Becoming Human: A Devotion on Genesis 1-11Isampula

When I was a student at Moorlands Bible College, there was a student lounge where we spent almost every waking moment in which we weren’t in lectures. At the time, it was a little worn down. As well as its somewhat musty smell, it had a pool table with a cue you had to share and yellow wallpaper peeling at the edges. In our final year, the campus had a fancy renovation, but during my three years of study, this student lounge was the life of the college. It was the place for deep late-night conversations, game nights, and countless belly laughs. We loved it! The only thing we didn’t like about it was the sink in the kitchen at the far end. It regularly built up with people's mugs and plates as a group of young adults got to grips with the basics of cleaning up after ourselves.

Regardless of the carnage through the week and late-night antics on Friday night, when students came in to make their mid-morning coffee, the kitchen was immaculate. It made no sense, and it sometimes even felt awkward that someone was cleaning up our mess. Only in my final year of study did I discover that the Vice Principal, unbeknown to the student community, used to come in early on Saturdays, before anyone was out of bed, and clean the kitchen for everyone. We never even had lectures on Saturday; he went out of his way to show kindness by cleaning up the mess we couldn’t be bothered to tidy ourselves.

We don’t often associate the story of Cain and Abel with kindness. Maybe it’s the minor detail of the first murder in history that steals our attention. But on the first few pages of the Bible, amid the drama, we find a story not only of mess and darkness but also, perhaps surprisingly, of kindness.

We find this lesson amid a series of events that should cause us to ask some questions. After offering what seems to be some below-par sacrifices, Cain has a confrontation with God. Cain heads out to the field with his brother Abel and driven by jealousy, bitterness, and resentment, he attacks his brother and kills him. Now, hold up. Murder is no light deal.

And given that this is supposed to be the first murder in human history, that really makes it something worth thinking about. Imagine with me that you are Cain. You are a farmer, and you work the ground. It’s hard work; your hands get cut up a bit, your back aches, and scars from thistles mark your body. You have gained an understanding of pain and what causes it. What you don’t understand is killing. You haven’t seen or heard of someone dying at the hands of another before; it has never happened. So imagine the horror you would feel when, in your anger, you lash out at your brother Abel, thinking that you are going to cause some temporary pain, only to discover that he falls to the ground. The life that once inhabited his body seems to disappear.

Maybe you think that’s a bit unrealistic. Perhaps we live in a world now where we have become all too familiar with death. But this surprise would explain God’s response.

Then the Lord said to Cain, “Where is your brother Abel?”

- Genesis 4:9a

It echoes the story we read before with Adam and Eve. Surely God, in all his omniscience, knows where Able is? And given the weight of what’s just happened, surely God has some words to say. If you were God and you had just seen a murder, the first murder (ever!), you wouldn’t be playing guessing games. But what if God was looking to give Cain a chance to reveal something of his own heart?

Cain responds: “I don’t know,” he replied. “Am I my brother’s keeper?”

Uh oh… It's Eden all over again. Pass the blame and pretend nothing happened. Ironically, Cain's rhetorical question almost makes us want to shout the answer. “Yes! You are your brother's keeper; that’s the role of an older brother, right? To protect, to look after, to keep safe!” Cain's sin is not only what he does but what he fails to do. He not only kills his brother, accidentally or otherwise, but he fails to protect his brother.

So, what does God do about it? Kill Cain? Imprison him? Torture him? Not exactly. The Lord reveals a curse of Cain that reflects the curse his parents received before him. Like his parents before him, he is banished from where he lives and will struggle to produce food from the ground.

But then Cain pipes up with a complaint:

Today you are driving me from the land, and I will be hidden from your presence; I will be a restless wanderer on the earth, and whoever finds me will kill me.”

- Genesis 4:14

That all seems fair enough. An eye for an eye, a life for a life? It seems the least Cain deserves! But then God does something surprising and unexpected. He acts kindly to Cain.

But the Lord said to him, “Not so; anyone who kills Cain will suffer vengeance seven times over.” Then the Lord put a mark on Cain so that no one who found him would kill him.

- Genesis 4:15

All of a sudden, the story reorientates itself from one of darkness and pain to one that shows extraordinary kindness. In the same way that Cain should have been his brother's keeper, God becomes Cain's keeper. Marking him, ensuring his safety from the very thing that he deserves. In the first few pages of Genesis, we see a kind of grace that points us towards Jesus. A grace that meets us in all of our guilt and offers us precisely what we do not deserve. A grace that invites into a kingdom that does the same for others. If you read Deuteronomy 19, we find examples ingrained in the very fabric of Old Testament law of how refuge should be given to those who don’t deserve it. Laws that would ultimately be fulfilled by Christ and reflected in his kingdom.

Let me finish with a question. Where can you be responsible for showing kindness as an unexpected response?