As believers abiding within the words of Yahweh and his Messiah, we conduct ourselves in well-worn paths that have been cut by our spiritual forefathers.
As believers abiding within the words of Yahweh and his Messiah, we conduct ourselves in well-worn paths that have been cut by our spiritual forefathers.
Proverbs 2:20-22 – So follow the way of the good, and keep to the paths of the righteous. For the upright will inhabit the land, and those of integrity will remain in it; but the wicked will be cut off from the land, and the treacherous ripped out of it.
The way of the good and the paths of the righteous were found in the keeping of the commands of God. We can know this because the penalty for not remaining in those paths would result in removal from the land. When Moses had charged the people of Israel with faithfulness to Yahweh, he outlined very specific results that would occur from either obedience to the law, or rejection of it.
Deuteronomy 28:1-2 – “Now if you faithfully obey Yahweh your God and are careful to follow all his commands I am giving you today, Yahweh your God will put you far above all the nations of the earth. “All these blessings will come and overtake you, because you obey Yahweh your God…”
He then goes on to list a host of physical blessings inclusive of bountiful harvests and peace in the land. However, if they were to reject the law, there would be many horrific things that would be applied to their forfeiture of the covenant; most prominently, that they would be removed from the land he was allowing them to inhabit.
Deuteronomy 28:15; 63-64 – “But if you do not obey Yahweh your God by carefully following all his commands and statutes I am giving you today, all these curses will come and overtake you:…”Just as Yahweh was glad to cause you to prosper and to multiply you, so he will also be glad to cause you to perish and to destroy you. You will be ripped out of the land you are entering to possess. Then Yahweh will scatter you among all peoples from one end of the earth to the other, and there you will worship other gods, of wood and stone, which neither you nor your fathers have known.”
This was a common theme all throughout the Old Testament writings. Removal from the land was to be the the sign of, and penalty for, their disobedience to the commands of God. When Israel did fall to the Assyrians in 721 BC and again to the Babylonians in 587 BC, the captives were carried off to the nations, and the prophetic curse of Moses came to pass. Jeremiah recounts the distress of the faithful over the loss of their identity:
Lamentations 2:9, 15, 17 – Zion’s gates have fallen to the ground; he has destroyed and shattered the bars on her gates. Her king and her leaders live among the nations, instruction is no more, and even her prophets receive no vision from Yahweh. … All who pass by scornfully clap their hands at you. They hiss and shake their heads at Daughter Jerusalem: Is this the city that was called the perfection of beauty, the joy of the whole earth? … Yahweh has done what he planned; he has accomplished his decree, which he ordained in days of old. He has demolished without compassion, letting the enemy gloat over you and exalting the horn of your adversaries.
Even when they returned to the land later that century, they never fully regained a solid independence and ended up remaining vassals to Egypt, Greece, and finally Rome. Upon their rejection of their true Anointed One, the Messiah in the person of Yeshua, this was the ultimate refusal to obey the God of their fathers. The temple was therefore destroyed and the nation was once for all finally disassembled and scattered among the nations for all time. This was to be, of course, since God had something much more wonderful planned for those who would demonstrate faithfulness with him.
After listing the righteous and faithful examples of believers such as Abel, Enoch, Noah and Abraham, the writer of Hebrews expresses how they never actually received what was promised and they always considered themselves sojourners in a land that was not really theirs.
Hebrews 11:13-16 – These all died in faith, although they had not received the things that were promised. But they saw them from a distance, greeted them, and confessed that they were foreigners and temporary residents on the earth. Now those who say such things make it clear that they are seeking a homeland. If they were thinking about where they came from, they would have had an opportunity to return. But they now desire a better place – a heavenly one. Therefore, God is not ashamed to be called their God, for he has prepared a city for them.
Even after recounting the events in the lives of Isaac, Jacob and his offspring, Moses, Joshua, Gideon, Barak, Samson, Jephthah, David, Samuel and the prophets, the writer is convinced that even though these had indeed lived in and inherited the actual physical land that God had promised them, they still had not received the true promise of God: a heavenly dwelling.
Hebrews 11:39-40 – All these were approved through their faith, but they did not receive what was promised, since God had provided something better for us, so that they would not be made perfect without us.
In Messiah, the promise was accomplished. The transition from an earthly land and kingdom was finalized into a spiritual land and heavenly capital city of the New Jerusalem.
