Speaker: Mike Connell
When we have understanding of this whole area, then we
can more easily administer to more people. So we want to understand what
Generational Iniquity and Curses are. We want to learn how to recognise them -
what we look for, and then we want to learn how to minister to people to set
them free. So we’re going to focus around those things today.
So first of all, we’ll start in Mark 9. I believe that
all of you, when you’re ministering to people, will need to become aware of
this root problem of generational curses. I’ll just explain what we mean by
these terms shortly. So first we want to take a look at a story in the gospel.
We’re going to read from Mark 9:20 – “Then they brought him to Him. And when he
saw Him, immediately the spirit convulsed him, he fell on the ground and
wallowed, foaming at the mouth.”
So here is a young man, who has got a demonic spirit,
and the spirit is manifesting. Many times you find, that when Jesus went to
different places, spirits actually manifested. They did this as a reaction to
the high level of anointing and presence of God He carried. As the level of
anointing in our life rises, we often experience more of these things
happening. Particularly you’ll find when you go to third world cultures, you’ll
see very often spirits manifesting quite quickly. So the disciples had tried to
cast the demon out, but were unable to.
I want you to notice here in verse 21 – Jesus asked
the child’s father: how long has this been happening? And he said, “From
childhood” - and the word literally means from being a little infant. 22 And
often he has thrown him both into the fire and into the water to destroy him.
If you can do anything, have compassion on us and help us.” 23 Jesus said to
him, “If you can believe, all things are possible to him who believes.” 24
Immediately the father of the child cried out, and said with tears: “Lord, I
believe; help my unbelief!” 25 When Jesus saw the people came running together,
He rebuked the unclean spirit, saying to it: “Deaf and dumb spirit, I command
you, come out of him and enter him no more!” 26 Then the spirit cried out,
convulsed him greatly, and came out of him. And he became as one dead.” 27 But
Jesus took him by the hand and lifted him up, and he arose. 28 And when He had
come into the house, His disciples asked Him privately, “Why could we not cast
it out?” 29 So He said to them, “This kind can come out by nothing but by
prayer and fasting.”
So we’re going to go through the story, and gain some
insights. The first thing we see is: a child is being tormented by an evil
spirit. This means demonic spirits can be in people from childhood. There’s
more than one example, of demonic spirits being in children, in the Bible. We
need to distinguish between what is just bad behaviour, and lack of discipline,
and a demonic spirit. Some children behave badly because they’ve never been
disciplined. This example is not just bad behaviour and lack of discipline -
the demon is actually throwing him into the fire - its destructive behaviour.
So we see in this child, destructive behaviour, caused by the demonic spirit.
It’s interesting the question Jesus asks: How long has
this been in him? Or how long has this been happening. That’s an important question
to ask, when you are working with people. One of the things to look for, when
you are tracking the presence of generational curses; ask this kind of
question: when did this problem begin? Or as Jesus said: how long has this been
happening? Now when you ask the question: how long has this been happening; if
the person responds: well, since I was very young; then it’s either a trauma
that happened when they were young that caused it; or it’s a generational curse
of some kind.
So when you are working with people, you would ask:
what is the problem you have; how does it affect you; and this question – how
long have you had it”. When you ask the question “how long have you had this
problem”, you get pointed to: possibly, this has been a generational thing. If
you’re in some of the meetings, you’ll know I asked more than one person: how
long has this spirit been tormenting you? Oh, since I was very, very young. In
one or two cases, I said: this has been since very young, hasn’t it?
So, there’re two questions that will give clues to the
presence of a generational curse. The first one is how long has this been
happening? Or in other words, when did this start? The second one is: has
anyone in your family had a problem like this? Those are the two questions to remember:
1) when did this first start; and 2) did anyone else in your family have this
problem?
So, in trying to locate the root of this problem, you
have to ask questions. Notice how Jesus started, by asking the father
questions. The word “child” is literally the word “infant”, one that’s just born, or very young; and the
father describes the way the child behaves. So it’s almost certain that the
child was suffering from some generational spirit.
