Generational Curses? Part 2

One of the most prevalent verses used for the belief on generational curses is found in Exo 34

“The Lord, the Lord God, merciful and gracious, longsuffering, and abounding in goodness and truth, keeping mercy for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, by no means clearing the guilty, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children and the children’s children to the third and the fourth generation.” - Exo 34:6-7

We were taught that in the Old Covenant, our good and loving God would judge the sins of the fathers upon their children, up to the fourth or even further generations.

Is this really the truth and the context of this passage?

According to the Jewish Targum, the context of this passage is about ungodly fathers and their rebellious children. While this may be a good argument, nothing is better than the Scriptures itself.

You shall not bow down to them nor serve them. For I, the Lord your God, am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children to the third and fourth generations of those WHO HATE ME. - Exo 20:5 (emphasis added)

The context of this is the Old Covenant Law. In the Old Covenant, God related to men according to the Law. For that was what Israel wanted, though God had wanted to relate to them based on sonship. In the New Covenant, God related to men according to Jesus.

It is clear in this passage that the Law would judge the sins of the fathers AND the sins of their children because the children followed the fathers' ungodly example of HATING (rejecting) God by bowing down to worship other gods. It has to do with role modeling.

It is not talking about God judging the innocent children because of their fathers and grandfathers! In fact, we can see throughout the Old Testament that when the next generation (from the same family who sinned) walked in faith, God blessed them!

"God does not violate His Word. But He is pretty comfortable violating our understanding of His Word." - Bill Johnson 

God does not contradict His Word. How do I know that? Look at the following passages:

Deut 24:16 says, "Fathers shall not be put to death for their children, nor shall children be put to death for their fathers; a person shall be put to death FOR HIS OWN SIN." (emphasis added)

Ezekiel 18:20 - "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."

Jer 31:30 - "But every one shall die for his own iniquity; every man who eats the sour grapes, his teeth shall be set on edge."

2 Kings 14:6 - ...according to what is written in the Book of the Law of Moses, in which the Lord commanded, saying, “Fathers shall not be put to death for their children, nor shall children be put to death for their fathers; but a person shall be put to death for his own sin."

There is a difference between responsibility and consequence. God, in the Old Covenant, did not place the responsibility of the father's sins upon his children and his children's children, etc.

While there was consequence because of the father's sin, each generation was clearly responsible for his own sin.

God did not place generational curses on the future generations because of the fathers' iniquity.

In the next part, we will see how Jesus came to confirm this in the New Testament, because the Jews, like many believers today, were misled into thinking that there are generational curses. #bustgenerationalcurses