The Truth About Generational Curses (Pt.9) (305) – July 5 2025

Not only does the son or daughter not have to worry about bearing the sins or a generational curse from their fathers and ancestors, but if you turn around and live right, you will not even have to bear your own sin!

The Lord remembers no more the transgressions of the wicked man that turns from his wicked ways and keeps the Lord's statutes, and does that which is lawful and right. Ezekiel 18:22 shows the Lord stating this person shall live.

For those who believe that the Lord takes pleasure in the death of the wicked, they are proved wrong in Ezekiel 18:23.  "Have I any pleasure in the death of the wicked? says the Lord, and not rather that he should turn from his evil way and return [to his God] and live?"

This program covers the following Scriptures from the Amplified Classic version (AMPC):  Ezekiel 18:20, Colossians 1:13, John 3:18, Ezekiel 18:21-23, Hebrews 8:10-13, Romans 10:12, Romans 11:13, Ephesians 2:16, James 3:10, Philippians 4:19, Romans 12:2.

Transcript

0:22

(Transcribed by TurboScribe.ai. Go Unlimited to remove this message.) And a very good day. This is Pastor Marc Whelan with Touch of God. My Wife, Catrice, and I thank the Lord for creating you, fearfully and wonderfully making you. We thank the Lord for giving you a purpose in your life, the ability to love others and love God with all of your heart, soul, mind, and strength, to worship the Lord, to pray to Him, to seek Him, our precious Creator. We thank the Lord for this radio station. We thank the Lord for everyone working there and their precious souls, their precious families. Lord, we thank you. Lord, we bless you for all good things. We love you. And we thank you for your tremendous sacrifice for us to be born again, to destroy the works of the enemy for us, Lord, that we may live and not die, that we may receive eternal life through believing in you, Lord Jesus, and confessing you as Lord. Lord, thank you for your message today, that we may understand to an even greater degree that we are set free by your grace, your suffering, your persecution, and by us being delivered from the powers of darkness. In the name of Jesus, we pray. Amen. So this week, we are continuing with the series, The Truth About Generational Curses. And it seems that we will be coming to an end of this series in a couple of weeks. In last week's program, we were finishing off by talking about Ezekiel chapter 18 and verse 20, where the Lord was telling Ezekiel, the soul that sins, it is the one that shall die. The son shall not bear and be punished for the iniquity of the father, neither shall the father bear and be punished for the iniquity of the son. The righteousness of the righteous shall be upon him only, and the wickedness of the wicked shall be upon the wicked only. In Deuteronomy chapter 5, verse 9 and 10, we see two verses which are repeated almost word for word in other areas of the Old Testament. And in verse 9, the Lord is saying, you shall not bow down to them or serve them. Now in verse 8, he's talking about graven images or likeness of anything that is in the heavens above or that is in the earth beneath or that is in the water under the earth. So the Lord in verse 9 is saying, 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 upon the children to the third and fourth generations of those who hate me. Verse 10, and showing mercy and steadfast love to thousands and to a thousand generations of those who love me and keep my commandments. So remember this concept and this truth that the Lord is not going after anyone who loves him and keeps his commandments. In addition to that, the Bible is progressive and as we move into Ezekiel chapter 18, the Lord begins to clarify further that even the son shall not bear and be punished for the iniquity of the father, neither shall the father bear and be punished for the iniquity of the son. So in verse 20 of Ezekiel 18, he says, the soul that sins, it is the one that shall die. The son shall not bear and be punished for the iniquity of the father, neither shall the father bear and be punished for the iniquity of the son. The righteousness of the righteous shall be upon him only, and the wickedness of the wicked shall be upon the wicked only. So if nothing else, this one verse in the Old Testament should be enough and it should stand by itself and be strong enough in your mind to conclude that generational curses are impossible in either direction, from father to son or son to father. Because as we talked about last week, further back in Ezekiel chapter 18, if you read it from verse 1, the Lord goes into examples and scenarios of family members, a father being just and what happens to the son and a father being unjust and what happens to the son. And when we get to verse 20, we find out there is no payment for the cost of sin and iniquity by the son or the father if the other has been unjust and been embroiled in sin and iniquity. So this should help us accept and come to a firm and final conclusion, if we haven't already, that generational curses do not exist in the way that we have been taught, as shown even in the Old Testament times. And this is before Christ and we know that once we are born again, a new creation, Jesus became the curse because he was hung on a tree, the cross, and the Lord became the curse for us that we may become the righteousness of God in Christ and we may receive every spiritual blessing in heavenly places from the Lord as we receive Jesus as Lord. So even in Old Testament