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An Ancient Prophecy of the Fourth Generation
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An
Ancient Prophecy of
The
Fourth Generation
Are
You The Last Generation
of
The United States?
GALYN L.
WIEMERS
Generation
Word
West
Des Moines, Iowa
An
Ancient Prophecy of
The
Fourth Generation
Are
You The Last Generation
of
The United States?
GALYN L.
WIEMERS
Generation
Word
West
Des Moines, Iowa
Generation
Word
700
45th Street
West
Des Moines, Iowa 50265
©2002
by Galyn L. Wiemers
No
part of this publication may be reproduced or
transmitted in any form or by any means,
electronic or mechanical, including photocopy,
recording,
or any information storage and retrieval system,
without
permission
in writing from the
publisher
Printed
in
the United States of
America
An
Ancient Prophecy of
The
Fourth Generation
There
is a passage of scripture in Proverbs that has
intrigued
me for years. The truth of its meaning
continues to unfold each time I study from
it. The depth of its
inspiration takes us from one end of the
Bible to the other. The most stunning force
radiating from this ancient
revelation is that it projects itself upon
our time and our generation as if it were an
ancient mirror angled through the ages at
us. The scriptures seem to be reflecting the
light, or darkness, of our generation back to us
through the pages of scriptures. It presents
a true perspective of how great the depths a
culture can decline and at the same time present
the ideal background for God's greatest
demonstration of power and
grace.
It is
as if our generation is simply a stage with all
its props and lighting being well prepared and
waiting for the show to begin. Do not allow
yourself to be distracted by the props or fixated
on the stage created by the last 120 years of
history or else you may miss your part in this
production.
Instead, be focused toward the stage because
it is
here the main show is going to
unfold.
Through out history Jesus Christ
has always allowed the stage to be prepared, the
props positioned and the lighting set before he
came on the scene. All great actors know the
importance of timing. Timing is needed to
receive the greatest response, to draw into the
show the greatest
number
of the audience, and to communicate the message
most effectively. Do not allow yourself to
be disinterested by the style of lighting on the
stage or discouraged or alarmed by the
props. The next great scene is about to
begin.
The season of the harvest is upon us. Now
that you know, begin to anticipate the
intervention of the Lord. With this book I
hope to focus some members of this
generation
toward the stage upon which a mighty
demonstration
of God is about to begin.
The
Word of Revelation
In
Proverbs 30:11-14 there are four sequential
generations listed. Each generation leads
into the next generation. The NIV reads like
this:
"There are those who curse their fathers
and
do not
bless their mothers;
those who are pure in
their own eyes and
yet are not
cleansed of their filth;
those whose eyes are
ever so haughty,
whose
glances are so disdainful;
those whose teeth
are swords and
whose jaws
are set with knives,
to devour
the poor from off the earth, and
the needy
from among men."
We need to look also at
the King James Version. Notice the different
method of translation and notice the italics in
the King James:
"There
is a
generation that
curseth their father, and
doth not
bless their mother.
There
is a
generation that is pure in their own eyes, and
yet is not
washed from their filthiness.
There
is a
generation, O how lofty are their eyes!
And their
eyelids are lifted up.
There
is a
generation, whose teeth are as swords, and
their jaw
teeth as knives, to devour the poor from off the
earth, and the needy from among
men."
The
italicized words in the KJ text are words that are
not in the original language but added in the
English translations
to
make reading easier. In 1872 Joseph Bryant
Rotherham captured the literal reading of these
verses in his translation which
reads:
"A
generation! Its father it revileth,
And its
mother it doth not bless.
A
generation! Pure in its own eyes,
Yet from
its filth hath it not been bathed.
A
generation! How lofty are its eyes,
And its
eyelashes uplifted
A
generation! Swords are its teeth,
And knives
its incisors,
To devour
the humbled out of the earth, And the
needy from among men."
The Word of God is
setting forth four successive
generations.
