When God says, “Not So.”
sermon by Ann Pittman Zarate
Text: Genesis 4
4 Now the man knew his wife Eve, and she conceived and
bore Cain, saying, “I have produced[a] a man with the help of the Lord.” 2 Next
she bore his brother Abel. Now Abel was a keeper of sheep, and Cain a tiller of
the ground. 3 In the course of time Cain brought to the Lord an offering of the
fruit of the ground, 4 and Abel for his part brought of the firstlings of his
flock, their fat portions. And the Lord had regard for Abel and his offering, 5
but for Cain and his offering he had no regard. So Cain was very angry, and his
countenance fell. 6 The Lord said to Cain, “Why are you angry, and why has your
countenance fallen? 7 If you do well, will you not be accepted? And if you do
not do well, sin is lurking at the door; its desire is for you, but you must
master it.”
8 Cain said to his brother
Abel, “Let us go out to the field.”[b] And when they were in the field, Cain
rose up against his brother Abel, and killed him. 9 Then the Lord said to Cain,
“Where is your brother Abel?” He said, “I do not know; am I my brother’s
keeper?” 10 And the Lord said, “What have you done? Listen; your brother’s
blood is crying out to me from the ground! 11 And now you are cursed from the
ground, which has opened its mouth to receive your brother’s blood from your
hand. 12 When you till the ground, it will no longer yield to you its strength;
you will be a fugitive and a wanderer on the earth.” 13 Cain said to the Lord, “My
punishment is greater than I can bear! 14 Today you have driven me away from
the soil, and I shall be hidden from your face; I shall be a fugitive and a
wanderer on the earth, and anyone who meets me may kill me.” 15 Then the Lord
said to him, “Not so![c] Whoever kills Cain will suffer a sevenfold vengeance.”
And the Lord put a mark on Cain, so that no one who came upon him would kill
him. 16 Then Cain went away from the presence of the Lord, and settled in the
land of Nod,[d] east of Eden.
17 Cain knew his wife, and she
conceived and bore Enoch; and he built a city, and named it Enoch after his son
Enoch. 18 To Enoch was born Irad; and Irad was the father of Mehujael, and
Mehujael the father of Methushael, and Methushael the father of Lamech. 19
Lamech took two wives; the name of the one was Adah, and the name of the other
Zillah. 20 Adah bore Jabal; he was the ancestor of those who live in tents and
have livestock. 21 His brother’s name was Jubal; he was the ancestor of all
those who play the lyre and pipe. 22 Zillah bore Tubal-cain, who made all kinds
of bronze and iron tools. The sister of Tubal-cain was Naamah.
23 Lamech said to his wives:
“Adah and Zillah, hear my
voice;
you wives of Lamech, listen to what I say:
I have killed a man for
wounding me,
a young man for striking me.
24 If Cain is avenged
sevenfold,
truly Lamech seventy-sevenfold.”
25 Adam knew his wife again,
and she bore a son and named him Seth, for she said, “God has appointed[e] for
me another child instead of Abel, because Cain killed him.” 26 To Seth also a
son was born, and he named him Enosh. At that time people began to invoke the
name of the Lord.
Leave it to the brand new senior
pastor of First Baptist Church to assign the the story about two sons fighting
and killing each other to the pregnant lady. Thank you, Griff. Kate Spencer
Lyle texted me the other day, “Wow, you’re preaching while pregnant? That’s
gonna be emotional. Maybe instead of singing in your sermons you’ll be known
for crying?” Leave it to my former FBC college kids to keep me humble.
The good news is, I love this
text. Not just this one. As the Adkins, Valentines, Strickland, Norris,
Greaves, and Avant kids will tell you, I love the Old Testament. And more
specifically, I love the Hebrew scripture of Genesis. It’s right up there with
To Kill A Mockingbird, The Color Purple, Their Eyes Were Watching God, and The
Little Prince.
As Griff reminded us last week,
Genesis one starts off with a swirl of action. With just one word, God sets the
world in motion creating order out of chaos, the story perfectly mirrored by
the poetic and priestly language of worship found in Genesis One. I love how
Griff explained the poem via it’s verbs… Created, separated, spoke, saw, named,
blessed, and rested.
