Why was Cain's sacrifice unacceptable?

He preached peace all throughout his life John. He is the Prince of Peace.And once again you are but quotemining. Worse than that you are pulling passages, not even from the same damn letter, totally out of context to try to support your earlier quotemining. Well, John, if you will check my posts here at EvC I think you will find that I am constantly suggesting to folk that they read all of the manual, and not just lines here and there.The whole Bible speaks to the fact that it is Jesus life that is the important point. Jesus became MAN, and one point about being man, is that you will die. Sorry, but if Jesus had not been crucified, he would have died of old age, sickness or accident.It is the Live that counts. Christianity is a religion of Life, not death.The Great Sacrifice is GOD becoming man, with all of the limitations that implies.

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

Give it up Ringo.For those readers wanting to know the truth about 1 Peter 1:18 notice that the following verse says "But with the precious blood, as of a Lamb without blemish and without spot, the blood of Christ"Refer back to Exodus 12:5, Leviticus 4:3,4, and 6:6. Christ was the human expiatory sacrifice slain like the animals prescribed in the Old Testament.Plus the fact in the same epistle Peter says "Who Himself bore up our sins in His body on the tree ..." (1 Pet. 2:24). The tree here means the cross made from a tree, on which Christ was nailed and died. Redemption from sins required that Christ carry up our sins in His body to the tree of the wooden cross where He shed His blood.After death Christ in resurrection became the Executor of the New Covenant. He is the resurrected High Priest forever, in resurrection, according to the power of an indestructible life (Hebrews 7:16).Ringo's and jar's appeal to the life of Christ is actually a subtle denial of Christ's resurrection as well as His expiatory death. But I see them.This message has been edited by jaywill, 04-18-2006 10:16 PM

That's right. Before and after His resurredtion He preached peace. The Ephesian passage said that He Himself is our peace. So if Christ is not resurrected He cannot be peace to the repentent sinner. You are making a pretense of speaking noble words about Christ's life while undermining His death and resurrection. It would be better if you spoke highly of the life of Christ both in His incarnation and in His resurrection. That would be more according to the whole Bible, as you suggest but do not practice. That's good. I have read the whole Bible probably much more than you have. Christ death is needed not only for the shedding of His redemptive blood. But it is needed to kill off the old nature within us. This why Paul stressed that he had been crucified with Christ. And in Romans he teaches the disciples how to apply the death of Christ in the Holy Spirit to the old man.So in His resurrection life the effectiveness of His death is included not only for its redeeming power, but for its TERMINATING power. There is no underminding of Christ's death in the New Testament. And there is no teaching that He accomplished everything apart from the need for Him to die.My many posts on The Tree of Life proved amply that I could write many things about the life of God in Christ and not only speak about His redeeming death.This message has been edited by jaywill, 04-18-2006 10:39 PM

I fully agree.But judicial peace comes from righteosness. The sinner has peace toward God because Christ has borne the judgment do to him or her. The fact that justice on behalf of the sinner has been satisfied is what makes for peace.Now that we must go on to live by the Spirit of the resurrected Christ is quite crucial. Redemption is not an end in itself.But neither should you try to deny that redemptive death in Jesus has no place. Without His death there is no righteousness imputed to you or me. And without righteouesness there is no peace.He is the God of peace. And regenerated human "spirit is life because of righteousness" (Rom. 8:10). Man can be born again because of righteousness. And that righteousness is founded in the death of Christ on behalf of the guilty sinner.This message has been edited by jaywill, 04-18-2006 10:49 PM

Coming back to Cain. Cain disbelieved God. Abel believed God.Just from reading Genesis it is hard to ascertain that. But I take the comments of the apostles on these two men as inspired insight into what we should know about them. Abel offered His sacrifice by faith and was accepted. Conversly Cain's sacrifice did not include faith. It may have included presumption. But presumption is not the same thing as faith.Now faith in the Bible always has God's Word as its object. I conclude then that what Abel had faith in must have been God's word. And what Cain failed to have faith in was God's word.Where did they hear God's word and either believe or disbelieve it? They must have heard God's word from their parents - Adam and Eve. And instructions of offering must have been taught them by Adam and Eve. In that instruction there must have been something of God's word.Abel believed. Cain did not."By faith Abel offered to God a more excellent sacrifice than Cain ..." (Hebrews 11:4a)This message has been edited by jaywill, 04-18-2006 10:58 PM

Let's mine a little more ore from 1 Peter, shall we?

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1Pe 2:21 For even hereunto were ye called: because Christ also suffered for us, leaving us an example, that ye should follow his steps:
1Pe 2:22 Who did no sin, neither was guile found in his mouth:
1Pe 2:23 Who, when he was reviled, reviled not again; when he suffered, he threatened not; but committed himself to him that judgeth righteously:
1Pe 2:24 Who his own self bare our sins in his own body on the tree, that we, being dead to sins, should live unto righteousness: by whose stripes ye were healed.

