Ezekiel 17-18 • A Parable and Generational Curses

ezekiel chapter 17 and it's been a while since we've been in ezekiel but we're going to be picking it up right where we left off we we finished chapter 16 last time and that's a fairly lengthy chapter and now we're going to get into chapter 17. excuse me for when i cough occasionally i've still got this lingering cough that's probably going to be with me for a while so anyway let's begin with prayer shall we heavenly father we thank you so much for giving us the time tonight to be in the word it is always a delight to come together as the body of christ and dig into the scriptures and so we pray father that as we do that tonight that you would use this time to really speak to our hearts and enlarge our understanding and give us lord god a sense of just your heart your your desire your plan your purpose be with us lord god and and just enlarge our understanding we want to see jesus tonight we pray that you'd help us do that for we ask you to in that name the name of jesus our savior amen amen amen all right as we get into chapter 17 i i i want to ask a question i don't know if you've ever thought about how cool it would be if god would just speak up and comment on what's happening in the world right now i get so many emails in a given week saying pastor paul what is going on in the world and you know what they're wanting what they're asking is can you can you comment from the basis of scripture and and there's not a whole lot i can say to be completely honest first of all i'm really not a prophecy buff or a even a last days buff necessarily and and and so i just tell them well you know we're in that time of birth pains you know this is this is that that's about all you can say you know we're going through a time which the bible talks about where we're kind of we're getting ready for the end we're we're close to the very end of things but no we're not in the great tribulation i know it seems like it to some people but we're not uh if i had a dollar for every time somebody asked me uh you know if what we're going through is is uh the tribulation period and whether the vaccine is the mark of the beast or i mean i've had that asked many many many many times and you got to understand people first of all that's not possible because well that's not the way the mark of the beast is going to be distributed but second of all the mark of the beast doesn't come until the midway point of the tribulation of the great tribulation the the antichrist has not been revealed the church is still on the earth we have not been caught away yet and so there's so many things yet you know uh so no we're not in the great tribulation and no no no this is these are birth pangs and i know that it seems really um difficult in fact in an unprecedented sort of a way difficult but it's not difficult in a historical context the world has been going through these sorts of things for a long long time we haven't so we've kind of gotten pretty soft on these sorts of things and i know it's scary and and one of the other things that you have to understand about the current pandemic we're in is one of the reasons that it's so bad is because we're talking about it all the time do you guys understand the more you talk about something and the more you think about it the worse it gets do you know that the more you fear something the more it is to be feared it's exactly what happened when the nation of israel got to the promised land the first time they sent spies into the land and they came back with a bad report well we can't go in there there's giants in the land well the more the people talked about those giants and the more they feared those giants the more their faith failed and the bigger the problem became and that's just the way of things you keep your eyes on your problems they will get bigger i promise you you keep your eyes on jesus your problems will stay their proper size and so many times you know what we're what we're dealing with is just this absolute focus on the issues or the problems and it it's it and that's one of the reasons people are coming away saying well this has got to be the end times i think we're in the great tribulation and on and on and on and on and on and and frankly it's just not the case so but it would be cool if god would at least comment wouldn't it and kind of just talk about the things that are going on the reason i mention that is because that is actually what he does in this chapter god is going to comment on what is going on with the nation of judah and he's going to do it in kind of a a parable form in fact he's going to have ezekiel tell them a story which is an allegory or a parable that is going to help them understand excuse me what is going on uh around them and but before we get into that now i could just start reading these verses and just we could get into the story because what what he does is he tells the story in parable form and then he gives the explanation for it but i want to give you a little bit of a backstory going into it because i think you're going to understand better remember that because of the disobedience of the people of judah the northern kingdom of israel has long since been conquered by the assyrians but now the southern kingdom of judah because of their disobedience god gave his people into the hands of king nebuchadnezzar of babylon who invaded the land and deposed the king the king at the time was a man by the name of jehoiakim and he was taken off to babylon and king nebuchadnezzar put a vassal king in the place of the throne there in judah