Study VF

LESSON I.

SIN is any want of a conformity to the law of God. Man was created free from sin. He was placed under the government of laws adapted to his condition. But a want of conformity to any item of such law necessarily disorganized and deranged some portion of his original condition. Let us cast a hasty view at the operation of these laws. It is contrary to the law of God that a man should put his hand in the fire; when he does so, his condition is somewhat physically changed, and he is in trouble.

It is contrary to the law of God that a man should bear false testimony; he having done so, his condition is changed mentally, and his troubles increase.

It is contrary to the law of God that a man should remain ignorant; he doing so, is not in the condition of him who has multiplied and replenished his mental and physical capabilities: he is less capable, he has less power.

The law of God is all powerful, and will be executed. The punishment of its breach is certain. It is effect following cause. The whole of God's creation is planned by this principle.

A want of conformity to the law operates as a poison, that spreads through the moral and physical man, sinking, forcing him down to trouble, pain, misery, ruin, and death.

The boy, intending to appropriate to himself, takes a pin. If there is naught that checks him, petty thefts push him on to deeper crimes, that end in death. The young gentleman drinks the social glass, nor thinks harm to himself; he feels strong, he fears nothing: but habit becomes excess; his physical appearance becomes sickly; his mind obtuse, his pleasures gross; his condition is changed; he is evidently tending downwards to the grave. And

such are the course and progress of every other sin; for, whatever has a tendency to injure the character, health, mind, and body, is sin.

Speculators upon the holy writ may say what they will; yet it is certain, that act, called the eating the apple, was an act, whatever it may have been, that necessarily injured the character. health, mind, and body of man. It is certain, because it did so. It was the very birth of death itself. The wages of sin are deaththe Lord God Almighty hath spoken it!! Another law of God, till then unknown to man, was brought instantly into operation. His wants were changed; the earth no longer produced spontaneously to them. In the emphatic language of that day, it was cursed, that he might have less leisure time and opportunity to continue in the downward course of sin to sudden destruction and death. He was in great mercy condemned to labour for the supply of his daily wants; he was made the slave to the necessities of animal life. Is it necessary to quote Scripture to show that it abounds with the doctrine that idleness is a wonderful promoter of sin? God in great mercy contrived that his hungry body and naked back should in some measure keep him from it.

"Therefore, the Lord sent him forth from the garden of Eden to till the ground from which he was taken." Gen. iii. 23, "To till" is translated from la avod, to slave. It is the very word that means a slave; but is here used as a verb, and literally means to slave the ground. In this early instance of its use in holy writ, in relation to man, it is used as a verb, to show us, not that he had become the property of any other person, but a slave to his own necessities, and that the labour required was the labour of a slave.

Until man had become poisoned by sin there was no want of a law, of an institution to interpose between him and his sudden destruction and death.

This is the first degree of slavery among poor, fallen men, and upon which now depend their health, happiness, and continuance of life.

LESSON II.

"BUT Cain was a tiller of the ground." The word tiller is translated from the same word used as a noun, a slave of the ground, having reference to its cultivation for his support and sustenance. And here we see the peculiar propriety of the language of the Psalmist: "He causeth the grass to grow for the cattle, and herb for the service of man, that he may bring forth food out of the earth." Ps. civ. 14. In this instance, "service" means slavery, and is translated from the same word, la avodath. “He causeth the grass to grow for the cattle, and herb for the slavery of man, that he may bring forth food out of the earth."

But we are directly informed that the Lord had no respect for the offering of Cain; that Cain was very wroth, and his countenance fell; and the Lord reasoned with him and said, "If thou doest well, shalt thou not be accepted? and if thou doest not well, sin lieth at the door;" also promising him, if he would do well, he should have rule over his younger brother! All this shows that Cain's progress in sin had become very considerable, notwithstanding the mild yet unavoidable slavery already imposed. But, like many other sinners, he ran his race rapidly, until his hands were dyed in his brother's blood.

