4:9
¶ And the LORD said unto Cain, Where is
Abel thy brother? And he said, I know not: Am I my brother’s keeper? 10 And he said, What hast thou done? the voice
of thy brother’s blood crieth unto me from the ground. 11 And now art thou cursed from the earth, which
hath opened her mouth to receive thy brother’s blood from thy hand; 12 When thou tillest the ground, it shall not
henceforth yield unto thee her strength; a fugitive and a vagabond shalt thou
be in the earth.
Cain
asks an important question that has resounded all throughout history and played
a particularly important role in our society as the Industrial Revolution began
in earnest. Am I my brother’s keeper?
Do you, as a Christian, feel any sense of responsibility for those around you?
We are all children of Adam at birth and the sons, children of God at another
birth, by virtue of our being born again into Christ’s kingdom. All men and
women are our brothers and sisters and all Christians in particular. Do you
feel any responsibility for them? If you do not, ask yourself if that makes you
more like God, who died for all on Calvary and who causes the rain to fall on
good and evil alike and the sun to shine on both, or less like Him.
Matthew
5:45 That ye may be the children of your
Father which is in heaven: for he maketh his sun to rise on the evil and on the
good, and sendeth rain on the just and on the unjust.
1Timothy
2:4 Who will have all men to be saved,
and to come unto the knowledge of the truth.
Specifically,
though, in context, this is another one of man’s dodges as when Adam tried to
pass the blame for disobeying God off on Eve and God Himself in the last
chapter. Here, Cain, knowing he is the murderer of his brother, speaks as if he
is ignorant of what happened to Abel.
God
asks another question to which He already knows the answer, which he reveals
right after the question. Cain will fail at tilling the ground and is to be
cast out into the earth to wander, rejected and exiled.
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