CAUSES OF CURSE!

(57)WE ARE GOING TO LOOK 3 CAUSES OF CURSES TODAY!
1. GOD HIMSELF!There are also in the Bible a number of different sources and specific causes for curses. We’ve dealt with the general one, now we’ll deal with some specifics. The first source of curses—and this may surprise some of you—is God Himself. There are many curses in the Bible which God Himself pronounces. Probably one of the most common forms of God’s judgment on disobedient people or nations is to pronounce a curse on them. And then as the curse is worked out, that’s the outworking of God’s judgment. Do you understand that? God both blesses and curses.So we’re going to deal, first of all, now with curses that proceed from God Himself. And there is one supreme cause which is stated in Exodus 20:3–5. This is the first part of the Ten Commandments. Let me say before we read the greatest and most common cause of curses in peoples’ lives is breaking the first two commandments. In fact, I’m inclined to believe you cannot break those commandments without coming under a curse. Now let me read those words.“You shall have no other gods before me.”
But the Hebrew means just as much beside me. It’s not a question of having the Lord as the main god and other gods as well. He says, “I am the Lord and beside Me there is no other god.” So, you must not acknowledge any other god except the true God.And the second is what we would call idolatry.“You shall not make for yourself any carved image, or 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: 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 on the children to the third and fourth generation of those who hate me.”
Notice that’s the specific feature of a curse, it goes on for at least three and probably four generations. Think of the billions of people on earth all of whose ancestors worshiped idols for countless centuries. Think of the pile-up of curses that there is. Travel in Southeast Asia. In my opinion it’s scarcely worth ministering in Southeast Asia if you can’t deal with the subject of the curse because basically ninety-five percent of all the people there are under a curse. That’s not to say that they’re bad people. I think they’re wonderful people. But there’s something from the past, you see.It’s very important to see that having another god besides the one true God includes every form of occult practice. I cannot take time this evening to go into all the possible forms of the occult, because they are almost countless. But whenever you go to a source other than the true God for things which you are free only to seek from the true God, whatever source you go to you are actually making your god. So, if you go to a fortune teller for information about the future which God has said you shall not receive through that channel, through that fortune teller you’re making the power behind that fortune teller your god. You play with a Ouija board. If you get involved in all sorts of occult experiences or cults that deny the truth of the Bible. In all those things you are making a god who is not the true God. So, it’s very important to say this, the curses pronounced for the breaking of the first two commandments cover every form of occult.
Now, the Lord says up to the fourth generation. If you do a little arithmetic, go back four generations. Every one of us has thirty ancestors. How many of us can say for sure that none of our thirty ancestors were ever involved in the occult? Maybe a few of us can, I don’t know. I certainly couldn’t.To give you a very simple example of this. A good many years ago I was in a typical home prayer meeting which was the kind of thing that was going on in those days. I just found myself next to a young man of about twenty or so. I said to him, I suppose the Holy Spirit prompted me, “Have you received the Holy Spirit?” He said, “Yes, but . . .” And whenever a person answers that question yes but, you know what the but is. “But I don’t speak in tongues.” And it seemed to me he really wanted to speak in tongues. I wasn’t trying to force him. I didn’t argue with him but the Lord prompted me, I said, “Did you ever go to a fortune teller?” He thought and he said, “Yes, once when I was about fifteen. But I only did it for a joke, I didn’t mean anything by it.” I said, “You did go.” He said yes. I said, “You know, God forbids that kind of thing.” He was a little reluctant to acknowledge that but he did. I said, “May I lead you in a prayer in which you confess that as a sin and release yourself from its consequences?” He said all right. I think he only said it because he just wanted, you know, to get me off his back. So I led him in a very simple prayer, “Lord, I confess as a sin that I went to that fortune teller, et cetera.” I didn’t say another word to him, put my hand on his shoulder and prayed for him. He immediately began to speak fluently in an unknown tongue. In a few moments he was just lost. You see, there was an invisible barrier that kept him from the freedom of tongues. What was it? The occult. It’s just a simple example.soundDisobedience
2.DISOBEDIENCE!Now in Deuteronomy 27:15–26 we have twelve curses pronounced and when Israel went into the Promised Land they had to pronounce all these curses upon themselves. If they disobeyed the Law they automatically came under these curses. They couldn’t get into the Promised Land without. I think it’s very much the same in a way when we come into a relationship with God, if we’re obedient we come under the blessings but if we’re disobedient we’re in real danger of coming under the curses.I’ll just give you my little summation of the things on which the curses are pronounced in Deuteronomy 27:15 and following. Number one, once again, idolatry, false gods. That’s always at the top of the list. Number two, disrespect for parents. And this is repeated in the New Testament, Ephesians 6:“Honor your father and mother, which is the first commandment with promise, that it may be well with you and you may live long on the earth.”My personal conviction is any person who does not honor his parents never will have it well with him, never. I can think of scores of examples of people. That doesn’t mean you can’t get saved, speak in tongues and go to heaven when you die. But there will be something missing in the quality of your life until you adjust your relationship with your parents. That doesn’t mean you have to agree with your parents or do everything that they say, but you have to respect them.I think of another young man I dealt with. He had a very bad relationship with his father. His father was dead, buried in a cemetery more than a thousand miles from where we were. When this truth really penetrated he took a journey of a thousand miles to the cemetery where his father was buried, went to the grave, knelt at it, confessed his wrong attitudes to his father, wept his heart out and got up a different person. And from then the course of his life changed. I know that there are lots of parents, especially today, you have a lot of reasons for having something against them. I understand that. I say there are no delinquent children, there are only delinquent parents. Nevertheless, if you want to have it well with you, you better do what God says. You can’t afford not to.soundTreachery
3.TREACHERY!Then the next, and we must go quickly, in this list is treachery against a neighbor. The book of Proverbs says whoever rewards evil for good, evil will never depart from his house