Let's turn in our Bibles to the
book of Hebrews chapter 11. Hebrews chapter 11, I'm just
gonna deal with one verse in this passage as we go through
it. Concerning, as Randy said, the subject, a more excellent
sacrifice. Verse four, speaks of a man named
Abel by faith. Abel offered unto God a more
excellent sacrifice than Cain. By which, that is by this more
excellent sacrifice. Now that's key. Abel obtained
witness. A witness from who? From God. That he was righteous. God testifying
of his gifts, of the things that God gave him. That's what it's
talking about. and by it he being dead yet speaketh. In other words,
I'm preaching Abel's message this morning. Abel's giving testimony
this morning. This man named Abel. Now in this
series of messages, last two messages I entitled The Dynamics
of Saving Faith. One of the things I have in mind
is the fact that our generation, as every generation, needs to
be taught a biblical understanding of this issue of faith, faith. I've said in the past that most
people think of faith as just believing something, believing
anything, but just believing it sincerely. Everybody says,
well, you've got to be sincere. Well, sure you have to be sincere.
Abel was a sincere person. Somebody says, well, you've got
to believe intensely. You've got to believe it a lot.
And just going on about faith that way, some kind of a mystic
thing. Many people think of faith as
persuading God to do something that he's reluctant or just wouldn't
do otherwise. For example, when somebody gets
sick, we say, well, let's pray for them, okay? Well, we who
are saying, we should pray for the sick, but not to persuade
God to do something that he's reluctant to do. Our prayers are to be supported
and underlined with these words, thy will be done. And many times in our prayers
or in our lives, we find out that God's will and our will
are not the same. And somebody says, well, let's
start a prayer chain. You know, well, if we get enough
people praying, maybe God will hear us. Are you serious? Now
think about that. God knows our thoughts. And I'm not just saying that
to make fun of people. I know people are sincere and
dedicated in their prayers or their faith. But unless you understand
what the Bible shows us as biblical, God-given faith, by grace are
you safe, through faith, that not of yourselves, it's the gift
of God. Faith is not natural to us. The Bible speaks of the natural
man receiving not the things of the Spirit of God. The natural
heart is an evil heart of unbelief. And I'm telling you, if you have
God-given faith, you need to understand if that's
the case. If your faith is that which God
gives by His Spirit through His Word, you're a miracle of God's
grace. You're not just somebody who
rose up out of the crowd and left them behind. It was a better
person than this one or that one. But here's the things that
I've been trying to emphasize. I've got basically three points
that I'm gonna emphasize through these messages. And that's this,
number one, saving faith has a foundation. What is the foundation? It's the word of God. In other
words, whatever I believe, if it's God-given, saving faith,
it's got to be based upon what God said and not what I think,
or not man's opinion. But I've got to be able to point
to the Word of God. We're saying, standing on the
what? The promises of God. We're going to see in just a
moment about Cain and Abel. Cain believed a promise that
God didn't make. Do you understand that? Abel
believed a promise that God did make. Cain believed a promise
God did not make. It was his own imagination. Abel believed a promise God did
make. All right? Secondly, faith has
to have a proper object. and what is the only object of
faith? well it's put this way in the Hebrews 11 for a more
excellent sacrifice now listen to me Abel was killed by his
brother when both were young men you know a lot of people
when they tell the story of Cain and Abel they act like these
these boys were just like teenagers or something no they were men
with families How do you know that? Because they were bringing
sacrifice and that was the head of the household to do that. If they'd been teenagers, it
would have been Adam bringing it for them. So they were probably, I'd say
probably in their 20s or 30s, I don't know, but they were men. But Abel was cut down in the
prime of life. He had a very short life. And there's not a whole lot written
in the Bible if you consider the whole content of Genesis
to Revelation about Abel. And here's just one verse. But Abel's testimony and what
is said about Abel is so profound and sets such a precedence concerning
gospel truth and how God saves sinners that it's just amazing
how God has put this, and it's so simple. It's as simple as
this. Everything about Abel's salvation,
everything about his acceptance before God, with God, everything
about his worship, everything about his faith is in this one
thing, a more excellent sacrifice. We're not told anything else
about Abel here other than in Genesis 4 we're told that he
was a shepherd. He was a keeper of the sheep.
