{"id":63744,"date":"2023-04-30T22:54:48","date_gmt":"2023-04-30T22:54:48","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/?p=63744"},"modified":"2023-04-30T22:54:48","modified_gmt":"2023-04-30T22:54:48","slug":"the-course-and-cause-and-kinds-of-curses-part-2-of-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/?p=63744","title":{"rendered":"The course, and cause, and kinds of curses (Part 2 of 2)\u00a0"},"content":{"rendered":"

By The Preacher <\/strong><\/p>\n

5.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 A Notice or a Pronouncement?\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

To the fallen man, God said, \u201ccursed is the ground for thy sake.\u201d \u00a0God appeared to have cursed the ground, not the man; yet the ground was cursed \u201cfor thy sake\u201d \u2013 for the sake of the guilty man (Genesis 3:17).\u00a0 God proceeded to say that man would thenceforth eat his bread \u201cin sorrow\u201d and \u201cin the sweat\u201d of his face (vv. 17-19).<\/p>\n

It might also be argued, and very well so, that God\u2019s statement to Adam was not the pronouncement of a curse but merely an announcement of consequences that the failure and fall had already brought upon Adam: \u201ccursed IS\u2026\u201d\u00a0 All the same, God never directly cursed man.<\/p>\n

https:\/\/everyday.ng\/2023\/04\/the-course-and-cause-and-kinds-of-curses-part-1-of-2\/<\/p>\n

6.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Commanded to Curse or to Bless?\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

One expression I have not found of God in the Bible is, \u201cI curse you\u2026\u201d; but it is not uncommon on the lips of certain sorcerous priests who often seek to threaten meek sheep with their robes and their rods.\u00a0 Even Balaam confessed,<\/p>\n

8 How shall I curse, whom God hath not cursed? or how shall I defy, whom the LORD hath not defied?<\/p>\n

20 Behold, I have received commandment to bless: and he hath blessed; and I cannot reverse it (Numbers 23:8, 20).<\/p>\n

Whether the greedy Balaam obeyed that commandment or not, is a story for another page.\u00a0 If Balaam was going to curse whom God had blessed, it was not the commandment of God; it was the seduction of fat bribes and some weakness in character.<\/p>\n

7.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Direct and Indirect Curses: The Paradox of Cursed Blessings\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

We might say, from the character of God as seen at Creation, that the Almighty does not curse but blesses what He creates.\u00a0 For instance, \u201cAnd God created great whales … And God blessed them \u2026 So God created man \u2026 And God blessed them\u201d (Genesis 1:21-22, 27-28).\u00a0 God gives what He has: blessings, not curses.\u00a0 The nearest to a curse from the lips of God is found in Malachi 2:2 where God said to stubborn Israel,<\/p>\n

If ye will not hear, and if ye will not lay it to heart, to give glory unto my name, saith the LORD of hosts, I will even send a curse upon you, and I will curse your blessings: yea, I have cursed them already, because ye do not lay it to heart.<\/p>\n

Here, God threatens to dispatch or \u201cSEND a curse.\u201d\u00a0 The curse was going to be a messenger on special assignment from God, to a specific target: \u201cupon you.\u201d\u00a0 \u00a0In other words, a curse can be on errand from a sender, detailed to carry out specific outcomes upon or against a given target.<\/p>\n

About stubborn Israel in Malachi 2:2, God proceeded to explain what He meant by \u2018sending\u2019 a curse; He meant that He would curse their blessings, but not them. \u00a0In fact, He said, \u201cI have cursed THEM already.\u201d\u00a0 So, what God cursed was not His stubborn people but their cherished blessings (in the plural); an indirect curse.\u00a0 What does that mean?\u00a0 How would that work?<\/p>\n

This is how:\u00a0 their cherished car that had been the object of much pride and support would suddenly be smitten with frequent faults that would make it a drain pipe for much unplanned finances; their much desired and admired fine house would suddenly be visited by a \u2018messenger\u2019 from God, with endless litigations that would make that \u2018blessing\u2019 a wearisome worry and waste of time and other precious resources; they would be blessed with a job that everyone celebrates, but a job that would become the source of constant distress, loss of health, loss of friends, loss of investments, until it is wondered if it had not been better without that cursed blessing; the very rich and handsome husband who had hitherto been such a joy would suddenly and \u2018unreasonably\u2019 be inflicted with such a curse as to impoverish them to be so poor and ugly that they would wish they had not been married at all, as all that used to envy them begin to pity them. \u00a0They would still be blessed, very blessed, but the blessings would have been invaded with a curse.\u00a0 Should you take them through a spiritual scanner, no curse would be found on them.\u00a0 The curse is not on their lives but on what they have.<\/p>\n

