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LESSON 2 * PART 2 * BOOK 2
Cain and Abel
Genesis 4:1 – 5:24
Ok let’s pick up where we left off in the last lesson, and that would be in Romans chapter 3 and verse 24. We want to have a little more discussion on that word "Redemption," and/or "Redeemer." So now let’s look at that verse again.

Romans 3:24

"Being justified freely by his grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus:"

In other words there is a way whereby God will purchase back that which He lost, back there in the Garden of Eden. You want to remember that when Adam and Eve were in the Garden they belonged to God, and they were in perfect fellowship with Him weren’t they? But when sinned entered, that fellowship was broken and God lost control of them because they had come under control of the god of this world, old Satan. So immediately God institutes a way whereby He can buy the human race back to Himself, and we call that redemption.

And you’ll find that all the way through the Old Testament when God purchased Israel out of the slavery of Egypt, and that is also a beautiful picture of our own salvation. We too as sons of Adam were slaves of sin; we’re in the slave market of Satan. I guess you could say that God’s hands are tied because He has given us that free will. Now God will do everything He can to bring us out of that slave market, but first we have to want to. See, God cannot force you and I out of that market. Remember when we were created, we were created with a mind and will, as well as a set of emotions. And when God extends his love toward us, then He can rightfully expect us to love Him in return. But we don’t have to love God in return, we don’t have to do anything, but He’s made it all possible.

Now Paul here in this word redemption actually goes into a physical, literal setting, and he uses a word that was so common in the days of the Roman Empire and the slave market. If you know anything about ancient history, slavery was just part and parcel of everyday living. These Roman Legions would make their journeys up into Europe, and wherever they went conquering, they would always bring back slaves. This is also what finally made the Roman Empire so corrupt, because the Roman citizens didn’t have to work. These slaves that were constantly being brought in did all the manual work, and for little or no wages, it was slavery to the utmost. Of course that gave rise then to softening of the Roman physique and they finally fell apart, and then they were conquered.

So let’s talk about this slave market that the Romans had. I like to picture some young teenagers that had been taken prisoners maybe up in France, or Germany or some other country, and they bring them back to Rome. They are put into the slave market for people to purchase. The end result for those not bought, are to be made sport of by the lions in the coliseums, I’m sure you remember that from Roman history.

So far as a person coming into the slave market, if someone didn’t come along and buy them out, the end was death! They didn’t have much to look forward to, but let’s take for example an attractive brother and sister, maybe they were both captured at the same time, and the Roman legion brings these kids back to Rome. Let’s say they are in the prime of life, 18 or 19 years old, they’re lovely kids, but they’re now slaves. So they’re in this slave market with nothing to look forward to except death in the coliseum.

But along comes a benevolent Roman, who is well to do. Now in the Roman slave market language there were three different words, and it doesn’t hurt to remember them. The first word was "agerozo" The second word was, "exagerozo" and then the third word was "Lutroo." Now those were the Greek words that were constantly in use in that Roman slave market. I’m not up much on the stock market, but I know they too have their own language. I know you can sell short and buy long, and take options, and so forth. Any way they have their own language, but so did the Roman slave market.

Now if they wanted to "agerozo" someone who is in this slave market, it was sort of like the stock traders do today. They’ll buy stock in the morning and maybe it goes up 2 or 3 points in the afternoon and they sell if for the profit. . In other words they have no real intention of hanging on to that stock, they’re just playing the market. Well they could do the same thing back in Rome with slaves. They could buy a slave at 8 o’clock in the morning and could leave that slave in the market, hoping that maybe later in the day the market would go up and they could resell the slave and take a profit. It was kind of a sport to these traders.

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