We're not told about his sinful past. We're not told about his
attitude other than what we know from what we can derive from
the passage here. He approached God as a sinner,
begging for mercy. How do I know that? Well, just
hold on. the object of his faith was this more excellent sacrifice
and you know what this more excellent sacrifice means and what it points
to points to Christ and Abel knew that you say well
there's a lot of things Abel did not know you're exactly right
but he knew the promise that God made to send a redeemer a
sacrifice a messiah who would be the Son of God in human flesh. He knew that. Who would establish
righteousness for him. That's the object of faith. Christ. And then thirdly, that's the
second, faith has a foundation, the Word of God. Secondly, faith
has an object. Christ as he's promised in the
Word of God, the Gospel. And faith has proof. There's
evidence of faith. Do you believe this Gospel? And
that proof comes in many forms, and we're going to see it throughout
this passage as we go through it. But Abel proved his faith
here by doing what? He brought a more excellent sacrifice. That's proof of his faith. Cain
said, well, I believe too, but what do you believe, Cain? How
do you know Cain's faith was not God-given, saving faith,
Holy Spirit-wrought faith? He didn't bring the more excellent
sacrifice. By faith able. What does that
mean? Does that mean Abel just believed
whatever he believed hard? Sincere? I believe he was sincere,
I do. But that's not the point. By
faith, by looking to and resting in Christ, the future promised
Messiah. What did Abel do by faith? He
offered a more excellent sacrifice than Cain. His faith, his acceptance
with God, his righteousness was all about this one thing. Simple, folks. This is the simplicity. You know,
Paul, when he wrote to the Corinthians in the second epistle, he talked
about them being moved away from the simplicity that's in Christ. He's not talking about a simple
ABC message, one, two, three, walk the aisle, get on your knees,
pray this prayer after me stuff. That's not what he's talking
about. The simplicity that's in Christ is just the same as
the simplicity is here. Everything I am, everything I
have that is acceptable to God, pleasing to God, is in Christ. Simple as that. It's based on
His blood and righteousness. Simple as that. Nothing else. Somebody says, well, but you
gotta do your part. My part is the recipient of the blessings. that I didn't earn and don't
deserve, even at my best. It's all about this one thing.
And whenever false preachers come in and try to interject
the works or the will of men, you know what they do? They confuse
that simplicity. They dishonor that simplicity. They corrupt it. It's all about this. And it says, by which he obtained
witness that he was righteous. Is there any doubt that Abel
was righteous? What does the Word of God say?
It doesn't say that he obtained witness that he would be in the
future righteous. It says he was righteous. And
the righteousness that was imputed to Abel, charged to Abel, had
not yet been brought in time because that came in time on
the cross when Christ was crucified and died. You say, well, how
could God do that? It's based upon the surety of
His promise. You see, there was absolutely
no doubt and no possibility that the Son of God, the second person
of the Trinity, would come into this world and take into union
with himself the likeness of sinful flesh, yet without sin,
and do his great work of redemption as Abel's surety and substitute,
go to the cross, die for Abel's sins, and establish righteousness,
which God had already imputed to Abel. All the promises of God are in
Him, that Him there is Christ. Yay and amen, sure and certain.
There was never any doubt. Satan couldn't stop it. And no
man could stop it. Abel couldn't even stop it. The ground of Abel's justification
before God was the imputed righteousness of Christ and the source of Abel's
life, spiritual life and faith and repentance. and love was
that same imputed righteousness, Christ. That's what this more
excellent sacrifice means. So what was Abel's foundation
of faith? Turn back to Genesis chapter
two. Now, as I said, this sets precedence. I think we've got two lawyers
in the audience, right? Y'all know what precedence is,
don't you? Sometimes when you argue your case and prepare your
case, you have to go back to legal precedence. Something that
you can go back to as a benchmark upon which to base your arguments.
Well, that's what this is. This is precedence. They're right
here. You wanna know how God saves sinners? You wanna know
how he has always saved sinners? It starts all the way back here.
Look at Genesis chapter two, for example. Verse 16. Here God lays down the law. Here's
the law. That's where you got to start.
What's the law? You know, they're arguing today
about President Trump and his executive orders and all that.
And they've forgotten the law, hadn't they? It's like the law
doesn't even exist. Well, that's what it's all about.
Well, here God lays down the law. Look at it. Verse 16 of
Genesis 2. The Lord God commanded the man,
saying, of every tree of the garden thou mayest freely eat.
You can eat of any tree in this garden, except one. Here's the law, verse 70. But
of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt
not eat of it. You can't eat of that tree. That's
God's right. That's God's sovereign right.
And what this tree of the knowledge of good and evil, now don't be
arguing about whether it was a palm tree, a fig tree, and
all that junk. That just diverts your mind away
from the issue here. What this tree represents is
God's sovereign right as creator to lay down the law. God is the
one who says what's good and what's evil. Adam didn't have
that right because Adam was the creature. You see that? You're
a citizen of the United States of America. Our forefathers laid
down the law in the Bill of Rights and the Constitution when this
country began. Now you don't have any right
to go around here and say, no, I'm going to change that law.
Somebody said it takes an act of Congress to change the law.
Yes, it does. Elected representatives. But
you just can't go out on your own and say, well, now, I don't
like that law. You go to a jewelry store and
you see that beautiful diamond there, and the law says you can't
steal that. Well, I'm gonna change that.
I'll just break in there and steal that. Well, you can't do that. That's against the law. Well,
who has the right to set the law down? God does, not me, not
you. That's why when you hear preachers
preach and they're giving you their opinions, what God would
do, what God won't do, I'm telling you, run as fast as you can. They better be talking about
God's word. So he says, you can't eat of that. Now, here's the
penalty. You see, God is a God of justice
and he cannot be anything but a God of justice. He cannot just
say, forget about it. You know, okay, you broke the
law, just forget about it. Let's act like it didn't happen.
No, he can't do that. And he says, for in the day that
thou eatest thereof, thou shalt surely die. You may have in your
concordance this phrase, and it's a good translation of it.
It says, in the day that you eat thereof, dying thou shalt
die. And that indicates that this
death involves something more than just physical death. Now,
Adam didn't die physically immediately, did he? In fact, he lived, what,
almost 900 years? All total. But the process of physical death
began. The disease and the decay and
the corruption of physical death. But I'll tell you how he died.
He died spiritually. He lost his spiritual ears. When the gospel is preached,
the scripture says the true gospel now, not a false gospel. but
the true gospel is foolishness to them that perish. Why? They don't have spiritual ears
to hear the truth, to love it and believe it. How many times
in the book of Revelation did the Lord say, he that hath ears
to hear, let him hear. What did he tell the disciples
about the Pharisees? Hearing, they hear not. Seeing,
that's spiritual eyes. Seeing, they see not. But blessed
are your ears, for they hear. Blessed are your eyes, for they
see. Can you see and hear? And you know what I'm talking
about. I'm talking about spiritually. The glory of God in the face
of Jesus Christ. Do you see how much of a sinner
we are in the sight of God? Somebody says, well, I just don't
believe this part of the Bible. Listen to me. If we don't see the sinfulness
of sin as God shows us, we don't have spiritual eyes to see. I'm not talking about somebody
who says, well, I can't see the depths of my depravity. I'm not
talking about that. I'm talking about this. I'm saying, just
like I always define total depravity, number one, we don't have righteousness. Pick the best person out on earth
that ever lived, ever will live, other than Christ, who is God-man.
That person does not, by nature, does not have righteousness.
Secondly, we can't work one. We can't create one. And thirdly,
we don't want one God's way. Because God's way takes everything
that we by nature highly esteem and puts it in the category of
abomination. Everything a man and woman naturally
thinks recommends them unto God is an abomination to God. You say, well, where's our hope?
Right here it is. A more excellent sacrifice. One whom God is pleased with.
We're gonna talk about that next week with Enoch. But God says you're gonna die.
And then the Bible teaches us that when Adam died, when he
disobeyed, and when he, in unbelief, that we all fell with him, doesn't
it? You say, well, not me. Well,
you're the exception. But according to the Bible, you're
right with the rest of us. You're in the same boat that
we're all in. When Adam fell, we fell. Romans 5, 12. By one man, sin entered into
the world, and death by sin, for that all sin, death passed
upon all men for that all sin, all have sinned. Are you a sinner? If you say
yes, I'm gonna tell you where you got that from. You got it
from Adam. You say, well, I think I got
it from making the wrong choice. Well, do you ever know anybody
in the history of the human race who didn't make that choice? We got it from Adam. So justice,
in the day ye eat thereof, that's the first thing. When I look
over at Genesis chapter three, The penalty of sin had already
been established now, even before Adam fell. And then Adam fell
and plunged the whole human race into sin and death. God then
revealed his way of salvation for sinners by his grace and
mercy based upon justice satisfied through an innocent sacrifice. That's the precedent. And he
talks about a surety and a substitute. And what he's doing here in Genesis
3, you know, Adam and Eve fell. Adam fell into sin, brought the
whole human race. You remember what happened? They
realized they were naked and they were ashamed. So what did
they do? They ran out and hid from God
and got themselves some fig leaf aprons to cover their nakedness. Now, nakedness in the scripture
is a symbol of having no righteousness before God. If you don't have
a righteousness before God, you're spiritually naked and you'll
be ashamed. That's why the scripture says,
he that believeth not shall be ashamed And people spend their
lives trying to clothe themselves with their own works. Lord, Lord,
haven't we preached in your name? Lord, Lord, haven't we done many
wonderful works? Now, if you stand before God
clothed in your own works, speaking metaphorically, you're going
to be ashamed. Depart from me, ye that work iniquity, I never
knew you. And that's what Adam and Eve's fig leaf aprons symbolize,
man's efforts to cover his shame. It won't work. So what does God do? Well, he
first pronounces a curse upon the serpent. Satan appeared to
Eve in the form of a serpent, and he pronounces a curse upon
the serpent. And he says, look at verse 15,
Genesis 3, 15. Some say this is the first promise
of Messiah. He said, I will put enmity between
thee and the woman and between thy seed and her seed. It shall
bruise thy head, thou shalt bruise his heel. The seed of woman. That speaks of a miraculous birth,
doesn't it? And then on over when he's pronounced,
after he pronounces the curse upon the, he pronounces the curse
upon the serpent, then upon the woman and then upon the man.
And after he does that, look at verse 20. Now he'd already
promised that a savior is coming, the seed of woman who will, who
will, he will die. Satan will bruise his heel. And
what he's talking about there is the consequences of death,
the consequences of sin rather. God is the one who bruised him.
Scripture tells us that. And he's coming, he's going to
finish Satan's work. He's going to put Satan down.
He's going to finish transgression, bring in righteousness. And verse
20 says, and Adam called his wife's name Eve. You know her
name was not Eve until after the fall. You know what her name
was before the fall? Woman. Ish. Or Isha, rather. Woman. But now she's called Eve,
look at verse 20, because she was the mother of all the living.
Now, she couldn't be called Eve before the promise of the Messiah
was given, the seed of woman, because without him, there's
no living, there's no life, it's all death. But because he's going
to be the seed of woman, the Messiah, who is our life, she's
called the mother of all living. And then how's that gonna come
about? Look at verse 21. Unto Adam also and to his wife
did the Lord God make coats of skin and clothe them. He slew
an animal. He shed blood. Why did he do
that? To show them in type and picture
that justice must be satisfied. The penalty of death. That's
what you do when you shed blood and make a coat of skin, you
kill an animal, don't you? Death. And that skin that he
clothed with is an emblem, a symbol of the righteousness that the
seed of woman, Christ, would work out on the cross as the
surety and substitute of God's elect, the imputed righteousness
of Christ. And in that little act there,
God established the whole sacrificial worship system of the Old Testament
to typify and point to the coming Messiah. It's all about Christ. And then in Genesis 4, we come
to Cain and Abel. You see, there's the gospel already
established. And that's the foundation of
Abel's faith. God promised to save sinners
through his mercy and grace based on justice satisfied through
an innocent sacrifice, a substitute, a surety, which is Christ. So
here's Cain and Abel. Look at verse three of chapter
four. In the process of time it came
to pass that Cain brought of the fruit of the ground an offering
unto the Lord." Remember what happened when God cursed the
man over in Genesis 3? You know what he did? He cursed
the ground. This earth is cursed. What does
that teach us? There's no salvation in the earth. If you cling to the earth, If you deal only in earthly things,
there's no salvation. The earth is cursed. What did
Cain do? He brought of the fruit of the ground, the fruit of the
cursed earth. That represents his works. Verse
four, and Abel, he also brought of the firstlings of his flock
and the fat thereof. Now, how do you get the fat out
of the firstling of the flocks? Kill it, shed blood. And the
Lord had respect unto Abel and to his offering. You see that? A more excellent sacrifice. How
did Abel know about this salvation? His mommy and daddy taught him,
Adam and Eve, as the Lord revealed it. Verse seven, look here, well,
look at verse six, it says, well, verse five, it says, but unto
Cain and to his offering, God had not respect, and Cain was
very angry, and his countenance, you could tell it in his face,
you ever seen somebody, they can't, they gotta show their
emotions, well, Cain showed them here, his countenance fell. The Lord said unto Cain, why
are you angry? Why is thy countenance fallen?
