The Broad Way and the Narrow Way
Matthew 7:13-14 “Enter through the narrow gate; for the gate is wide and the way is broad that leads to destruction, and there are many who enter through it. For the gate is narrow and the way is constricted that leads to life, and there are few who find it.
The Way of Cain is the broad way: self-righteousness and fleeing from God.
The narrow way is the way of the shed blood of Jesus Christ; coming to God for forgiveness, living righteously by His Spirit.
We’ve spent a number of weeks now in our study of the whole Bible. The study that ours is based on is entitled; Firm Foundations. It is designed to cover all of the Bible in a relatively short time, looking at the foundation stones for the Christian faith. We want to answer the question, “What are the very basic truths that are the foundation of what God is telling us in the Bible.
There was a Christian singing group called 4Him that was popular in the 90’s. They had a song called “Basics of Life.” Let me read you, its lyrics.
1st verse: We've turned the
page For a new day has dawned And we've rearranged
What is right and what's wrong Somehow we've
drifted so far from the truth
That we can't get back home
And where are the virtues That once gave us
light And where are the morals
That governed our lives Someday we all will
awake and look back
Just to find what we've lost
++2nd verse: The
newest rage is to reason it out Just meditate and you can overcome every doubt
After all man is a God They say God is no longer alive
But I still believe in the old rugged cross
Whoa, I still believe there is hope for the lost
And I know the rock of all ages will stand
Through the changes of time
Through the changes of time
We need to get back to the basics of life A
heart that is pure and a love that is blind
A faith that is fervently grounded in Christ The
hope that endures for all times
These are the basics We need to get back to the
basics of life
That’s what we are doing with this study. The basics of life. And what basics have we learned so far? God created a marvelous world for us. He created us to be His image, and to manage this marvelous world. But He also gave us freewill, and a choice to obey or disobey Him. The choices we make come with consequences. The first man and woman chose to disobey God, so the world and humanity came under the curse. And the curse brought death. And not just the physical death of organic life in our world, but the eternal death for all human beings; separation from God in a place called Hell. A place of eternal punishment. All of humanity is born under the curse of physical death in this world and spiritual death in Hell. But even in mankind’s disobedience, God promised a Savior; One who would offer Himself, His blood, to pay the debt of sin for those who would come to Him in faith.
So now, we find mankind walking through their lives. And they are still given a choice. It is the choice between two ways; the way of faith, forgiveness, and righteousness found only in Jesus Christ, or the way of self-righteousness, pride, and sinfulness found in any system outside of faith in Christ. Those are the basics that we have learned so far.
Matthew 7:13-14 “Enter through the narrow gate; for the gate is wide and the way is broad that leads to destruction, and there are many who enter through it. For the gate is narrow and the way is constricted that leads to life, and there are few who find it.
Today we continue with our flight over the foundational truths of the Bible. We leave the Garden of Eden, the first man and woman, their first two children; Cain and Abel, and we will fly quickly over world history to the birth of the next significant person in Bible history; Noah. There is about 1000 years between the creation of Adam and the birth of Noah. Today we will be illustrating the two ways set before man by looking at the lives of particular people who lived from Adam to Noah.
Prayer
What does the broad way look like?
I. Cain; the broad gate of wandering/searching
I think Jesus’ illustration gives us some clues about these two ways. A narrow path is limited in it’s wandering. When you are on a narrow path you don’t doubt where the next step is. You just follow the path. But the broad way allows a person to wander back and forth, to try this and that. It allows a person to believe that they are the captains of their own fate, to say, “I make my own destiny.” That’s the path Cain took.
You remember where we left Cain. He had offered a sacrifice to God that did not meet the standard for the sacrifice at that time. His brother Abel, on the other hand, offered a sacrifice that was approved by God. Cain was admonished by God, and he was angry. He ran into his brother Abel in the field, and in his anger, he killed him. That’s where we pick up with Cain’s journey away from God. And we notice some things about Cain that characterize people who walk the broad path to destruction.
Genesis 4: 9 Then Yahweh said to Cain, “Where is Abel your brother?” And he said, “I do not know. Am I my brother’s keeper?”
First off, he, like his parents before him, tries to hide his sin. He hides it with denial. But one thing we know for sure, you may be able to hide your sin from others, you cannot hide it from God.
Hebrews 4: 12 For the word of God is living and active and sharper than any two-edged sword and piercing as far as the division of soul and spirit, of both joints and marrow, and able to judge the thoughts and intentions of the heart. 13 And there is no creature hidden from His sight, but all things are [e]uncovered and laid bare to the eyes of Him to whom we have an account to give.
So, God knows.
10 And He said, “What have you done? The voice of your brother’s blood is crying out to Me from the ground. 11 And now, cursed are you from the ground, which has opened its mouth to receive your brother’s blood from your hand. 12 When you cultivate the ground, it will no longer yield its strength to you; you will be a vagrant and a wanderer on the earth.”