Each generation develops a life style and a
worldview and then raises the next
generation. When the children begin to form
their generation they build on what their parents
developed. The attitudes that the parents
hold tend to be viewed as absolutes by the
children. Attitudes about money, religion,
family, society, politics, etc. are engrained into
children by their parents. There is very
little chance of children having an opportunity to
decide if their parents are right or wrong because
they must use their parent's
views to make this decision. By the time
they reach an age of critical thinking they have
been positioned to evaluate their parents views
from the same perspective as their parents.
The children are trapped. It is very
difficult
to overthrow the ideas of the parent's generation,
while at the same time it is very natural to
develop these same ideas to the next level during
the next generation.
Generation
Number One:
A
Generation Who Curse The Fathers
"There
is a generation that curseth their father, and
doth not bless their mother." (Pr.
30:11 KJ)
How does this all begin? In
Deuteronomy 11:18-21 the Hebrew parents are told
to:
"Fix
these words of mine in your hearts and minds; tie
them as symbols on your hands and bind them on
your foreheads. Teach
them to your children,
talking
about them when you sit at home and when you walk
along the road, when you lie down and when you get
up. Write them on the doorframes of your
houses and on your gates, so
that your days and the days of your children may
be many in the land that the Lord swore to give
your forefathers,
as many as the days that the heavens are above the
earth."
The
command to continue a righteous line comes with
the promise that they would be enabled to stay in
the land that God had given to the generation
before them "for as many as the days that the
heavens are above the earth." This is
similar to the promise of a thousand generations
in the
second commandment that says, "I am the
Lord your God. . .showing love to a thousand
generations of those who love me and keep my
commandments." The righteous line has the
potential to go on forever and never be driven
from their land. The parent's responsibility
was to introduce their children to the Lord.
The Lord was the living God that the parents had a
relationship with. In fact, everything they
had and everything they were was from the
Lord.
Proverbs 30:11 begins a spiritual and
moral decline that will span through four
generations. The decline begins with a
generation that curses their righteous father and
does not bless their righteous mother.
Here
is a brief word study of the Hebrew word for
curse: "Curse"
Hebrew
Word:
qalal
Hebrew Pronunciation:
/kaw-lal/
Root Meaning: "be
light"
Literal Meaning:
"small"
Figurative Meaning: "trifling,
vile"
Translated Meaning: "to bring
contempt, to curse, to despise"
1
The
first generation curses their father who is to
instruct them in the ways of the Lord.
Within the word "curse" we can see that the first
generation considered the things of God and the
righteous heritage inherited from their father to
be small, trivial, insignificant, or
unimportant. This is what Esau did when he
considered a bowl of stew more valuable than the
blessing his father could give him.2
Genesis 25:34 says, "So Esau despised his
birthright." The family line of Esau and
their nation never recovered and were obliterated
as a people.3
This
same generation is said to "not bless their
mothers." A word study of "bless" reveals
this:
"Bless"
Hebrew
Word:
barak
Hebrew Pronunciation:
/baw-rak/
Root Meaning: “to
kneel"4
The
association between "to kneel" and "bless" is seen
in the custom of taking a child on one's knee to
pronounce a blessing on it. The word is seen
in a dual usage where "blessing" is said to be
given and received in 2 Chronicles 31:8 where it
says, "When Hezekiah and his officials came and
saw the heaps [of offerings for worship], they
praised ("barak") the Lord and blessed
("barak") his people
Israel." "It seems that this dual
usage of ‘barak’, . . .is to be explained on the
following grounds: God blesses human
beings
by speaking well of them, thereby imparting
"blessing" (good things) to them, and so they are
blessed"; human beings bless God by speaking well
of him,
attributing
"blessing" (good qualities) to him, and so he is
"blessed."5 Since
the mother was the instrumental source of teaching
in the Jewish culture6
we can conclude in this brief study that a
generation that "does not bless their mothers" is
a generation that does not attribute good
qualities
to their mother's teaching.
"A generation:
Who curse their fathers and do not bless their
mothers," is a generation of people who do not
consider
their righteous heritage worthy of recognition and
adherence. This generation rejects the
truth of scripture and the standard of
righteousness.
How
Long is a Generation in Scripture?
A
generation is said to be a period of forty
years.
"He made them wander in the
desert forty years, until the whole generation of
those who had done evil in his sight was gone."
