That was one of mine taken off there, too. All right. So good morning to everyone. Appreciate good looking crowd and everyone being with us this morning. As it's already been said, this is Some call fall the season of death and spring the season of life. I enjoy both. I get to bring death to animals in the fall. So that's one reason why I enjoy it. I knew somebody had to amen me there. But we're glad for each one. Somebody mentioned to me this morning about my beard that I'm trying to grow. They said, well, I would grow one. They said, it looks like the mane's got a hold of mine. I said, well, I think the mite's got a hold of mine. It might grow and it might not. I don't know. We're still still figuring that out, but this is about three or four weeks worth I've had fun with it if nothing else But again, we'll thank for each one appreciate the song just when I really do and You have no idea how what you just say it goes in line with what I'm getting ready to preach I'm going to try to be brief. I won't get through this I was going to tell you I didn't think I would even if I would have started at 20 after but we'll try to get you out of here at normal time. Turn with me to the Bible, it's in Genesis chapter four. Genesis chapter four, very familiar story, very familiar passage of scripture. Some of you may not be familiar with all the details that's there, but everybody knows the story, I think. When Cain rose against his brother Abel and slew him, and he asked, God asked, to bring sacrifice, and they each did, and there was some problems with it, but when you find, Abel, please stand on the reading of the word of God. Genesis chapter four. We're gonna read down in verse 15, starting at verse one. The Bible says, and Adam knew Eve, his wife, and she conceived, and bare Cain, and said, I have gotten a man from the Lord. And she again bare his brother Abel, and Abel was a keeper of sheep, but Cain was a tiller of the ground. Now notice the wording there in verse two, and it says, and bare his brother Abel. Now, we know Adam and Eve had many more kids. I don't know how many they had, but they had a lot more. I'll promise you, they didn't just have two or three. They lived 800 some years. That's a lot of time to have kids. And so, but it pointed out here, his brother. There was specific brought there to that point. And Abel was a keeper of the sheep that came to till the ground. And in the process of time, it came to pass that Cain brought forth of the fruit of the ground an offering unto the Lord, And Abel, he also brought of the firstlings of his flock, and of the fat thereof. And the Lord had respect unto Abel and to his offering, but unto Cain and his offering he had not respect. And Cain was very wroth, and his countenance fell. And the Lord said unto Cain, Why art thou wroth? And why is thy countenance falling? If thou doest well, shalt thou not be accepted? And if thou doest not well, sin lieth at the door. And unto thee shall be his desire, and thou shalt rule over him. And Cain talked with Abel his brother, and it came to pass, when they were in the field, that Cain rose up against Abel his brother and slew him. Now as far as we know, They've been four people mentioned in the Bible at this time. I don't know if they was 15 or 20 or if they was four. But it didn't take very long for murder to take place, did it? The Lord said unto Cain, where is Abel thy brother? And he said, I know not, am I my brother's keeper? A little bit of sarcasm. What hast thou done? The voice of thy brother's blood crieth unto me from the ground. Now thou art a curse on the earth, which hath opened her mouth to receive thy brother's blood from thy hand. 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. And Cain said unto the Lord, My punishment is greater than I can bear. Behold, thou hast driven me out this day from the face of the earth, and from thy face shall I be hid. And I shall be a fugitive and a vagabond in the earth, and it shall come to pass that everyone that findeth me shall slay me. And the Lord said unto him, Therefore, whosoever slayeth Cain, vengeance shall be taken on him sevenfold. And the Lord set a mark upon Cain, lest any man find him should kill him. I'm gonna read verse 16 as well. And Cain went out from the presence of the Lord. and dwelt in the land of Nod on the east of Eden. Father, we thank you again for this day that you've given us, for this time together. Thank you, God, for your word, for its instructions that it gives about us and about you. God, everything we know about you and about ourselves, everything we need to know, God, in life comes from your word. God, that's amazing to me how one volume can give so much information, but God, your word is endless. Lord, we could never, ever, could we ever search it all out. God, if we could read the Bible one time and understand it, God doesn't make it as smart as you. Lord, we know that's not gonna happen. But God, we thank you again for your word, God. I