GENERATIONAL CURSES

Generational curses are so huge today such that every problem, struggle or sin is blamed on your ancestors in the past generations. Hence the belief that you will behave like the person you are named after, or that certain problems or sins run in the family are quite prevalent. People fear to be cursed! Walitipwa they would say. We are so steeped into superstition as Zambians so much so that, such a teaching finds fertile soil to breed in.

What is a generational curse?

Those who are “experts” in generational curses define it as “a defilement that was passed down from one generation to another” another one says “a generational sin or curse is the natural consequence of ingrained behavioral patterns passed down from one generation to another” In other words those under generational curses are born destined to commit certain sins because there are demons that are passed on from their ancestors.

Now it is true that they are biological conditions which are hereditary and will run in the family, but it is not the same as generational curses, from what is taught generational curses have to do with behavior and the state of one’s life. And because people are bound or under a spell that runs in the family, there is need for DELIVERANCE! The chains need to be broke, hence the rise of deliverance services among our charismatic brethren, as they summon on higher powers to break the chains that were cast by ancestral spirits in the past.

This teaching has become popular because people do not want to take responsibility for their sins, but would rather blame others. After all popular psychological theories teach us that we are not blame for our actions or behavior, it is the environment or family we were born in. Furthermore the idea of a quick sensational solution is quite appealing to our quick fix mindset.

Passages that deal with generational curses

Exodus 20:5-6  You shall not bow down to them or serve them, for I the LORD your God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children to the third and the fourth generation of those who hate me, but showing steadfast love to thousands of those who love me and keep my commandments

Exodus 34:6-7 The LORD passed before him and proclaimed, "The LORD, the LORD, a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness, keeping steadfast love for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, but who will by no means clear the guilty, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children and the children's children, to the third and the fourth generation."

Numbers 14:17-18 And now, please let the power of the Lord be great as you have promised, saying, 'The LORD is slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love, forgiving iniquity and transgression, but he will by no means clear the guilty, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children, to the third and the fourth generation' And Deuteronomy 5:9- 10 which is a repeat of Exodus 20. What do we learn from what the verses say?

The first thing that jumps out is that a generational curse is God’s judgment on those who reject him and do not obey him. He is a jealous God who visits the iniquity of fathers to the fourth generation. It is therefore the consequences of sin that will affect the descendants and not that they will also continue with the same actions. I.E. the people who were taken into captivity were facing the consequences of their forefathers.

The second is that the Lord is merciful and slow to anger that he blesses to a thousand generation! Whereas he visits sin to a fourth generation his mercy is to a thousand generation. The point of the passages is to actually teach God grace and mercy.

There is nowhere in the bible were it says the devil or demons put curses on people that bind their descendants for generations to come. In fact the devil only does what the Lord allows him to do. (Job and Peter are a case in point)

Furthermore if a generational curse is God’s judgment on people, who has power to undo what the Lord, has done? If the Lord places a curse or judgment on an individual, which man of God can honestly rescue such a one from the hands of the all-powerful God?

What are the problems with this teaching?

It attacks the power and sufficiency of Christ’s work and death on the cross. Christ paid for all our sins; we therefore do not need any deliverance from some fellow sinner. Surely what can be more powerful than the work of God’s son? (Hebrews 10)

This teaching causes people not to take responsibility of their sins. If someone is immoral, the blame is placed on the late uncle who was equally immoral. People sin because they are sinners, who need the grace of God to cleanse them of their sins. (Rom 3:9-13)

As Christians there is no curse, no spell that will require us to run to another man for deliverance. The bible tells us that greater is he that is within us than he that is in the world. (1 John 4:4)

3 THINGS THAT WILL NEVER SATISFY YOU

No matter who you are, where you live and what you do, there is one constant among men; the pursuit of satisfaction! We all want to be satisfied in life, from the person who kills another, to the one who takes his own life. The ultimate reason we do what we do is because we want to be satisfied. The difference lies in where and how we try to fill this craving for satisfaction, some pursue it in church, others in mosques, yet others in night clubs, most in money, some in relationships and a majority in material wealth. Sadly despite the daily pursuit of satisfaction a lot of people are not satisfied, they are still empty inside and their life is one sad journey of chasing after the wind.

The bible gives us an excellent case study of a person who pursued satisfaction in every avenue that he possibly could and still come up short. This man is called Solomon king of Israel. The amount of gold he received annually is worth anything from 1.5 to 2 billion dollars and the man ruled for 40 years! If Solomon lived in our day he could easily be among the top two richest people. The richest at the moment is worth 83 billion dollars. With all the wealth at his disposal, Solomon vainly pursued satisfaction in 3 ways;

GRATIFYING HIS PLEASURES- Ecclesiastes 2:1-3

The man tried his best to fulfill any kind of pleasure that his body longed for. He indulged his sexual desires by marrying 700 wives and had 300 concubines. He tells us that he tried to cheer himself with wine and all kinds of entertainment but to no avail. Today we have all forms of entertainments movies, series, comedies, sports; some go for parties and clubbing where they expect everyone to be laughing, drink alcohol to drown their sorrows, etc. Yet we can never have enough, we always want more.