Numbers 32:13
The Hebrew word for
generation is "dor." It means a revolution
of time such as an age or generation. "A
‘dor’ is roughly the period of time from one's
birth to one's maturity, which in the Old
Testament corresponds to a period of about 40
years."7
When Moses was eighty years old, Joshua was
forty.8
They represented the leadership in the first and
second generations.
Generations
of the Righteous & Wicked
The
Bible describes both the building of successive
generations
of righteousness and successive generations of
wickedness. In Exodus 20:5 the second
commandment is recorded along with a promise
that is attached as a foot note to those who
develop this command in righteous
generations
or a curse to those who digress away from it
through wicked generations:
"You
shall not make for yourself an idol in the form of
anything in heaven above or on the earth beneath
or in the waters below. You shall not bow
down to them or worship them; for I, the Lord your
God, am a jealous God,
punishing
the children for the sin of the fathers to the
third and fourth generation of those who hate
me, but
showing love to a thousand generations of those
who love me and keep my commandments." (also,
Exodus 34:6)
The word "punishing"
(translated "visiting" in the King James) has as
its root meaning to visit with either friendly or
hostile intent. It carries the meaning
of "overseeing, charging, care for"9 and
"looking over, looking after,
inspecting,
examining."10
This means the Lord, Yahweh,
oversees,
cares for, looks after, inspects or examines" the
sins of the fathers (the first generation) into
the third and fourth generation.
Notice
that this statement has a beginning and an
end. The beginning is "the fathers."
The end is in the third and fourth
generations. This means there is not a
fifth
generation.
It is possible that the
sin of the fathers in that first
generation is removed by the second, third
or fourth generation by repentance and through
what Romans 12:21 calls the "renewing of your
minds." This would require something, some
event or someone being more influential in that
generation's thinking than their parents who had
committed or developed "the sin of the
fathers." We are a generation that needs to
individually repent and renew our minds and then
influence our generation towards
righteousness.
Idol
Worship in the 21st Century
One
other thing needs to be noted here. The
declaration of God to watch the development of the
father's sin down to the fourth generation is a
footnote on the second of the Ten Commandments.
"You
shall not make for yourself an idol in the form of
anything in heaven above or on the earth beneath
or in the waters below. You shall not bow
down to them or worship them." (Exodus
20:4)
The
emphasis is apparently on idol worship. The
ancient people had a strong tendency to look to
idols to explain their origins, to identify their
purpose, to develop their ethics,
and to determine their future. It would be
difficult to find an idol in our modern world if
we were to identity it as a statue representing a
deity that we bow down to in worship. But,
what would you label as an idol if we took the
ancient use of an idol and used that as a
definition to identify modern idols. What is
used to identify modern man's origins?
Modern science and its theory or evolution would
be an idol. What does the Western mind use
to identity their purpose for existence?
Materialism and pleasure. These would be an
idol. What establishes our code of right and
wrong in the United States? The answer could
be our legal system that is run by a democracy
that is based on the majority rule, also known as
popular opinion, which is itself established by
the current cultural trends that are highly
influenced by the media. Ancient idols were
also used to determine their future.
Everything mentioned above is looked at to predict
and control what will happen in the
future.
The
second commandment tells us not to make any idol
from the created world that replaces the Creator
of the world. The impression is that if a
generation were to turn from God to some form of
idolatry they would unknowingly begin a fall that
ends with the overthrow of their grand children
and their great-grand children. This
principal has been repeated for hundreds of
years and through multitudes of generations.
Rarely, if ever, is this process identified
because it is almost impossible to
connect the elimination of a family, a
culture or a nation to a process that began four
generations, or 160 years, earlier. Within
the pages of scripture this principle of God has
been recorded.
1880-1920
A
Generation that Cursed Their Parent's
It
was during this generation in the United States
of
America that the "sin of the fathers" was
committed. It was at this time the second
commandment, "You shall not make for yourself an
idol" was violated and the promise that God would
watch its possible development into the third and
fourth generations began. The first
generation "curses their father and does not bless
their mother." This means they consider
their father's relationship with God as trivial
and do not attribute good qualities to their
mother's teachings about the Lord.
