Are Generational Curses Still For Us Today?

So the topic tonight is very interesting. How many of you are here because of the topic? You saw the title on Facebook. Are generational curses still for us today? Are generational curses still for us today? And how many of you are not familiar with this term? Is there anybody that hasn't heard generational curses much? What it is, and I'm going to go through Scripture basically the sins that your parents, grandparents, throughout your family history have dealt with or passed down.

And with any topic, there's truth, and then there's stuff that you just pull out of thin air and it's not in Scripture. I'm not going to say his name. He's a friend of mine.

He's a very popular YouTuber. Some of the younger kids know him. He's part of Deliverance Ministry and all those guys that do deliverance.

And I asked him about one of these verses because he teaches on generational curses. And I asked him about Ezekiel 18. What about this? And I didn't get a response back.

And that's normally when I lovingly challenge people on this topic, they don't really have an answer for what I'm about to talk to you about. Now, here's why it's tricky. Many times when we're talking about this topic, no matter kind of what side you're on, we're all saying the same thing.

Well, most of us are. It's not anything to divide on because I do believe there are predispositions in a family. You know, if your dad struggles with something, it could be passed down to that.

It could be genetics. It could be as they're studying epigenetics, right? The study of the gene codes. It's mind-blowing, your DNA and how all these genetic switches are on and off and different things.

And so there is a lot to that. The problem I've always had is when you say a generational curse, it means I'm cursed because of something my dad struggled with. And a curse is when God is not happy with you.

So I have a hard time using that word for believers. Like I don't think there's a generational curse on you and your family. However, I don't make it a point of contention because I know what people are saying that there might be a demonic stronghold.

There might be a bondage. There might be something that has to be dealt with that's part of the family line. And so let's just unpack it because it is an important topic.

Again, are generational curses still for us today? Let's look at Scripture. Deuteronomy 5.8 is really where this comes from. It's when God said, you shall not make for yourself a carved image, any likeness of anything that is in heaven above or that is in the earth beneath or that is in the water under the earth.

You shall not bow down to them nor serve them. If you're not aware, this is part of the Ten Commandments where the people would actually make things out of wood, out of stone. And they would put them in their hut, let's say, or tent.

I don't know what they lived in back then. And they would kind of show homage to it and bow to it. And I've had some friends that are Hindu.

I haven't been there in a while, but they've got a big house over by the mall. And there's this shrine right when you walk in the front door with, I don't know what it is, like this little God with heads. And it's like so weird.

But where's the one true and living God? That's who we are to worship. And so He was just reminding the people, don't do that. Worship Me and Me alone.

I'm a jealous God. How many of you didn't know that God was a jealous God? How many of you have ever heard Oprah Winfrey talk about this? I remember it. You can find it on YouTube, I'm sure.

I can't follow a God that's jealous. And that's her thing against Christianity. A jealous God.

But if you think of what jealousy is, it actually can be a good thing in the right context. You should not like somebody hitting on your spouse. I hope.

I don't know. Right? There's a jealous because it's righteous. This is a holy union.

And don't try to come in and infringe on that. I'm jealous for that. And so that's all God is saying is, I'm your Lord.

I'm your God. Serve Me and bow to Me and I will take care of you. I will bless you.

And I'm jealous for when your affections go to other gods. Which actually, there's no other gods. They're fake gods.

There's no other gods. They're all fake. There's no other God at all.

There's demonic and there's the real. And so I am the Lord your God. I am a jealous God.

And I will visit the iniquity of the fathers upon the children to the third and fourth generations of those who hate Me. See, that's another thing that we forget about is the iniquity was passed down to the third and fourth generation on those who hate God. So I have a hard time believing also how, you know, that would be unbelievers.

There's another, I don't know if I wrote it down. I did write it down. We'll get to it in just a minute.

But it was a pretty hard time to live in the Old Testament. Wasn't it? So basically the sins of the father were passed down to the children and they were actually punished for the sins of the fathers down to the third and fourth generation. This is a disobedient people he's addressing, but he shows mercy to thousands to those who love Me and keep My commandments.

But now we go into Ezekiel that we'll put up on the screen. And remember, Genesis, the beginning of really biblical history. Exodus is when the children of Israel are leaving Egypt.

Exodus Deuteronomy is the law and how they are to live. Genesis, Exodus Leviticus is the part of the Levitical priesthood. Deuteronomy, Joshua judges how they're going to the promised land and how they're conquering.

And then they have the kings from Saul was first and then David and then Solomon and then the kingdom was broken up between Rehoboam and Jeroboam and the southern and northern kingdoms. And then you have all these kings and then in the midst of these kings, many of them would do evil in the sight of the Lord, but some would do, and I just, I love when I read the Bible and he did was right in the sight of the Lord. Don't you like that as well? I get so happy.

And then Asa did this and Manasseh did this and Jezebel and like, oh, these people. But in the middle of all this, of all the kings is you have the majority of the prophets, the Elishas and Jeremiah's and Ezekiel's. So Ezekiel was a prophet who wrote actually at a time, some of his ministry, it's a pretty wide, it's a pretty big book and different sections are different times in Israel history, but some of them were in captivity and they were actually conquered and God led them into captivity and they were under the direction of their enemies.

But now, so Ezekiel says this, this is God speaking to him. Yet you say, why should the son not bear the guilt of the father? So in other words, the people think, yes, the son should be guilty for what the father did. I'm so glad I would be in trouble.

Wouldn't you? Yet you say, why should not the son bear the guilt of the father? And God again is speaking through His Word because the son has done what is lawful and right and has kept all My statues and observed them. He shall surely live. The soul who sins shall die.

The son shall not bear the guilt of the father, nor the father bear the guilt of the son. The righteousness of the righteous shall be upon himself and the wickedness of the wicked shall be upon himself. And Jeremiah again writing in the time of the kings, in those days, they shall say no more.

They used to say, the fathers have eaten sour grapes and the children's teeth are set on edge. Have you ever eaten sour grapes? It hurts your teeth. So basically, the old proverb was when the father eats the sour grapes, the children feel the ramification of that.

It's passed down. And so that's where a lot of the teachings come from on generational curses. And they'll use Deuteronomy.

I've heard them use Deuteronomy a lot. But to me, it's incomplete because God clearly says no longer will the iniquity be passed down. But then you get into another interesting concept because the punishment is not passed down to the children, but is the struggle passed down? Because you know, and it runs in the family.

You've heard that before, certain things. And breaking those generational strongholds and things like that. And so it's a very interesting topic.

But curse, the word curse is a fallout from sin. God is against those who reject Him. That's why I don't think as a believer, I don't use the term generational curse when I'm talking to believers, okay? The punishment for sin no longer exists for believers, but that doesn't mean that the pull of sin doesn't exist.

We all know that exists. There's not a curse that is passed down, but there is a battle that could be passed down. So you could say, my dad had this struggle, or my grandpa, and that curse is now passed down to me.

Not the curse is, but maybe the battle. Maybe that same stronghold, and nobody knows how exactly it works. With, again, genetics, fleshly desires, what's passed down, maybe a demonic stronghold, and that demonic stronghold can keep going if it's not broken.

I mean, there's a lot of truth to that. I actually just had a lot of ideas when I was sitting there during worship, writing down some things that I want to talk to you about on this topic because it's so important. So there may be strongholds in your life, but they are not curses.

Again, with a curse, God is against you, but with a stronghold, He is for you. Does that make sense? So when you're cursed, God's against you. That's actually what a curse is.

I curse the land for your sake. And so He's not for you when you're cursed, but when you have a stronghold in your life, if you're going through something that you just can't break, and you want to be delivered, and there's something holding me at stronghold, God is for you in those areas. And again, and I want to be careful, nobody knows exactly how the demonic realm works.

We just have a lot of Scriptures at our disposal. For example, deliverance is really popular right now. And as a church, when you read the Bible, you see people were delivered.

Jesus said, go and do the same. And so, and we've seen people here. It just, I think I mentioned last Sunday, it happened, a guy up front with Paul and Diana, he was getting rid of a lot of stuff, and he wanted to get baptized, and that's why he had to fill up the baptismal during second service with ice cold water.

And then another man who moved out of state, another lady in the prayer room, and I don't know if Kiva's here tonight. Are you here at all? She got baptized as well, and she said she was set free of all these. So what do you do with that? And Jesus talked about it.