pray that you give me the words needed to empty myself. Forgive me for any sin, God, that's in me right now, Lord, that would hinder this message. God, I want you to speak through me. God, I want you to have your way this morning. Touch the hearts of each one that's here. You know the needs, God. I don't. In the Lord Jesus Christ's name we pray, amen. Thank you. Now, as I said, I know this is a fairly well-known story, and a lot of people know about it, but I wanna point some things out to you as we get on through this. I remember years ago, back when I was a heathen, and I watched a lot of goofy movies, I remember watching a movie one time called Raising Cain. And this woman had two sons, and one was fairly dormant and docile, and the other one was, well, he's a little bit crazy. And that's who the Cain was in the movie. Needless to say, you see where they got the influence from. Not hard to figure that out. And so many things when we realize they're not an influence of the Bible. Does any of you know the phrase, you ever heard the phrase, by the skin of your teeth? You know where that came from? The book of Job. You know how many people would quit saying that phrase if they knew that's where it originated from? Probably a lot. I think it's kind of comical. Sometimes I hear people that don't let God say that phrase. I want to look at them and say, you're quoting the Bible. Anyway, so many things come from the Bible. We learn about from the Bible. We don't know, without the Bible, we would have no idea where they originated from, where they come from. That's so many things we've learned from that. Do you know all false religions derived from the Bible? It was taken from the Bible, twisted out of context, turned and flipped again on its head, and therefore that false religion came about. Do you understand that? That everything we know comes from the Bible. And here we read this story at this time, we know that Adam and Eve had ate of the fruit. Again, I don't know what kind it was, and if it was anybody else, I promise you it's not on Earth today. If it is, you're not gonna find it. but they ate of that fruit of the tree of knowledge and the good and evil and therefore they came to know good and evil they sinned God gave them one commandment they couldn't follow it don't worry you and I couldn't either and therefore they ate of that fruit and sin was cast upon mankind And God told them in their punishment, He told Eve in verse 16 of chapter 3, He said, And to the woman, He said, I will greatly multiply thy sorrow and thy conception. In sorrow shalt thou bring forth children, and thy desire shall be unto thy husband, and he shall rule over thee. Let me preach here for a while. No, I'm joking. I knew I'd get at least one amen. But He told her that sorrow would be multiplied. Do you not think This dear lady who went through the jaws of death to bear two children before anesthesia was around, before there was a thing called epidural, that she went through the jaws of life to bear these two children and she watched one get killed and another one sentenced to life of exile. I wonder what that did to her. That broke her heart. It crushed her. I mean, here, in one fatal swoop, she lost both of her children. And there, one of them was dead, and he's not coming back. The other one is gone, and he's not coming back. He was cast out of the face of the earth, if you will. And one of the saddest verses in all the Bible is verse 16, and it dwelt in the land of Nod, when it said, and Cain went out from the presence of the Lord. I don't know if there are any other greater things sadder than that in the Bible. It's gonna be a long introduction, so just bear with me. We're going somewhere. But we read this story, and we see so many things. Now over in Hebrews chapter, let me turn over here, 11, it's what we call the roll call, the hall of faith. It says, now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen. That's chapter 11, verse one. For by it the elders obtained a good report. Through faith we understand that the worlds were framed by the word of God, so that things which were seen were not made of things which do appear. You know why the Bible says through faith? Because it takes faith to believe it. But you know what takes greater faith to believe creation? It takes greater faith to believe in evolution. I'm going to give you a quick evolution illustration. Here's what we're going to do. We're going to compare just our eyeball and our skin. I've just mentioned this before not too long ago, to evolution. Our eyeballs are so complex that the best, whatever eye doctors are called, those people, I mean the most steady, most well-versed, most intelligent can only scratch the surface of our eyeball and how it works. Just our eyeball. Some of the best dermatologists, some of the greatest doctors, most brilliant thinking minds on earth can not even begin to even remotely grasp our skin and all that it is so complex and all