Hebrews 12:22-25 – Instead [of the fiery dread of Mount Sinai], you have come to Mount Zion, to the city of the living God (the heavenly Jerusalem), to myriads of angels, a festive gathering, to the assembly of the firstborn whose names have been written in heaven, to a Judge, who is God of all, to the spirits of righteous people made perfect, and to Yeshua, the mediator of a new covenant, and to the sprinkled blood which says better things than the blood of Abel. See to it that you do not reject the one who speaks. For if they did not escape when they rejected him who warned them on earth, even less will we if we turn away from him who warns us from heaven.
This promise to those first-century believers holds true to this day. If we continue to walk in the good ways, the paths of righteousness, we will remain within the promised inheritance, the heavenly city of Jerusalem. Living with integrity according to the words of Yahweh will guard and protect those within the well-worn and clearly defined paths of righteousness. It is up to us to abide in him by remaining obedient to his words.
Proverbs 2:6-11 – For Yahweh gives wisdom; from his mouth come knowledge and understanding. He stores up success for the upright; He is a shield for those who live with integrity so that he may guard the paths of justice and protect the way of his faithful followers. Then you will understand righteousness, justice, and integrity – every good path. For wisdom will enter your heart, and knowledge will delight you. Discretion will watch over you, and understanding will guard you.
John 12:44, 49 – Yeshua cried out, “The one who believes in me believes not in me, but in him who sent me. … “For I have not spoken on my own, but the Father himself who sent me has given me a command to say everything I have said.
John 14:21 – “The one who has my commands and keeps them is the one who loves me. And the one who loves me will be loved by my Father. I also will love him and will reveal myself to him.”
Since the words of Yeshua are the words of Yahweh, we can have every confidence that as we faithfully follow the Messiah, we are abiding within the true paths of righteousness.
If you enjoy these daily articles, be sure to visit the growing archive of the Core of the Bible podcast. Each week we take a more in-depth look at one of the various topics presented in the daily blog. You can view the podcast archive on our Podcast Page, at Core of the Bible on Simplecast, or your favorite podcast streaming service.
When we act disobediently, God appears to reciprocate in kind by providing negative experiences, or what can be called his curses.
Core of the Bible podcast #49 – Is there a biblical curse in withholding forgiveness?
Today we will be exploring the topic of forgiveness, and how the forgiveness we extend, or don’t extend, toward others will likely be evidenced within our own relationship with God.
John 20:23 – “If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven them; if you withhold forgiveness from any, it is withheld.”
The context of this passage is the day of Yeshua’s resurrection, in the evening of that very day. The disciples were still trying to understand what had happened since their Teacher had been crucified a few days before. A strange report of Messiah’s appearance had come from Mary, and Peter and John had both been to the tomb and found it was empty.
Suddenly, Yeshua is among them all, proclaiming peace and wholeness (shalom), and providing an admonition to remain receptive to the holy Spirit of God and to exercise the privilege of forgiveness with others.
Most commentators view this as a special privilege, anointing, or commissioning of the twelve disciples (or, in this case, the ten disciples, since Thomas and Judas were not among them). However, there is no indication this admonition was just to Yeshua’s closest circle, but it was conveyed to all of those present.
How much value should we place on these words? Let’s put this in perspective. If you were to die and then to be raised back to life and to visit once again with your closest friends and confidants, what words would you say? Do you think those words would be considered important words by those who were were seeing you alive again? I believe wholeheartedly, yes, they would be extremely important words!
And this is why I believe the significance of what Yeshua is teaching here cannot be minimized: the first collective teaching Yeshua provides his followers after being resurrected is to remain receptive to God’s Spirit and to be mindful of how they exercise forgiveness, because to whomever forgiveness is not extended, then the state of unforgiveness remains.
In reality, this should not be surprising to us, since Messiah consistently taught of the importance of forgiving others, and how the believer’s use of forgiveness with others will be an indicator of God’s forgiveness with them.
Matthew 6:12, 14-15 – “And forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors. … “For if you forgive others their offenses, your heavenly Father will forgive you as well. “But if you don’t forgive others, your Father will not forgive your offenses.”
Mark 11:25 – “And whenever you stand praying, if you have anything against anyone, forgive him, so that your Father in heaven will also forgive you your wrongdoing.”
