A Call for
Role Model and the Curse that goes
on to the fourth generation
Christianity is very
clear in the judgment of God, “Whatever a man sows, that he will also reap.” – Gal. 6:7. This expression has a constant flow
from the very beginning, even when before the law was given. The Torah
declared, "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.” – Deut.24:16. When our Lord Jesus walked on the earth He said, “But I say to
you that for every idle word men may speak, they will give an account of it in the
Day of Judgment.” – Matt.12:36. Each man shall be responsible for what he does.
Now, what does it
means when the Bible also says, “And the LORD passed
before him and proclaimed, "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.” It
repeats 4 times in the Pentateuch (Exo.34:6&7; Num.14:18; Exo.20:5; Deut.5:9). The first part is so blessed but the second part sounds
scary. God, the good, loving and forgiving God, is not clearing the guilty even
to the third and fourth generations. [By the way, Israelites were in Egypt till fourth generation (Gen.15:16) which was 430 years (Exo.12:40, 41). Four
generations are indeed very long years.] Does that mean we
are cursed and going to be punished because of our ancestors? Certainly not! Balaam
could not curse God’s blessed people; neither can anyone else curse the people
whom Christ has redeemed. Prophet Ezekiel refutes the Israelite in the days
of Babylonian captivity when they have been misusing this and the second
commandment of “God’s Visit” (Ezekiel 18). The Lord GOD says, “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.” – Ezek. 18:20.
Unfortunately,
we see bad or worse things happening to the children of parents who have bad
reputations. Someone may doubt, “Could it be the curse of this Scripture?” What
could be the reason? The reason is simple; it is “like father like son” or “like mother like
daughter.” The children are prone to follow
what their parents have done. In the family, the children look up to parents as
their Hero, their Guide, and their Provider. The parents are the Role Models for
the children. They set an exemplary life for their children to follow whether
it is good or bad. To miss the role of Parenthood is to mislead the children.
The ungodly and unrighteous parents never learn to teach and lead their
children unto godliness and righteousness. If the children follow the sins of
their parents they will surely go down to grave like their parents. It is not
the inheritance of sins; it is the copying of sins of their parents. The child
wants to grow up like his parent. He follows whatever his father does like the
song go: “Cats in the Cradle”
sung by Harry Chapin:
My child
arrived just the other day;
He came to the
world in the usual way,
But there were
planes to catch, and bills to pay,
He learned to
walk while I was away.
And he was
talkin’ ’fore I knew it and as he grew,
He’d say, “I’m
gonna be like you, Dad.
You know I’m
gonna like be like you.”
And the cat’s
in the cradle and the silver spoon,
Little Boy
Blue and the man in the moon.
“When you
comin’ home, Dad?”
“I don’t know
when, but we’ll get together then;
You know we’ll
have a good time then”
My son turned
ten just the other day.
He said,
“Thanks for the ball, Dad, come on, let’s play.
Can you teach
me to throw?”
I said, “No,
not today,
I got a lot to
do.”
He said,
“That’s okay.”
And he walked
away but his smile never dimmed.
It said, “I’m
gonna be like him, yeah,
You know I’m
gonna be like him. . . .”
And he came
from college just the other day;
So much like a
man, I just had to say,
“Son, I’m
proud of you, can you sit for a while?”
He shook his
head and he said with a smile,
“What I’d
really like, Dad is to borrow the car keys.
See you later,
can I have them please?”
I’ve long
since retired, my son’s moved away.
I called him
up just the other day,
I said, “I’d
like to see you if you don’t mind.”
He said, “I’d
love to, Dad, if I can find the time.
You see, my new
job’s hassle and the kids have the flu,
But it’s sure
nice talkin’ to you.”
And as I hung
up the phone
It occurred to
me,
He’d grown up
just like me,
My boy was
just like me.
And the cat’s
in the cradle and the silver spoon,
Little Boy
Blue and the man in the moon,
“When you
comin’ home, Son?”
“I don’t know
when, but we’ll get together then, Dad.
We’re gonna
have a good time then.”
That’s a sad story
but worse things happen to a family which had a father of bad habits. A father who
is a drunkard has no time to teach his children. He doesn’t know even how to
behave himself, and how will he know to teach his children? The child when he
grows up becomes like his father and goes on bringing towards his destruction.
That indeed goes on to generation to generations difficult to break the vicious
circle. Similarly, we’ve seen the children of doctors becoming doctors;
children of politicians becoming politicians; children of professors becoming
intellectuals. It is not uncommon that rich people are becoming richer and poor
people becoming poorer (at least in India) of course, there are some
exceptions. I have seen a father who is polygamous, so is his son; a father
who beats his wife, so his son beats his wife too. Many times the children
become the carbon-copy of their parents: in characters, in lifestyles, in
attitudes, in emotions, in the way they talk, and this and that. When the
children followed the sins of their parents they brought upon themselves the
destruction and curse of God. So, there is no problem with the Scripture when
it says what we have just read it, rather it implies that we should be
exemplary (Christianly) in our faith and conducts. If we have younger siblings
(or juniors for broader context) surely they would be ending up doing some of
our styles knowingly or unknowingly. It calls us to be the Role Model for the
younger generation. There were Lois and Eunice for Timothy,
Mordecai for Esther,
Rebecca for Jacob,
Naomi for Ruth and
Rabbi Gamaliel for Paul. Who
are we for?
Having said and
established that call for Role Model, I want to go to the other side of the
goodness of God. John
Calvin commented about Exodus 20:5 that, “When God declares
that He will cast back the iniquity of the fathers into the bosom of the children,
He does not mean that He will take vengeance on poor wretches who have never
deserved anything of the sort; but that He is at liberty to punish the crimes
of the fathers upon their children and descendants, with the proviso that they
too may be justly punished, as being imitators of their fathers.” Calvin,
commenting on the contrast between the thousands and the third and fourth
generations, states that, “He extends His
mercy further than the severity of His judgment.” God is just and
merciful and nothing in this passage suggests otherwise. It is the
haters of God and the imitators of their sinful parents who will be punished,
not children who refuse to participate in their parent's sins. Yes God had
visited the sins of the fathers, just as He said would, in the days of Daniel, they
were taken captive in Babylon because
of Israel's
long history of idolatry and rebellion, but Daniel found great mercy and
blessing because of his own faith in God. Daniel saw God as righteous,
compassionate and forgiving. Nothing any of his ancestors did, as sinful as it
was, kept Daniel from having a humble attitude of faith and trust. The Biblical
teaching on this is very clear and it holds from Genesis through Revelation
that those who trust God (Jeremiah 17:7) are blessed. The just God would not hold the innocent
children of the wicked parents guilty. Solomon is
the son of the woman, whom David took
from Uriah,
but he was beloved of the LORD and he loved the LORD, and God prospered him
more than to anyone. Even the reluctant preacher Jonah knew
that God was more willing to show mercy because of His gracious and
compassionate nature than to destroy Nineveh. (Jon.4:2). He wants
us to repent and live.
18th October 2013