Join Rick Hughes as he delves into the intriguing Biblical notion of generational curses, breaking down how disobedience across four generations can lead to national upheaval. This episode is a call to understand the spiritual and societal dynamics at play, especially in times of heightened social tension. With clear insights and actionable advice, Rick emphasizes the importance of recognizing and adhering to divine mandates to protect and preserve our cultural and spiritual heritage.
Welcome to the Flatline with your host, Rick Hughes. For the next 30 minutes, you’ll be inspired, motivated, educated, but never manipulated. Now, your host, Rick Hughes.
SPEAKER 01 :
Good morning and welcome to the Flatline. I’m your host, Rick Hughes, and please stick with me for a few minutes of motivation, some inspiration, some education, but no manipulation. That’s right, no manipulation, no solicitations. We’re not asking you for money. We just want to give you some information that will help you verify and identify the plan of God for your life. And if we can do that, then you have the freedom and the privacy to orient and adjust to the plan, as always. But my job is to be accurate and give it to you straight so that you can understand what your choices are, what your options are. We call the show the FLOT line, F-L-O-T, because that’s an acronym for the Forward Line of Troops. We’re teaching that military analogy there, using that to say there are 10 unique problem-solving devices found in the Word of God that if you learn them and you use them, they will act like a forward line of troops in your life. By that I mean they will stop the outside sources of adversity from ever becoming the inside source of stress. No one can stop adversity, it’s inevitable, but stress is totally optional because adversity is what the circumstances do to you and stress, now that is what you do to yourself. So the Christian life is a life with no stress, no worry, no fear, no anxiety, no bitterness, no animosity. It’s a wonderful way to live. And that’s why you need to build a Flatline in your soul. The Flatline radio show is increasing as we speak. We’ve now upped our show to 56 cities across America. what a wonderful opportunity god has allowed me to have and i’m so thankful for it and i always ask for your prayer support as we continue to move across this country with the information we have to give the greatest information i can give you is to remind you of biblical truths and introduce you to a different way of studying different way of learning the word of god without any sort of manipulation just to verify god’s plan for you it starts with the best news i could tell you and that is jesus christ the anointed son of god has redeemed you and me out of the slave market of sin. He paid our debt for sin to God, and we have been freed now. We are reconciled to God, free of the penalty of death and free from the power of sin in our life. If you have never received Christ as your Savior, it is the single most significant decision you’ll ever make. It totally changed my life, not in an instant. I mean, when I received Christ, I didn’t all of a sudden become a new person. However, the Bible does say if any man’s in Christ, he’s a new creation. Old things are passed away, and behold, all things become new. What became new was my inside, my dead human spirit that was identified with Adam’s original sin was born again, spiritually made alive, so that I could have a relationship with God the Father by means of God the Holy Spirit. living and indwelling in me. And when you receive Christ as your Savior, you in effect will accept the same thing. The offering he made on your behalf, it’s free, free gift of God, compliments of God’s grace, because here’s the big news, God actually loves you and loves me. So the Bible says, not by works of righteousness which we’ve done, but according to his mercy he saved us by the washing of regeneration and the renewing of the Holy Spirit which he shed on us abundantly through Jesus Christ our Lord. So that being justified by his grace, there it is, not by works, not by purchasing, justified by his grace we should be made heirs according to the hope or the confidence of eternal life. So that’s the best news I could ever tell you. Now, the bad news. I promised you last time we spoke, or last time you listened, that we would talk about the four-generation curse. It’s a significant truth taught in the Bible, and I think it’s worth looking at, mentioning, in light of the fact of what’s going on in this country today. When one looks at the chaos, I call it the chaos climate in this election year, that’s 2020, we see multiple young people calling to overthrow the police and overthrow the system of government. Now, I don’t believe that these young people are in the majority. There are millions and millions of great kids who are law-abiding, respectful to authority. And the news really never shows these types unless it’s to stage some sort of political argument and try to make them seem out of touch with reality. However, if the rebellious trends continue, fueled