So what happens is, a demonic spirit that enters the family line; and because you are legally and genetically connected to that family line, the evil spirit has a right of access to your life. So many times when we’re praying for people, we find that the source (or the root) where this problem began was beyond them, but was in their family line. So when families have been involved in idolatry, or with forms of spiritism, divination, sorcery, there’s an open door created in the family line.
Now, we are not responsible for what our parents did; we are only responsible for what we do. However, the consequences of what they do, we can experience. How is it that these problems keep repeating one generation to another? Some of it may be in the DNA. Scientists don’t yet know enough about DNA to know how it could be corrupted by sin, so some can be genetic. Some are spirits, evil spirits that are in the family line. Some behaviour is just learnt – people copy their parents. We need to understand that Jesus has made room for this power of iniquity and cursing to be broken.
Let me give you an example of a generational curse. I was asked by a woman in New Zealand to pray for her. I said: “What is your problem?” She told me the problem, and what I always ask is: when did this problem begin; because it can give a clue if a situation is generational. This is the problem she had: she was tormented in her mind by sexual images. They were sexual images of a perverse nature; and she was single, and she was a Christian worker. I said: “Have you ever been involved in sexual sin?” “No.” “Have you ever been sexually abused?” The answer was no. “How long have you had this problem?” “Pretty well most of my life.”
So when a person says: “Most of my life”, or “It began when I was young”, this is a clue it could be generational. So I asked about her family background, and it was very interesting what she told me. Her grandparents had been missionaries in China, and they had a son and a daughter. They sent the children to school in another province, and when the Japanese invaded China in the 30s, they took over the province that these kids were at school; the children were taken prisoner by the Japanese, and the girl was sexually abused by Japanese soldiers. She was about 12 or 13. Eventually the children were rescued, and the parents left the mission field. This woman grew up, she got married, and she had one child - the girl who I was praying for - and the marriage broke up.
Now it’s not surprising the marriage broke up, because she carried the trauma of sexual abuse by these Japanese soldiers; and in those days, you just didn’t talk about anything, you just buried it. So when she was sexually abused, demonic spirits entered the family line; and these were the cause of this young girl, who’s now grown up, being traumatised. The problems this woman was facing, did not originate with anything she had done. They originated in what had happened to her mother, and so the spirits had come down the family line, and were affecting her. We led her to pray and forgive the Japanese soldiers, to stand on behalf of the family and break the cursing that’s over them, and then she was delivered, and her mind cleared.
I’ve prayed for many people that the cause of their problem has been generational. Young men, young women, tormented with demons, and it’s not their fault. It came down the family line. This is particularly so if there’s: idolatry; any form of spiritism; any form of sexual perversion; a door is opened for these cursings to come.