ENGAGED IN PROJECT- Ecclesiastes 2: 4-8

The second source of satisfaction he went to were projects. And he goes into great detail about what those projects involved – building houses, planting vineyards, gardens, parks and all kinds of fruit trees, making reservoirs to water groves of flourishing trees, buying slaves, owning herds and flocks, amassing silver and gold, acquiring men and women singers, having “. In the light of these projects, he became greater by far than anyone who ever lived in Jerusalem before him. And he clearly was successful at his projects, but they still did not quench his pursuit of satisfaction.

THE POWER OF POSITION- Ecclesiastes 2:9-11

Solomon sought greatness and he found it. He became the greatest and most powerful person of his day; you could say he was a modern day celebrity. And as a might king had the power to get anything he wanted.  He tells us that he denied himself nothing that his eyes desired. He refused his heart no pleasure. He made sure he found joy in everything he did. So, to the outside world, his smile was a cause of no small envy. Yet, he admits that when he stood aside for some quiet meditation, it is striving after the wind. His still craved for lasting satisfaction, for the void was still there.

Is this not what has often shocked the world with our Hollywood film stars? One moment, they are smiling at us from the covers of glossy magazines, but in the next they commit suicide. What happened to those smiles we envied? The truth is God has put a void in every human soul that he alone can fill. Our hearts are restless until they find their rest in God.  Many try to fill that void with the world’s pleasures and find them to be broken cisterns. Are you still on that path? Do not waste your life. True lasting satisfaction is only found in God!

DO NOT LIMIT GOD- MY TESTIMONY

In my walk with the Lord I have noticed a cycle that I never seem to learn from and God never tires teaching me (He is indeed patient and loving father). I often turn to think that when a situation is hard for me or too difficult to deal with, then it must be hard for the Lord as well and amazingly the Lord rebukes me each and every time in ways I never forget. Now you might be thinking such a truth is an obvious one and should be straight forward for any mature Christian, but like most teachings in the bible, it is easier to confess a truth then to actually live it out in ourselves.

Recently I had the opportunity to work with the brethren in Francistown Central Baptist in Botswana. This was my second time going to that country and from my first experience I was highly persuaded that that country is HARD GROUND (whatever the term means). I however wondered on this visit what exactly we mean by “hard ground”? Do mean people are not interested in God or the gospel? Well which lost soul is interested in God or the gospel? The bible in fact says no one seeks after God, they have all gone astray (Rom 3:9-13), so we honestly do not expect dead people to love spiritual things do we? Maybe we say hard ground to suggest they persecute Christians and those who preach the gospel, which cannot be far from the truth, anyone who has been there will bear me witness. Do we say hard ground to mean it’s an Islamic nation and the powers that be are anti-Christianity? Statistics actually 70% of the country’s population is “Christian” (a in a very lose and general meaning of the word). If we however say they are not as religious as Zambia then we are correct, but yet again which country is as religious as our beloved Zambia? And whether or not that has been a blessing or curse is a topic for another discussion.

If anything the real issue in that country is that they have very few conservative evangelical churches that preach the true gospel. The traditional churches with their works salvation are well established, the charismatic churches with their hell condemning prosperity gospel are rampant and so are the cults. And God rebuked me for my shallow and unbiblical thinking. Whereas I was right to admit that I am small and unable, it was nothing short of blasphemy to think that the God who raised an army from dead, decaying, dry bones (Eze 37) is not able to quicken those who clearly seeking to make sense of life and looking for answers to life’s ultimate questions. It is insulting to the Lord of harvest to suggest that there is no hope for a people that Christ died for. It is a clear luck of faith to suggest that the gospel cannot penetrate where the hope sucking work’s salvation of the traditional churches is making headway and the frustratingly depressing prosperity gospel is equally drawing many.

As I sat meditating on the glorious and encouraging fact that nothing is impossible with God, the Lord also brought to memory the many times I have lost hope and made conclusions about people and God’s work and dwelt on the fact that it is difficult or impossible. Then I realized the importance of Christ’s last phrase in the great commission; lo I am with you always (Matt 28:18-20). The miracle working God is with us whenever we labor for His cause. It is no wonder that our labor is never in vain (1 Cor 15:58).

It is no wonder Daniel proclaimed that a people that know their God will be strong and do great exploits (Dan 11:32) and in more recent history William Carey the “father of missions” charged; “Expect great things from God, attempt great thing for God”. What we know of God must propel us to” labor for the master from morn till setting sun and talk of his wondrous love and care”.

CELEBRITIES AND STARS- A WORRYING TREND IN THE CHURCH

“The English word celebrity derives from the Latin word celebrer, “to frequent” and more remotely from the Latin celer, “to hasten.” The desire for celebrity is, at its heart, the desire of a person to be “frequented”—to turn heads and command the notice of others. To become a celebrity is simply to succeed in being noticed regularly.” (http://dbts.edu/blog/author/msnoeberger/).

