Daily Manna, Year Two · Day 207 · July 26
Lieth at the Door
“If thou doest well, shalt thou not be accepted? and if thou doest not well, sin lieth at the door. And unto thee shall be his desire, and thou shalt rule over him.”
An animal is lying against the outside of the door, long enough now to have flattened the grass. It is waiting for the door to open on its own.
That is the picture God hands Cain, and the timing matters. The offering has been passed over, the face has fallen, and Cain gets a question rather than a sentence. Why art thou wroth? and why is thy countenance fallen? If thou doest well, shalt thou not be accepted? A man is angry in a field and the door is still shut.
And if thou doest not well, sin lieth at the door. The Hebrew behind lieth is a crouching word, used of an animal settling down to wait. Sin here has a body, a posture, an address.
The next clause is stranger. And unto thee shall be his desire, and thou shalt rule over him. One chapter earlier, over the woman: thy desire shall be to thy husband, and he shall rule over thee. The same two verbs in the same order, and both times a claim is pressed on somebody by something that wants them.
Cain opened the door. And it came to pass, when they were in the field, that Cain rose up against Abel his brother, and slew him. You can hear the animal in the next thing out of his mouth: I know not: Am I my brother's keeper?
Translations divide over whether thou shalt rule over him is promise or command. God says it to a man already angry, which tells you when it is for. The New Testament form has no ambiguity. Sin shall not have dominion over you: for ye are not under the law, but under grace. And: God is faithful, who will not suffer you to be tempted above that ye are able; but will with the temptation also make a way to escape. The animal is still at your door this morning. The promise is about who opens it.
Daily Manna runs on a two-year cycle. The year one reading for day 207 is He Will Answer (Psalm 86:7).