So I don't think as a believer, that you're obviously possessed. We know we're not possessed, but are there demonic strongholds? Because the enemy can dig in tightly in some of our lives. And you know what it is.

We could go, how many people are here this evening? We could go down a long list. For some people, they struggle with, I don't know, you fill in the blank. Self-esteem.

Jealousy. Anger. Anger, fear, yes, for sure, and anxiety.

We've had people we've prayed with with fear and anxiety, and they've been released of it and felt great, but months later, they're struggling again. It's interesting to have a control. There's a controlling spirit, and sometimes, especially with men, I've talked about this before, depending on our past, and trying to control our brokenness and being hurt as little boys, and we begin to now control everything, and it can become a stronghold in our lives.

And so, marijuana. You know how many people I've talked to in the last few years, where they just cannot stop? Or I've had friends who went five, six, seven years, no alcohol, nothing at all, and then they open that door again, and that's a tough one to break out of. And so I think we need a lot more grace, too, knowing people struggle, and we need to encourage them, we need to help them.

But what if, I've thought about this a lot, we pray for deliverance, but what if you're not delivered? What if you keep struggling with something? Because also, what is true, I've seen it a lot pastoring this long, is, I mean, people are at the altar, they're weeping, Lord, take this away. God, take this away. And they're repenting.

They're acknowledging it. They're making amends. They're doing everything they know to do, and yet, they're not delivered from it.

I've seen other people where they give it to the Lord, and one Sunday, and they're delivered, they're set free and never want to taste it again. Like, how did that happen? Well, good for you. And they didn't really repent that much.

I mean, not as much as these other people. It's like, it's a very interesting topic, is it not? But then, of course, my mind goes back to often what Paul said. Lord, take this away from me.

Take this away from me. And this is Paul, and a messenger of Satan came after Paul, a thorn in the flesh. I'm kind of glad it doesn't say what it is, because it could fit any scenario.

I mean, I could see him maybe saying, Lord, take this lust away. Take this desire for strong drink away. Take this desire for fear.

Who knows? But there's something that won't go away. And he said, God said, My grace is sufficient. Wow! But then it goes deeper.

In your weakness, in your weakness, you are strong. And you know, we all have things that we wish God would kind of help us out a little bit with. Like for me, I don't know why I have to eat so much after I go home at six.

It's like, why can't I just be quiet, King's Stomach? You know, or sugar, anybody? Why do I have to? If I can just get 31 flavors, yogurt, chocolate, every day, every day it's calling. I did good today. Thank God.

Because I knew I had to preach tonight. But some things, and those are minimal, I know, there's big things, of course, too. I've talked to people that, I mean, they're incredible people.

They're abstaining, but they still struggle with same-sex attraction. Well, you must not be a Christian. No, they're on fire for the Lord, but man, every once in a while, saying, I don't know what to do, I get this, I don't know what to do with it.

Can we pray? And we pray, and we pray, and we pray. And so, I just think there's not a nice, clear-cut answer on how this works other than Scripture. Because we do know that God can deliver.

We will pray for deliverance. We've seen it. We know it, but we also, if you're going to use Scripture for that, you also have to use it for God saying my grace is sufficient.

And it's tough, maybe, and I've had to tell, I've had to tell people that I've known, I've prayed for in a men's ministry, and even back in Lancaster, years. And like, you know, you might be the guy who cannot have that drink ever again. Like they say, every time I hear that ice hit the glass, I just get, and every time I see that cold, you know, whatever, and I just, it's like, I haven't been delivered of this.

And like, maybe they won't be. We'll pray for it, we'll hope for it, we'll have faith. But sometimes, I think the struggle is left because we have to apply discipline as well.

Because you can't discipline a demon. And you can't cast out the flesh. And I know people can get wonky and weird on this topic.

And as a church, we try to, I actually sent this message, all these notes to our elder board, and they're all on the same page about this topic. Because I didn't want to go into waters that were muddy. Because we understand that God can deliver us, will deliver us, but sometimes there's a battle.

For example, how many of you know in Ephesians where it says, put on the whole armor of God? Do you know, how many of you don't know what it says after that? That you may be able to withstand the wiles, the trickery, the deceit, the strategies of Satan. So that tells me He's coming after me, and you. So don't look at me that way.