Luke 17:4 – “And if he sins against you seven times in a day, and comes back to you seven times, saying, ‘I repent,’ you must forgive him.”
Therefore if we withhold forgiveness from someone, for whatever reason we may have, we may in a very real sense be creating a situation where God withholds his forgiveness from us. It is not that our actions can restrict the workings of the all-powerful God, but only that he has chosen to align himself with the human ideals as a means of communicating his love and mercy to us.
Charles Ellicott has the following to say in regards to this idea of forgiveness and unforgiveness:
“In the very act of prayer we are taught to remind ourselves of the conditions of forgiveness. Even here, in the region of the free grace of God, there is a law of retribution. The temper that does not forgive cannot be forgiven, because it is ipso facto a proof that we do not realise the amount of the debt we owe. We forget the ten thousand talents as we exact the hundred pence, and in the act of exacting we bring back that burden of the greater debt upon ourselves.”
I believe this is a critical, yet often-overlooked aspect to the forgiveness of God. In all things God desires us to be true and honest, and he abhors dishonesty and hypocrisy. If we are withholding forgiveness from someone for some offense they have committed against us, what should be God’s logical reason for continuing to provide us forgiveness that comes from him?
This seems to create a bit of a paradox for us. Yeshua appears to be teaching us that we hold within our grasp the key of forgiveness or the lock of unforgiveness toward others, and our experience with God will mirror how we apply this privilege.
God, it seems, desires that we model ourselves after his characteristics, such as holiness, mercy or compassion, and forgiveness.
Leviticus 19:2 – “Speak to the entire Israelite community and tell them: Be holy because I, Yahweh your God, am holy.
Psalm 145:8-9 – Yahweh is gracious and compassionate, slow to anger and great in faithful love. Yahweh is good to everyone; his compassion rests on all he has made.
Colossians 4:6 – Let your speech always be gracious, seasoned with salt, so that you may know how you should answer each person.
1 Peter 3:8-9 – Finally, all of you be like-minded and sympathetic, love one another, and be compassionate and humble, not paying back evil for evil or insult for insult but, on the contrary, giving a blessing, since you were called for this, so that you may inherit a blessing.
He has made us in his image, and yet when that image becomes marred through our own selfish ambition and disobedience God appears to reciprocate in kind by providing negative experiences, or what can be called his curses.
Here’s an example of how this principle is exhibited with personified Wisdom in the book of Proverbs.
Proverbs 1:22, 25-26 – “How long, inexperienced ones, will you love ignorance? How long will you mockers enjoy mocking and you fools hate knowledge? … “since you neglected all my counsel and did not accept my correction, “I, in turn, will laugh at your calamity. I will mock when terror strikes you…”
Notice, the mockers who rejected the knowledge of God would be mocked by personified Wisdom as their own calamity would befall them due to their rejection of God’s instruction.
In the apocryphal book of the Wisdom of Solomon, there is a passage which identifies this type of thinking of the Hebrew culture in the time of 2nd temple Judaism. Speaking in the narrative about the Israelites wandering in the desert, it says:
Wisdom 11:15-16 – “In return for their foolish and wicked thoughts, which led them astray to worship irrational serpents and worthless animals, you sent upon them a multitude of irrational creatures to punish them, so that they might learn that one is punished by the very things by which one sins.”
This is the state of those who live in rebellion against God. It becomes a natural course of events due to their unwillingness to abide by God’s righteous ways, and the things through which they sin against God become the very things that plague them later on.
This idea of retributive justice is all through the Bible. The apostle Paul also presents a view of the fleshly life vs. the spiritual life as he encourages the Galatian believers to be sure they are sowing seed in the appropriate place:
Galatians 6:7-8 – Don’t be deceived: God is not mocked. For whatever a person sows he will also reap, because the one who sows to his flesh will reap destruction from the flesh, but the one who sows to the Spirit will reap eternal life from the Spirit.
I tend to believe this retributive justice of God is this ancient biblical principle from which the Eastern concept of karma has been derived. That’s certainly my opinion and one that would require a whole other group of research to fully substantiate, but I believe the biblical principles were at one point understood by all mankind and other religions have since become corruptions of these truths over the millennia.
Let’s take a closer look at this idea of the retributive justice of God in some of the final words of Moses to the Israelites.