Genesis two and following has a
different rhetoric however. This author’s strategy for describing God and
creation focuses less on how powerful God is and more on how loving and how
near to us God is. The text anthropomorphizes God who in this creation story
walks in the garden. Heavenly hands dig in mud and God isn’t afraid to get
dirty. Halfway through this creation story and we realize “it was good”
probably isn’t going to be a refrain we sing. We read about loneliness and a
God trying to make companions like animals and a woman for the first human whom
God desperately wants to be happy. There aren’t just forests, but good trees
and a bad tree. There’s a talking animal who uses manipulation to get what he
wants. Genesis two’s creation story stands in direct contrast to the
systematic, intentional, and good Genesis one.
And of course, you know the rest
of the story, right? After a game of telephone from God to Adam, Adam to Eve,
and Eve to the serpent, Eve eats some fruit, Adam joins her in juicy
deliciousness, and they are thrown out of the garden for disobeying God. Adam
has to work the fields, Eve has to painfully give birth to new life, and sure
enough, their first child is born, followed by a second. The brothers grow old
enough to choose their own vocations, Cain taking after his father in
agriculture, and Abel starting a new business in animal husbandry. One
brother’s a farmer and one’s a rancher.
And cue sibling rivalry.
At eight years old, the youngest
Pittman daughter announced she would not be doing theatre. She performed in
Fiddler on the Roof in the historic Missouri Theatre and when it finished its
run, the precocious little thing announced that she was done. She had two older
sisters in theatre and after one show herself, she decided she would have none
of it. To this day, Emily still won’t let my parents put the adorable picture
of her in Anatevka up on the wall next to the rest of the family’s theatre
memories. If Ann and Amy were going to be in plays and musicals, Emily was going
to play tennis. The end. Except sibling rivalry never seems to end no matter
how grown up we become.
So the competition begins. Cain
tills the soil to produce crops just like dad. Abel also needs land, but he
uses it to tend sheep. As such, Genesis 4:5 indicates a farmer versus herdsman
mentality. Later, when Cain establishes the first city in 4:17 it may indicate
an urban versus rural rivalry. And without reading the rest of the book, you
can probably already guess which vocation the Israelites adopted as well.
Much of Genesis 1-11, which is
known as “pre-history,” could be described as etiology. Etiology is the study
of why things exist and it can be both scientific and mythological both of
which carry their own elements of truth. In other words, when a kid asks a
parent, “Why does everyone in our family grow up to sheer sheep?” the answer
might be “Once upon a time there were two brothers…”
Or “Mom, why don’t snakes have
arms or legs?” - “Once upon a time there was a garden…”
Or “Grandpa, where do rainbows
come from?” - “Once upon a time there was a flood…”
But back to the story. The
brothers choose vocations and the seeds of sibling rivalry are planted. But the
competition escalates when for some reason the brothers decide they need to
make an offering to God. Remember, we’re at the beginning of the Israelites
story. We’re in pre-history. We’re only in chapter four in the first of 39
books. There’s been no Sinai at this point. No law. No Temple. No rules about
sacrifices to God or worship guidelines. But the two men make an offering: Cain
gives something he grew, Abel gives a firstling of his flock.
And God plays favorites praising
Abel’s offering.
Oh man was that a bad idea. The
Pittman parents can tell you. You never praise one daughter without having
something good to say about the other two. Lord. Obviously God missed the
Parenting 101 class offered seventh period right after Home Ec.
Clearly, the favoring of his
brother upsets Cain. So God confronts Cain about his sunken countenance and warns
him to mind his P’s and Q’s. But Cain invites Abel to go into a field, they
fight, Abel dies, and again God confronts Cain who responds with the now
iconic, “Am I my brother’s keeper?”
When looking at a Hebrew text, I
like to head to the original interpreters to perhaps get a feel for how the
Jews and dare I say Jesus would have heard this story. Just as Christians have
Walter Brueggemann, N.T. Wright, and Jen Hatmaker, the Jews had their rabbis
who wrote about the Hebrew texts. Their interpretations of the stories were
collected in what’s called a Midrash.
Rather than exploring the
etiological “why are we herdsman?” questions, the Midrash raises the questions
“why do we fight? why do we go to war?” One answer we’ve already covered - we
fight over land and property, and the second should be right behind it - we
fight over religion[1] and what we think God likes best.
