He never lets the guilty go unpunished, punishing children . . . for their parents’ sins to the third and fourth generation.
Numbers 14:18
G od promises to punish those who do evil. That’s a relief when you’re the victim of evil, but what about when you’re a victim of the punishment? God’s law says that when parents sin, those sins will be punished for generations to come. And so if one parent serves the idol of drunkenness, you see that pattern repeated for generations. Sin seems to be passed on in the DNA, but that doesn’t have to be the case for you.
As a God Girl you are no longer a slave to sin. You’re no longer controlled by its power. While some children may continue on in the sinful ways of their parents, forever condemned to a life of bondage, you, God Girl, are now set free. Jesus came to set the captives free, and that means even you who used to be captive to the sins of your family. You might not have realized you’re free, and you might have been living under the deception that your parents’ sins will be your own, but that is rubbish. The price for those sins in your DNA has been paid. You are no longer living under the curse, because “Christ paid the price to free us from the curse that God’s laws bring by becoming cursed instead of us” (Gal. 3:13).
When you read the Old Testament, you also have to take into consideration the New Testament. Yes, God curses the kids of sinners, but he also offers freedom from the curse to all those who are willing to repent and to make Jesus the Lord of their lives. If there’s a familial sin in your family, confess that sin as if it were your own, and then promise God you will turn from it and never do it. You can be sure that when you do, you will be set free from the curse and given a new life in the area where your family has previously been in bondage.