Evil spirits need some legal ground to enter a
person’s life. They need some door to get in. So unless the child had a trauma
of some kind, its most likely this was a generational spirit. One thing we need
to understand is that generational curses can be the cause of many problems
that people have. A little later, we’ll ask: how we’ll recognise a generational
curse - we’ll talk about how you would identify it.
Notice that Jesus said that faith is required for
deliverance. If you can believe, all things are possible. So, faith is
essential. I must believe that God will move - that I have power to cast these
demons out. Notice that Jesus, later on the disciples asked Him: why could we
not cast this demon out? They had done a lot of deliverance, they had seen
results; but this time, it failed - and they were quite puzzled why they
failed.
Jesus did not blame the father or the child. Jesus
said to the disciples: it requires faith. Then he said an interesting statement
– this kind comes out by nothing but by prayer and by fasting. In other words,
Jesus is saying two things: 1) there are different levels of authority or power
that evil spirits have; 2) we require faith that we’ll move them; 3) that
prayer and fasting helps establish faith in our life.
You noticed Jesus did not stop and pray and fast - He
just immediately delivered the demon out of the child; but when we read of His
life, we find that He prayed, and He fasted. So moving in deliverance, we need
to recognise the place prayer and fasting has, and we’ll talk a little bit
about some aspects of prayer later on. I’ll just perhaps get a chance to share
with you some things I pray around my life; but there has to be faith in the
heart - so without faith, nothing happens.
So we see then, an example of a child who needed
deliverance; and the single requirement: that there be faith - we have to
believe God for the breakthrough; and that sometimes, there can be resistance.
Notice that when the demon came out, Jesus identified what it was – a deaf and
dumb spirit. It’s very helpful if you can name the spirit you’re commanding
out. Naming it weakens its power in the person’s life. You notice also, that
Jesus spoke directly, he commanded: “I command you come out”.
The last thing I noticed there is quite different -
it’s the only place I’ve seen it. He commanded the spirit not to enter the
child again. That’s the only time that’s actually mentioned, as far as I’m
aware: “Don’t go back into this child”. So, when we do deliverance, the only
example we have for forbidding the demon to return, is this particular one. I
think that Jesus said this, because it’s a child. In the other cases, Jesus
taught (Matthew 12) that if the demons do try and re-enter, the person has to
be responsible, to build a good life with God. So, here is an example then, of
what appears to be a generational, demonic spirit in the family.
Let me share with you a couple of stories of people
we’ve prayed for, where there was clearly a generational spirit. The first one
concerns a young child. Two people came to me, and they said: "we’re
having a major problem with our child”. I said: “What is the problem?” They
said “when the child wakes up, he immediately starts to destroy things in his
room - he’s extremely destructive, and we have no idea why”. The child was
around about the age of two and three. When it woke up, it would just go in a
rage, and begin to be destructive. The parents had no understanding of why the
behaviour would be like that.
So, I began to enquire about both of their
backgrounds, and I looked for a spiritual root for what was a really unusual
behaviour. It turns out that the husband had been involved equally in drug
addiction, and had major anger problems; and the mother’s family had been
involved deeply in the occult. So it would appear to me that the spirits that
were there, came as a result of what the family, or the parents, had opened
their lives to.
So in this particular case, praying for such a young
child - we prayed when the child was asleep. It just was an easier way of doing
it. You can pray when they’re awake, but you’ll find that often the demon will
manifest, and the child will scream and shout and fight, and it becomes a very
difficult process - can be quite unnerving. So, we prayed - I had the parents
there with me, I didn’t want the child to wake and find a strange person in their
room. So even if the child would maybe have recognised me, I didn’t want them
to be awake and be frightened, so I had the parents with me, and the parents
agreed that we would pray for this child. So I didn’t put my hand on him, I
just put my hand just slightly above his head, so as not to wake him.