This
first generation knew Robert G. Ingersoll as the
"the great agnostic." According to the Chicago
Tribune in 1899, Ingersoll could have become great
in the political arena, but instead choose to
enlighten the world concerning the "Mistakes of
Moses." His completed twelve volumes of
writings were published in 1902. In this
collection was this quote from his article "The
Absurdity of Religion” written in
1890:
"Has a man the right to examine, to
investigate the religion of his own country - the
religion of his father and mother?"11
Here is a
statement of an individual whose attitude of
cursing his mother and father's religion
was embraced by a generation. He goes on to
violate the second
commandment
in this classical textbook
example:
"We
find now that the prosperity of nations has
depended, not upon their religion, not upon the
goodness or
providence of some god, but on soil and
climate
and
commerce, upon
the ingenuity, industry, and courage of the
people, upon the development of the mind, on the
spread of education, on the liberty of thought and
action; and that in this mighty panorama of
national life, reason has built and superstition
has destroyed."12
It is
fairly easy to see the violation of the
second
commandment:
"You
shall not make for yourself an idol in the form
of
anything in heaven above. . .(Ingersoll
calls this "climate"
)
or on the earth beneath. . . .
("soil")
or
in the waters below." . . .
("commerce,"
they traded with
ships in the seas)
The first
generation of Proverbs 30:11-14 appears to have
unfolded within the years of 1880-1920.
Through the
documents that time has preserved for us we
see this
generation questioning or rejecting the
validity of
Christianity. This criticism grows
during these years in
several areas including science, education,
industry, and philosophy
and even with in the church
itself.
Charles
Darwin, the
founder of the modern theory of
evolution died in 1882. His teachings
had captured the
academic world and the "logic" of evolution
had flooded into
every area.
Karl
Marx,
implemented the concept of evolution into
human society, died in 1883. Marx's
influence in America is
revealed by what two American papers wrote about
him
at his death. The Boston Daily
Advertiser wrote,
"Karl Marx was one of the most remarkable
men of our time. . ." and The Chicago Tribune
called him "a man of high intelligence, a scholar,
and a thinker." 13
Julius
Wellhausen (1844-1918)
brought the principals of evolution to the
interpretation of the Bible. He abandoned
the view that the Bible had been divinely inspired
and
instead
taught that it had progressively developed when
men added to the original written thoughts of
earlier men. His views were published and
consumed by the academic world. Seminaries
through out America taught his form of Biblical
interpretation to the pastors who would teach and
lead the believers in the first and second
generations.
Sigmund
Freud,
presented his pioneering work on
psychoanalytic method of free association
in 1895. Freud explained the phenomena of
religion through
psychoanalysis. "Freud, an atheist,
gave every successive detractor of the value of
religion a set of clever,
psychological remarks through which to
express
contempt for God and His work."14
To
Freud religion was a pointless delusion. It
is clear that Freud believed society would be more
productive and more pleasant if Christianity was
abandoned and in its place Freud's theories
were
embraced.
These
preceding men spoke about many things and
represent several fields of study.
They consistently spoke in unison against God and
exalted man. If we desired, we could follow
this investigation into business, politics,
medicine,
and many other areas. Here we would also
find the key leaders speaking against God.
Remember though, these men are leaders not because
they were right, but
because this first generation (1880-1920)
followed them. These men are not influencing
society because they are presenting correct
information; instead, the general
population is hearing what they can accept
to be correct information. A leader of this
caliber is only a leader
because he is in the front of the line that
is going where everybody is already going.
These men did not cause the change; they were the
voice of the change.
Human
reason had laid the foundation of liberalism that
not only taught that men evolved physically,
mentally and socially, but also believed that the
scriptures and the
concept of God had evolved through
time. The application of this false truth is
to say that if Christianity is to be
relevant today it must lay down the old
ways, the old truths and the old doctrines and
change with the new growth that is being formed as
we continue to evolve physically,
mentally, socially, and
religiously.
The process had begun.
These teachings of the first
generation
were going to be engrained into their children as
absolutes. The second generation would not
even have the challenge of making a decision. The
"sin of the fathers" was handed to them and they
would develop it into a worldview.