a man by the name of zedekiah and zedekiah is essentially kind of a puppet king he's he's had his army taken away he really has no way to rebel necessarily with his own resources against what the king of babylon has done and so this is just the way things are going on babylon has made a treaty with judah through zedekiah this puppet or vassal king and um as long as as long as the people of judah were okay with this arrangement of the babylonians being in charge everything was going fine and the reason it was going fine was because this was god's disciplinary act in their lives the the babylonian army coming into judah this was god's discipline because they had been disobedient and what what is you know what does god want when he's putting us through a time of discipline he wants us to submit to it not rebel against it but submit to it and as long as the people of judah submitted to the the disciplinary actions of the lord things were going okay and and frankly prophets like jeremiah which we recently studied were encouraging the people to do just that they said accept what the lord is is doing and everything's going to go fine and and he told them repeatedly that that the babylonian invasion and the domination that was going on was god's doing it was god's doing and they needed to accept it but eventually judah became restless and false prophets began to rise up and say no this is not the hand of the lord the lord is going to overturn the king of babylon and they were getting the people all lathered up and and so on and so on but of course you know judah didn't have any way of throwing off the the domination of the babylonian army so what they did is the king of judah zedekiah reached out to egypt to make an alliance with the king of egypt that they together would throw off the yoke of babylon and of course the lord saw this as an act of rebellion which it was against his his disciplinary hand so he basically told them through the prophets egypt is not going to be able to help you not at all so knowing what's going on right that babylon is god's disciplinary hand they want to throw off god's disciplinary hand they've reached out to egypt to help them to throw off the dominion of the babylonians now we can read this story it begins here in chapter 17 verse 1 saying the word of the lord came to me son of man propound a riddle and speak a parable to the house of israel and you need to know going into this that the hebrew word for riddle here speaks of a mysterious story or something that is intentionally phrased in such a way as to require an explanation the parable that he's going to give is contained in verses 3 through 10 so let's go ahead and read it it says thus or say thus says the lord god a great eagle with great wings and long pinions rich in plumage of many colors came to lebanon and took the top of the cedar now stop there for a minute because the great eagle you need to know is nebuchadnezzar king of babylon and the top of the cedar that he snatched away was the king of judah king jehoiachin all right in fact we're told in verse 4 he broke off the top most of its young twigs again that's king jehoiachin and carried it to a land of trade and set it in a city of merchants and that of course again refers to babylon then he and we're still talking about king nebuchadnezzar although you aren't being told that yet it's just all in parable form then he took the seed of the land and planted it in fertile soil he placed it beside abundant waters he said it like a willow twig and it sprouted and became a low spreading vine now that's judah judah has now become a low spreading vine okay so and and god is saying that they the the the king of babylon planted this and it and it it grew and it began to be fruitful and it says and its branches turned toward him meaning the king of babylon and its roots remained where it stood so it became a vine and produced branches and put out boughs so you can see from the language here that the lord is showing in this parable so far that the even though the king of judah was taken captive to babylon the lord was blessing this arrangement because it was his act of discipline that was being carried out against the people all right and the people were going with it at this point but then the parable goes on verse 7 and there was another great eagle with great wings and much plumage now we're talking about the king of egypt okay and behold this vine remember the vine is judah that has been replanted bent its roots toward him and shot forth its branches toward him from the bed where it was planted that he might water it in other words they're looking to him now it had been planted on good soil by abundant waters that it might produce branches and bear fruit and become a noble vine so god is saying that he gave this vine this low creeping vine everything it needed but it sought sustenance elsewhere from the king of egypt all right so obviously this is talking about the fact that they reached out to egypt for the military might to free them from babylonian domination so god asks a question in verse 9. look what he says say thus says the lord god will it thrive he's speaking of the vine that represents judah and jerusalem will it thrive and he says will he not pull up its roots and cut off its fruit so that it withers so that all its fresh sprouting leaves wither it will not take a strong arm or many people to pull it from its roots behold it is planted will it thrive will it not utterly wither when the east wind strikes it wither away on the bed where it's sprouted so all of these rhetorical questions