"He Had Not Respect"

So, there's a part of Genesis chapter 4 that really stuck with me when I read it last night.

5 But unto Cain and to his offering he had not respect. And Cain was very wroth, and his countenance fell.

6 And the Lord said unto Cain, Why art thou wroth? and why is thy countenance fallen?

7 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.

This really bothered me. Without really getting into what exactly Cain offered God, the fact remains that Cain made God an offering, and God had no respect for it. Now, maybe Cain should have made a better offering, but this strikes me as the kind of situation where a child scribbles up a drawing out of crayon and the father, instead of taping it to a fridge like a normal parent, reviews the drawing like an art critic and tells the kid that his linework was shoddy. And I'm sitting here thinking "Of course the linework was bad. People are imperfect, the way you made them. At least Cain offered something. Respond with some positive reinforcement, and he might improve."

And maybe that's what God was trying to do when He said, effectively, "Yeah, this offering wasn't good enough, but if you give me an offering that is, I'll accept it," but that still leaves a bad taste in my mouth. How do we know how good is "good enough"? Are we supposed to keep making God better and better offerings, making greater and greater sacrifices, until God eventually rewards us with a pat on the head? I believe that even small steps in the right direction should be encouraged with proportionally small rewards rather than not getting any reward because they weren't good enough. And I kinda feel like, if Cain had been given that kind of encouragement, maybe he wouldn't have killed his brother out of jealousy.

Now, one argument is that God already gives us blessings aplenty and we are deep in the red in terms of what sorts of offerings and sacrifices we owe God. But that completely misses my point. We may, in fact, owe God all our belongings, service, and everything we can offer, but owing such a debt doesn't automatically instill in a person a motivation to pay it. If the purpose of mortality is to progress toward perfection, then God would do well to use every tool at His disposal, including positive reinforcement, to encourage any amount of progress, however small.

Granted, this entire rant of mine may be completely unfounded. No thanks to the imprecise nature of wording, especially wording that was written by someone in a different culture and run through a few rounds of translations, it's possible that many of the most important details of this story were changed or omitted. I hope that's the case. I hope God still rewards small efforts and doesn't criticize His children for their God-given imperfections. It just bothers me that such a charitable interpretation isn't well supported by the text.

It bothers me that God "had not respect" for Cain's offering, when it seems like it would have been better for God to appreciate the offering at least a little.