that it entails. We are just now starting to understand some of the way these things work. So here's what we're going to do. We're going to take everything you see here, these lights, the speakers, the wires, even the register book over here, this cross, and even the numbers on the piano, and the seats, the pews, the carpet, the wood floors, we're going to build a new church out here. We're going to buy land, we're going to build a new church. We're going to take all this stuff and put it in a big pile. We're going to take dynamite and strategically place it in that pile. We're going to light it. And boom! There it is. The walls are painted, the lights are hung, the fans are working, the pews are set. I mean, it's all there. The lanterns are on the piano. I mean, right down to the finest minute detail. The nails are even in the floor. You say, preacher, that's crazy. Might want to think about that for a minute. I've never seen an explosion construct anything, but I've sure seen a lot of things deconstructed by explosions. There's something called tannerite. I like to shoot it. It comes in little jugs. You go out, you put something over top of that, you take a high-powered rifle, you get back a certain distance, you shoot that, that projectile goes through that little gum of powder there, and kaboom! Whatever's there, it blows up. I've yet to see a Barbie doll house built out of doing that. Have you ever seen one? I've seen some things sure go into a thousand pieces though, I'll tell you that. And I don't know, that wasn't part of the lesson, it just come there. But it's through faith we understand this. If you don't have faith in God, church, you gotta realize you're not pleasing him. You cannot believe this Bible, you can't believe what's going on. It takes more faith to believe in evolution. In verse four it says, by faith Abel offered unto God a more excellent sacrifice than Cain. by which he obtained witness that he was righteous. God testified of his gifts, and by it been dead, yet he speaketh. You see, Abel's blood spoke from the ground, just as God told Cain. He said, his blood speaks to me from the ground. I wonder sometimes in our life what the blood that we've shed of ourselves and innocent people by our sins, if it speaks from the ground sometimes to us. You see, in life, you're either gonna be an Abel or you're gonna be a Cain. So my title for this message, however many Sundays it takes, is Don't Raise Cain. You see, we can raise Cain by mimicking what he did. We do that so often. Now, we back up here in this story. Let me slow down just for a minute. So we see that Abel's death and Cain's exile brought forth multiple sorrows unto Eve. And verse four says, in Abel, verse three, in the process of time, it came to pass that Cain brought the fruit of the ground an offering to the Lord. He was the firstborn. I believe that's why I mentioned him first. But in Abel, he also brought the fortunes of the flock and the fat thereof, and the Lord had respect unto Abel and to his offering. But unto Cain, to his offering, he had not respect. And Cain was very wroth, and his countenance failed. Now, I'll tell you, there was a lot of, there's a lot of debate on why God did not accept Cain's offering. And I'm not 100% sure you can answer it. I've got my opinions. I'm going to give those to you. Number one is we know from beginning to end it's blood, blood, blood, blood that brings remission of sins. Yes, there was a fruit offering in the sacrificial system, but you've got to understand what it was for. It wasn't for sins. Big difference. And Cain was very wroth, and his countenance fell. I wonder if it has anything to do with, you go back over to verse 17, in chapter three, and to Adam, he said, Because thou hast hearkened to the voice of thy wife, and hast eaten of the tree of which I commanded thee, saying, Thou shalt not eat of it, cursed is the ground for thy sake. In sorrow shalt thou eat of it all the days of thy life. So here we find that the ground, yet today, is cursed because of Adam, for Adam's sake. That's why thorns and thistles and weeds and everything grows up in a garden. You plow a garden, and you go out there and plant that stuff, and you ride back and watch her grow, you're going to have something grow all right, but you better like to eat weeds because that's all you're going to get. And so it was cursed. So Cain brought something that would come from a curse and tried to present it to God and expect Him to accept it. They then got mad when God didn't accept it. Well, let me tell you something. I heard a message one time that said, My need is greater than my offense. And a preacher preached it because he got mad at God one time. And it finally came to the point, he said, You know what, God? I need You more than I need my anger. Too many times we get mad at a preacher, we get mad at God or somebody because their rabbi can tell us the truth. I try to do it in as loving and gentle way as I can and