One of the most glaring passages to illustrate this concept of retributive justice is in Deuteronomy chapter 28. Moses is reminding the people of all that God has done for them from Egypt up until the eve of their entering into the promised land. In this chapter he lays out blessings that would be evident for their obedience, and also curses for their disobedience. When viewed together, we can see that the curses are essentially the opposite of the blessings.
28:3 – “You will be blessed in the city and blessed in the country.”
28:16 – “You will be cursed in the city and cursed in the country.”
28:4 – “Your offspring will be blessed, and your land’s produce, and the offspring of your livestock, including the young of your herds and the newborn of your flocks.”
28:18 – “Your offspring will be cursed, and your land’s produce, the young of your herds, and the newborn of your flocks.”
28:5 – “Your basket and kneading bowl will be blessed.”
28:17 – “Your basket and kneading bowl will be cursed.”
28:6 – “You will be blessed when you come in and blessed when you go out.”
28:19 – “You will be cursed when you come in and cursed when you go out.”
28:7 – “Yahweh will cause the enemies who rise up against you to be defeated before you. They will march out against you from one direction but flee from you in seven directions.”
28:20 – “Yahweh will send against you curses, confusion, and rebuke in everything you do until you are destroyed and quickly perish, because of the wickedness of your actions in abandoning me.”
On and on it goes through the whole chapter. It would appear that curses for disobedience are essentially corrupted and inverted blessings for obedience. This implies that God desires our obedience in righteous actions. When we do so, he demonstrates we are acting in accord with his purposes by providing certain blessings towards us. However, when we choose not to do so, then he matches his actions towards us by our actions towards him. And those actions meant to be blessings then become inverted and appear to us as curses.
Here’s another example from the book of Daniel. Daniel appears to be well aware of how they were living out the very warnings and curses that Moses had provided 700 years earlier:
Daniel 9:11 – All Israel has broken your law and turned away, refusing to obey you. The promised curse written in the law of Moses, the servant of God, has been poured out on us because we have sinned against him.
Yes, Daniel is lamenting the curse that Moses warned them about had come to pass! Specifically, here again from Deuteronomy 28.
Deuteronomy 28:36-37, 49-52 – “Yahweh will bring you and your king that you have appointed to a nation neither you nor your fathers have known, and there you will worship other gods, of wood and stone. “You will become an object of horror, scorn, and ridicule among all the peoples where Yahweh will drive you. … “Yahweh will bring a nation from far away, from the ends of the earth, to swoop down on you like an eagle, a nation whose language you won’t understand, “a ruthless nation, showing no respect for the old and not sparing the young. “They will eat the offspring of your livestock and your land’s produce until you are destroyed. They will leave you no grain, new wine, fresh oil, young of your herds, or newborn of your flocks until they cause you to perish. “They will besiege you within all your city gates until your high and fortified walls, that you trust in, come down throughout your land. They will besiege you within all your city gates throughout the land Yahweh your God has given you.”
Daniel has these warnings in mind as he continues his admonition to the people of God in captivity.
Daniel 9:12-14 – He has carried out his words that he spoke against us and against our rulers by bringing on us a disaster that is so great that nothing like what has been done to Jerusalem has ever been done under all of heaven. Just as it is written in the law of Moses, all this disaster has come on us, yet we have not sought the favor of Yahweh our God by turning from our iniquities and paying attention to your truth. So Yahweh kept the disaster in mind and brought it on us, for Yahweh our God is righteous in all he has done. But we have not obeyed him.”
Daniel recognized that the Israelites were experiencing the fruit of that which they had sown. They rebelled against God and he responded in the way that he told them he would. This resulted in a horrific overthrow of the city of Jerusalem, and the final remaining Israelites to be carried off to Babylon. Daniel connects the two concepts in no uncertain terms, and this is a clear demonstration of how God’s curse, the opposite of the blessing in the land, came to pass.
It seems to me that people today enjoy talking about blessings and how much God has blessed them, but curses are viewed as medieval superstitions. While there is in truth a measure of superstition to the idea of people placing curses on other people, if we understand that biblical curses are essentially blessings of God that have been inverted due to disobedience, it helps to make sense of some of the struggles non-believers face as they live lives in rebellion against God.