And so I'm supposed to resist the devil, that Scripture, and He will eventually flee. So that tells me if I'm resisting the devil, probably the demonic minions, I'm going to be under some type of demonic attack from time to time. Maybe, and I think the main way they work is through planting those seeds, those thoughts.

Yes, fiery darts. Because, I mean, again, I wish I had time to go through all the different verses, but it's interesting that Satan put it in the heart of Judas to betray Him. What about Simon the Sorcerer when he became, I think it was Simon the Sorcerer, when he became a Christian, he's fallen to disciples and he sees the power of the Holy Spirit, and he goes, I want to buy that.

And I think it was Peter who said, you have no part, no portion in this matter because your heart is not right with God. You're poisoned by iniquity and bound by it. Why has Satan deceived you? See, Satan, he's planting these thoughts.

And once you realize that, because sometimes he can also, I believe, Jesus actually rebuked a spirit of infirmity. And I'm not into Leviathan and octopus spirit and all this, I mean, I don't know. I just look at Jesus' example, right? But if you can say, you know, rebuke the spirit of infirmity or deaf and dumb, he actually said deaf and dumb spirit, which was the one that was hindering the boy from speaking.

And I do believe as believers, I even believe you'd see that probably more in unbelievers that are bound by Satan and in order to pray over them and have them release, show them the power of the Gospel and lead them to repentance. But for believers, it's a very interesting topic because even when Satan tried to deceive Jesus, how did he do it? Or he took him places and showed him this. It was thoughts.

It was thoughts. Look, I'll take you on this high mountain and look at all these kingdoms. If you just bow to Me, I'll give them to you.

Oh, you bowed to God and got alone. Took him to the pinnacle of the temple, the very high spot of the temple. He said, throw yourself down.

The Bible says this. And see, that's another thing that's very dangerous. People twisting Scripture.

Just a little bit to validate their error. We see that a lot, don't we? Don't judge. Don't judge me.

Who are you to judge me? And Jesus, what did He say? Don't tempt the Lord your God. I'm not going to throw myself down. Turn these stones into bread if you're really hungry.

But we see that. And in our thoughts, here's how He's going to work. And we've seen it many times.

Other than giving somebody a sickness or something, because we see that with Job as well. That happened with Job. But more often than not, He's planting seeds.

And that's why we recommend that book before. I think Lori and Rick did a study with John Bevere on the bait of Satan. It's huge.

I would say without a shadow of a doubt, that is first place on what jacks up a church. What messes up a church. What divides a church.

What makes our job really hard in a church is offense. Somebody made you mad. Have you ever felt that way? Nobody ever been offended? Is there anybody here that's never been offended by a Christian? Yeah, maybe not today.

But that's what He'll do. And that's why it's hard to talk to them. I don't want to talk to them.

I don't want to bring it up. The enemy doesn't want you to talk to them. Because nine times out of ten, when you do, you get clarity.

And the fiery darts are put out, and you understand where the person's coming from. And you work through it. And often the relationship is stronger.

Stronger than when it was before that. And so that's what He's using, those fiery darts of the enemy. He'll plant thoughts in your mind.

They don't like me. They don't want to use me. They don't see my gifting.

I don't want to throw out too many examples here, but you guys get the idea. And then also I've seen how Satan will plant those thoughts on isolating. And we see sometimes mature believers do this too.

They'll just not come to church anymore. They'll not fellowship with you anymore. They just isolate themselves all under the disguise of seeking God.

That's how we live in deception. It's okay to do that for a season. But the Bible also says, do not forsake the assembling together, of coming together.

Letting iron sharpen iron. Open yourself up to constructive feedback. Grow in the faith and apply the Word of God.

And so the more we get isolated from others, but again, I've been there where you think you're hearing from God. And that's where it gets tricky too because not every thought you have is from God. I believe the satanic thoughts, demonic, whatever you want to call it, your own thoughts, of course, and then God thoughts.

And that's how the enemy will deceive you. He'll plant those thoughts. Anybody ever hear of the victim mentality? Another word, blame shifting.