know how, but I tell you the truth what I believe from the Bible and sometimes it's pretty plain and we don't accept that and we get wroth like Cain did and we get mad and we raise Cain. Cain was very wroth and his countenance fell. You know in Proverbs it says a wounded spirit who can bear. Another one says something like a wounded spirit drive the bones. David sat miserable for over a year. because he had a wounded spirit, because he had sin, unconfessed sin in his life that he was not willing to admit. And Nathan came to him. And David knew why Nathan was there. He ain't stupid. I mean, here Nathan walked in. He didn't like he come in and said, hey David, what's for supper this evening? That ain't how their relationship worked. He knew why he was there. I believe when Nathan walked in, I believe David's bones went cold. I believe his heart sank. And I believe his blood run cold there for a few moments because he knew why he was there. And he looked at him and gave him the parable of the sheep, the ruler, and then the poor man who had the sheep. And the ruler took that one sheep that that poor man had slept with in its own bed, ate from its table. They loved it, they cared for it and nourished it. And he gave him that illustration. And David said, he shall be a fence fourfold. And David sentenced himself, but for a year he waxed cold. because of that sin in his life. And I believe at times he was wroth, he was angry and wrathful because he did much more than just murder he writhed. You know, he had people killed, run over them with plows, cut up in pieces. We forget that, don't we? When God tells you to come to him in a certain way, God's not playing games and he's not flexible. It's his way. And what happens is we come to God and we say, but God, can't you accept this? Can't you accept that? And God says, no, I'm accepting this. And we get mad and we want to hold our head high against God and basically say, I don't like that, God. Here's how it is. And it doesn't work that way. Cain had no conscience of his sin. Notice what else the Bible says. And I'm trying to move on and get somewhere in a hurry here. In verse six, it said, Lord Senator Cain, why art thou wroth? And why is thy countenance falling? If thou do us well, shalt thou not be accepted? And if thou do us not well, sin lieth at the door, and unto thee shall be his desire, and thou shalt rule over him. Now, I wonder, as I read this, I think back to what I mentioned a couple weeks ago to Adam and Eve, and I don't know why I'm preaching along this same line almost every Sunday. God is speaking to somebody or somebody's. And I'm telling you now, if you don't get a hold of this, you're fixing to suffer, buddy, like you don't want to. I'm trying to help you. But Adam and Eve ate of the fruit, and God didn't boom down from heaven. I love what you've done! And he had every right to. He didn't look at Eve and do her the same way. He said, Adam, where art thou? Adam, I'm looking for you. Adam, I need you to come to me. We gotta talk, Adam. And even in punishment, God had mercy and grace on him. Do you know if they would have aided the tree of life, do you realize we'd be stuck in these bodies for eternity? You never thought about that, did you? How'd you like to have the flu every year for the rest of your life? Viruses. aches, pains for the rest of your life because we were stuck in these bodies. That's why he drove him out of the Garden of Eden, one of the reasons. And here we find that Cain brought forth his offering. And I don't know how he come, I've got an idea in my head, I think he was a little bit smug about it. His attitude shows that. I think Abel come, the Bible tells us in Hebrews, Abel brought his by faith. I think Cain brought his by arrogance. You say, a preacher, I'm not like that with God. Are you real sure? You sure? Are you sure about that? If God put his finger on something in your life and you refuse to acknowledge it, then you're doing the very same thing. You're raising Cain right now. You're raising his mentality up inside of you. And God looked down at Cain and said, Cain, I want to help you. I'm trying to help you, Cain. If you'll just do what I'm asking, Cain, I'll give you peace. We'll have a relationship, Cain. If you'll just simply do what I'm asking you to do, things will work out. Cain, will you please listen to me? Because God knew what was about to happen. He was trying to stop it. He was trying to help him. This morning, there's some of you in here that God is trying to stop. He's trying to help, and you're going to refuse His help, and you're going to suffer just like Cain. Here, he tried his best to talk to him. He was gentle with him, and God had every right to say, Cain, you wanna act like that with me? Shoosh, and off goes his head, rolls over the hill, and that's the end of him. But he didn't. He tried to pull him up to him. I'm gonna give you three points, and I'm not gonna cover them, but I'm just gonna give them to