times, verse 20 of chapter 18 of Ezekiel should show us that the iniquity of one person or one ancestor does not come down the lineage and it doesn't go up the other way for those elders that are still living. Verse 20 also shows us that children cannot blame their actions upon their parents. Each child has their own free will to make decisions that affect their lives every day and together with the strength of the grace of God, we are able to do all things through Christ to strengthen us and we can say no to sin and have the grace and the power of the Holy Spirit to allow us to continue on a path of holiness and out of the ditch of iniquity and wickedness. Now, in complete darkness, is there even a flicker of light? In spiritual darkness, where we all once were, was there any light anywhere? No. Spiritually, we were in utter pitch-black darkness. Perhaps you could say the only time there is light in darkness is when a lost soul cries out for Jesus and the divine hand of the Lord pulls that soul from the clutches of darkness. We know in Colossians 1, verse 13, it says, The Father has delivered and drawn us to himself out of the control and the dominion of darkness and has transferred us into the kingdom of the Son of His love. This was a letter written by the Apostle Paul to the church at Colossae. So, this letter is to born-again believers, not to the lost. So, for the period of our lives prior to receiving Christ as our Lord and Savior, where were we? The answer is we were in utter spiritual darkness, not knowing the truth, falling into ditches of all different kinds of trouble, anxiety, worry, sickness, disease, sexual vices, falsely blaming God for our own trouble, when it was we who ate of the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil and brought upon this world and all creation its fallen existence. So, who should be blaming who here? It should not be us blaming God. But while we were in darkness, what are we protected from? Perhaps nothing at all. We are a sitting duck from the enemy, with all the fiery darts landing, with no armor of God to protect us. Perhaps you could say, well, God loves His creation. Perhaps God protected us even though we never deserved it. Perhaps He protected us from something in our lives. Who knows? God is sovereign. He can decide what to do and when to do it. But we do know that someone who has a relationship with God does receive protection. Psalm 91 says that we get protection against evil when we are under the shadow of the Almighty, whose power no foe, no enemy can withstand. So it stands to reason that any evil dart can land on us when we are not saved, especially when we sow deeper and deeper into sinful behavior and even witchcraft in any of its many forms. We reap what we sow, that can be good or bad, and the law of sowing and reaping is for those who are saved and those who are yet to be saved. So in darkness, in the spiritual darkness and under the clutches of evil, why would we not be immune from a curse? Even prior to coming to Christ, when we were walking around totally lost, God never spoke a curse over us. Maybe a family member did. Maybe a so-called friend did. But their heart was still lingering in darkness and speaking from the heart of Satan himself. But God never cursed us. God never spoke an evil word over us. That is not His nature. God in His infinite mercy, grace, and love, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. John chapter 3 verse 18 says, He who believes in Him, meaning Jesus, who clings to, trusts in, relies on Him, is not judged. He who trusts in Him never comes up for judgment. For Him there is no rejection, no condemnation. He incurs no damnation. But he who does not believe, cleave to rely on, trust in Him, is judged already. He has already been convicted and has already received His sentence. Because he has not believed in and trusted in the name of the only begotten Son of God, he is condemned for refusing to let his trust rest in Christ's name. Let's continue in Ezekiel chapter 18 verse 21. It says, But if the wicked man turns from all his sins that he has committed, and keeps all my statutes, and does that which is lawful and right, he shall surely live, he shall not die. This is the Lord speaking to Ezekiel, and this is Ezekiel making a recording of what the Lord told him. So remember in verse 20 we were just speaking about there is no payment of iniquity by a son of an unjust father or a father of an unjust son. So not only does the son or daughter not have to worry about bearing the sins or a generational curse from their fathers and their ancestors, but if you turn around and live right, you will not even have to bear your sin. Hallelujah! Verse 22. None of his transgressions which he has committed shall be remembered against him. For his righteousness which he has executed, for his moral and spiritual rectitude in every area and relation, he shall live. Verse 23. Have I any pleasure in the death of the wicked, says the Lord, and not rather that he should turn from his evil way and return to his God and live. Over the course of the last several weeks, I have often brought up the topic of the Lord's heart, his nature, the intent of his ways, his heart, his forgiving heart, his mercy, his grace. Do you see here in verse 23 that the Lord's heart, what the Lord really means by what he says, he says, have I any pleasure in the death of the wicked. You might say to yourself, well if someone is wicked and someone is mean and someone kills someone, the Lord has a right to be