This is the further curse against Cain. He had been a cultivator of the soil. And even though the ground would only produce with sweat and labor, he chose planting over livestock. But now God further curses him. Not only would the ground only give fruit with great sweat and difficulty, for him it would not produce at all. And in addition to that God condemns him to being a vagrant and a wanderer. The word vagrant here is translated in other places, “fugitive.” And wanderer is translated vagabond. Because he has committed the first murder, he will be notorious in the world of men. He will have to run and hide from those who would bring justice for this murder.
As I said last week, the specific and natural consequences for Cain’s sin involve alienation. He is alienated from his preferred work. The earth is cursed for him. He is alienated from God because of his sin. And he is alienated from other people, his parents, his family because he murdered Abel. Do you want to know where the wide road ultimately leads, to alienation, to loneliness.
Well Cain can’t handle this thought.
13 And Cain said to Yahweh, “My punishment is too great to bear! 14 Behold, You have driven me this day from the face of the ground; and from Your face I will be hidden, and I will be a vagrant and a wanderer on the earth, and it will be that whoever finds me will kill me.”
He says, people will know I’m a murderer and seek to bring justice. This is interesting for a couple of reasons. Number one it implies that there was already some understanding that the punishment for murder should be death. Number two, it implies that the population of the world must have been more than four at this time. We don’t know how old Cain and Abel were when this happened. Adam and Eve may have had other children. In fact, in a moment we discover another reason that we know they had other children. That means that Cain could be held accountable for his deed. He could be killed. But God, as always, is willing to extend some grace to Cain.
15 So Yahweh said to him, “Therefore whoever kills Cain, vengeance will be taken on him sevenfold.” And Yahweh [i]appointed a sign for Cain, so that no one who found him would strike him.
God put some sort of mark on Cain, so everyone would know what he had done, and that God had pardoned him from receiving a penalty of death.
16 Then Cain went out from the presence of Yahweh and [j]settled in the land of [k]Nod,
Nod means wandering. It probably got that name because it is the area that Cain wandered when he was initially banished from his family.
east of Eden. 17 Then Cain [l]knew his wife, and she conceived and [m]gave birth to Enoch; and he built a city and called the name of the city Enoch, after the name of his son.
I told you earlier that there is a second reason why we know that the population of the earth had to be more than four at this time. Cain gets a wife. Adam and Eve had other children. They end up having one more named son, Seth. And Genesis 5 tells us…
Genesis 5:4….and he became the father of other sons and daughters.
We don’t know how old Cain was when he killed his brother, and we don’t know how long he wandered before he took a wife. He may have married a sister, or maybe more likely, he wandered as an outcast from the family for 10, 20, or 30 years, and ended marrying a niece, or even a cousin.
There’s a second example of the broad road of disobedience given in this span of time between Adam and Noah.
II. Lamech; the broad gate of disobedience
Again, the narrow road gives us a picture of a life that is laid out step by step. That means that the person on the narrow knows that as far as morals and spiritual things are concerned, most decisions are black and white. If you stay on the path, that is right. If you step off the path, to the right or to the left, it is wrong, it is sin.
But the broad path allows for wandering and disobedience.
Lamech is born 5 generations after Cain. He is Cain’s great great great great grandson.
17 Then Cain [l]knew his wife, and she conceived and [m]gave birth to Enoch; ….18 Now to Enoch was born Irad, and Irad [n]was the father of Mehujael, and Mehujael [o]was the father of Methushael, and Methushael [p]was the father of Lamech.
Now, for most of these people we are only given names. But when we get to Lamech, Scripture pauses to tell us more about him. The reason it does so is because he illustrates something. He illustrates how the branch of humankind who were going down the broad path to destruction are becoming worse and worse; more and more rebellious. Cain killed his brother Abel and seemed to have been at least a little sorry for it. But 5 generations later we get Lamech.
19 And Lamech took for himself two wives: the name of the one was Adah, and the name of the other, Zillah.
He is the first recorded bigamist. From the beginning the example was set in the creation of Adam and Eve. God said, “A man (singular) shall leave his father and mother and cleave to his wife.” (singular) Well he violated that mandate. It may be that bigamy had become common by his time. Next, we have some details about his children.
20 And Adah [q]gave birth to Jabal; he was the father of those who live in tents and have livestock. 21 And his brother’s name was Jubal; he was the father of all those who play the lyre and pipe. 22 As for Zillah, she also [r]gave birth to Tubal-cain, the forger of all implements of bronze and iron; and the sister of Tubal-cain was Naamah.
Then in verse 23 we see how far humanity has fallen.
23 And Lamech said to his wives, “Adah and Zillah, Hear my voice, You wives of Lamech, Give ear to my word, For I [s]have killed a man for [t]striking me; And a boy for wounding me; 24 If Cain is avenged sevenfold, Then Lamech seventy-sevenfold.”
What can we gather from this statement of his? First, these phrases are written like Hebrew poetry. He has killed somebody and then made a limerick about it. Second, many believe that he is talking about killing two people: a man and a boy. The second word is used for a young child in other places.
“Adah and Zillah, Hear my voice, You wives of Lamech, Give ear to my word, For I [s]have killed a man for [t]striking me; And a boy for wounding me; 24 If Cain is avenged sevenfold, Then Lamech seventy-sevenfold.”