that the lord is asking concerning judah and jerusalem and god is telling them that because they've rebelled against his hand of discipline the blessing that he's been giving them is going to be now pulled away so beginning in verse 11 where we are now he's going to begin to explain the parable now you already know what it means but i think the explanation i gave is going to help you to understand what he's saying here in these verses then the word of the lord came to me say now to this or to the rebellious house and right there we see how the lord sees the actions of judah it's a rebellious house he says do you not know what these things mean tell them behold the king of babylon came to jerusalem and took her king and her princes and brought them to him to babylon and he took one of the royal offspring and now he's talking about king zedekiah whom nebuchadnezzar put in charge as a vassal and made a covenant with him putting him under oath the chief men of the land he had taken away that the kingdom might be humble and not lift itself up and keep his covenant that it might stand i want you to stop there because god reveals in these verses that he allowed the babylonian army to come in and overwhelm judah so that they would walk in humility so that they would accept the hand of discipline that god had placed over them but that's not what happened verse 15 he says but he rebelled against him by sending his ambassadors to egypt that they might give him horses and a large army will he thrive can one escape who does such things can he break the covenant and yet escape and the covenant is not the mosaic covenant the covenant is the agreement that zedekiah made with the king of babylon to basically obey to just relax and let this thing play itself out and he says no he he broke that covenant and he says in verse 16 as i live declares the lord god surely in the place where the king dwells who made him king whose oath he despised and whose covenant with him he broke in babylon he shall die so this is obviously a word that is given before zedekiah's final rebellion after which he was captured and brought to babylon and put to death pharaoh with his mighty army and great company will not help him in war when mounds are cast up and siege walls built to cut off many lives he despised the oath in breaking the covenant and behold he gave his hand and did all these things he shall not escape therefore thus says the lord as i live surely it is my oath that he despised and my covenant that he broke i will return it upon his head now he's still not talking about the mosaic covenant he's when he says my covenant god is saying i was behind this arrangement this was my disciplinary hand on the nation of judah so he didn't just break a covenant with the king of babylon he broke a covenant with me an agreement that he had made verse 20 i will spread my net over him and he shall be taken in my snare and i will bring him to babylon and enter into judgment with him there for the treachery he has committed against me and all the pick of his troops shall fall by the sword and the survivors shall be scattered to every wind and you shall know that i am the lord i have spoken well you know we we end that portion of the chapter and it's it's all pretty negative wouldn't you say i mean he's using this story this parable form to show that this is something that god is well aware of this attempt to rebel against his disciplinary hand and he's basically saying it's not going to come to any fruition it's not going to be successful he's going to completely fail in fact he's going to lose his life in the whole process of the thing but i want you to see here as the as the chapter closes out god is going to give a prophecy of something that is not yet fulfilled but it is a prophecy that's positive and so he ends this chapter saying thus says the lord god i myself will take a sprig from the lofty top of the cedar and this once again refers to a king from the davidic line and we'll set it out i will break off from the top most of its young twigs a tender one and i myself will plant it on a high and lofty mountain on the mountain height of israel will i plant it that it may bear branches and produce fruit and become a noble cedar and under it will dwell every kind of bird in the shade of its branches birds of every sort will nest and this speaks of the nations of the world being gathered under the promised king that god is talking about and he says in verse 24 and all the trees of the field shall know that i am the lord i bring lo the high tree and make high the low tree dry up the green tree and make the dry tree flourish i am the lord i have spoken and i will do it now that's that's a very strong phrase at the end of that chapter i will do it god says when is he going to do it well the nations of the world have never yet come under israel but they will they will during what we call the millennial or messianic kingdom let me put a chart up on the screen here for you this evening so that you can kind of see this last day and i know there's a lot there and it's going to be very very difficult to kind of make it all out which is one of the reasons why i circled in red that area that is that that blue double arrow there that says millennial or messianic kingdom we are in the church age which is listed on the far left side of that chart the tribulation period is going to commence once the church is caught away to be with the lord and after the seven year tribulation where the wrath of god is poured out upon the earth there will be the second coming of jesus christ followed by the battle of armageddon which where the lord will put down the enemies that come against israel and then we will enter into that period of time called the millennial or messianic kingdom it's a time during which satan will be bound and there will be unprecedented peace and prosperity on the earth for a period of 1 000 years according to the bible and and this is what the lord is promising here at the end of ezekiel chapter 17. it has not yet happened because obviously the great tribulation has not yet happened but it is going to happen and the lord says here at the end of this chapter i have spoken and i will do it now by the way if you would like to get a copy of this last day's timeline you can actually download it from our website if you go to ccontario.com forward slash ezekiel you'll find a button there at the top of our ezekiel study thus far and you'll be able to download a pdf of this timeline so once again it's ccontario.com forward slash ezekiel and you'll find this timeline chapter 18 let's get into chapter 18 it says the word of the lord came to me what do you mean by repeating this proverb concerning the land of israel the fathers have eaten sour grapes and the children's teeth are set on edge all right so stop there for a moment we need to talk about what this means this proverb if you will as spoken by the israelites was debate was basically saying that the reason we're going through the hardships that we're going through and we are going through hardships is because our parents and our grandparents sinned and now we're reaping the judgment that came because of their sin and then what they're doing is they're deflecting the guilt that's really all they're doing they're taking whatever accountability that they might themselves have to stand and face and address with god and they're blaming it on their parents how long have people been blaming things on their parents good grief my parents if it wasn't for my parents you know it's a very common sort of a thing i'm i'm going through all these things here because of my parents well interestingly enough this proverb was also addressed by the lord in the book of jeremiah which tells us how popular it had actually become as a saying but more than that it was a popular belief in what we call today a victim mentality you see i'm a victim i i don't deserve any of this i'm a victim i'm a victim of my circumstances i'm a victim of the people who came before me i'm a victim i'm a victim i'm a victim and we understand we know that this is a very popular refrain that we hear today well it was going on then too the jews living in judah believed they were victims of the sins of their parents and their grandparents it's their fault that we're going through all this now listen to me in other words what we're saying is they believed they were victims of a generational curse have you ever heard of generational curses it's very popular in some parts of the world as far as the teaching goes particularly in the continent of africa i i find well we'll talk about it here's god's response verse 3 and 4. as i live declares the lord god this proverb shall no more be used by you in israel behold all souls are mine the soul of the father as well as the soul of the son is mine the soul who sins shall die all right stop there because there's two things that i want to bring out here there's two points that i want to make and i'm going to put each one of them up on the screen for you to see them point number one both the the blessing of life as well as the judgment of death that is being talked about in these verses is temporal not eternal you're going to hear about people who are going to die for their sin he's not talking about eternal damnation he's talking about physical death okay so that's very important that you understand that and because and because he's going to talk about how the people who do right who kept the law are going to live but you know we know from the new testament that god never promised eternal life for the people when they kept the law he never made that promise so these are not talking about eternal life and eternal death but there's another point that i want you to take note of here point number two is that generational judgments or if you will generational curses must be understood correctly because they are not understood correctly now you might have noticed i said a moment ago that in this chapter god is going to correct their mistaken notions about generational curses and some of you might be thinking now wait a minute i happen to know the generational curses are real because i mean what about that passage in in deuteronomy that talks about generational curses here it is up on the screen you shall have no other gods before me god says to the nation of israel you shall not make for yourself a carved image or any likeness of anything that is in heaven above or that is on the earth beneath or that is in the water under the earth you shall not bow down to them or 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 but showing steadfast love to thousands of those who love me and keep my commandments so people read that right there and they say see so pastor paul you see you got a problem because god just said here that there's such a thing as generational curses and so now we've got all these teachings that circulate in the body of christ in certain parts of the world in some cases here even in america where they're teaching you that if you're going through rough times it's probably because there's a curse on i don't know some family member back to the