Wednesday, April 20, 2016
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“You must not make for yourself an idol of any kind or an image of
anything in the heavens or on the earth or in the sea. You
must not bow down to them or worship them, for I, the Lord your God,
am a jealous God who will not tolerate your affection for any other gods. I lay the sins of the parents upon their
children; the entire family is affected—even children in the third and fourth
generations of those who reject me. But I lavish
unfailing love for a thousand generations on those who love me and obey my
commands. Exodus 20:4-6(NLT)
Most people consider
placing judgment for sins done by parents on the children, grandchildren, and,
even great-grandchildren as being somewhat unfair on God’s part. However, when you stack that against the thousand
generations of “unfailing love” (covenant blessings) for the
obedient, you rarely get a lifted eyebrow.
In the reality
of interpretation department – the verse actually means that the effects
of the sins affect generations.
A drunk in the family can cause bankruptcy which may take the family
generations to dig out from under. Same
with being the child of a murderer, and trying to have a decent reputation.
But using
this verse to blame God for stuff we bring on ourselves is very
convenient!
It’s pretty
typical of human nature that, when things are going well, and we are getting
what we want – well, it’s just fine and dandy!
But if we get taken to the woodshed (and God really only does that when
we’ve been especially bratty), we consider the system to be rigged and we are
the poor victim; we sing our lament:
God, how could you do that to me; how can you be so unfair?
Well, ain’t
life hard!
Now consider
the way God really does business with his human children:
The ratio
here between God handing out disciplinary judgment and God showering undeserved
blessings on us is a whopping 4/1000, or eighty years (3-4 generations) of judgment
compared to 20,000 years (1,000 generations) of blessing.
Actually…it’s
an even wider gap than that, because the 3-4 generations is specific, while the
number 1,000 is sometimes interpreted as without ceasing. So God could be talking about eighty years
versus eternity!
Listen to what
one of God’s choicest children said about all that:
Put your hope in
the Lord. Travel steadily along his
path. He will honor you by giving you
the land. You will see the wicked
destroyed. I have seen wicked
and people flourishing like a tree in its native soil. But when I looked again, they were
gone! Though I searched for them, I
could not find them! Look at
those who are honest and good, for a wonderful future awaits those who love
peace. But the rebellious
will be destroyed; they have no future.
Psalm 37:34-38 (NLT)
For You Today
The bedrock
reality of the comparison of God’s judgment and blessing is that God is much
more willing to bless his children than curse them. Truth be told, the Father is rooting for our
best; I’ve seen his refrigerator door, and your pictures are all over it!