A blessing is good, but some good blessing can carry a curse, as any clean water can also be polluted.\u00a0 So, even when God might not directly curse His own people, He can send a curse upon their ground, or upon their blessings.\u00a0 Thus, a people on their happy way from wicked Pharaoh in Egypt, blessed with freedom from slavery and refreshing miraculous waters from the rock, could be cursed to wander and waste in the wilderness, being bitten by venomous serpents along their blessed route that is guided by God\u2019s rare pillars of fire and pillars of cloud.\u00a0 An indirect curse might not be generational, but it could be no less dangerous.<\/p>\n

8.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 God\u2019s \u2018Dirty\u2019 Messengers\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

God gives what He has: blessings, not curses.\u00a0 For instance, when Satan kept urging God to \u2018touch\u2019 Job and afflict him, God made it clear that His hands carried no such damnations. \u00a0Job would be more doubly blessed if He touched him.\u00a0 To curse and to kill were things in the \u2018hand\u2019 of Satan, not God.\u00a0 The point was stressed when God said further to Satan about Job, \u201conly upon himself put not forth thine hand\u201d (Job 1:11-12). \u00a0It was obvious whose \u2018hand\u2019 carried what.\u00a0 That is not to say, however, that God is all \u2018blessings\u2019 and no judgment.\u00a0 If it ever comes to doing the \u2018dirty job\u2019 upon the wicked, God also has those to do it, who would often do it very badly well (Ezekiel 5:17; 14:21).<\/p>\n

20 The Lord asked, ‘Who will deceive Ahab so that he will go and be killed at Ramoth?’ \u2026 a spirit stepped forward, approached the Lord, and said, ‘I will deceive him.’ \u2026 ‘I will go and make all of Ahab’s prophets tell lies.’ The Lord said, ‘Go and deceive him. You will succeed'” (1 Kings 22:20-22, Good News Translation).<\/p>\n

Could God work with deceivers and killers? Can the good God ever have anything to do with such negative forces to His great purpose?\u00a0 I don\u2019t know.\u00a0 I still have much to learn from the Bible.<\/p>\n

9.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Cursed Places\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

The next time we hear a curse in the Bible, after the forbidden fruit incidence in the Garden of Eden, is at the instance of Cain\u2019s murder of his brother Abel.\u00a0 Then, God said to Cain, \u201cAnd now art thou cursed from the earth.\u201d \u00a0God proceeded to explain Himself to Cain: \u201cWhen thou tillest the ground, it shall not henceforth yield unto thee her strength\u201d (Genesis 4:11-12).\u00a0 The ground had been blighted for the sake of guilty man.<\/p>\n

Again, we might worry: was that the pronouncement of a curse upon Cain, or was it merely a notice to Cain of the execrable consequences that his action had activated upon himself?\u00a0 Was God saying to Cain, \u201cBecause of what you have done, I curse you\u2026\u201d or He was saying, \u201cAlas, Cain, behold what you have put yourself into; behold the latent curse that you have now unleashed upon yourself by your wicked action!\u00a0 Thou ART already in the condition of a curse\u201d?<\/p>\n

Not only lives but also lands can be cursed.\u00a0 In the Garden of Eden, the ground was cursed for the sake of man.\u00a0 When Cain killed his brother, the land\u2019s support to Cain the culprit was deactivated (Genesis 4:10-12).\u00a0 When Joshua conquered Jericho, the land was cursed.\u00a0 For the next nearly 500 years or so, until Prophet Elisha\u2019s intervention, the blessed people in that cursed land suffered the consequences so long as they stayed there (Joshua 6:26; 1 Kings 16:34; 2 Kings 2:19-22).\u00a0 The people were not cursed, but the place was.\u00a0 So, not only people but also places can be cursed.\u00a0 Sometimes, though, the detestable curse might not show in the elegant skyscrapers and Edenic attractions of the place (Genesis 13:11-13; 2 Kings 2:19).<\/p>\n

10.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Inherited Curses\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

These are curses that come to a person through their ancestral line. They might have been acquired or pronounced in the past, but they go down the blood line.\u00a0 When Gehazi sinned, for example, his master the prophet announced a curse that was going to come upon him, and be inherited by his seeds forever.\u00a0 Elisha said to him, \u201cNaaman’s leprosy will cling to you and to your descendants forever\u201d (2 Kings 5:27, NIV).\u00a0 Every descendant of Gehazi down a thousand generations over a million years across continents, \u201cforever,\u201d unless God intervened, was thenceforth going to be a leper, not for what they have done or would do, but for what their ancestor did, even if in future they lost touch with that culpable and regrettable ancient history.<\/p>\n

Another example of an inherited curse would be the pronouncement of Joshua against the Gibeonites who through deceit had secured a covenant of peace with Israel: \u201cNow therefore ye are cursed, and there shall none of you be freed from being bondmen, and hewers of wood and drawers of water for the house of my God\u201d (Joshua 9:23).<\/p>\n