If, for example, we choose to live lives of treachery and deceit for our own pride and selfish gain, there is a good likelihood that our lives will be filled with not knowing who to trust, and being fearful of being taken advantage of at every turn. This is the natural result or consequences of those decisions. Yet if we choose to live humbly with integrity and honesty, it is more likely people will interact with us in similar ways, and we will have friends we can trust and experience less stress overall.
Proverbs 3:33-34 – Yahweh’s curse is on the household of the wicked, but he blesses the home of the righteous; He mocks those who mock, but gives grace to the humble.
Now I’ve kind of gone off into the weeds in regards to retributive justice of God, but if you’ll remember, it was not without reason in light of Yeshua’s teaching on forgiveness.
Matthew 6:12, 14-15 – “And forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors. … “For if you forgive others their offenses, your heavenly Father will forgive you as well. “But if you don’t forgive others, your Father will not forgive your offenses.
If we truly believed this was the case, then we would never remain unforgiving toward anyone. If we desired God to be forgiving toward us, we would do everything we could to ensure there was no form of outstanding unforgiveness among any of our relationships.
We saw that when Yeshua returned from death, he exhorted his disciples to receive the holy Spirit, and to extend forgiveness to others, otherwise, unforgiveness would remain. If we can cautiously peel back the prejudice of our religious orthodoxy regarding the historical commentary of John 20 and simply consider the Messiah’s words for what they say, the importance of forgiveness in the teaching of Yeshua cannot be understated.
So, is there a biblical curse in withholding forgiveness? I think a case can be made to demonstrate that God actively resists those who resist his will, and I’ve included a few examples here to illustrate this idea. If we are allowing the Spirit of God to guide our lives, then we need to always be mindful of how important the role of forgiveness plays in our interactions with others. For to whomever forgiveness is not extended, then a state of unforgiveness remains. And if we are to maintain a consistent view within the larger context of Yeshua’s teaching during his life and ministry, that state of unforgiveness can be measured against our own standing with God.
The fact that the operation of the Spirit and forgiveness are knit together so closely should cause us to evaluate how recep
Today we will be exploring the topic of forgiveness, and how the forgiveness we extend, or don’t extend, toward others will likely be evidenced within our own relationship with God.
John 20:23 – “If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven them; if you withhold forgiveness from any, it is withheld.”
The context of this passage is the day of Yeshua’s resurrection, in the evening of that very day. The disciples were still trying to understand what had happened since their Teacher had been crucified a few days before. A strange report of Messiah’s appearance had come from Mary, and Peter and John had both been to the tomb and found it was empty.
Suddenly, Yeshua is among them all, proclaiming peace and wholeness (shalom), and providing an admonition to remain receptive to the holy Spirit of God and to exercise the privilege of forgiveness with others.
Most commentators view this as a special privilege, anointing, or commissioning of the twelve disciples (or, in this case, the ten disciples, since Thomas and Judas were not among them). However, there is no indication this admonition was just to Yeshua’s closest circle, but it was conveyed to all of those present.
How much value should we place on these words? Let’s put this in perspective. If you were to die and then to be raised back to life and to visit once again with your closest friends and confidants, what words would you say? Do you think those words would be considered important words by those who were were seeing you alive again? I believe wholeheartedly, yes, they would be extremely important words!
And this is why I believe the significance of what Yeshua is teaching here cannot be minimized: the first collective teaching Yeshua provides his followers after being resurrected is to remain receptive to God’s Spirit and to be mindful of how they exercise forgiveness, because to whomever forgiveness is not extended, then the state of unforgiveness remains.
In reality, this should not be surprising to us, since Messiah consistently taught of the importance of forgiving others, and how the believer’s use of forgiveness with others will be an indicator of God’s forgiveness with them.
Matthew 6:12, 14-15 – “And forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors. … “For if you forgive others their offenses, your heavenly Father will forgive you as well. “But if you don’t forgive others, your Father will not forgive your offenses.”
Mark 11:25 – “And whenever you stand praying, if you have anything against anyone, forgive him, so that your Father in heaven will also forgive you your wrongdoing.”
Luke 17:4 – “And if he sins against you seven times in a day, and comes back to you seven times, saying, ‘I repent,’ you must forgive him.”