you real quick, because I need to get this said, and we'll pick this back up next Sunday. One more idea. You know, one of the sacrifices had no life. The other sacrifice gave its life. It doesn't take much of a sacrifice if it doesn't cost life, does it? That's no sacrifice. That's why some people are vegetarians because they don't want to eat anything living. It has a ring to it. I want to just give you three points real quick, and I won't come back to this. Number one, God's calling is gentle. God was gentle with Cain when he called him. He wasn't mean and hateful. He was gentle. Right now in your life, wherever you are, whatever's going on in your life, whatever sin is in your life, God is gently calling you. You see, God's a gentleman. He's not like Satan. Satan is a jerk. I want to tell you. He's a beast, man. He's an animal. He doesn't knock on your heart's door and says, won't you please, please let me in, please let me talk to you. I want to help you. Please, I'm begging you, I want to help you. Satan will find the least little crack and he'll kick the door open to your life and invite himself in, uninvited, and ransack your house and destroy your life and walk away laughing at what he accomplished while you're laying in a pile of puddle Roaring in tears and sorrow, and he says, ha, ha, ha. God's gentle. Number two, God's calling is gracious. God was gracious with Cain. Oh my, was he gracious. You see, Cain, in a sense, this is gonna be strong language, okay? In a sense, you can say Cain spit in the face of God. You say, a preacher, I would never say that. Are you sure? Has God ever showed you something in your life and you said, God, I see that, but I'm not gonna acknowledge it. Guess what you just did? You just raised Cain. And you did just exactly what Cain did. You say, preacher, this is harsh. Hey, this is mild to what God's gonna be. This is nothing to what Satan will be when he gets ahold of you and what sin will do when he gets ahold of you. This is kid's play, the way I'm preaching this. Trust me, I can preach it much stronger than it is, but I can never preach it the way God will preach it straight to your heart if you don't heed his word. God is, hey, he was gracious. Thank God for grace. Grace is unmerited favor. I didn't do anything to merit salvation. I'm not any better than anybody else. In fact, I'm worse than most people that's not saved. I probably have, they got better morals all the times than I've got. But God saved me, and I was just smart enough to one night recognize that I was lost and dying and going to hell, and I came to an altar and asked God to save me. And you know what else I've had to done through the years, Brother Morgan? I've had to come to an altar and say, God, I've sinned, and I'm sorry, and I don't care who knows it. I gotta get things settled with you now. I've had to do that a few times, too. I've had to go to people. You know something that's hard? Have you ever went to somebody, confessed to them, you said something about them that you shouldn't have said? I have, because God told me to. Do you think that was fun? Do you think it was enjoyable? I've had to go to people and say, I'm guilty of this and I'm guilty of that. I don't know how that's going to react. I just knew I had to get things settled between me and God. And I'll be honest with you, I really didn't care to a large degree as long as I had it settled between God and I. That's all that mattered. Cain didn't care. All he cared about was Him. Number three, God's calling is glorious. God's calling is glorious. All right, I'm gonna give a little illustration. We've talked about sports, we've talked about hunting and fishing, we've talked about NASCAR, old cars, antiques, cleaning cars, which I don't do very much of. I knew somebody would amen me. I do when they're new. I worked with a guy, he said years ago he was working with a boy, he'd bought a brand new truck and he took it home, watched it, he said, you better enjoy this one, because this is your last one. said he never washed it again the rest of the whole time he owned it. I got to get back to think about where I was at now when I was getting reset and got off on it. But I want right now, we got what's going on called March Madness. Even if you don't watch sports, you've probably heard that once or twice in your life. My son right now is eat up with it. I mean, I enjoy it, but I don't know that I've ever wanted to be as involved in basketball as he is right now. He gets obsessed with something. He gets on something, and he will drive you nuts with it. It's different things at different times. He can tell you who won, what game, which team you won. I mean, it's unbelievable, the score of the game and everything. You was a pretty good athlete, wasn't you? You go, and I wasn't going to say yes. I know you was. I've got an answer for you. You watch basketball? Who won the NCAA championship five years ago? I'm not trying to be funny. I mean, it is, but