The Sacrifice of Faith
“By faith Abel offered to God a more acceptable sacrifice than Cain, through which he was commended as righteous, God commending him by accepting his gifts. And through his faith, though he died, he still speaks.” (Heb 11:4). “In Abel we see how faith makes death the path of life.” (A. Murray)
Background
This Sunday I will be preaching to our local church’s morning congregation, many of whom are older than me. Since the Gospel text features the Song of Simeon ““Sovereign Lord, now let your servant die in peace, as you have promised.” (Luke 2:29 NLT), I will be “compelled” by Christ’s death (2 Cor 5:14) to speak of our own deaths. This pressing situation, compounded by some degree of uncertainty about my own future, is the immediate background to today’s reflection.
Introduction
For some months I have been reading, as a daily Bible study, Andrew Murray’s classical devotion on Hebrews, The Holiest of All (1894). His Christ-centredness is set in the framework of teaching on the Christian’s “higher life” (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Higher_Life_movement). Whilst I do not believe that there are grades of Christian experience, Murray is justly famous for his emphasis on humility, abiding in Christ, and a life of intercession. His 99th chapter, Abel- The Sacrifice of Faith, highlights some truths glaringly absent from contemporary Western forms of Christianity. As an exposition of Hebrews 11:4, this exposition contrasts radically with the teaching on faith I was exposed to by Pentecostal pastors as a new Christian. These godly brothers loved expounding, with personal illustrations, faith as some sort of “spiritual achievement”. An approach that left me feeling depressed as I vainly sought to find such a dynamic inside me. Whereas this genuine but mistaken emphasis on “positivity” has manifestly failed to promote maturity in Christ, my hope is that Murray’s insights will inspire spiritual depth. Whilst unpopular, self-sacrifice is the spirit and power of life as God always destined it to be (1 Pet 1:19-20; Rev 13:8).
Abel
Following on from God’s plan for Adam, Abel is also a “type/pattern” of the coming Lord of all (Rom 5:14; Acts 10:36). This is implied in the status given by Jesus to this man as the first of the biblical prophets. Christ’s word, “the blood of all the prophets shed….from the blood of Abel to…” (Luke 10:50-51) is full of significance. Christ enrols Abel as he first prophetic forerunner who must die for the sake of the testimony of righteousness in a fallen rebellious world (Rev 16:6; 18:24). Picking this up, Hebrews testifies that “though he died, he still speaks through his faith” (11:4 cf. 12:24). Woe to us if we do not understand the sacrifice of Abel! Though his time on earth was short, Abel teaches us much concerning how the life of Jesus Christ pleased the Father .
“More Acceptable”?
In what ways was Abel’s sacrifice “more acceptable” than Cain’s? Many commentators have sought to answer this question. One popular interpretation is that Abel’s blood offering was preferable to Cain’s grain offering. This could be grounded on the animal sacrifice God presumably performed to clothe the naked Adam and Eve with animal skins (Gen 3:21; Lev 7:8). However, under the Mosaic Law, both grain and animal offerings were equally honourable to God (Gen 29:21 etc.). A better explanation is that whereas Cain brought “some of the harvest”, Abel brought the fat portions from the best of the flock. His willingness to trust God for multiplication, rather than relying on the natural reproductive power of the pick of the crop of created things, displays a trust in supernatural provision. In other words, Abel prophetically imaged resurrection faith. (Like Abraham, the Bible’s “second maned prophet”, later would by sacrificing Isaac (Gen 20:7; Heb 11:17-19) There is more to the story of Abel and Cain even than this. Murray expounds with great power, “If Abel had offered up the lamb and kept back himself, his heart, he would not have pleased God….[but] believing that in the sacrifice he was accepted, he gave himself to God’s worship and service, he gave himself to the very death, to die to self and live to God.” (Murray). This leads us inevitably to Jesus to whom Abel points.
Union with Christ’s Death for Life
Abel embodies the secret of limitless Lamb-power (Rev 5:6ff.). As “he worshipped with his eye on the dying lamb… the more I gaze in confession and trust on the dying Lamb, the more Jesus’ S/spirit enters into me and the more I am conformed to his likeness.” (Murray). As with Abel a testifier of Jesus, “you will be a witness” (Acts 22:15), Paul shares the secret of his own apostolic fruitfulness, “We are afflicted in every way, but not crushed; perplexed, but not driven to despair; 9 persecuted, but snot forsaken; struck down, but not destroyed; 10 always carrying in the body the death of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus may also be manifested in our bodies” (2 Cor 4:8-10). In the cause of the kingdom of God and of Christ (Rev 12:10), death in union with Jesus is always the pathway to life (2 Cor 6:6).
Conclusion
By his original active faith (Gal 5:6), Abel confessed the just judgment of God on himself as a sinner, his actions testifying that atonement for sin requires the death of the sinner. Cain however brought his witness without blood, without death, so offering sacrifice in the religious spirt of the world. Mature believers will recognise God’s sovereign choice of Abel as the first prophet to be killed for the testimony of Jesus (Rev 19:10), placing him at the head of the long line of witnesses to his unparalleled Son (Luke 10:50-51; Heb 11:4). A line which God our Father longs to extend through us all. Tragically, few today desire to imitate Abel, implying, despite personal protests of our unfailing devotion (Matt 26:33), few of us long for costly Christlikeness (Phil 3:10; Col 1:24). There is a sense in which the contemporary people of God need to rediscover the secret of conversion, that death to self, and so to sin, is always the way to God in Christ (Gal 2:19-20). As Murray says, “There is no way out of sin and sinful flesh, but through death to life.”