Therefore if we withhold forgiveness from someone, for whatever reason we may have, we may in a very real sense be creating a situation where God withholds his forgiveness from us. It is not that our actions can restrict the workings of the all-powerful God, but only that he has chosen to align himself with the human ideals as a means of communicating his love and mercy to us.
Charles Ellicott has the following to say in regards to this idea of forgiveness and unforgiveness:
“In the very act of prayer we are taught to remind ourselves of the conditions of forgiveness. Even here, in the region of the free grace of God, there is a law of retribution. The temper that does not forgive cannot be forgiven, because it is ipso facto a proof that we do not realise the amount of the debt we owe. We forget the ten thousand talents as we exact the hundred pence, and in the act of exacting we bring back that burden of the greater debt upon ourselves.”
I believe this is a critical, yet often-overlooked aspect to the forgiveness of God. In all things God desires us to be true and honest, and he abhors dishonesty and hypocrisy. If we are withholding forgiveness from someone for some offense they have committed against us, what should be God’s logical reason for continuing to provide us forgiveness that comes from him?
This seems to create a bit of a paradox for us. Yeshua appears to be teaching us that we hold within our grasp the key of forgiveness or the lock of unforgiveness toward others, and our experience with God will mirror how we apply this privilege.
God, it seems, desires that we model ourselves after his characteristics, such as holiness, mercy or compassion, and forgiveness.
Leviticus 19:2 – “Speak to the entire Israelite community and tell them: Be holy because I, Yahweh your God, am holy.
Psalm 145:8-9 – Yahweh is gracious and compassionate, slow to anger and great in faithful love. Yahweh is good to everyone; his compassion rests on all he has made.
Colossians 4:6 – Let your speech always be gracious, seasoned with salt, so that you may know how you should answer each person.
1 Peter 3:8-9 – Finally, all of you be like-minded and sympathetic, love one another, and be compassionate and humble, not paying back evil for evil or insult for insult but, on the contrary, giving a blessing, since you were called for this, so that you may inherit a blessing.
He has made us in his image, and yet when that image becomes marred through our own selfish ambition and disobedience God appears to reciprocate in kind by providing negative experiences, or what can be called his curses.
Here’s an example of how this principle is exhibited with personified Wisdom in the book of Proverbs.
Proverbs 1:22, 25-26 – “How long, inexperienced ones, will you love ignorance? How long will you mockers enjoy mocking and you fools hate knowledge? … “since you neglected all my counsel and did not accept my correction, “I, in turn, will laugh at your calamity. I will mock when terror strikes you…”
Notice, the mockers who rejected the knowledge of God would be mocked by personified Wisdom as their own calamity would befall them due to their rejection of God’s instruction.
In the apocryphal book of the Wisdom of Solomon, there is a passage which identifies this type of thinking of the Hebrew culture in the time of 2nd temple Judaism. Speaking in the narrative about the Israelites wandering in the desert, it says:
Wisdom 11:15-16 – “In return for their foolish and wicked thoughts, which led them astray to worship irrational serpents and worthless animals, you sent upon them a multitude of irrational creatures to punish them, so that they might learn that one is punished by the very things by which one sins.”
This is the state of those who live in rebellion against God. It becomes a natural course of events due to their unwillingness to abide by God’s righteous ways, and the things through which they sin against God become the very things that plague them later on.
This idea of retributive justice is all through the Bible. The apostle Paul also presents a view of the fleshly life vs. the spiritual life as he encourages the Galatian believers to be sure they are sowing seed in the appropriate place:
Galatians 6:7-8 – Don’t be deceived: God is not mocked. For whatever a person sows he will also reap, because the one who sows to his flesh will reap destruction from the flesh, but the one who sows to the Spirit will reap eternal life from the Spirit.
I tend to believe this retributive justice of God is this ancient biblical principle from which the Eastern concept of karma has been derived. That’s certainly my opinion and one that would require a whole other group of research to fully substantiate, but I believe the biblical principles were at one point understood by all mankind and other religions have since become corruptions of these truths over the millennia.
Let’s take a closer look at this idea of the retributive justice of God in some of the final words of Moses to the Israelites.
One of the most glaring passages to illustrate this concept of retributive justice is in Deuteronomy chapter 28. Moses is reminding the people of all that God has done for them from Egypt up until the eve of their entering into the promised land. In this chapter he lays out blessings that would be evident for their obedience, and also curses for their disobedience. When viewed together, we can see that the curses are essentially the opposite of the blessings.
