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Reading through the Bible every year for several years in a row, you’d think I’d retain more of what’s written in this all-important book, but this practice never fails to reveal something new. For instance, a few weeks ago we read the story of Cain and Abel in Genesis 4. In the story, Cain kills his brother Abel out of jealousy after Abel brings the better offering to God. God sees what happened and calls to Cain, asking him a question which He already knows the answer to, “Cain, where is your brother?”

Cain replies in a defensive, guilty way, “I don’t know. What am I, my brother’s keeper?” (Really smooth, Cain, not suspicious at all, buddy.) Then the Lord explains Cain’s punishment. He says, “Now you are under a curse and driven from the ground, which opened its mouth to receive your brother’s blood from your hand. When you work the ground, it will no longer yield its crops for you. You will be a restless wanderer on the earth.”

Considering that this is the first murder in the Bible, I feel like having to do yard work is a very lenient and merciful price to pay, but what really stood out to me on this pass through Scripture was Cain’s response. He’s not so much worried about the hard labor, but the hard labor away from the Lord’s presence. He says to God, “My punishment is more than I can bear. Today you are driving me from the land, and I will be hidden from your presence; I will be a restless wanderer on the earth, and whoever finds me will kill me.” Cain knew for a fact that his everything—his abundance, his safety, his peace—came from the Lord, and now he doesn’t know how to survive away from God. He just assumes that outside of God’s presence, he would face life-threatening danger.

But the Lord had a contingency plan for Cain’s would-be attackers. He told Cain that anyone who tries to kills him would suffer greatly, seven times greater than what they had meted out on him. Then God did something that has baffled generations. Verse 15 says, “Then the Lord put a mark on Cain so that no one who found him would kill him.” We don’t know what this mark was or how it communicated so effectively that Cain’s life was out of bounds, but since God did it, we know it worked.

Reading on, we see that Cain “went out from the Lord’s presence and lived in the land of Nod, east of Eden.” He left the vicinity of relative safety (I mean, it wasn’t perfect. Abel was murdered there), and he went on to build a life in a place which means wandering.

Another interesting way to think about Cain’s punishment and this mysterious mark is to compare it with the preceding chapter and Cain’s parents’ sin. When God questioned them after they had eaten of the forbidden tree, God knew what had happened but He allowed the First Couple to spin their own version of events. As with Cain, God also punished them by kicking them out of the place where they felt most safe, this time the Garden of Eden. But He didn’t send them away without protection. Genesis 3:21 says, “The Lord God made garments of skin for Adam and his wife and clothed them.”

I was recently watching a documentary about the Revolutionary War. In it, they described the practice of branding a person’s right thumb to show they had been convicted of a crime when this had been their first offense. So if someone was caught stealing, and their thumb had a “T” seared into the skin, it could be assumed that this was a repeat crime. Whether they never stole again, they had been branded with a mark that would forever define them.

Ephesians 1 spells out a different kind of mark. Not one of shame or condemnation, but a mark of ownership. “When you believed, you were marked in him with a seal, the promised Holy Spirit, who is a deposit guaranteeing our inheritance until the redemption of those who are God’s possession.” Or as The Messagestates it, “You found yourselves home free—signed, sealed, and delivered by the Holy Spirit. This down payment from God is the first installment on what’s coming, a reminder that we’ll get everything God has planned for us, a praising and glorious life.” Oh, I’m so grateful that God called dibs on my life and marked me as His own!