by the social media influencers that are at work every day, then it won’t be long before bad things start to really happen in this country. And the worst thing that could ever happen to us is God bringing judgment on this nation. Why? Because of our departure from the divine institutions and because we turned our back on the one who gave us our great nation and preserved it through two world wars and numerous internal conflicts. From what I can tell, from what my pastor taught me in the Bible, it only takes about four generations of rebellion to God’s laws before the nation undergoes disruption and divine discipline. now our country the united states of america has been a client nation you’ve heard me talk about a client nation that’s a nation that represents god to the world we have been a client nation for many years a client nation for many years now we’ve been the beacon of hope and we we’ve projected the gospel and evangelism throughout the whole world we have been faithfully as a nation guarding god’s word we’ve taught it to our youth We’ve been a haven for and a guardian of the Jewish race. We’ve stood on our nationalistic policy and avoided being lured into international control. We have honored marriage, and we’ve supported the family as an institution, and we have given freedom to all of our citizens, and very often at a great cost. But, but, but, we have focused our attention lately on the gifts of prosperity, and we seem to have forgotten the giver. In eternity past, as recorded in the scripture, God gave his servant Moses explicit instructions regarding worship. And here’s what’s recorded. And before I read this to you, let me make something clear. My pastor taught this to me many years ago. And a lot of what I’m going to share with you today is not original. These are his notes as he taught them to me. And I recall them and reuse them with his permission. But this is the thing he taught me about the four-generation curse. In Exodus 20, verses 4 and 5, you shall not make for yourself an idol in the form of anything in heaven, above, or on earth beneath, or in the waters below. You will not bow down to them or be cause to serve them, for I, the Lord your God, am a jealous God, punishing the children of the sins of their fathers to the third and the fourth generation of those who despise me. Now this was a warning to the Jews as they came out of slavery in Egypt, as they headed for the promised land, as they set up a new system of government and a new nation. This is a law that God decreed. Again, do not make for yourself any idols. in the form of anything in heaven above or on earth below. You will not bow down to them, and you will not be caused to serve them, because I am a jealous God, punishing the children for the sins of their fathers to the third and fourth generation of those who despise me. Now, jealousy. God is not jealous. Jealousy is a sin. The Bible says that. So this is an anthropomorphism giving a God a human characteristic to help us understand that God requires fidelity in the life of those who love him. And this passage that is here was a warning to the Jews against idolatry practiced by the vigorous and very powerful Canaanite giants who occupied that land they were about to go into. And part of the power of those Canaanite people was the power that came from demonism related to idolatry. That’s right, demonism. Demons are fallen angels, and they are real, and they are still in operation today, I can assure you. So the Ten Commandments that God gave to Moses were in effect a constitution for Israel. It was designed to help these former slaves from Egypt establish the concept of freedom in the new nation they would now possess. And these mandates were designed for the protection of freedom, the continuation of freedom. That’s the Ten Commandments, the Freedom Code. And the curse of the four generation, and here again, don’t let me lose you. I am a jealous God punishing the children of the sins of their fathers to the third and fourth generation of those who despise me. What I want to attempt to show you is that we are down the road in that four generation curse. Maybe even to the fourth generation. I’m not sure. But we are looking at discipline from the hand of God if we continue to go down the road we’re going down. You wonder why certain things are like they are and nothing can stop them. Nothing changes. People can get away with crime. Politicians get away with crime and no one convicts them. Politicians do terrible things and no one seems to care. Crimes rampant on our street and no one seems to stop it. What’s going on? Why is this? Is God letting some of these things happen to get our attention? You know, in Hosea, the Bible says, my people are destroyed for lack of knowledge. Since you rejected knowledge, I’ll reject you and you’ll no longer be a priest for me. All God requires is for us to listen, learn, and understand his plan. And then from that course, you have to decide whether or not you’re going to live it. Listen, learn, and understand, and live the plan. There’s a term we used to use called