We are living in a time of celebrities, superstars and heroes. And it seems the world is divided into two categorizes the celebrities/superstars and those who want/claim to be associated with them. Stardom comes in different ways there are those who are specially gifted (athletes, speakers, musicians, actors etc.) and there are those who have achieved something great (i.e. Mandela, Thomas Edison) but there are yet those who either have LOTS of money (i.e. Carlos Slim, Bill Gates) or hold a public role or office (i.e. Queen Elizabeth, Barak Obama). Those of us who fail to make it in the above categorizes will often try our best to tick in at least one box and when all else fails then we try as much as possible to get associated with the people who are stars. Everyone wants to be noticed and everyone wants to be heard. No wonder we are obsessed with how many people are following us on social media or how many likes and comments we get on our Facebook statues or how many compliments we get about our achievements. The cult hero syndrome is here to stay!

Sadly this is true even in churches and among Christians and pastors! Ministers of the gospel are becoming stars and celebrities at an alarming rate. With the rise of social media we are daily trumpeting our achievements and marketing ourselves (like products). What is even more worrying is how that it is often about our success; how many people came, what we did, the buildings, how well we are doing, how many people follow us etc. Meanwhile the rest of us are busy trying to get as close as we can to them (superstars or wanna be celebrities) and are eager to show or prove our closeness to them and how that they recognise us and they know us and we actually have personal relationships with them. In extreme situations they have become the rule of faith and practice. How often do we refer to some celebrity rather than the bible when discussing how God wants us to live, serve and function as a church? (Am sure you have got my point!)

I think it is important for me to say that I am not saying social media is sin or evil. It is in fact a powerful to share the gospel and further the kingdom of God. I thank God for social media. More often than not I find myself checking my motivates and asking why am doing what am doing and checking if I am not simply looking for the praise of men and seeking to puff myself or up lift my image. Paul and John the Baptist were men who had every reason to boast and glory in their influence and success. If they lived in our days they would be great celebrities, they would have millions of followers yet their attitude was anything but that of stars and we can learn from them.

Paul tells the Corinthians; for what we proclaim is not ourselves, but Jesus Christ as Lord, with ourselves as your servants for Jesus' sake… But we have this treasure in jars of clay, to show that the surpassing power belongs to God and not to us. And who can forget the humbling words of John the Baptist when answered; the one who has the bride is the bridegroom. The friend of the bridegroom, who stands and hears him, rejoices greatly at the bridegroom's voice. Therefore this joy of mine is now complete. He must increase, but I must decrease."

SIX THINGS THAT OFTEN BECOME IDOLS- PART 2

last week i proposed that there are six things that often become idols in our lives and we looked at three of them. Here is the second set of potential idols in our lives.

WORK

In line with the love of money is that of work. Some people are workaholics and pride themselves in it. They dream, breath and live work. Now we are supposed to work and do so with excellence, in fact the bible tell us that whatever our heart finds to do we should do it mightily as unto the Lord. Laziness is sin! My concern however is when work takes first priority in our lives and we begin to neglect other important responsibilities such as our worship of God and fellowship with other believers, (Hebrews 10:24-25), playing our role in the building of other believers (Ephesians 4:12-16) and spreading of the gospel to the lost (Matt 20:18-20) these thing s are the reason we exist and it is important to note that God has placed us in our work places so that we might be light. The other responsibility that suffers when idolize work is that of family. When your family is suffering or been neglected because of work then you are not glorifying God. Either you are outside his will or you have misplaced priorities.

CHURCH AND MINISTRIES

This must come as a shock to some, but sadly church and our ministries can easily become idols. It is very possible to love and be dedicated to your church and not be dedicated to the God of the church just as it is possible to be devoted to the bible but not the God of the bible. There are people who love their churches and will give their all to what the church does and its programs yet are totally far away from God. To them the church is just like a club that they are a part of and pay subscription fee. They are willing to defend the church and its confession of faith but yet their faith is not in God. They adore and revere their pastors but have no regard or fear for God. The same can be said about our ministries. We can easily be intoxicated with praise, our ability, our sense of importance and success. At the very core of sin is man’s desire to be on the throne and we seek to build our little empires through the ministries we have regards of the type or size. This is nothing but idolism! I am not in any way saying we should not be committed to the church and our ministries, but we should constantly examine our motives.  

FAMILY

I am a newlywed, so we are a family of two! I love Kunda (my wife) and my love for her keeps growing, but I constantly have to check that I do not love her more than I love God. And the same can be said of the rest of my family. My love for them should not rival my love for God. The moment anyone of them becomes the center of my affection and my life, they have just turned into an idol. Jesus’ answer to the lawyer about what the greatest commandment is should be instructive to us. He said the first is Love the lord your God with your entire mind, heart, strength and soul and the second is likewise, love your neighbor as yourself. Reversing that order is takes God off his throne! And someone has observed your horizontal relationships (with people) will not be healthy if you do not have a healthy vertical relationship (with God).

Exodus 20:2-5 says you shall have no other gods before me. You shall not make for yourself a carved image, or 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 or serve them, for I the LORD your God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children to the third and the fourth generation of those who hate me.