Daily Lesson for January 2, 2019

Today’s Daily Lesson comes from Genesis chapter 4 verses
 1 through 7:


4 Now the man knew his wife Eve, and she conceived and bore Cain, saying, “I have produced 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.”

We read this story and our natural inclination is to condemn Cain for his malice and murder.

But this is an archetypal story — meaning it is a story about us — and the way we are to read it is by letting it speak to the Cain that is within us.

Do we have anger, bitterness, a sense of resentment, and/or malice towards others?  Could our contempt be a projection of our own inner hostilities? Could our condemnation of others have much more to do with the unresolved anxieties, dissonance within own ourselves about our own commitments to God?

Moreover, do we see ourselves as righteous Abel, but are we really dealing with our own unrighteousness Cain-like guilt?

We all like Cain fall short in what we offer to God. We cannot all be righteous Abel all the time. So then sin enters in; and its desire is to eat us up with shame. This usually masquerades as righteous anger. And the spiritual task is to recognize this within ourselves, to unmask it, to master it before it masters us.

The LORD asks Cain, “If you do well, will you not be accepted?”

And what the Cain in us must learn to see is that the answer is Yes, always Yes. Yes we will be accepted, always and completely, not because our offerings to God are great or even good, but, much more importantly, because they are honest.


Note: I am attempting to read the whole Bible in 2020 and taking Daily Lessons from the prescribed Daily Scriptures. Tomorrow’s Scripture is Genesis chapters 8 through 11.