I'm not picking on you. I'm making an illustration. You're helping me, you just don't know it. You watch basketball? You got a little thicker skin he's got. Who won the NCAA championship seven years ago? Nine years ago. I'm kidding. I thought you had me, but I was going to get you. What did you have for dinner on Sunday two months ago from today? You know what I can tell you? I'll never forget that night I went to that altar. It wasn't this one, but it was one just like it. God save my soul. And even though I'm interested in other things, nothing has ever brought me, I've never seen glory in anything like I have the gift of salvation. Even though the Super Bowl, they're glorified, they're magnified, they're mystified and all these things, nothing I've ever seen will do what salvation will do. The glory of God shining right through somebody You're coming out of their heart and soul. You say, what are you going on about, preacher? What's all this shouting and making sense? Because I've got something inside of me that's glorious and it is beyond my control and it's beyond description of words because God's glory, He shared with us in a sense through His Son of salvation and gave us that and glorified our souls one day. Nothing will touch that. Now the opposite of that is this. Cain said, you know what? I don't care. I'm going my way. And God punished him. You know what? I believe in my heart. I still believe. If you read it closely, I believe if Cain would have looked at God and said, God, I'm sorry. And I realize now what I've done. Even though that had been some punishment, I believe God would have still said, okay, Cain, let's get it right. I think 20 years later, if Cain would have come back to God and said, God, I sinned and I want to get it right, God would have accepted it. Scripture never records him ever doing that. And if you follow the two bloodlines of Seth and Cain, you'll see how they turned out. Cain's great, great grandson named Lamech, He said, you all think my old man was bad? I'm the baddest one of the bunch. I killed a man today because he said something I didn't like, and I killed another man because he punched me. I don't know exactly what he did, but that's along what the Bible's basically pointing at. You don't find anything like that in Seth's bloodline. But Cain's gets worse and worse and worse and worse. What are you doing to your bloodline today? Whether you think it is or not, it's full of folly. You better get a hold of that. It's your preacher, you don't understand. You're right, I might understand your situation, but I understand sin, it's effects, I'll tell you that right now. And God understands that he doesn't understand your excuse, nor does he accept it. He don't accept mine, and he won't accept yours. If I can take and show the Bible, person after person, how many people in here's got their name in the Bible? I can show people, chief, their name in the Bible, and God didn't accept their excuse. We ain't in the Bible. So I'd say, if anything, we know better than they are. And I'm done right here. Cain had his chance, but instead of getting things right with God, he decided he was going to raise Cain. And he thought he was going to be stronger than God and make God bend down to his demands. And God basically looked at him and said, Cain, you're fixing to learn who's in charge, and it's not you. Sometimes it's hard to submit to people in charge. I struggle with it the same as everybody else sometimes. But you know what's amazing is I've submitted to people in charge and they still did me wrong. God has never done me one wrong time. I've submitted to Him and it always goes right. And for the better. Never the worse. I've submitted to bosses and they turn around and kicked me out of the job. I mean, no one there was going to do me wrong. And I've submitted to God. There's a peace. You know, in Philippians, it says there's a peace that passes all understanding. How are we supposed to explain it if we can't even understand it? It's that great. It really is. It's that great. But you've got to do things God's way. Don't raise Cain. You're either going to raise Cain or you're going to raise Abel. Either your testimony is going to cry from the ground or you're going to have blood shed on the ground and you're going to raise Cain. Which one is it going to be this morning? God is speaking to someone or someones. That might be poor English, but it's the truth. The question is, are you gonna accept it? You gonna walk away like Tank Cane did and have a mark put on your life? Paul said, I bear about my body the marks of the Lord Jesus. I'd much rather have the marks of the Lord Jesus in my life than I would have a mark put on me so men wouldn't murder me because of what I did. He had a mark to protect him. I want the mark of Christ to protect me. As we stand, we get a song. I could keep going, but I've got to quit. I'm not out of the way. I'm certainly not out of matches, but I'm out of time.