mad at them. But you see here that the Lord does not have any pleasure in the death of the wicked. Secondly, we see here in verse 22 where it says, none of his transgressions, who's his, the wicked man, none of his transgressions which he has committed shall be remembered against him. So verse 22 is continuing to talk about the wicked man who's turning from his sins and keeping the Lord's statutes as described in verse 21. And the great thing about this is the Lord desires to not remember the transgressions of the wicked man who turns from his sins and keeps the Lord's statutes. Furthermore, God has decided not to remember the sins of the soul that has entered the new covenant with God through Christ. The Bible never says that God forgets our iniquity, that God forgets our sins, but it does say in several places that God decides not to remember our sins. So that's a rule that we should also abide by. Let us not dig up our past because the Lord is not there with a shovel trying to dig up the past. You know who's trying to dig up our past? The devil tries to remind us how we used to be, making us feel bad, making us feel unjustified to feel good and to feel joyful in the presence, in the fellowship of the Lord. We are a new creation now and what has it got to do with the devil anyway? Hebrews chapter 8 verse 10 to 13. It says, For this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, says the Lord. I will imprint my laws upon their minds, even though their innermost thoughts and understanding, and engrave them upon their hearts. And I will be their God, and they shall be my people. Verse 11. And it will never more be necessary for each one to teach his neighbor and his fellow citizen, or each one his brother, saying, Know, perceive, have knowledge of, and get acquainted by experience with the Lord. For all will know me, from the smallest to the greatest of them. This in verse 11 is basically saying it's no more necessary to tell other people to get to know the Lord because the house of Israel will know the Lord. They won't need to be told to get to know the Lord because from the smallest to the greatest of them, all of them will. So they don't need to be told. Let that be the case for us today. Amen. That no one needs to encourage us in the Lord. No one needs to tell us that we need to spend more time with the Lord. We should be able to say, Oh brother, I love you. Thank you for the encouragement, but I'm already spending the time with the Lord. It is great. Let that be something for us to consider today, that it shouldn't be necessary for anyone to teach us that we should know, perceive, have knowledge of, and get acquainted by experience with the Lord. For we should all know him and be getting to know him more and more every day. We shouldn't need to be told. Verse 12, For I will be merciful and gracious toward their sins, and I will remember their deeds of unrighteousness no more. So here again, we see in the writer of Hebrews is repeating something the Lord said previously as it was written in other chapters of the Bible, where the Lord is not going to remember the deeds of the wicked person who repents of their sin and turns to the Lord. Verse 13, When God speaks of a new covenant or agreement, he makes the first one obsolete, out of use. And what is obsolete, out of use, and annulled because of age, is ripe for disappearance and to be dispensed with altogether. Amen. The new covenant, the covenant of the blood of Jesus Christ. And although this speaks to the Lord establishing a new covenant with the house of Israel, those of us as Gentiles know we have been blessed because we have been grafted in to be a part of this new covenant, as the Apostle Paul speaks about in several places, including Romans chapter 10, verse 12, Romans 11, verse 13, and Ephesians chapter 2, verse 16. But just make sure you are one of his. Make a decision for Jesus today. Turn, repent from doing those things that you know in your heart are not pleasing to the Lord and receive Jesus as Lord instead. Seek the Lord with all your heart. He will deliver you from your iniquities. The sting of sin will dissipate and be gone. You will find strength in the Lord to say no to temptations, that you will no longer fall into sin. And even if you slip, you will feel repulsed by the thought of sinning. The Lord is faithful to forgive you of your sins and to cleanse you of all unrighteousness if you confess those sins to the Lord. 1 John chapter 1, verse 9. Follow the Lord, commune with him, love him, love and absorb the word of God, his holy scriptures, which is God's heart and his will, written on the tablet of your heart. Make a decision for Jesus so that the Father will make the ultimate rescue of your soul, as shown in Colossians chapter 1, verse 13. Says the Father has delivered and drawn us to himself out of the control and the dominion of darkness and has transferred us into the kingdom of the Son of his love. Amen. We are rescued out of darkness. And what a rescue that was. A rescue that we did not deserve. A rescue that was necessary because of what we got ourselves into when we sinned against the Lord at the tree in the garden of Eden and decided to follow the devil instead of the Lord. Now, a question that you still may have is if I'm not bearing the iniquity that is a generational curse from something my parent or grandparent did, how come I have the same problem they used to have? When I was growing up, I was constantly around my parents because they raised me. And my dad smoked cigarettes