Then I spoke and prayed, and we broke the curses
operating down through the father’s side of the family, and the mother’s side
of the family – commanded the spirits to go. When we commanded the spirits to
go, the child just began to yawn and sigh. He was asleep all the time, and
several times as I prayed, he kind of gave a big sigh - it was quite evident
that something was happening. We then just prayed that the spirit would not
enter the child anymore; we released peace over the child; and he never woke up
through the process.
The next day, the parents called me, and they said:
“The child woke up today with absolutely no destructive behaviour - the problem
has just completely gone! It’s just not there anymore.” So that was a great
learning experience for me, of the reality of these generational spirits. This
is what we’re going to look at – to identify these things, and discover how
they occur, and primarily, what to do about it.
So that’s an example of a young person. I’ll give you
an example of an older person. I had a woman come to me, and she must have been
in her 50s I suppose. She said “I’m a Christian worker, I’ve been working for
the Lord for many years of my life”. She said “I have a problem that greatly
disturbs me, can you help me with it?” So, you notice the thread of questions:
what is the problem; how does it affect you; how long have you had this
problem?
She said: “Here’s the problem. I have these
tormenting, unclean, sexual images coming into my mind - it disturbs me during
times of worship.” So I said: “How long have you had this”. She said: “Since I
was very young”. So then I asked the next couple of questions: “Did you have
any traumatic experience, or were you exposed to any sexual abuse of any kind?”
She said: “No”. So that left the only possibility open – that it was a
generational spirit of some kind. The fruit was torment by an unclean spirit.
She was experiencing these horrendous, unclean images in her mind - often as
she worshipped.
So I asked her and enquired about her family
background, and she began to tell her story to me. Her grandparents were
missionaries in China, and they had two children – a daughter (which was her
mother), and a son. They served the Lord in one province, and sent their
children to another province. They sent them to a boarding school, but that
province was overrun by the Japanese, and the school was taken over - and these
were white, Western children. The girl was sexually abused by Japanese
soldiers, over quite a long period of time. Eventually, the children were
restored to their parents, and eventually they left China, and came and
re-settled. The child grew up, got married, had a child, and the marriage broke
up. So, we asked: “Are you willing to act on behalf of your family, and forgive
these Japanese soldiers?” She said: “Yes, she would”.
So I led her in a very simple prayer, acknowledging
her faith in Christ, and renouncing all of the sexual abuse that has come into
the family life, and releasing forgiveness to the soldiers. When I commanded,
unclean spirits just came out, with strong manifestation. Because we were aware
of the nature of what had been done, I knew what to pray against. From that
point on, her mind became clear, and she did not have the torment in her mind.
She did not have these unclean sexual images - they were the product of a
spirit of perversion, which had entered years before, into the family line.
So we’ve seen many other people, over the years, set
free of spirits that were generational in nature. So, that’s why we want to
have a look at this area and understand it. The first thing we see is a Bible
example of a demonised child, and then we’ve seen a couple of personal stories.
Now we want to have a look at this whole area.
First, I’m going to look at Galatians 3 - I want us to
see what Christ has done. Galatians 3:13-14 says: “13 Christ has redeemed us
from the curse of the law, having become a curse for us (for it is written,
“Cursed is everyone who hangs on a tree”), 14 that the blessing of Abraham
might come upon the Gentiles in Christ Jesus, that we might receive the promise
of the Spirit through faith.
So we notice very clearly in the scripture, that one
work that Christ did on the cross, was to redeem us from cursing. The purpose
of redeeming us from cursing is to bring us in to blessing. So God wants to
move us from being in a place of cursing, into a place of blessing.
Specifically, he wants to remove all curses from our breaking of the law of
God. Notice in verse 14, God’s purpose is that blessing would come upon us,
that we might receive the promise of the spirit.
So the Holy Spirit working in our life is the source
of blessing. Blessing means favour. Blessing means fruitfulness. Blessing means
the flow of the life of God. So God’s plan is to bring us, or position us, so
we live a blessed life. So we need to understand - there’s absolutely no doubt
here - God’s desire is for a blessed life, and our cooperating with the Holy
Spirit is the cause of that blessed life. It is the life of faith in the
spirit, that is a blessed life. Notice as the blessing of Abraham come upon the
Gentiles in Christ; so God’s blessing on Abraham is fulfilled in Jesus. So when
we identify with Jesus, and live with Him and identify with Him - that is the
way blessing is released.