Fortunately, here in America we’ve
matured to the point that we no longer fight about land, property, or religion,
so we’ll just keep right on digging into this text.
The Midrash offered one
interpretation that focuses less on the why and more on the conversation
afterwards. Look at the infamous verse 9. The word that Cain uses for the
pronoun “I” in “Am I my brother’s keeper?” is the word “Anokhi.” The first
person pronoun usually used by people is “ani,” but Cain uses “anokhi” a rather
uncommon word. In fact, one of the few times “anokhi” is used in the Bible is
in Exodus 20 at the beginning of the 10 commandments, “Anokhi the Lord your
God” I am the Lord your God with anokhi denoting the uniqueness of God.
Thus the rabbis understand Cain’s use of the word ‘Anokhi’ here not as first person
singular, but as another name for God. In other words, Cain doesn’t ask “Am I
my brother’s keeper,” but rather “Isn’t God the guardian of my brother?”
Here we have perhaps the first
person to raise the question of theodicy - can God and evil co-exist? Was it
not God who was tasked with protecting Abel?
Was it not God who failed?
Eve didn’t know what death was
when she argued with the serpent. Is it fair to said that Cain did? In this
interpretation Cain switches the devil-made-me-do-it argument around and
actually blames God! You planted the evil in me. You didn’t protect Abel.
You’re responsible.[2] Not to pin the blame on the
invisible God in the room, but this interpretation raises a question we’ve all
asked.
Why do bad things happen to good
people?
But God is having none of that
argument and like his parents, Cain is cast out. The family of four brutally
became a family of three and is finally back to a family of two. Mom and dad.
Alone.
But like any good firstborn child,
Cain isn’t going without a fight. “You can’t do this to me! Haven’t you heard
of capital punishment?! They’re going to kill me! Do I not matter to you at
all?” he laments at God.
Of course, if you’re trying to
read the Bible literally, you should give up now and go home. The Bible’s
truth-telling is much more sophisticated than science or history: it’s
storytelling. As if two different creation stories weren’t evidence enough, any
eight year old who can read from left to right would respond to Cain’s lament
with, “I’m sorry, but… what people?”
We must set aside our need for
facts and embrace our need for truth.
That’s the great part about
Judaism - Jesus’ religion - one story can have multiple meanings… and all of
them can be true. That’s why Jesus never answered a theological question with
an ontological truth statement. Instead, he told stories. Not just stories,
parables. Somehow in the 2000 years since Christ, Christianity has managed to
lose that beautiful part of the Judeo-Christian story. Told in its entirety,
that story is a tradition of so many stories, and so many truths inside them.
This is gospel. It is literature.
Genesis chapter one was poetic liturgy. Chapters two through four is
storytelling. And it is in this story that we learn about what is perhaps the
most beautiful and poignant truth about God.
Cain said to the Lord, “My
punishment is greater than I can bear! Today you have driven me away from the
soil, and I shall be hidden from your face; I shall be a fugitive and a
wanderer on the earth, and anyone who meets me may kill me.”
God’s response?
“Not so.”
And then the hand of God reached
out like in the iconic Michelangelo painting of Cain’s dad and God put a mark
on Cain.
God marked Cain, “mine.” Safe.
Protected. Do Not Disturb. Seat’s taken.
Hollywood got it wrong. Even the
Indigo Girls got it wrong.[3] The mark of Cain is not a
curse.
It’s the ultimate sign of grace.
Of hope.
It’s the first act of amnesty.
It’s the first of a lot of things.
It’s the first story of the
preference of God for a younger child to an older child (soon to follow is a
preference of Isaac over Ishmael, Jacob over Esau, and Joseph over his 11
brothers).
Cain has been called everything
from the first ginger (thank you Shakespeare) to the first black person (thank
you white supremacists).
But my favorite first is the grace
God pours on Cain. I was reminded of God’s narrative which is told over and
over in the Bible while watching the X-Men movie Days of Future Past. In
it Charles Xavier says, “Just because someone stumbles and loses their path,
doesn't mean they're lost forever.” That is biblical truth. And to make sure
Cain gets the message, God gives him a mark. And he gives him back his life.