third or fourth generation something somebody did and now you've got to break that curse in order to be free from the circumstances that you now find yourself in this is a very very common belief and it is biblically false because in this passage that we're looking at here on the screen there's a key to understanding this idea of generational judgments and i'm going to highlight for you some of the words later on in the passage so let's take a look at this passage again with some of the words highlighted let's go to the next slide look what it says there visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children to the third and fourth generation of those who hate me but showing steadfast love to thousands who love me did you did you catch the the deal there so when is when is a generational judgment passed along to the third and fourth generation when they carry on the heart of their parents grandparents or whatever and continue to hate the lord and rail against the lord but what happens if you've got a a a parent and you're just the second generation and your parent hated god and railed against god and wanted nothing to do with god now are you to live under a generational curse or judgment because of that now that you're a believer not at all what we forget is to take this passage into consideration second corinthians up on the screen chapter 5 verse 17 therefore if anyone is in christ he is a new creation the old has passed away behold the new has come and i just want to encourage everybody who's ever been exposed to the idea of generational judgments or generational curses to take time and meditate on second corinthians 5 17 because that that passage will set you free because you do not have to live under a generational curse or a generational judgment when you come to jesus christ he has taken your judgment he has taken your condemnation he has borne it on himself on the cross you know when i say from the pulpit that when that you're never going to answer for any of your sins when you stand before god do you know that freaks people out i i seriously get notes at least at least once a week from somebody who heard me say that and are just freaked out i got one this week pastor paul i don't understand i don't understand what you're saying so yeah sure i came to jesus christ and i accepted what he did for me on the cross and i know that he forgave me for all my sin but you're telling me that if i continue to sin that i'm never going to stand before the god in gen before god in judgment and tell him that's exactly what i'm telling you jesus either bore your sin in the condemnation and judgment of it or he didn't and what he said on the cross was it is finished which means paid in full and you know they usually always like to throw in another question well you know what if what if somebody like just keeps living a life of unrepentant sin what then i go why are you asking are you planning on living a life of unrepentant sin are you kind of preparing for the future is that why you're asking don't even go there why are you asking about somebody who lives a life of unrepentant sin is there somebody you want to judge is there somebody you need to condemn why are you asking the question live your life for jesus live it for him 100 and you never have to worry about all that junk and besides that's god's business to judge the sinner not yours and he doesn't always share all the details with you and me all you need to know is that jesus died for your sins and there is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in christ jesus that's all you need to know live your life now beginning in verse 5 of this chapter he begins to outline three cases and to highlight this principle of what we're going to call individual responsibility he says if a man is righteous and does what is justin right and then he goes on to describe what justin wright means if he does not eat upon the mountains and that refers to participating in an idol feast which they did on high mountains or hills okay or lift up his eyes to the idols of the house of israel does not defile his neighbor's wife or approach a woman in her time of menstrual impurity again those had to do with prohibitions related to the law of moses concerning blood does not oppress anyone but restores to the debtor his pledge commits no robbery gives his bread to the hungry and covers the naked with a garment does not lend that interest or take any profit he's talking about the man who puts god's law ahead of financial gain withholds his hand from injustice executes true justice between man and man walks in my statues and keeps my rules by acting faithfully he is righteous he shall surely live declares the lord god okay you got it pretty simple straightforward again not it's not talking about eternal life saying he shall live if he fathers a son who is violent a shedder of blood who does any of these things though he himself did none of these things who even eats upon the mountains defiles his neighbor's wife oppresses the poor and needy commits robbery does not restore the pledge lifts up his eyes to the idols commits abomination excuse me lends to intra at interest and takes profit shall he then live he shall not live he has done all these abominations remember this is the son of the man who did none of these things he shall surely die his blood shall be upon himself so the principle goes the same way the son doesn't benefit from the father's righteousness the father lived a life that was righteous before god but the sun didn't but the son doesn't get any special consideration because