LAG, L-A-G, learn it, apply, and glorify God. And that’s all God is asking of you or any of us. He’s blessed our nation. He’s made us free. He’s given us prosperity. We’re the greatest nation in the world. And to think that we couldn’t lose it is naive. Certainly we can lose it. And there are people in this nation today that want to fundamentally remake this whole nation and make us slaves again, slaves to those that hate this way of life, slaves to those who hate Christianity, because I personally believe that much of what you’re seeing today is a disguised attack on the Christian way of life. So, those Ten Commandments were the Constitution. And that curse, that four-generation curse, now let me make it clear, it does not apply to anyone who believes in the Lord Jesus Christ or to any establishment-oriented unbeliever. If you’re an unbeliever or anyone’s an unbeliever, but they do believe in the establishment principles of freedom, marriage, family, and nationalism, then they’re going to be protected. But hating God to those who what despise me, he said. Hating God or despising God refers to rejecting Jesus Christ as Savior. So this four-generation curse never, never would apply to the believer. Unless he spends his life out of fellowship with God, as some people say in reversionism or as I say in the cosmic system, you know, the bottom line is negative volition. God gave you volition as part of your soul. Mentality is part of your soul. Self-consciousness is part of your soul. You have a conscience and you have volition. God gave you volition. And negative volition is you saying no, you saying no, no to God, no to his word, no to Jesus Christ. Negative volition is the basis of you or anyone becoming culpable to God. But becoming a believer in the Lord Jesus Christ breaks the four-generation curse principle. Exodus 20, verse 6 adds comfort to this curse. Here’s what it says. But I will show mercy to thousands who love me and guard my mandates. So there is your security. God promises he will show mercy to those that love him and guard his mandates. But he said he would visit the children for the sins of the fathers to the third and fourth generation of those who despise me. This does not mean that a child is going to be disciplined for what his father did. I’ll explain it. But that’s not what that means. Here’s another statement about the curse in Exodus 34. Then the Lord passed in front of Moses and said, The Lord God, merciful and gracious, slow to anger, abounding in mercy, abounding in truth, guarding his mercy for thousands and forgiving iniquity, transgressions, and sins, yet he will by no means leave the guilty unpunished. He punishes the iniquity of the fathers on the children and on the grandchildren to the third and fourth generation. This curse is never given where people respond to grace. each generation is a separate generation and each generation is responsible for its own equity which is then passed on through the culture from one generation to the next generation and when we’re talking about the four generation curse we’re talking about the father passes on through the culture his sin and the child picks it up believes it passes it on to his children and they pass it on to the next children It’s a way of life. It’s a culture of negative volition. It’s rejection of the word of God. Each generation is responsible for its own iniquity. And it’s passed on through the culture from one generation to the next. You’ve heard me say what used to be evil in this country is now good. And what used to be good is now evil. That’s the way the culture is changing. Thanks to the internet, thanks to social media, people are accepting perverted lifestyle as if it’s wonderful and fine. And people are looking down their noses at Christians as if they’re perverted and weird. And some of them are kind of weird, I promise you that, because they’re self-righteous legalists, just like the ones who put our Lord Jesus Christ on the cross, the religious self-righteous crowd. But let me give you some characteristics of that four-generation curse so you can see it. Number one, there’s a great difference between the first generation and the fourth generation because each generation specifically gets worse and worse and worse. How does that happen? Well, the culture changes. Culture changes. What used to be good is now evil. What used to be evil is now good. And then the motivation of the people changes. People, you know, what do you think is the greatest motivation in your life? The Bible says, if you love me, you’ll obey me, and my mandates are not hard. Personal love for God is what motivates us to be the kind of people he asks us to be. And when our motivation changes and we begin to worship the gift rather than the giver, then our values have changed. So the culture changes, the motivation of the people changes, values change. This is what it looks like in the four-generation curse as it begins to build up from generation to generation to generation. Juvenile crime increases in every generation. And in the fourth generation occurs when it finally gets there. And