28:3 – “You will be blessed in the city and blessed in the country.”
28:16 – “You will be cursed in the city and cursed in the country.”
28:4 – “Your offspring will be blessed, and your land’s produce, and the offspring of your livestock, including the young of your herds and the newborn of your flocks.”
28:18 – “Your offspring will be cursed, and your land’s produce, the young of your herds, and the newborn of your flocks.”
28:5 – “Your basket and kneading bowl will be blessed.”
28:17 – “Your basket and kneading bowl will be cursed.”
28:6 – “You will be blessed when you come in and blessed when you go out.”
28:19 – “You will be cursed when you come in and cursed when you go out.”
28:7 – “Yahweh will cause the enemies who rise up against you to be defeated before you. They will march out against you from one direction but flee from you in seven directions.”
28:20 – “Yahweh will send against you curses, confusion, and rebuke in everything you do until you are destroyed and quickly perish, because of the wickedness of your actions in abandoning me.”
On and on it goes through the whole chapter. It would appear that curses for disobedience are essentially corrupted and inverted blessings for obedience. This implies that God desires our obedience in righteous actions. When we do so, he demonstrates we are acting in accord with his purposes by providing certain blessings towards us. However, when we choose not to do so, then he matches his actions towards us by our actions towards him. And those actions meant to be blessings then become inverted and appear to us as curses.
Here’s another example from the book of Daniel. Daniel appears to be well aware of how they were living out the very warnings and curses that Moses had provided 700 years earlier:
Daniel 9:11 – All Israel has broken your law and turned away, refusing to obey you. The promised curse written in the law of Moses, the servant of God, has been poured out on us because we have sinned against him.
Yes, Daniel is lamenting the curse that Moses warned them about had come to pass! Specifically, here again from Deuteronomy 28.
Deuteronomy 28:36-37, 49-52 – “Yahweh will bring you and your king that you have appointed to a nation neither you nor your fathers have known, and there you will worship other gods, of wood and stone. “You will become an object of horror, scorn, and ridicule among all the peoples where Yahweh will drive you. … “Yahweh will bring a nation from far away, from the ends of the earth, to swoop down on you like an eagle, a nation whose language you won’t understand, “a ruthless nation, showing no respect for the old and not sparing the young. “They will eat the offspring of your livestock and your land’s produce until you are destroyed. They will leave you no grain, new wine, fresh oil, young of your herds, or newborn of your flocks until they cause you to perish. “They will besiege you within all your city gates until your high and fortified walls, that you trust in, come down throughout your land. They will besiege you within all your city gates throughout the land Yahweh your God has given you.”
Daniel has these warnings in mind as he continues his admonition to the people of God in captivity.
Daniel 9:12-14 – He has carried out his words that he spoke against us and against our rulers by bringing on us a disaster that is so great that nothing like what has been done to Jerusalem has ever been done under all of heaven. Just as it is written in the law of Moses, all this disaster has come on us, yet we have not sought the favor of Yahweh our God by turning from our iniquities and paying attention to your truth. So Yahweh kept the disaster in mind and brought it on us, for Yahweh our God is righteous in all he has done. But we have not obeyed him.”
Daniel recognized that the Israelites were experiencing the fruit of that which they had sown. They rebelled against God and he responded in the way that he told them he would. This resulted in a horrific overthrow of the city of Jerusalem, and the final remaining Israelites to be carried off to Babylon. Daniel connects the two concepts in no uncertain terms, and this is a clear demonstration of how God’s curse, the opposite of the blessing in the land, came to pass.
It seems to me that people today enjoy talking about blessings and how much God has blessed them, but curses are viewed as medieval superstitions. While there is in truth a measure of superstition to the idea of people placing curses on other people, if we understand that biblical curses are essentially blessings of God that have been inverted due to disobedience, it helps to make sense of some of the struggles non-believers face as they live lives in rebellion against God.
If, for example, we choose to live lives of treachery and deceit for our own pride and selfish gain, there is a good likelihood that our lives will be filled with not knowing who to trust, and being fearful of being taken advantage of at every turn. This is the natural result or consequences of those decisions. Yet if we choose to live humbly with integrity and honesty, it is more likely people will interact with us in similar ways, and we will have friends we can trust and experience less stress overall.