And so you see this a lot. I'm sure we see it all the time. Instead of owning it and repenting and growing, no, here comes a victim.

I've been this. I've been hurt. I've been... Or you shift the blame.

Here comes a constructive criticism like a football player. I'm just going to take it. I'm going to shift the blame to somebody else.

That's Satan often working because those thoughts will come in. Don't let them talk to you that way. They don't know how hard you try.

So you've got all these different things working against you. And that's why this topic is so important because I've seen so many sincere believers pray for deliverance. And sometimes God might allow that thorn to remain in order to keep you humble.

And it works, doesn't it? Can you imagine if you mastered everything? God took away every stronghold and man, you were walking holy for a while. You were good to go. I mean, you'd be so arrogant.

I would be without those little reminders of God saying, remember, I'm just keeping you together here. However, blessings can be replaced with consequences from disobedience which can be a form of a curse. In other words, we talk about this here when it comes to the topic of curses.

I believe we can walk in the blessings of God. Many of you do as well in our marriages, right? We're trying to treat our spouses correctly. We're in the Word.

We're praying. We're trying to work through issues. And there's a covering, I believe.

There's a covering that God blesses. But if you begin to walk outside of that covering and you open yourself up, then you can be in disobedience. And it's the Old Testament theology issue that I talked about a while ago, the doctrine of Balaam where he was hired to curse the children of Israel and he could not curse them.

He said, I can't curse what God has blessed. And the king got so mad, Balak. He said, there's nothing I can do.

God's blessed them. You cannot curse what God has blessed. Isn't that incredible? But, he did say, but there is a way.

There is a way. Have the women of the land come down and entice them, the men, to leave God and to begin to bow to the false gods. And they will curse themselves.

So that's really what happens is when we remove away from God's shelter, that framework. There's a place of safety and protection. It doesn't mean you're living life perfectly, but you're living life repentant.

You're living life following God. You're falling forward. You're in His Word.

You're trying not to hold on to offenses. You're forgiving. You're applying all these things.

There's God's grace on the humble, but He resists the proud. Focus on the family had an incredible article. I think we passed it out.

They said this generational curse in Romans 5-7. The Apostle Paul argues that from a certain point of view, human sin and death are a corporate problem rather than an individual one. He tells us that one man's sin, Adam, brought guilt to all people.

And that sin entered the world because of one man's sin. And death came because of sin. So, technically, all of the world was under the curse.

As unbelievers. This is why each one of us remains a slave to sin unless we're set free by the redemptive work of Jesus Christ in Romans 6. To get out from under the generational curse, you have to be grafted into a whole new family tree. So maybe none of you are here tonight that are not believers.

I don't know. Some listening no doubt will be. But that's how you get away from the generational curse because in that sense, there is a generational curse that started with Adam.

Actually, all of the earth even groans. Everything was affected by the curse. And that makes the life of Jesus Christ so much more beautiful.

The truth sets you free. And once you repent and believe and now you're a child of God, that curse of sin and death and condemnation is broken. And so that's another reason it's hard for me to use the word generational curse for a believer.

Because that has been broken in Jesus Christ. Every individual is responsible for their own choices. Then what shall I do with Jesus who is called Christ is the question you must answer.

It won't be because of the skeletons in your family closet. It will be because you didn't embrace the gift of God's forgiveness and grace through Jesus Christ. Or will you receive Him? Will you live forever in fellowship with the Heavenly Father? If so, it won't be because you somehow managed to avoid the mistakes that previous generations made.

It will be because you accepted God's merciful offer of unmerited deliverance and salvation. So even though I'm not sure about a generational curse, I do know about generational blessings. There are generational blessings.

I mean, you look at the Psalms and from Joel to Deuteronomy even, there's blessings in the life of David and what he wrote about. Even Joel, you know the verse we quote often about, in the last days I will pour out My Spirit among all flesh and your sons and daughters will prophesy. There's something incredible that you can actually, I believe you can set in motion for your family.

Oh, my kids are grown. I know. I know, but I believe we can still pray for them.

I believe we can still intercede for them. It's so important. We can establish, we can break our families out of these cycles.

Lord, and you pray tonight as we go into worship, Lord, break this out of me. I don't want to deal with this anymore. And whatever it is, I don't know.