we may be there. You’ll see why here. Life is cheap in the fourth generation. Idolatry occurs in the third and fourth generation, but murder is known to be rampant. Life is cheap in this world today. Life is cheap in this country today. You’ve seen the same videos I’ve seen of people walking up and shooting innocent bystanders. You’ve seen the same videos I have of law control officers who make mistakes and shoot innocent men and women. Life is never cheap. Jesus Christ died for everyone, man, woman, child, baby, boy. The Lord Jesus Christ paid a great price for us. It’s not cheap. And yet in this nation, the murder rampant in my city, and mine’s just a small city, is unbelievable. It’s not a day that I don’t pick up the newspaper and read in fine print how many got murdered last night. And if you look at cities like Chicago and St. Louis and Atlanta and Houston and Dallas, you wouldn’t believe it. Life has become so cheap and people kill each other as if there’s nothing to it. The generation that kicks this all off is taught in the Bible, and it’s the generation that begins to be anti-authority, the generation that gets negative to God. And you may wonder, well, what does the Bible consider to be a generation? Roughly 30 years, we’d say. So we’re born under the authority of our parents because until we learn to submit to authority, then we suffer in life under the laws of volitional responsibility. In other words, you are responsible for every decision you make. The Bible teaches that. You are responsible for every decision you make. The reason you have parents is to teach you respect for authority. And when parents don’t teach respect for authority, then they raise a child that has No sense of responsibility. Under the law of volitional responsibility, you must pay for your own sins. All seeming advantages in life are lost if you reject authority. The authority, you might not like the person, you might not care for the person, but the person represents authority. In our home, it’s the police officer. In our nation, it’s the president and the judicial system, the executive and judicial system of law. And then it may be outside, it may be the military, but it’s authority. It keeps us free. It keeps us safe. That’s very important you understand that. So rejection of authority is the problem because Until we learn to submit to authority, we suffer in life. And when you can see young people stand in front of a police officer and curse him and yell at him and throw things at him and people won’t answer the questions the police officer asks, you can see young people rejecting authority. Not all, but the news media certainly makes it available to make it look like it’s all, and it’s not. So rejection of authority is the most prominent cause for suffering in life. Most of the suffering you’ll go through is because you rejected the authority of someone in control. Someone’s got to be in control. And people don’t want that. People want to be free to make their own decisions. And you are basically, to a certain degree, free to make your own decisions. When the sign says the speed limit is 70, the speed limit is 70, not 90. If you get a ticket, it’s because you disobeyed the authority of that sign. Rejection of authority is the most prominent cause for suffering in life. Divine institution number one, freedom, free will, is yours. And if you choose to accept it or you choose to reject authority, you choose it at a very early stage in life. There’s nothing worse than seeing a child who has no respect for the authority of their parents and gets away with anything. Authority is necessary. for the very function in life because you’ll never enjoy your freedom and you’ll never have capacity for freedom until you understand and accept authority. So the first generation of this four generation curse will reject authority beginning in the home. That’s verified in Proverbs 30 verse 11 where it mentions the four generation curse in the next few verses. a generation who curse their father and who do not bless their mother. We have that in America today. We have that very thing going on here in this country today. The greatest suffering in life comes to someone who rejects parental authority because understanding the issue of authority is the key to being stable in life. It’s the key to stability in the nation. It’s the key to stability in the home. And where there’s authority, it must be enforced. There must be discipline. There’s no way around it. The Bible says fathers don’t provoke your children to wrath, but bring them up in the nurture and the admonition of the Lord. So the second generation, the first generation is indicative of rejection of authority. The second generation, Proverbs 30, verse 12, there’s a generation that’s pure in its own eyes, yet not washed from its own filthiness. This is self-righteous arrogance. They look in the mirror and they like what they see. Remember that the person who’s arrogant has an unrealistic self-image. If he has an unrealistic self-image, he has unrealistic expectations. So this is the self-righteous, arrogant generation. And