Proverbs 3:33-34 – “Yahweh’s curse is on the household of the wicked, but he blesses the home of the righteous; He mocks those who mock, but gives grace to the humble.”
Now, let me be quick to add that Yeshua provides additional perspective on what a blessing from God may look like. Based on what we have seen so far, blessings are good things and curses would be bad things. However, Yeshua also mentions how some things that can look bad can actually be blessings when based on the truth of God and viewed from his perspective:
Matthew 5:3-4 – “Blessed are the poor in spirit, for the kingdom of heaven is theirs. “Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted.
Being poor in spirit doesn’t appear to be a blessing, yet Yeshua says it is. Mourning in and of itself does not appear to provide a blessing, yet Yeshua says there is a certain type of mourning that does. For those who are of humble heart and circumstance (poor in spirit) and who mourn for righteousness to be expressed will have those yearnings fulfilled.
Matthew 5:10-12 – “Blessed are those who are persecuted because of righteousness, for the kingdom of heaven is theirs. “You are blessed when they insult you and persecute you and falsely say every kind of evil against you because of me. Be glad and rejoice, because your reward is great in heaven. For that is how they persecuted the prophets who were before you.”
Certainly, being insulted and persecuted and having false and evil things said against you cannot possibly be considered a blessing, could it? Yeshua confirms that they are, but ONLY IF those things are being conducted against you specifically because of your expressed faith in Messiah, who is the truth of God revealed.
Psalm 5:11-12 – “But let all who take refuge in you rejoice; let them shout for joy forever. May you shelter them, and may those who love your name boast about you. For you, Yahweh, bless the righteous one; you surround him with favor like a shield.”
Consistent with all blessing is that those who exhibit righteousness are blessed by God. To have faith in Yeshua was to have many negative consequences for the believers, and may still to this day; however, those negative consequences could be considered as blessings because they were and are based on the truth of God.
So returning in summary to our topic of forgiveness, you may have noticed I have kind of gone off into the weeds in regards to retributive justice of God. But if you’ll remember, it was not without reason in light of Yeshua’s teaching on forgiveness.
Matthew 6:12, 14-15 – “And forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors. … “For if you forgive others their offenses, your heavenly Father will forgive you as well. But if you don’t forgive others, your Father will not forgive your offenses.”
If we truly believed this was the case, then we would never remain unforgiving toward anyone. If we desired God to be forgiving toward us, we would do everything we could to ensure there was no form of outstanding unforgiveness among any of our relationships.
We saw that when Yeshua returned from death, he exhorted his disciples to receive the holy Spirit, and to extend forgiveness to others, otherwise, unforgiveness would remain. If we can cautiously peel back the prejudice of our religious orthodoxy regarding the historical commentary of John 20 and simply consider the Messiah’s words for what they say, the importance of forgiveness in the teaching of Yeshua cannot be understated.
So, is there a biblical curse in withholding forgiveness? I think a case can be made in the affirmative to at least demonstrate that God actively resists those who resist his will, and I’ve included a few examples here to illustrate this idea. If we are allowing the Spirit of God to guide our lives, then we need to always be mindful of how important the role of forgiveness plays in our interactions with others. For to whomever forgiveness is not extended, then a state of unforgiveness remains. And if we are to maintain a consistent view within the larger context of Yeshua’s teaching during his life and ministry, that state of unforgiveness can be measured against our own standing with God.
The fact that the operation of the Spirit and forgiveness are knit together so closely should cause us to evaluate how receptive we are to the influence of the God’s Spirit in our lives. In my estimation, a life guided by the Spirit is, by default, a life of forgiveness. And forgiveness always brings a blessing.
tive we are to the influence of the God’s Spirit in our lives. In my estimation, a life guided by the Spirit is, by default, a life of forgiveness. And forgiveness always brings a blessing.
If you enjoy these daily blog posts, be sure to visit the growing archive of the Core of the Bible podcast. Each week we take a more in-depth look at one of the various topics presented in the daily blog. You can view the podcast archive on our Podcast Page, at Core of the Bible on Simplecast, or your favorite podcast streaming service.
Now also on YouTube! Just getting started, but new videos will be added regularly on many different topics, find us at: Core of the Bible on YouTube.
The Core of the Bible 