So blessing comes out of identifying with Jesus
Christ, and aligning with his life. It comes out of living as a new-creation
person in Christ. God’s blessing came upon His son Jesus Christ, and when I
identify with Him, I am blessed. So when you become a Christian, you identify
with Jesus Christ and His death, burial and resurrection - you are already
positioned for blessing. You are blessed because of your relationship with
Christ; and not because of all the things you do.
One danger is that, having come to Christ, we go back
under the law. I am blessed because I identify with Christ; it’s not because of
what I do. Otherwise, you come back under the law: if you do this you’re
blessed; if you don’t’ do it, you’re cursed. Jesus has redeemed us from the
curse of the law. In other words, He has paid the full price. His work on
Calvary was enough to break the power of all cursing.
When Jesus died on the cross, He fully satisfied the
demands of God. When Jesus died on the cross, we died with Him - and a dead man
can’t be affected by curses. So notice He says: He redeemed us from the curse
of the law; having become a curse for us. So on the cross, Jesus represented
us. The nature of His death, hanging on a tree - in the Bible God said a person
hanging on a tree is cursed.
So hundreds of years before the Romans invented
crucifixion, God planned how we would be set free from cursing. He set a law in
motion: if the person is hung on a tree, that person is cursed. So when Jesus
was hung on a tree - He became a curse for us; and redeemed us from the curse
of the law.
The power behind curses is demonic spirits. The power
behind the curse is a demonic spirit. A curse is a spiritual force that works
against us. A curse is an unseen spiritual force, that’s powered by an evil
spirit; and it continues until the curse is broken. A curse is an unseen, or
invisible, destructive force; that is empowered by evil spirits; and it
continues until the curse is broken. Hence, we find many people struggling with
the consequences of curses, in spite of the fact that Jesus has already
redeemed them. It’s like the devil is making an illegal claim against them, so
we have to enforce on the evil spirits what Jesus has done.
So we see here a couple of things then. Firstly, that
the power behind a blessing is the Holy Spirit. And your life is blessed when
you identify with Christ. Ephesians 1:6 says “We are blessed with every
blessing in heavenly places in Christ”. I don’t have to work for blessing, I
just need to receive blessing.
The power behind a curse is a demonic spirit. Curses
are the result of the law of God being broken in some way. Jesus has redeemed
us from all curses that come about as a result of breaking God’s law. To redeem
means to pay the full ransom price - to pay the full price to set someone free.
So if Jesus paid the full price, how much price do I have to pay? None! If
Jesus has provided for me to be blessed, how much do I have to do to earn His
blessing? Nothing - I need to just believe. So we’ll see as we get to how a
person remains free, that the key for our victory is faith - not trying harder.
The harder I try, the more I come under the curse of the law. I’m called to
live differently. I’m called to live as a blessed person. So I am a blessed
person, regardless of what is going on around me - I am blessed. I am blessed
through faith in Christ. It’s not an external thing, it’s an internal thing.
You are blessed. You are blessed in every way. You are blessed by God in every
dimension of your life. You don’t have to earn the blessings; they’re something
that comes when we identify with Christ. They are released through faith. We’ll
talk a little bit about that later on. So we know what a blessing is and what a
cursing is.
I’m going to go a little bit further now and look at
Generational curses and Iniquity. I want to show you a couple of scriptures.
We’ll look at the first few verses of Exodus 20, these are what we call the 10
commandments. We’ll read from verse 2 to verse 6:
2 “I am the LORD your God, who brought you out of the
land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage. 3 “You shall have no other gods
before Me. 4 “You shall not make for yourself a carved image—any likeness of
anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is
in the water under the earth; 5 you shall not bow down to them nor 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, 6 but showing mercy to thousands, to those who love Me and keep My
commandments.
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