It’s a motif that repeats all the
way to the gospels. It doesn’t matter what you do or who you are. Whether
you’re a foreigner named Ruth or a disciple named Peter or a Pharisee named
Saul… there’s always hope. Dying to self, we each are resurrected to walk in
the newness of life. Every. Single. Day.
And thank God because the world is
getting darker and darker. I can hardly read the news anymore in order to
preserve the health of my baby and my own sanity. The people we put in power to
protect us are killing us. They’re shooting our black children. They’re taking
away our health care. They’re putting semi-automatic weapons into the hands of
criminals and people with mental health issues. And we’re letting them do it.
We’re culpable too. We participate in a system of have and have nots. Never
mind the gap between the billionaires and the homeless people. What about the
gap between the millionaires and the lower middle class? I remember when Steve
Mines and I took the FBC college kids to work at an orphanage in Temuco, Chile.
The people who ran the home drove us around town one day to show us the “depth”
of Chile’s disparity. They drove us through the shanties where children and
adults alike lived in cardboard boxes and make-shift dwellings. And then they
drove us to the other side of town and pointed out the huge houses. “Have you
ever seen anything so big?” the guides asked, and I watched my students swallow
hard and struggle to answer. Those “huge houses” were no bigger than 1500-2000
square feat and all but maybe one or two of us lived in houses much larger than
that back in Austin.
If Cain could get angry enough to
kill his brother whom we assume he loved, what will we do - what have we done -
to people we know nothing about? Every time we cheat on our taxes or take the
easy way out, is that one more unfilled pothole in the road? One more unfixed
leak in the roof of an East Austin school? Every time we vote for tax breaks on
the rich, what is the cost to someone further down the line? Every time we buy
a 48 pack of bottled water, what does that cost the environment? And if you
think we as a culture and cops in particular aren’t targeting black boys and
men, you’re just in denial.
No one gets bragging rights when
it comes to righteousness and God. When I was a teenager and read a lot of Max
Lucado books I remember he used jumping as a metaphor for righteousness. It’s
always stuck with me. I’m paraphrasing, but Lucado said, “just because some guy
is prison can only jump three inches and you with all your good deeds can jump
three feet high doesn’t put either of you at an advantage when your goal is the
moon.”
And that means that even if the
most unpopular person in America whether from your perspective that’s Donald
Trump or Stephen Colbert were to turn to God right now in lamentation and cry
out, “My punishment is more than I can bear, I shall be hidden from God’s
face!” They would hear God’s response, “Not so.”
That’s the divine nature of the
gospel. I’d leave that door shut myself, but God says “not so.” Anyone who
knocks, gets to come inside.
Not so. No one can separate you
from the love of God through Christ Jesus. No matter what you do and no matter
what others do to you.
Several weeks ago my husband and I
were invited to New York to have some conversations about our work in Colorado
on the National Winter Playwrights Retreat. As I tried to decide which of the
amazing shows on Broadway I wanted to see during our down time, I texted Griff,
Sarah, and Jared. The latter sarcastically suggested Spider Man. Sarah
voted for Sunday In the Park with George starring Jake Gyllenhaal. But Griff said, “Dear Evan Hanson. You HAVE
to go see Dear Evan Hanson.” And because it’s been getting great
reviews, and because Griff is my new boss, Dear Evan Hanson tickets were
purchased.
Evan Hanson, played flawlessly by
Ben Platt, is a teenager with social anxiety disorder who tells a lie that
quickly escalates from being told to a classmate’s family to circulating the
whole school to “going viral” on social media.
Towards the end of the play as
Evan begins to see the damage he’s caused, he sings a song of lamentation
called “Words fail.” I imagine his sentiment resonates in the heart of anyone afraid
they screwed up enough that the face of God will turn away.
“I’d rather pretend I’m
something better than these broken parts. Pretend I’m something other than this
mess that I am. Cause then I don’t have to look at it. And no one gets to look
at it. No, no one can really see. Cause I’ve learned to slam on the brake
before I’ve even turn the key. Before I make a mistake. Before I leave with the
worst of me. I never let them see the worst of me. Cause what if everyone saw?
What if everyone knew? Would they like what they saw or would they hate it too?
Well I just keep on running away from what’s true. All I ever do is run. So how
do I step in… step into the sun? Step into the sun.”
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