I could start going over lots of different issues. But God knows and you know, and you say, Lord, help me with this issue. I don't want to be this any way.

I don't want to struggle with it anymore. And maybe He'll deliver you. Maybe He'll set you free.

Maybe something will break. You know that song we used to sing, something has to break. But be encouraged if you get up off this altar and tomorrow there's still that struggle sometimes.

Because what happens is we can beat ourself up because of the struggle. Have you ever done that before? And you're like, man, I was doing so good and now these desires are coming again. What's going on in my heart, Lord? And we get discouraged.

And we almost get filled with shame and guilt. And I don't know where these thoughts are coming from or these desires are coming from. But remember, temptation is not yet sin.

At least according to Scripture, I believe. Now what you do with that temptation, if you get the temptation, and you're like, oh, I'm going to feed on that for a while, then yeah, you're not taking your thoughts captive. That's another way the enemy comes in through our thought life and take our thoughts captive to the obedience of Christ.

So when that thought comes in to do whatever you're struggling with and you have that desire, you say, Lord, I'm going to take this thought captive. I know this isn't right. I'm going to choose to apply discipline.

And I think we overlook that sometimes in the Christian community. Because discipline is like, oh, that's kind of legalistic. You know, that's pretty harsh.

Shane, what about the God of the New Testament now? What about just grace? Yeah, but there's a lot of verses on discipline. I mean, Paul said he disciplined his body. Brought it under subjection.

He talks about making no provision for the flesh. Don't plan ahead. Talks about crucifying the flesh.

Talks about running from sexual immorality. I mean, we could probably find a lot more verses on discipline, which is actually a fruit of the Spirit. So I think God is also teaching a lot of us discipline.

He's a rewarder of those who diligently seek Him. That takes discipline. And you do have to discipline the flesh.

And that's how you really begin to conquer certain things. Because when you give in to things, you begin to lose that battle. And you lose the battle again.

And you lose the battle again. And what happens, your discipline begins to fade. The things you used to control now are controlling you.

And reapplying discipline again, saying, Lord, give me the strength. That's why we talk about fasting a lot. Because I believe that can be one huge way of just really disciplining the flesh and bringing in the submission.

And a lot of the choices we make, how we live our lives, what we put into our body, everything from medication to other things, we really have to be seeking God in this area. It's vitally important. Hezekiah, when he was going to die, the prophet said, get your house in order.

And he cried and he cried. The Bible says he turned to his wall and cried and cried out to God. And one of the prophets, they were leaving, and God grabbed him and said, go back and tell Hezekiah, okay, what? I've heard your cries and I've seen your tears.

And I'm going to heal you. I don't know. There's something to that.

Because we could also look at the Psalms. How many Psalms talk about God hearing the cries of His people? A broken and contrite heart, I will not cast away. I will revive the spirit of the humble.

I will bring back what was driven away. I will bind up the broken. I will strengthen the sick.

But the fat, the proud, the arrogant, I will feed in judgment, thus saith the Lord. He's looking for those people to seek Him. And again, it's not about coming forward.

But guys, there's got to be a point sometimes in our lives where we get out of our chair, or we at least sit there and we engage with God. I don't know if churches just listen to a few songs. Oh, that was a good message.

Yep, someday I'm going to apply that. I'm out of here. There should be a stirring.

And I feel that's part of my calling is to stir the body to that deeper walk, to stir revival, to stir desperation. And I could stand up here for hours if we could bring in all the people, all the testimony after testimony after testimony. It wasn't until I sought God, Jane, with all my heart that I found Him.

It wasn't until I cried out for a day and night for a while that I found Him. It wasn't until I fasted and prayed and really made it a priority that God began to answer. There's something to that deeper life that's seeking Him with all of our heart, with all of our strength.

Think of that verse I just thought of. If you seek Me with all of your heart, with all of your strength, with all of your soul, there's just something about that. And that requires sometimes, you don't have to do it here, you can do it at home, but you should get on your knees at some point at home, or if it's not comfortable, I know my knees are starting to hurt too, lay down on the bed and just, Lord, I'm going to seek You tonight.

Turn off Amazon, turn off Prime, turn off Netflix and seek God like never before.