it’s found in Christian homes sometimes where there’s tremendous legalism and blind arrogance. A person can really become, you talk about getting into judging and maligning and criticizing. Religious people do it all the time. And then the third generation, there is a generation, oh, how lofty, Proverbs 3.13, oh, how lofty are their eyes. And their eyelids are lifted up. That’s the third generation who has locked in, now locked in arrogance, locked in negative volition. You’re not going to reach them. You’re not going to get to them. They’re not going to go to a Billy Graham crusade. They’re not going to go listen to a Rick Hughes radio show. They don’t care. They’re locked in. They look into their own image and they believe that they’re right. They believe in their own arrogance that they are correct and you are wrong. I’m wrong. The evangelist is wrong. The Bible is wrong. The churches are wrong. That’s what they believe. And they believe they’re right. That’s the third generation that has locked in arrogance, a generation whose eyes are so arrogant that their eyelids are raised in arrogance. Kind of like the person who gives you that look with their eyes and looks up like, oh, you stupid fool. You’ve seen it happen, maybe even from your kids. And then in Proverbs 3.14, here’s the last generation. There’s a generation whose teeth are like swords and whose jaws are like knives. This generation is the generation that has lust for power. This generation will kill you to keep their self in power. They will kill you to maintain the power. Kill anyone that gets in their way to maintain the power. Say anything they got to say to maintain the power. And make no mistake about it, politics is all about power. And the public lie says if you tell it often enough, loud enough, and long enough, somebody’s going to believe it. A generation whose teeth are like swords, whose jaws are set like knives. They will cut you to pieces with their words. Christian leadership today, even Christian leadership, church ministers advocating rebellion against the government, advocating civil disobedience and violence. These are the kind of signs I’m talking about that says we are in the fourth generation. Our first generation was during World War I, during the presidency of Woodrow Wilson. The second generation was during the Depression, the third generation was the Vietnam generation, and now we’re in the fourth generation, especially with young people. It’s a very serious problem, since the fourth generation can cause destruction of the nation under the five cycles of discipline. Now, you’re not in the four-generation curse unless you’re culpable, unless you’re responsible. And culpability is based on your volition, the volition of each individual in any generation of human history. You are only responsible for your personal sins, not the sins of your parents. So the four-generation curse never exists except where the children of the four-generation curse commit the same sins that their parents did in the third generation. In other words, one multiplies two, two goes to three, three goes to four. Listen to Deuteronomy 24, 16. Fathers shall not be put to death for their children, nor shall children be put to death for their fathers. Everyone will be put to death for his own sin, his own sin. And that’s what God’s holding us responsible for. our own sin. In every generation there’s always a certain number of young people whose arrogance and rejection of authority results in all sorts of immoral behavior. Rape, drug addiction, burglary, arson, violence. Crime is one of the greatest dangers to freedom. No respect for authority. And if crime is not controlled by the judicial system and the rule of law, then your freedom is gone. Four-generation curse. I don’t have time to go much further with it, but that’s it. We’re probably in the fourth generation. I don’t know how much longer this country can continue to exist where there’s no respect for authority. I don’t know how much longer this country can continue to exist when we’re split and fractured and we’re thinking in different ways as it’s going on today in politics. No one’s willing to come together. Everyone thinks they have a better plan. Only the word of God has the right plan, the right way, the right way to do it. If my people that are called by my name will humble themselves, turn from their wicked ways, seek my face and pray, then I’ll hear from heaven, then I’ll heal their land. That’s the key to it. Humility, rejecting, arrogance, turning to the word of God and asking for mercy. I ask you to please pray with me for this great nation before we lose everything that our forefathers fought and died for. We’re in serious trouble. We’re looking at the fifth cycle of discipline and it will not be nice. Until next week, this is your host, Rick Hughes, saying thank you for listening to The Flood Lines.
SPEAKER 02 :
Thank you for listening to The Floodline with your host, Rick Hughes. If you’d like to contact Rick, please write to him at P.O. Box 100, Cropwell, Alabama, 35054, or online at www.rickhughesministries.org.
