Are Sins & Their Consequences Passed Down Through The Generations?

Word-Of-The-Day: ‘(2) What do you people mean by quoting this proverb about the land of Israel: “ ‘The parents eat sour grapes, and the children’s teeth are set on edge’? (3) “As surely as I live, declares the Sovereign LORD, you will no longer quote this proverb in Israel.’ (Ezekiel 18:2-3)

I was once asked about the verse of the sins of the father passing down three or four generations, as it is laid out in Exodus 34:7.  Why would there be generational punishment by God for the sins of a person when God says in Ezekiel 18:20 “The one who sins is the one who dies, the child shall not bear any guilt”?  Are these contradictory?

They are not contradictory but complimentary.  There is a historic cycle of rise and fall, or ebb and flow.  Weak people fall away from God, and sin without remorse.  Our nation, though for now stable and perhaps healing, is stressed because as a whole we have embraced the secular worldview of ‘people are good, we’re here to enjoy ourselves’ instead of the Godly worldview of ‘people are sinful, we’re here to enjoy God’s presence’. 

We Americans are now burdened with generational debt in the US ($37 trillion in debt and rising, and over $200 trillion in long-term obligations) that if no further debt was accrued will take several generations (more than three or four, or our great-great-great grandchildren) to pay off.  The generation of those who lived it up in the Roaring ‘20s had children growing up in austerity in the Great Depression era of the 1930’s.  Those children, and likely our children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren and more ‘greats’ are likely going to suffer in the future because of our sin of fiscal irresponsibility today. 

But remember there is the secular term of punishment or consequences, and the Godly term of punishment, which are separate.  Exodus 34:7 is a statement on the secular term of consequences, or ‘weak people create hard times’.  The sins of Israel that led to the exile to Babylon during Jeremiah’s time, led to the hardships experienced by all Israelites. 

They were not allowed to live in their own country, and fell not under the rule of Israel but the rule of Assyria and Nebuchadnezzar (known to his friends as ‘Neb’).  The Godly (Daniel and others) had to endure the test of the furnace, and the test of the lion’s den, due being under the rule of Neb and not an Israeli leader.  They, like our offspring, suffered (or will suffer) because of what transpired before them.  But the children in exile who remained Faithful were nevertheless considered Righteous by God.

Ezekiel 18:2-3 gives us the Godly term of punishment.  While a child or distant offspring may suffer the secular hardships of Exodus 34:7, God sees everyone as independent with regards to His judgement.  If Adolf Hitler or Josef Stalin had children (I believe both were childless despite rumors), as bad as their sins of mass murder and genocide are, and as much pain and misery their actions gave the world for years afterward; their sins do not pass down to their children. 

Ezekiel 18:14-20 describes such a situation where a child does not sin as the father did; the child does Righteous things for God and worships and accepts Jesus as Lord over all things in their lives and repudiates what the fathers (or mothers) have done.  That child is not punished with Eternal Damnation to Hell as the father will be (assuming no repentance, of course).  Instead, the child is a Child of God and accepted by Jesus as Righteous and Just.

I may suffer physically and emotionally from my parents’ failings (like naming their son ‘Elmer’, and all the Fudd and Glue jokes that come with it), as my children may suffer from my failings (though I can’t think of any right now – doesn’t mean they don’t exist).  I have also benefitted from them, as my children have benefitted from me.  But I am not bound to Hell by the sins of my parents nor am I guaranteed Heaven by their Righteousness, just like my children are neither bound or guaranteed by my Judgement.  God makes it clear their Eternity is based on their actions alone, regardless of what I have done for them or to them.