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In verse 21, Jesus left us an example - by His life - that we should follow His steps. Follow Him in death? Or in life?In verse 22, He did no sin - in His life - and He had no guile in His mouth - in His life.In verse 23, He was reviled - in His life - but He did not revile in kind - in His life. He suffered - in His life - but He didn't threaten those who hurt Him - in His life.The whole passage is about His life, not His death.He came to tell us that we are forgiven. Figuratively, He took our sins back to heaven with Him when He died. There is nothing in that passage (or anything else that you have ptresented) that suggests that it was His death that saves us. This is where you make your big mistake.

quote:

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Lev 6:25 Speak unto Aaron and to his sons, saying, This is the law of the sin offering: In the place where the burnt offering is killed shall the sin offering be killed before the LORD: it is most holy.
Lev 6:26 The priest that offereth it for sin shall eat it: in the holy place shall it be eaten, in the court of the tabernacle of the congregation.
Lev 6:27 Whatsoever shall touch the flesh thereof shall be holy: and when there is sprinkled of the blood thereof upon any garment, thou shalt wash that whereon it was sprinkled in the holy place.
Lev 6:28 But the earthen vessel wherein it is sodden shall be broken: and if it be sodden in a brazen pot, it shall be both scoured, and rinsed in water.
Lev 6:29 All the males among the priests shall eat thereof: it is most holy.

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Killing the sacrifice was initiated so that the priests could eat. Other than that, what possible reason is there for killing the sacrifice? What use does God have for a dead sheep? What use does God have for a dead Son?In Leviticus, the killing of the sacrifice was a practical necessity for the livelihood of the priestly caste. You are projecting that necessity forward to Jesus' sacrifice, where there was no practical necessity for His death. You are also projecting it backward to Cain's sacrifice, where there was no practical necessity for killing the sheep. Nonsense. The resurrection is a given. If Jesus hadn't risen from the dead, He wouldn't have been the Son of God.But His message - exemplified by His life - would still be the same. And you still have not shown that His death was "expiatory". Maybe so, but the point of a discussion is to show others what you see. Feel free to do that.

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John, no one has said that Jesus resurrection is not important to Christianity. But Jesus would have arisen no matter how he died.Jesus was killed by men. That was very likely based on the message he brought, the message of his life. Jesus would have died no matter what. He was human. Jesus would have arisen. He returned to GOD.But the message is his life, death was but part of living.

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

I did.

Everthing you said has been rebutted. How about an actual response?

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What is the message?Here is an excellent summary of the gospel message:"For if we, being enemies, were reconciled to God through the death of His Son, much more we will be saved in His life, having been reconciled" (Romans 5:10)First the sinner is RECONCILED to God through the DEATH ... DEATH ... DEATH of His Son. Now having "BEEN reconciled" the sinner will much more be saved in Christ's life. And that is saved in the realm and sphere of His resurrection life after His work of death for reconciliation.Once again, because some may have forgotten already - "RECONCILED THROUGH THE DEATH OF HIS SON". Now having in the past been RECONCILED through the DEATH of the Son of God, based upon that foundation the sinner can be much more saved in the realm and sphere of the life of Christ.Reconciled judicially through Christ's DEATH is the first step. Saved much more in the realm of His resurrection LIFE is the second step.This message has been edited by jaywill, 04-18-2006 11:11 PMThis message has been edited by jaywill, 04-18-2006 11:13 PMThis message has been edited by jaywill, 04-18-2006 11:14 PM

Yea, sure Ringo.

So that's your best response? Declare victory and run away?

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"For if we, being enemies, were reconciled to God through the death of His Son, much more we will be saved in His life, having been reconciled"Let's wait and see how Ringo will "rebut" this one showing that Christ's death in not needed for full salvation.

LOL! So that's your best response? Ignore the Bible and keep running your mouth?

Read what you post. And once again you are but quotemining. Romans is one letter. For convenience and aesthetics, it is broken up into 16 Chapters, but it is still all one letter. In it Paul returns again and again to the message that it is behavior that is important.Christianity is a message of life, of love. You keep trying to drag us off into totally unrelated issues. The question was, "Why was Cain's sacrifice unacceptable?"The answer is, No one knows. But it has NOTHING to do with Jesus, nothing to do with the crucifixion, nothing to do with the resurrection. All of these are but dancing goal posts you bring in when you don't like the answers given.You seem fixated on Jesus crucifixion. But if Jesus came down and became man, he was going to die. If GOD wanted to forgive sins, becoming man and killing himself and arising from the dead is just plain stupid. GOD could forgive mankind simply by forgiving mankind. GOD does not have to sacrifice himself to himself to do that.GOD became man as a message. He became one of us, lived and died as one of us, taught us how we should live, showed us that life everlasting is a reality, told us what we needed to do.Love GOD and love others as we love ourselves.It really is as simple as that.

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion