Cain & Abel

Cain and Abel's story is where the consequences of Adam and Eve's sin suddenly become horrifically real. At the appropriate time, each brought his offering to sacrifice to the Lord. Cain gave a portion of his produce; Abel gave the firstborn of his flock. God accepted Abel's sacrifice but not Cain's.

I explained it to the kids this way: if you have one hundred dogs, and you are going to give one of them to the Lord, do you choose the one that sleeps in your bed at night? That's essentially what Abel did. His outward actions demonstrate his inward heart attitude.

Cain's heart attitude, on the other hand, went from bad to worse. Not only was his sacrifice rejected, but he let sin take a hold of him, became enraged, and killed his brother. What a shock that must have been! Death is horrible now, when we're used to it—but Adam and Eve had never seen it before. It's horrible now, when children are burying their parents—but these parents buried their child. For the first time, Abel's name made sense: “Vapor”—that's all it was. I brought a can of air freshener to use as a visual aid for the kids (best smelling lesson ever, by the way): “Life is like [squirt] a vapor....did you miss it? Here it comes again [squirt]. That quick [squirt]. -That's how long Abel had to live by faith....[squirt]....That long.”

Abel made it count. His name is first on the list of men and women who lived by faith (and first on the list of men and women killed or tortured for their faith). His sacrifice of his firstborn lamb points forward to the time when God would send His Lamb to be the sacrifice for all our sins.

This sketch is in a bit of a different style for me and not the exact moment I expected myself to depict. Anticipation...