“Where is Abel Your Brother?”
We all know the story of Cain. In jealousy, he killed his brother, Abel, because God accepted Abel’s sacrifice while Cain’s was rejected. In Genesis 4:9, when God asks Cain where his brother is, there seems to be time and distance between Cain and his action. We don’t know if he buried Abel or simply left him in the field in his haste to run away, but God comes to him, knowing what Cain has done, and as always, God gives the sinner an opportunity to take responsibility.
Just as He had with Adam and Eve, God asks a question to which He already knows the answer in order to give Cain the chance to examine himself. God’s question to Cain isn’t accusatory; God wants Cain to accuse himself. We all have to come to terms with the motivations of our hearts and accuse ourselves when we are confronted with our sins. We either repent or we don’t. Cain obviously does not. The first part of his reply is a statement - the second another question.
Cain outright lies to God when he says he doesn’t know what has become of his brother, Abel. While his statement is deceptive, his question is sarcastic. One commentary suggested that the use of the word keeper is an allusion to Abel being a keeper of sheep. In his arrogance, Cain says to God, “Am I the keeper’s keeper?”
It’s interesting to note that God, in His question, reminds Cain that Abel is his brother. He’s not some stranger. Even if Cain is jealous, Abel is his brother, and that should mean something. The intention of the question is wasted on Cain. He is unwilling, too calloused, to convict himself; as a result, God convicts him with yet another question - “What have you done?” It’s the same question God asked Cain’s mother in Genesis 3. It’s the same question Samuel asked Saul in I Samuel 13. Both questions are intended to make Cain think, but he just hides behind his pride. I wonder if he thought he could outsmart God.
It is not uncommon for one sin to lead to another. So it does for Cain. God had previously told Cain that sin was waiting to gobble him up. It had already taken the first bite as bitterness set in. Cain blamed Abel for his own shortcomings, and as he continually failed to take himself to task for his own deficiencies, he lashed out in an effort to remove the light that intensified his own darkness.
If we extend these questions to ourselves, we can substitute Abel’s name with any one of those around us about whom we should be concerned. When Jesus tells His disciples in John 13 that He is leaving and where He is going, the disciples can’t follow, He gives them a new commandment in verse 34: to love each other as He loved. The motive of the love He commands is the fact that He first loved them, and He goes on to say that this love of service, this commitment to each other, is how others will know that they are His. It won’t be by spiritual gifts or miraculous healings. Those will verify the word, but the way the world will know that this kingdom is different is in the way that its citizens care for each other.
We have to be willing to love as Christ loved. Jesus isn’t talking about the intensity of His love. He’s talking about the habits of His love. He has just washed the feet of His disciples, and He tells them that they have to love like that. They have to serve each other as He served.
Look at the impact that the beginning of the kingdom had on those in Jerusalem in the early chapters of Acts. In Act 2:44, we are told that the new Christians “...were together and had all things in common.” This was a spontaneous outgrowth of love. The spirit showed itself in many ways, but the most powerful was this love and concern among the new brothers and sisters. Others noticed it, and it drew them in. It was a light in an otherwise dark world. They knew who had needs, and it was the work of everyone to tend to and care for their new brothers and sisters - whom they didn’t know - whose language they may or may not speak - whose customs were foreign. They willingly gave up their personal possessions so that others weren’t living in want.
They loved and served anyone who needed something. It’s easy to pick and choose who we will serve. We love whom we want to and assume that someone else will love the rest. We don’t bother to get to know some people, saying that we just don’t have that much in common with them. That is not the love we see in Acts, nor is it the love we have modeled by Christ.
We are supposed to love our brothers and sisters, and that means knowing where they are. It means that we have to connect and know what others need, how we can support, how we can serve.
We have to be ready and willing to sacrifice our pride. It’s not glamorous work serving others. It may be dirty and messy. You may find things out about people that you’d rather not know. I have to tell you, I have found myself in places and situations where I thought, “How in the world is this my life?” Not bad places necessarily, but places I would have never imagined I’d be, that’s for sure!
When we love, we know where our brothers and sisters are in life. We care enough to ask and to help. I’ve said before that a trait that frustrates me is when people ask or talk about others, not because they intend to help, but because they just want to be in the know. If you want to know how a sister is, ask her, and then be prepared to serve her.
Loving our brothers and sisters gets complicated. It will be inconvenient. It can be expensive - financially and emotionally. But we can’t properly love people we don’t bother to know.
This is what unites us. Christ gives His disciples the comfort of each other. They will band together, these men and women from different backgrounds and political parties. In a world where they seemingly have nothing in common, they will be made brothers and sisters. That is the power of this kingdom!
Just as it should have meant something that Abel was Cain’s brother, so it should mean something to us with our brothers and sisters in Christ. They are our family.
Where is your brother or sister? Sadly, my answer is often, “I don’t know.” And shame on me. I have to accuse myself. I have to make every effort to know my brothers and sisters and to seek what will benefit them so that the gospel is promoted, and others are encouraged, and the light of Christ shines in this world’s darkness.
And then, if I’ve exhausted myself in the service of others, when I, too, am asked “What have you done?”...I’ll have an answer. I’ve done all that I could.