of his offering and slaughter it at the entrance to the Tent of Meeting.

Then Aaron’s sons the priests were to sprinkle the blood against the altar on all sides [*Leviticus 3:1, 2*].

The sin offering was to be a female lamb without defect.

The worshipper was required to lay his hand on its head and slaughter it for a sin offering at the place where the burnt offering is slaughtered [*Leviticus 4:32, 33*].

I am struck by the fact that there is but one way into the presence of God and that is by acknowledgement of your own sin and through casting oneself on His mercy.

Whether the offering was for the purpose of fellowship or to atone for sin, the worshipper was himself or herself required to kill the animal offered.

This was a powerful reminder of the responsibility of the worshipper for his or her sin.

There was no possibility of reducing worship to mere form if the act of worship began with such vivid confession of personal guilt.

Perhaps we would benefit from a reminder before ever we attempt to worship of our own guilt and of our own responsibility for broken fellowship.

No individual deserves salvation.

No individual deserves the privilege of coming into the presence of the True and Living God.

It is impossible to enjoy the presence of God except He should deign to be present with those seeking to worship.

God is not obligated to grace our efforts with His presence, though He delights to do so.

Salvation, fellowship with God, forgiveness of sin … all is given by God to the humble soul.

Whenever an individual says he or she will worship God, trusting Him for salvation and trusting themselves to do some good work, they are attempting to avoid responsibility for their own sin and they are attempting to force their way into the presence of God.

Cain attempted to provide for his own justification.

There are but two religions in this world.

One religion says that we must do something in order to merit salvation.

It says we must engage in some activity in order to be justified and in order to merit Heaven.

That religion depends totally upon how effectively we engage in some particular activity.

The other religion says that we can never merit the love of God and that we can never merit salvation.

We must cast ourselves fully on the grace of God.

A number of groups claiming to be fellow believers can be found on the fringes of the Faith.

Among those groups are the Jehovah’s Witnesses.

They claim salvation is capable of being earned.

They are uncertain of much of anything when speaking of God’s grace.

There is an answer provided for such people, and we should not hesitate to give it when we confront them.

It is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God—not by works, so that no one can boast.

For we are God’s workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do [*Ephesians 2:8-10*].

Another group calls itself the Worldwide Church of God and a growing number of evangelical scholars are saying that they have changed and are now Christians.

They still follow the teachings of a senile, twice-divorced, lecherous old man who ruled so completely in their lives that they were required to give more than thirty percent of their income to his cult.

They submitted, and still submit, to such an extent that they permit even the breaking up of homes and dissolution of marriages.

Is there no answer for such a group?

There were also false prophets among the people, just as there will be false teachers among you.

They will secretly introduce destructive heresies, even denying the sovereign Lord who bought them—bringing swift destruction on themselves.