Do you like to be proved wrong?

All photos courtesy of Unsplash 

Most of us like to be right, and not many of us like to be told that we are wrong, even if we are!

Only one person has ever lived who was perfect, and unable to do anything wrong — Jesus Christ. The Bible tells us plainly that ‘all have sinned’, yet we also read about some that became known as ‘righteous’. How can this be?

Today, we are thinking about Abel, the second man to be born. We inherit some things from our parents and there is one thing in particular that Abel and his older brother Cain inherited from their father that we have to mention. They did things wrong, and did not need to be taught how to do them — it just happened. This is because they got it from their father, Adam, who himself did something that God told him not to do. Eating the fruit that his wife, Eve, gave him might not have seemed very serious, but it broke his, and by inheritance, our relationship with God.

Adam and Eve had tried to cover up their guilt by making clothes from leaves, but sins can only be forgiven by the shedding of blood. So, animals were killed, and Adam & Eve wore clothes made from their skins.

After a time, Abel’s brother, Cain, thought that he would like to meet with God. However, Cain needed to own his sin and receive forgiveness before he could be accepted, but Cain approached God, offering fruit and vegetables he had grown, hoping that God would be pleased with his hard work. Abel too approached God, but in doing so — probably remembering what his parents had taught him about the clothes made with animal skins —he took a lamb, and having killed it, offered it to God.

As God looked at Abel’s gift and saw that a lamb had died, it seems that God’s mind looked forward through time to the moment when the Lord Jesus Christ died on a cross for the sin of the world. Looking back at Abel, God, having forgiven his sin, was pleased. Indeed, although Abel did not know anything about what the Lord Jesus was going to do many years later, Abel brought this offering because he was grateful that God had made it possible for him to be right.

Sadly, the product of Cain’s hard work just would not do, and God told him that he too could be accepted if he brought the right kind of sacrifice. Instead, Cain went on to do even worse things than before. We need to take care that, when we know we have sinned, we do not ignore God’s warnings because it can lead us further away from Him.

However, because Abel came God’s way, God counted him to be right. He could not make himself right, but when Abel trusted God, God made him right.

We have already said that most of us do not like to be told that we are wrong, but that is how we are because of our sin. How would you like God to tell you that you are ‘right’ or ‘righteous’? Well, He can, if we come to God His way — by being sorry for our sin and realising that the Lord Jesus died and rose again, to save us. He said ‘I am the way, the truth, and the life, no-one comes to the Father but by me.’

Although we can not make ourselves right, God can make us right, and, when God has made us right, let us remember, always to be grateful, and to show how much we appreciate him.

Written by Tom Merriman for Messages with Meaning (12/07/21) & Your542Day