Genesis 4:6-8--Sin is Crouching at Your Door

Genesis 4:6-8
World English Bible
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6 Yahweh said to Cain, “Why are you angry? Why has the expression of your face fallen? 7 If you do well, won’t it be lifted up? If you don’t do well, sin crouches at the door. Its desire is for you, but you are to rule over it.” 8 Cain said to Abel, his brother, “Let’s go into the field.” While they were in the field, Cain rose up against Abel, his brother, and killed him.

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The LORD knows the heart of Cain and tries to intervene with some pointed questions.  "Why are you angry? Why has your mood and countenance changed?" Cain was visibly upset so that he looked both angry and dejected.  Without even letting Cain answer (because He already knew the answer to the question before He asked it), the LORD assures Cain that if he also does what is right, he too will be accepted, and so will his sacrifice.  However, if he does not repent and continues in the path he is on, the LORD says that sin is crouching at his door like a ravenous beast that desires to attack and tear him to pieces.  Its desire is to rule over Cain and to destroy him, but Cain must assert himself and say "No" to temptation be master over it and in this moment, he needs to not be controlled by his feelings.

Cain does not listen to the LORD's instruction and decides to go through with his plan of premeditated murder.  He lures his brother Abel out into the field so that they would be away from everyone else.  It would seem Cain thought that if he got far enough away from everyone, even God wouldn't see him and what he did, but God is going to let Cain know that He saw and heard everything and that Abel's blood cries out from the ground for justice to be done.

This changes everything--the one they had hoped to be their savior clearly is not, and the one that it seems they did not even name because they expected nothing from him is now given the name Abel because his life was but a fleeting breath that was here today and then gone tomorrow.  How will God's promise of a deliverer be fulfilled now?  It seems like Satan has won, but we know he has not.  God's plans are not going to be circumvented or thwarted by the schemes or Satan or the acts of evil men.  Hang on to that idea as time and time again we will ask, "Is this the one?," and our hopes will be dashed as we realize that one we were putting our hopes in had their own sins and guilt and could in no way pay for the sins of others when he himself stood condemned.