Third, the words that he uses for what they did to him describe striking someone with the hand. But he responds to being struck by killing these two. Some have noted that his son was noted for making implements of metal. It’s possible that those implements included weapons. They hit him with the fist, he pierces them with a blade. And the fourth thing is that, put all together, this sounds like he’s bragging about killing a man and a boy who struck him in some scuffle.
This is where the broad road takes us. It leads to “every person doing what is right in his own eyes.” It leads to selfishness and “every man for himself.” It leads to a lack of compassion or remorse for evil. And it leads to “do unto others before they do unto you.”
Proverbs 14: 12 There is a way which seems right to a man, but its end is the way of death.
But, just as there were many on the road to destruction, there were, alongside of them a few on the road to life. After carrying us forward down the genealogical line of Cain, the 4th chapter then takes us back to finish the story of Adam and Eve. And we discover that there are people walking down the narrow road.
III. Seth; the narrow gate of calling out to God
25 Then Adam [u]knew his wife again; and she [v]gave birth to a son and named him [w]Seth, for she said, “God [x]has set for me another [y]seed in place of Abel, for Cain killed him.” 26 And to Seth, to him also, a son was born; and he called his name Enosh. Then men began to call [z]upon the name of Yahweh.
How do we know that Seth followed the Lord? It says that after he was born, and then his son Enosh was born, men began to call on the name of the Lord. This is 240 years after creation. And it is not saying that mankind did not know about God before then. It’s saying that mankind, probably with the leadership of Seth, began to seek God. Up until this point we have no record that man ever sought God. God called out and questioned Adam and Eve, and they responded. God punished. But no one sought that relationship that had been lost in the Garden. In fact, this statement that when Enosh was born to Seth, men began to call on the name of the Lord implies that man’s relationship to God between Abel and Enosh was disjointed at best. Maybe people continued sacrifices. Maybe they quit, for fear of a further curse like Cain received. They are aware of God. They know the story of the creation and fall and tell it to their children, but they consider God now only with fear.
Now there is an interesting part of this section of the story that I think bears consideration. And we can open this discussion with a question; “Was Seth the third son of Adam and Eve?” When you first read the text, it would seem so.
25 Then Adam [u]knew his wife again; and she [v]gave birth to a son and named him [w]Seth, for she said, “God [x]has set for me another [y]seed in place of Abel, for Cain killed him.”
It seems to lay out a clear chronology. Cain and Abel are born. Daughters may have been born in those initial years. Cain kills Abel. Then Seth is born as a replacement for Abel. But if we read further into chapter five, we discover something interesting.
3 When Adam had lived 130 years, he [b]became the father of a son in his own likeness, according to his image, and named him Seth.
Adam was 130 years old when he had Seth. Now let’s think a minute. Cain and Abel are presented as Eve’s first children. So, Adam, if he is created as a fully formed man, probably had them when he had existed for a year or two. We have to believe that Adam and Eve would have been very fertile. Now, I suspect that Cain and Abel had to at least be in their teens when Cain killed Abel. And if Adam and Eve are regularly intimate, she would likely be getting pregnant everywhere from yearly, to every couple of years.
So, if Seth is the third son, it means that Adam and Eve would have to have had Cain and Abel as their first two sons, and then had all girls, until they had a third son when Adam was 130 years old. I said all of that to say that I think that Seth was not the third son of Adam and Eve. Rather, I think he was the first son born, after Abel, who actively sought the Lord. He was the first preacher born into the family. He becomes the family priest, if you will.
At the birth of his son he seeks the Lord. And it says that men began calling on the name of the Lord. That means that it wasn’t just him, but he leads the return. And it says, by the way that they called on the name of Yahweh. It uses the name that God gave Himself later when He meets Moses on the mountain. This is only the second time that God’s name is found on the lips of men. The first is by Eve.Genesis 4:1 Now the man knew his wife Eve, and she conceived and gave birth to Cain, and she said, “I have gotten a man with the help of Yahweh.”So, their calling on Him by that name not only implies a turn back to the spiritual in general, but back to the One True God in particular. This was not just Seth getting spiritual, it was his getting right. He is walking the narrow road following the way, the truth, and the life.There are other examples of the narrow way in the genealogy of Adam. We will look at them next week.
Matthew 7:13-14 “Enter through the narrow gate; for the gate is wide and the way is broad that leads to destruction, and there are many who enter through it. For the gate is narrow and the way is constricted that leads to life, and there are few who find it.
MacArthur’s comments on these two paths are helpful:
There have always been but two systems of religion in the world. One is God’s system of divine accomplishment, and the other is man’s system of human achievement. One is the religion of God’s grace, the other the religion of men’s works. One is the religion of faith, the other the religion of the flesh. One is the religion of the sincere heart and the internal, the other the religion of hypocrisy and the external. Within man’s system are thousands of religious forms and names, but they are all built on the achievements of man and the inspiration of Satan. Christianity, on the other hand, is the religion of divine accomplishment, and it stands alone.1=======================================================