The Heritage Scheme Series

The iniquities of one generation can adversely affect future ones unless those sins are renounced and . . . heritage in Christ is claimed. - Neil Anderson(1)

Quite possibly, the sneakiest scheme of the devil is how he can keep us unaware of sin. Satan knows that if we’re left unaware of certain sins that we’re committing, that we can’t cease from our wrongdoing. The wages of sin is death and destruction (Rm 6:23a), and the devil realizes that if we’re blinded to sin in our life, then we’ll continue making detrimental life-choices. The devil is able to mask sin through heritage, and sin is a disease that can be passed through family lines like any other disease.

Suppose a father had a disposition for heart disease, and he raised a son who didn’t pay attention to his daddy’s health. When the son became an adult and entered his mid-forties, he experienced a mild heart attack. Only when the doctors inquired into his family history was he forced to actually talk to his dad and discover that his father had suffered a heart-attack around the same age. The son was then confronted with a choice to change his eating, exercise and lifestyle habits. Tommy Hays, author of Free to Be Like Jesus, says,

When we go to see the doctor, the first thing they do is take our medical history. They want to know the problems we are having now and the problems we have had in the past. But they also want to know the history of problems in our family line as well.

Medical science has discovered God’s truth that we are affected by the lives of those who have lived before us. We are affected by the acts of our forefathers, our ancestors before us, like it or not, [and] whether we think it is fair or not. Sin affects and infects everything and everyone around us, in our generation and in the generations to follow.(2)

Have you ever wondered why some families tend to have recurring patterns such as divorce, numerous setbacks, financial ruin, and phobias; just as a few examples? I have heard it said that addiction to alcohol or tobacco – and even criminal behavior – are genetic predispositions, but is this true? Are certain character traits really passed on through bloodline, or is there something else going on?

We’re going to discover tonight that people are linked to their family line much closer than we probably realize, often perpetuating a spiritual illness through many generations. Sin is the illness, and the only way we can treat and cure the underlying problem is to identify the particular sin – or sins, plural – repent of them, and make a resolution to cease from committing them again.

Generational Sin (Exodus 34:6-7)

Inherited sin is called “generational sin.” John Ortberg says this kind of sin “occurs when unresolved problems and sins of one generation tend to pop up again and plague the next generation, and the next one, and the one after that.”(3) The Lord said this would happen to His people if they continued in their transgressions and failed to seek forgiveness for their sin. We read in Exodus 34:6-7:

And the Lord passed before him and proclaimed, “The Lord, the Lord God, is 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” (Exodus 34:6-7).

The words of this passage are not an isolated occurrence in the Bible, for they can be found in four other places (cf. Ex 20:3-6; Nm 14:18; Dt 5:9-10; Jer 32:17-18 ). Since these words are repeated elsewhere, I think it’s safe to say they must be significant and worth taking a closer look at.

It’s important to note that God is merciful, gracious, longsuffering, abounding in goodness and in truth; and that He’s forgiving of iniquity, transgression, and sin. John said, “If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness” (1 Jn 1:9). If people will just ask the Lord to forgive them, then He will forgive by the blood of the Lamb; therefore, the key to receiving forgiveness is to simply ask for it in all sincerity.

If we refuse to ask for God’s forgiveness, then we will remain guilty of our crimes; and it’s also an indication that our heart is unrepentant and that we will continue in our sin regardless of what the Lord desires. We read that God does not clear the guilty, but visits their iniquity on their children and grandchildren for generations to come (Ex 34:7), and this is a depiction of generational sin.