When David sinned in the matter of Bathsheba, Prophet Nathan alerted him to the consequences of his action, some of which consequences were going to run down the bloodline forever.\u00a0 For example, the prophet said, \u201cthe sword shall NEVER depart from thine house\u201d (2 Samuel 12:10).\u00a0 Mark the word \u201cnever.\u201d \u00a0It was not the prophet pronouncing a curse; he was merely announcing what had been set in motion by David\u2019s adultery and murder.\u00a0 Promptly, from the next chapter, the bloody scenes began.\u00a0 The sword started to claim its preys, from Amnon the royal rapist to Absalom the sly killer; to Solomon versus Adonijah, all first generation sons of David (2 Samuel 13:28; 1 Kings 2:24-25), and further down the lineage to about 120 years later when Queen Athaliah of Jezebel and Ahab, wife of King Jehoram, massacred the princes royal, her own grandchildren, descendants of and heirs to the throne of David, in her desperate usurpation of the throne of Judah.\u00a0 Those were deaths and disasters manipulated by an ancestral curse, an inherited curse running down the bloodline. Revelation 2:23 reports a similar New Testament case, of death that was going to come upon the children of a great preacher in the church, through the transgression of their parent, an ancestor, a preacher in the church. The reporting voice was that of God.\u00a0 The curse had a cause.<\/p>\n

11.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0Attracted Curses\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

These are like roving curses of no particular address for no particular target, but which one attracts upon oneself by a lifestyle.\u00a0 Sometimes these might eventually run through the bloodline, but they were originally attracted.\u00a0 They might have been announced by someone, but they were not pronounced by them.\u00a0 The announcer merely alerts the guilty party to what their action has brought upon them.\u00a0 In such cases, the announcer may sometimes be mistaken for the pronouncer. For example, the Bible warns that one should not bring \u201can abomination\u201d into their house, \u201clest thou be a cursed thing\u201d (Deuteronomy 7:26).\u00a0 This curse has nobody\u2019s name attached to it.\u00a0 It has no specific address.\u00a0 If anyone contravenes that law by taking idols into their house, they would immediately activate and attract the curse upon themselves, which may thereafter be transmitted down the bloodline or quickly terminated through repentance.<\/p>\n

Again, the Bible warns, \u201cCursed be he that maketh the blind to wander out of the way\u201d (Deuteronomy 27:18). This curse has no specific target. It is a roving curse out there in space.\u00a0 Anyone who takes wicked advantage of the disable, to exploit them, promptly attracts that curse upon themselves.\u00a0 Depending on the nature of the particular abuse or exploitation, the consequences could be immediate or the curse could be generational.<\/p>\n

The Bible says to honour one\u2019s parents so that one would live long on the earth. That is the fifth of the Ten Commandments (Exodus 20:12).\u00a0 To obey that injunction is to activate the blessing of long life upon oneself; to flout it is to activate the curse of premature death upon oneself.\u00a0 No one needs to pronounce it for it to be activated.\u00a0 It is attracted by a kind of lifestyle, and there are many such roving curses, some of which are activated unawares, but are active all the same.<\/p>\n

12.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0Prayer<\/strong><\/p>\n

If it takes pronouncements to activate a blessing and a curse; if a priest might bless and their words be accordingly honoured by God; if housing an abomination might admit a curse upon oneself, as housing the Ark of God attracts blessings into a household, may I, as priest of God, and by this word of the Lord willingly housed by you as point of contact, declare, that all inherited and acquired curses be broken from your life this day. Amen.\u00a0 May every curse attracted and activated by a wrong lifestyle this day be deactivated in the name of Jesus.\u00a0 May your bloodline be purged of curses and be imbued with blessings.\u00a0 May every lingering curse and limitation in the overt form of Naaman\u2019s leprosy or in the covert sacramental form of Gibeonitish slavery, be broken from your life, in Jesus name. Amen.<\/p>\n

\u25aa\ufe0e The Preacher can be reached on +2348035115164; +2348035115025; or at info@thepreacher.info\u00a0; https:\/\/thepreacherdiary.com\/; https:\/\/facebook.com\/www.thepreacher.info\/<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By The Preacher 5.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 A Notice or a Pronouncement?\u00a0 To the fallen man, God said, \u201ccursed is the ground for thy sake.\u201d \u00a0God appeared to have cursed the ground, not the man; yet the ground was cursed \u201cfor thy sake\u201d \u2013 for the sake of the guilty man (Genesis 3:17).\u00a0 God proceeded to say that […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":63746,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5772],"tags":[5761,5762,1333],"class_list":["post-63744","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-faith","tag-cause","tag-course","tag-prayer"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/63744","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/7"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=63744"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/63744\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/63746"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=63744"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=63744"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=63744"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}