every day. He once told me, do not ever smoke, Mark, because it is a terrible thing. He told me this several times throughout my youth. And to this day, I have never wanted to smoke and always remember him telling me. My dad, however, never told me not to drink. He was not an alcoholic. But I started to drink, of all times, at Christmas each year as I was growing up. And when I became 16 years of age, I began to drink more regularly. I did not have a relationship with Jesus. And I fell into this trap of addiction to alcoholism. And it was my way of shutting out depression and worry for a few hours at a time. Remember that I never knew I could cast my cares upon the Lord. So I tried to care and solve them myself. But the burdens were too great. So I turned to the substance of choice, which was alcohol. So this relates to the verse before where the son was seeing the sins of his father and did not do them. I did not smoke. I didn't do the things of my father. There was no curse of me continuing to do something that I could not stop based on what my father was doing. However, they were not outwardly expressive of needing to trust in the Lord and casting our cares upon him. I never really heard these things from them. It was more of a religious duty to go to a church on a Sunday. My mother was a worrier and suffered from anxiety. So I was in and around a fear and anxiety all of my upbringing until I left home at the age of 25. I did not become born again until I was 38. So I spent all my first 38 years in anxiety and worry, worrying about tomorrow because I was around that environment for the first 25 years of my life. I was not living out a generational curse. God never put a curse upon me. My mother did not deal with the anxiety she had. I was not living out a generational curse per se. God never spoke a curse upon me. But it was more to do with my mother not dealing with the anxiety she had. And that was what I was around. But because I did not know the Lord, I did not know the way out of it except alcohol. And that was only for a few hours at a time. The alcohol was steadily getting worse until one night in April 2009 at the age of 38, right before I made the decision for Jesus. I spoke to a Christian and I said, how do I get rid of this alcohol? I have had it for so many years and it's getting worse and worse. And he spoke something from the Lord and he said, the Lord tells me to tell you, Mark, you take the first step and I will take the other ten. So I went home that night and I put the bottles of drink down the sink and I threw the bottles in the trash, in the rubbish. The Lord delivered me from alcohol that same night because I made a free will choice to give it up. Alcohol was my own free will choice which stemmed from being around an anxious filled environment for years and years, as well as being in sin and far from the peace of the Lord and the relationship with him. So it can be because of what you are or have been around in your life that you naturally copy the behavior of others. Some families, for generations they are in poverty and a person in that family may conclude that they must have a generational curse of poverty. From earlier programs we explained the definition of a curse and it was someone speaking doom over something to another person. It was not God speaking a curse over someone. James chapter 3 verse 10 says, Out of the same mouth come forth blessing and cursing. These things, my brethren, ought not to be so. So it is not God speaking a curse and saying you will be in poverty for the rest of your life. Remember, God has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly realm. Remember, Balaam said to Balak, How can I curse who God has not cursed? So it is not that a family in poverty has been cursed by God. It has been more of a mindset and the same actions by members of that family across their generations of how they have had to cope and believing that this is some kind of a plague. It is all in their belief. So what people call generational curses, no one has spoken over them and told them that they will be poverty stricken all their lives. But what the family member has said is things like, I will always be broke. I can never do this or never do that. It is because they have learned their parents' ways and actions and also their sins. Remember, what is not of faith is sin. If you are saying I'll always be broke, you are in sin because those are not words of faith in the Lord. Words of faith are, My God shall supply all my needs according to His riches in glory in Christ Jesus, based upon Philippians chapter 4 verse 19. You have to take every thought captive to the obedience of Christ. So you begin to not say things that you used to, even if it would help you feel better because it lines up with your current problem. You have to speak the things of the Lord over things that are not of the Lord. So when someone says to you, you need to find out what your father and your grandfather did or some ancestor did, because you may have a generational curse, you instead remember what the Lord has said in His word. Know His heart and realize you don't have a generational curse, especially if you are saved. You need to get in the word of God, believe what it says and do it. Renew your mind to the truth and it will transform you according to Romans chapter 12 verse 2. We will go over these last couple of points as a recap in next week's program. So don't worry if you have not captured them all. And so until next week, you have a blessed week. Amen.