A Young Person Who Makes a Difference! |
Those Who are Enlightened and Separated |
The first in this list is Abel. “By faith Abel offered to God a more excellent sacrifice then Cain, through which he obtained the testimony that he was righteous, God testifying to his gifts; and through faith, though he has died, he still speaks” (Heb. 11:4). Abel learned to live by faith. Genesis 4:1-26 tells the history of Cain and Abel. These verses make it very clear that Cain offered from the fruit of his labor, and Abel from the firstlings of the flock, the best of the flock. Let us see a little bit more about these two cases or characters.
With whom did Abel learn to live by faith? Of course it was with his father. When Adam sinned, the first thing he realized was that he was naked. That is why his first concern was to hide himself. He invented sewing. He made clothes with fig leaves to cover his nakedness. Did he make it? No, because the leaves dried out. Thus all his efforts to try to be righteous, to try to be correct, did not work. He used the wrong material. However, God made clothes with the skin of animals for Adam and Eve; certainly an animal needed to die for this. Hence, we see here that there was a sacrifice. Adam learned that to be righteous was not a matter of trying hard to be good, of trying to improve, or of doing good things to please God, but rather this was a matter of shedding blood (Heb. 9:22).
Clothes in the Bible indicate our acts (Rev. 19:8), which can be of righteousness or of unrighteousness. When Adam made clothes with fig leaves, those clothes represented Adam’s acts of trying to be a good person who could please God. What was God trying to say to Adam when He made clothes with the skin of animals? First, God wanted to tell him who made the clothes. Was it Adam or God? God did it. Was it made with leaves? No, it was with skin of animals. Hence, an animal died. This shows that if we want to please God, we can not do this by trying to be good by ourselves. It is God who needs to work in us. This was very clear to Adam, and he probably taught his children, Cain and Abel, this: to please God you need to offer an animal, and do not use anything that results from your own effort.
Cain plowed the ground to make his living, but Abel was a shepherd. We need to realize that at that time man fed on vegetables only (Gen. 2:16). Man began to eat meat only after Noah left the ark (Gen. 9:3). So, why did Abel shepherd sheep? If in that time people did not eat meat, why was he a shepherd? What profit was there in this? Nothing. Who could be pleased with this? Only God. Abel had a profession that was not for his satisfaction, nor was it for himself, much less for other people, rather it was for God.
Young one, this is to live by faith. Abel lived by faith, doing a job that, humanly speaking, had no profit. He could not eat sheep, but he did what pleased God. Then, Hebrews 11:4 says that Abel obtained the testimony that he was righteous, that is, that he pleased God because he did something for God’s pleasure only and not for himself. Young one, today your life must be like that. You must be an Abel. You must be one who does things not for yourself, to please yourself or just to satisfy yourself, but rather, to satisfy and please God. This is to live by faith. Can you see God? No. However, if what you do is to please Him, then you are living by faith and not just doing things to please yourself.
There were three things in the sacrifice: 1. the blood shed, since without shedding of blood there is no remission of sins, 2. the fat of the animal pleased God with its aroma when it was burnt, and 3. the skin, that was used to cover man’s nakedness. Abel’s life and occupation pleased God and this was living by faith.
Young person, consider your life today. What has been your occupation? Shepherd of sheep or farmer? Has it been a job of someone who seeks to please God or of someone who wants to satisfy his hunger? Cain produced things that could satisfy his hunger. He believed that, because he worked so hard and because, by the sweat of his face, he had success cultivating the land, the best he could present to God to please Him was the fruit of the land. Did it please God? No.
The title of this chapter is: “Those who are Enlighten and Separated.” Among Cain and Abel, who was enlightened? Abel was. Cain was in darkness. He believed that what he did could please God, but Abel realized that he himself could not please God.
Young one, do you realize that you cannot please God? Do you believe that what you are doing, the way you do things is acceptable? How is your life with the Lord now? You realize that you sometimes commit some mistakes, that you do not always please God. But in the end, you still are participating of the conferences, going to the meetings, sometimes reading the Bible, doing good in school; you do not kill, do not steal, so you think, “Yeah, I’m OK.” Are you really doing well? Abel was enlightened because he realized that whatever he did, he couldn’t please God. He could have been a farm laborer, shepherd, an actor, an important executive, or the first or the last of the class. It didn’t matter what he was, he couldn’t please God. When he realized this he would have thought, “Since I can not please God, I’m going to offer him an animal.” And this was what he did. Young one, you have to realize that you can’t please God. You need the Lord Jesus as your Lamb (John 1:29). He died, He gave his life for you, and He shed his blood for you. You need the blood of the Lord Jesus and you need to apply it in your daily life. You need to go before the Lord in order to be enlightened concerning your mistakes; you need to see them and confess them sincerely. “Lord I sinned on this and that. Cleanse me with your precious blood.” You need to learn to confess your sins. To confess them, first you need to be enlightened in order to see them. For this you need to go before the Lord and say, “Lord, enlightened me and show me what my sins are.”
There are some obvious sins like talking during the meeting without paying attention, not coming to the meeting like Thomas; and, it goes without saying, things like lies, stealing, etc. These sins are obvious but you need to go before the Lord to recognize them and have the habit of confessing them every day, not just once in a while, but every day. This is a habit that we do not have, but we need to exercise to have it. Because we were not born living by faith, but living by what we see, we need exercise our spirit before the Lord and learn how to use His blood; otherwise, everything that He accomplished on the cross is in vain. Days and days, weeks and weeks, months and months pass by and we never applied the blood of the Lord. We never asked for forgiveness from the Lord, we never repented before Him. The blood of the Lord is ready to be used, but we never use it, because we don’t realize that we have sinned. But John said that if we say that we have not sinned, we make Him a liar, and His word is not in us (1 John 1:10). Is God a liar? No. So we have sinned and we need to confess it. We need to be as Abel was. When we confess our sins we are covered by the blood of Christ and His blood takes away our sins.
We need to speak more about being covered by His blood . The purpose of clothing has two aspects: to cover our nakedness and protect us. In the winter time we use warm clothes to protect us, but in the summer time we use comfortable clothes. However the enemy always uses this matter to distract, to usurp and to contaminate us with the worldly things.
Young one, you must consider the way you present yourself; do not get carried away by fashion; do not use fashionable clothes just because everybody is wearing them. Don’t worry about what others will think of you if you don’t wear these type of clothes. Do not expose your body, especially the sisters. On the contrary, preserve your vessels (2 Cor 4:7). The world wants to carry you along with its trend and this is what it does with you. This is what the world offers to you. We are not of the world. We are in the world, but we don’t belong to this world. You do not have to wear the worldly clothes. You do not need to follow fashion. You do not need to expose your body in any way. This is one of Satan’s temptations to make man to fall into lusts of the flesh. Remember: Jesus said that we do not commit fornication physically only, but also when we have impure imaginations in our hearts concerning someone. A man who does this is already committing fornication in his heart with the woman. A woman who dresses to show off her body is participating in the fornication in the heart of all the men who lust after her. This means that in our hearts we can do many things that don’t please God, even if outwardly is everything okay with us.
We need to pay attention to these things. To wear clothes according to the latest fashion and to expose our body is to pay attention in the things that we can see. But you need to learn how to be “old-fashioned”, to be out of fashion, to be unfashionable; it doesn’t matter what you call this, you must preserve your vessel. Do not allow anything to damage your vessel, otherwise your vessel cannot contain the treasure.
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