his father was a godly man now suppose this man fathers a son who sees all the sins that his father has done he sees and does not do likewise he does not eat upon the mountains again participating in pagan feasts or lift up his eyes to the idols of the house of israel does not defile his neighbor's wife does not oppress anyone exacts no pledge commits no robbery but gives his bread to the hungry and covers the naked with a garment withholds his hand from iniquity takes no interest or profit obeys my rules and walks in my statutes he shall not die for his father's iniquity he shall surely live again principle of individual responsibility as for his father because he practiced extortion robbed his brother and did what was not good among his people behold he shall die for his iniquity yet you say why should not the son suffer for the iniquity of the father when the son has done what is justin right and has been careful to observe all my statutes he shall surely live the soul who sins shall die the son shall not suffer for the iniquity of the father nor the father suffer for the iniquity of the son the righteousness of the righteous shall be upon himself and the wickedness of the wicked shall be upon himself but then the lord gives another scenario but if a wicked person turns away from all his sins that he has committed and he keeps all my statutes and does what is justin right he shall surely live he shall not die none of the transgressions that he has committed shall be remembered against him for the righteousness that he has done he shall live have i any pleasure in the death of the wicked declares the lord god and not rather that he should turn away from or excuse me should turn from his way and live but when a righteous person turns away from his righteousness and does injustice and does the same abominations that the wicked person does shall he live none of the righteous deeds that he has done shall be remembered for the treachery of which he is guilty and the sin he has committed for them he shall die yet you say the way of the lord is not just hear now a house of israel is my way not just is it not your ways that are not just when a righteous person turns away from his righteousness and does injustice he shall die for it for the injustice that he has done he shall die again when a wicked person turns away from the wickedness he has committed and does what is justin right he shall save his life because he considered and turned away from the transgression that he has committed he shall surely live he shall not die yet the house of israel says the way of the lord is not just o house of israel are my ways not just is it not your ways that are not just so here's the conclusion therefore i will judge you o house of israel everyone according to his ways declares the lord god repent and turn from all your transgressions lest iniquity be your ruin cast away from all from you all the transgressions that you've committed and make yourselves a new heart and a new spirit why will you die o house of israel for i have no pleasure in the death of anyone declares the lord god so turn and live isn't that a incredible chapter i mean i just i think that's so insightful because not only does it address the issue of the throwing off of responsibility onto my forefathers or my parents or whatever it was their fault but it brings me to an understanding that god deals with each man according to his own life and that the heart of the lord is mercy he says even a wicked man if he turns from his wickedness none of his previous wickedness will be remembered and mankind what does mankind do well that doesn't make sense that's not just and god asked the question really is it me who's not just the word just of course means fair god makes the rules and that means whatever he does is fair even if it doesn't agree with you or me right it might mess with your mind a little bit when you try to figure some of these things out and you might say [Music] people say that to me all the time you know that just doesn't make sense to me i'm like so it doesn't make sense to you who are you did you think you were someone special i think god's wrong yeah no i don't think so he is the lord eternal god and he is perfect in justice and this is a great chapter to learn from so we we find out a lot about the the heart of god through this chapter which is always good because you know the more you learn about the heart of god the more you're going to be able to interpret the word of god do you know that do you guys get that do you know that a large part of interpreting god's word correctly is knowing his heart when people don't know god's heart they struggle to understand his word you know it just seems like a bunch of rules and they and they don't know him and so they ask a lot of questions well what about this rule and what about that rule what about this rule is it is it a sin to do this or is it a sin to do that but when you learn the heart of the father you don't have to ask a lot of those questions it really truly becomes this interpretive matrix that helps us to understand the will of god so let's pray father thank you so much for your word thank you for the insights that we gain from it thank you for the the wisdom the understanding of your heart lord continue to teach us help us to understand help us to grow and help us learn to be humble we look to you we commit our hearts to you in jesus precious name we pray amen

Channel: Calvary Chapel Ontario

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Length: 42min 40sec (2560 seconds)

Published: Thu Sep 02 2021