"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." Gen. iv. 12. Here tillest is also translated from the same word, and means "when thou slavest the ground," showing most clearly that the slavery imposed on Adam was attached to Cain, with the additions, that the earth should not yield unto him. her strength, that he should be a fugitive and a vagabond,—and a mark was placed upon him. The expression that the ground should not yield unto him its strength, may be understood to mean that it should not be as productive, or, that some other person should enjoy a portion of the benefit of his labour, or in fact both his labours were to be in some measure fruitless. And let us notice how this portion of his sentence compares with other announcements of Jehovah :

"Treasures of wickedness profit nothing, but righteousness delivereth from death."

"The Lord will not suffer the soul of the righteous to famish, but he casteth away the substance of the wicked."

"The hand of the diligent shall bear rule, but the slothful shall be under tribute."

"Poverty and shame shall be to him that refuses instruction, but he that regardeth reproof shall be honoured."

"A good man leaveth an inheritance to his children's children, but the wealth of the sinner is laid up for the just."

"The righteous eateth to the satisfying of his soul, but the belly of the wicked shall want." Proverbs.

"He should be a fugitive and a vagabond.

"The wicked flee when no man pursueth; but the righteous are bold as a lion." Prov. xxviii. 1.

"Blessed is the man that walketh not in the counsel of the ungodly, nor standeth in the way of sinners, nor sitteth in the seat of the scornful. But his delight is in the law of the Lord; and his law doth he meditate day and night. And he shall be like a tree planted by the rivers of water, that bringeth forth his fruit in his season; his leaf also shall not wither; and whatsoever he doeth shall prosper. The ungodly are not so, but are like the chaff which the wind driveth away. Therefore the ungodly shall not stand in the judgment, nor sinners in the congregation of the righteous. For the Lord knoweth the way of the righteous; but the way of the ungodly shall perish." Ps. i.

And again: "Set thou a wicked man over him; and let Satan stand at his right hand. When he shall be judged, let him be condemned; and let his prayer become sin. Let his days be few, and let another take his office. Let his children be fatherless, and his wife a widow. Let his children be continually vagabonds and beg; let them seek their bread also out of their desolate places. Let the extortioner catch all that he hath; and let the strangers spoil his labour. Let there be none to extend mercy unto him: neither let there be any to favour his fatherless children. Let his posterity be cut off; and in the generation following let their name be blotted out. Let the iniquities of his fathers be remembered with the Lord, and let not the sin of his mother be blotted out." Ps. cix. 6-14. Such is the prospect of the desperately wicked: "The curse of the Lord is in the house of the wicked: but he blesseth the habitation of the just." Prov. iii. 33.

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LESSON III.

BUT Cain had a mark set upon him. The word translated mark is oth: it means a mark of a miraculous nature, whereby some future thing is of a certainty known, and may be something done or only said. Whatever it may have been, the object was to prevent him from being slain by any one meeting him, by its proclamation of the burden of the curses under which he laboured. It was, therefore, absolutely the mark of sin, sealing upon him and his race this secondary degree of slavery. The mark distinguished them as low and servile as well as wicked, and hence its protective influence.

But what was the mark of sin? What is it now? and what has it ever been? If one is accused of some vile offence, a little presumptive evidence will make us say, It is a very dark crime; it makes him look very black. This figure, if it be one, now so often applied, is so strongly used in Scripture, and in fact by all in every age, that the idea seems well warranted that the downward, humiliating course of sin has a direct tendency, by the Divine law, to even physically degrade, perhaps blacken and disbeautify, the animal man.

A similar doctrine was well known to the Greeks. Demosthenes says to the Athenians, "It is impossible for him who commits low, dishonourable, and wicked acts, not to possess a low, dirty intellect; for, as the person of a man receives, as it were, a colouring from his conduct, so does the mind, take upon itself a clothing See Second Olynthiac. See Second Olynthiac. So the Arabians: "God invited unto the dwelling of peace, and directed whom he pleaseth into the right way. They who do right shall receive a most excellent reward, and a superabundant addition; neither blackness nor shame shall cover their faces." Koran, chap. x.

from the same acts."

"On the day of the resurrection, thou shalt see the faces of those who have uttered lies concerning God, become black.' Koran, chap. xxxix.

So, the Mohammedan belief is that a man who has some good qualities may die; but, on the account of his wickedness, he will be sent to hell, and there tormented until his skin is black; but