Our first parents, as we have seen, stood in Eden (the garden of God's delight); and were both of them naked and were not ashamed; now Satan enters, and "by one disobedience" the eyes of them both were opened and they knew that they were naked; and ashamed they retire among the trees of the garden (for they are no longer fit for God's delight) and immediately undertake to remedy the evil by sewing fig-leaves to cover their shame.
The new state of things is simply this, Adam has willed himself out of Eden, by willing himself into unfitness to remain in Eden, and can never will himself back again.
He has " become wise" to know good and evil. He knew good before. And now he knows evil also, and this has made him wise. He has attained knowledge, and knowledge puffeth up." He has gained a wisdom and knowledge which he can never lose. He has put himself into a state from which he can never recover himself. He cannot take back his lost innocence; he cannot put away his newly acquired knowledge, he cannot put away his sin, he is no longer fit for God's delight. " So He drove out the man." God had fitted him for blessing in His own presence; he has fitted himself for sorrow, misery and wrath, from which he can never recover himself, and what is more and still worse, it appears that he had no heart to recover himself, for when he found that his eyes had been opened by his act of disobedience, instead of turning to God, his only sure resource for help, he uses his newly acquired wisdom and knowledge to provide for himself in his new state.
This, then, is the new ground of his responsibility, not to recover what he had lost, for he had not power to do that,-and more, God had by "a flaming sword " made it forever impossible,-but to acknowledge God and take his place as a sinner, and thus abide his ruin until God should provide a better thing. Two things, then are here presented. For the man is a sinner, and his true resource is God; in the mercy of God; but since he has become wise he finds a resource in himself.
If God can have mercy, it is with respect to sin, and for a sinner He can provide a better thing, not restoration in Eden, for God never repairs a ruin which man has made, but always provides for Himself a better thing. And this he offers to the man as His own blessed remedy. Meanwhile God provides for the man in his new state, that which is a pledge and a type. of the future blessing. "Unto Adam also and to his wile did the Lord God make coats of skins and clothed them." Verse 21. It is very blessed to see, and to keep distinctly in mind this fundamental truth, that God alone was the man's resource in innocence, and is none the less so, but all the more, now that man is a sinner.
God was enough, enough, blessedly and forever more, for man in innocence; and is ENOUGH blessedly and forever more for man in sin and ruin. This is a truth everywhere acknowledged in theory, but alas! how sadly ignored in practice.
Man's responsibility in innocence, was, to maintain his place, in proper submission to the Divine will, and thus in absolute acknowledgment of his own dependence on God; and after he has lost that place of innocence, and has brought in an. entirely new state of sin, still God is his only' and absolute resource for blessing; and his responsibility now is, not to recover innocence, nor to recover Eden; but to take his place as a sinner in absolute dependence on God.
It was not a question of what man could do for himself as a sinner:•nor what he could do for God, not in the least; but it' was a question of acknowledging God who could have mercy with' -respect to sin, and do something for a sinner.' In a Word-, man's responsibility as a sinner was not to do for himself, neither' for God, for God had no need of anything from the hands of a sinner; but the sinner-had need of God to do 'something for him, and this is his responsibility, to wait on -God for it, in acknowledgment of his own place as a sinner, and God as the Giver,.
And: this is clear from the fact that no law was given to Adam out of Eden nor to man until twenty-five hundred years after, by Moses to Israel. But this- point will come up again, so we pass it now. Man's responsibility was to take and keep his place as a sinner before God and wait patiently on God for His word and His own appointed deliverance, and this was faith.
And this is very clearly set forth in the next chap., the 4th, in Cain and Abel. The first man "born of the flesh " was also born of " sinful flesh," and yet he does not take his place as such, nor acknowledge it at all.
He desires to acknowledge God; he brings an offering. But the sin-offering was not in it, and God could not ac. knowledge Cain. " Unto Cain and to his offering He had not respect." To reject the offering was to reject the one who offered it. By bringing an offering of the first fruit of the ground, he is willing to acknowledge God in His place, but refuses to identify himself in his own place, and this is clearly the ground on which he was rejected. Verse 7-"if thou doest not well, sin lieth at the door," (a sin-offering croucheth at the door) i. e. a sin-offering such as Abel has brought is near at hand, and the way of acceptance is open to you also.
Here, surely, was mercy and forbearance on the part of God towards Cain, but he had no heart for it. There was forgiveness with God; and with Him plenteous redemption; but Cain wanted neither, he was willing to acknowledge God, but he did not want God. Cain may be very devotional, very pleasant in his address, very bland in the presentation of his offering; but it was all of the flesh, which cannot please God; and it was worse than' nothing for sin was there, which he refuses to acknowledge, and thus he insults God's holiness, by presenting the result of his own labor and the fruit of the ground which had been cursed. Thus, in a word, he in self-will presumes to please God with that which had first pleased himself. And this is the spirit of the world. Here is where the world began. 1st John 2:15-17. A willingness to acknowledge God, but an unwillingness to identify itself in its true place and character before God. But the opposite of this we get in Abel, the first man of faith mentioned in the Bible. (Heb. 11:4, Gen. 4:4.) Abel does not bring an offering with a view to please himself, but with a view to please God.
How full of preciousness, to turn away from that which pleases man, to that which pleases God. Hence he comes with the firstling of his flock; and in this we have, first the acknowledgment of God in His place,,(an offering)) second, the firstling of his flock (a sin offering), in this he takes his own place before God; and third, how shall he present it? By the shedding of blood; for " without shedding of blood there is no remission." "And the Lord had respect unto Abel and to his offering. But unto Cain and to his offering He had not respect."
Dear reader, do you see the difference between Cain's presumption and Abel's faith? Cain's position was one of self-will, self-righteousness, and lawlessness. Abel's. position is exactly the opposite; no confidence in himself or the flesh, no setting up of his own will or preference, no thought of pleasing himself, but as a simmer under judgment he takes his place; he bows before God in complete acknowledgment of what was due to God's holiness, while he takes that which belongs to himself as a sinner; and this is the place of blessing. Here is where he finds God's heart, and how soon is he ushered into the presence of the One whose heart had found so supreme a satisfaction in the faith which had so fully honored Himself. Abel's offering proved Abel's faith. Cain's offering proved his unbelief, and his murder brought out his lawlessness: From this point we see the two things very clearly set forth in the word of God. First, lawlessness, as exemplified in Cain, which is' the spirit of "this present evil -world" and of Satan as the god of this world, for twenty-five hundred years, until the law. Second, faith as exemplified in Abel, Enoch, Noah, Abraham and others.
C. E. H.