Friday, August 30, 2013

Sour Grapes

Paul's warning against endless genealogies affects another teaching that has been popular in the United States for several centuries. Some teach that curses are passed from one generation to another, quoting Exodus 20:5 "Thou shalt not bow down thyself to them, nor serve them:for I the Lord thy God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation of them that hate me;".

They teach that a doorway has been opened to demons by ancestor's sins, therefore they must find out what the sins were and repent of them to close the doorway. But God said in Jeremiah 31:29-30 "In those days they shall say no more, The fathers have eaten a sour grape, and the children's teeth are set on edge. But every one shall die for his own iniquity: every man that eateth the sour grape, his teeth shall be set on edge."

And in Ezekiel 18:19-20 "Yet say ye, Why? doth not the son bear the iniquity of the father? When the son hath done that which is lawful and right, and hath kept all my statutes, and hath done them, he shall surely live. The soul that sinneth, it shall die. The son shall not bear the iniquity of the father, neither shall the father bear the iniquity of the son:the righteousness of the righteous shall be upon him, and the wickedness of the wicked shall be upon him."

We are held accountable only for our sins.