If thou doest well, shalt thou not be accepted? Now that indicates
that Cain heard the same message that Abel heard. If you do well,
Cain, you'll be accepted. What is it to do well? Well,
that precedence has already been set. What is it to do well in
the sight of God? It's to bring that more excellent
sacrifice. Come to God as a sinner seeking
mercy. pleading the blood and the righteousness
of the Lord Jesus Christ. Come bring in anything else?
Religion of Cain. Only two religions on earth,
you know that, don't you? It's either the religion of Cain
or the religion of Abel. It's salvation by works, conditioned
on sinners, or it's salvation by God's grace, conditioned on
Christ. He says, if thou doest not well,
sin lieth at the door, and unto thee shall be his desire, and
thou shalt rule over him. What he's talking about there,
literally he's saying, if you don't bring that more excellent
sacrifice, that blood sacrifice, if you don't plead Christ and
His blood and righteousness, then sin is waiting outside your
door like a lion ready to pounce on you, and you've got it to
deal with, you'll fail. Only one who can take care of
my sins, Christ. You see, the object of Abel's
faith was the promise of Christ. And what was the proof? Well,
he approached God with the more excellent sacrifice. Look back
over at Hebrews 11. He offered unto God a more excellent
sacrifice. What did that say about Abel?
Boy, he was a better guy than Cain. Well, Abel didn't think
so. Now, how do I know that? Because
he didn't come pleading anything of himself. He came pleading
Christ. And anybody who comes really
by faith, God-given faith pleading Christ, they know they have nothing
of themselves in themselves to recommend themselves unto God.
That's how. Cain was like the Pharisee in
Luke 18. God, I thank you that I'm not
like other men. Abel was like the publican. God
be merciful to me, the sinner. Abel knew that he was in need
of a righteousness he could not produce. He knew that his salvation
was totally 100% by the mercy, sovereign mercy and grace of
God. How do you know? He brought a more excellent sacrifice.
He brought Christ. Turn to that passage that Randy
read in 1 John 3. Anytime I go to this passage,
I'm tempted to go through the whole thing, but I'm not gonna
do that this morning. It says a lot about those who
commit sin and those who do with righteousness. He's not talking
about morality versus immorality. He's talking about belief and
unbelief. Here's a person like Abel who
comes as a sinner seeking mercy But not just mercy, you know
in that passage in Luke 18 when the publican says, God be merciful
to me, you know the word be merciful there is literally be propitious,
propitiation. So he's asking for mercy, as
we all do who know Christ, who know ourselves, but it's mercy
based on justice satisfied. God must be just when he justifies. So here comes Abel that way.
Well, Cain came another way. Now here's a sinner who comes
before God seeking mercy based on justice satisfied. The only
way you can find that is in Christ, the surety and substitute. Can't
find it anywhere else. That's a person who does righteousness
and cannot sin. That's what he's talking about.
Cannot leave Christ, he remains in Christ. Those who come like
Cain pleading anything of themselves or from themselves, they committed
sin. And so he says in verse 12, look
at it, verse 11, 1 John 3, for this is the message that you
heard from the beginning, that we should love one another, not
like Cain. Cain didn't love his brother,
his earthly brother, hated him, who was of the wicked one. That
Cain religion, that works religion is inspired by Satan, folks,
And he slew his brother. And why did he slay him? They
get in an argument over a ball game? You know, I read that in
the paper one time how a father and son got in an argument over
a ball game and the son or the father of one of them killed
the other. Ain't that stupid? Ain't that crazy? Well, why did
Cain kill Abel? It wasn't over something silly
like that. Here's what it was. Because his own works were evil
and his brother's righteous. Abel and his offering. You can't
separate the person from the offering. Do you know that? If the offering is evil, the
person is evil. If the offering is righteous,
the person is righteous. If the offering is Christ, He's
my righteousness. If the offering is anything else,
I have no righteousness. You see that? Abel came God's
way. Someone said one time, whatever
offering you bring, you just bring it in the right spirit
and attitude. Well, my friend, if you bring any offering but
Christ seeking salvation, seeking acceptance with God, seeking
to please God, I can tell you right now, you're not in the
right spirit and the right attitude. No matter how sincere or how
happy you are, Because the only right attitude is the heart of
faith broken and contrite over sin. Knowing, knowing that I
have no hope in myself, that I have no righteousness, I have
no forgiveness in myself. Nothing I am, nothing I do can
recommend me unto God. I must have this more excellent
sacrifice. And without it, it's all evil. without Christ. Isn't that right?