Generation
Number Two
A
Generation Pure in Their Own Eyes
"There
is a generation that are pure in their own eyes,
and yet is not washed from their filthiness."
(Pr.30:12
KJ)
Since this generation does not have in
their thinking the truth of a perfect, holy and
righteous God to compare themselves to they "are
pure in their own eyes" even though they are
utterly sinful. This generation does not
have the true teachings of the Christian
doctrines
established from the scriptures that
identify sin or instruct how to be delivered from
sin.
This
generation will have to form their own new
rules. They will have to establish their own
new values of right and wrong. The source of
their values will be the human mind. So
their standards will have their origin in fallen
man. Whatever they develop will be as
distant from God's ways as the heavens are above
the earth.15
They
will face problems in the world and problems
within themselves. These are the same
problems that every generation faces. The
problems do not change from generation to
generation, but what does change is the source
that a generation resorts to search for
answers. This generation will develop
theories and potential answers that are
logical
to
their human minds but will not be in agreement
with the Creator, nor with his creation.
This generation will be ready to accept and put
into practice anything that makes sense after it
has been evaluated by the judgment system of human
reasoning.
1920-1960
The
Generation That Was “Pure”
During
this time span a generation began to fill the void
left to them by the first generation. They
began to redefine sin and to drift further away
from the means of temporal and eternal
salvation. This was keenly
observed and
pinpointed by a great man of God to this
generation on November 3, 1921. J.
Gresham Machen, a New
Testament professor at Westminster
Theological Seminary in Philadelphia
said:
"Modern
liberalism has lost all sense of the gulf
that
separates the creature from the Creator. .
.According to the Bible, man is a sinner under the
just condemnation of God; according to modern
liberalism, there is really no such thing as
sin. At the very root of the modern liberal
movement is the loss of the consciousness of
sin."16
Of
course, a generation that had been raised to
question, doubt and consider traditional
Christianity's doctrines as ancient myths and
pre-scientific thinking would have no trouble
rejecting the sinfulness of man, the most sacred
and basic truths of the scriptures. In
their darkness the concept of a God that would
judge the world could only have been an ancient,
human ploy used to intimidate others into
acceptable social behavior.
They assumed that the
outdated teaching of the sinfulness of man
would only prove to be a damnable stumbling block
to their human
potential. The cross of Jesus
was explained as a barbaric form of escapism
from the realties that modern man was finally
ready to face and conquer through knowledge and
human cooperation. By the 1920's the Federal
Council of Churches had adopted "The Social Creed
of the Churches" to promote this liberal social
gospel to the second
generation.
The
1920's began with an American culture in turmoil
as it tried to implement the new "user friendly
faith."
· The
divorce rate in the United States increased five
fold between the beginning of the first generation
and the middle of the second generation
(1870-1930)
· Authors
attacked religion and mocked the revivals in books
like Sinclair Lewis's Elemer Gantry in
1927.
· The
false hope that had disillusioned this generation
was expressed in books like F. Scott
Fitzgerald's The
Great Gatsby and
Ernest Hemingway's The
Sun Also Rises.
· 250
people died in Chicago gang warfare during
Prohibition.
· Modern
woman known as "flappers" smoked, danced, wore
short skirts, drank, and bobbed their
hair.
· America
became obsessed with sports
·
40,000 members of the Ku Klux Klan marched down
Pennsylvania Avenue in Washington,
D.C.17
The
flash point came in 1925 in Dayton,
Tennessee. Early in 1925 the Tennessee
legislature passed a bill which stated: "It shall
be unlawful for any teacher in any of the
universities, normals, and all other public
schools of the State. . .to teach any theory that
denies the story of the Divine
Creation of man as taught in the Bible, and to
teach instead that man has descended from a lower
order of
animals." The American Civil
Liberties Union (ACLU) advertised to pay the costs
to test the statute in court. By July 10,
1925 they had their day in court. It was the
State of Tennessee verse John Thomas Scopes.
Scopes had been convinced to admit to teaching
evolution in the public school classroom and thus
violating the statute.18
This second
generation was the first to listen to a trial on
radio. The results were a classic example of
winning the battle but losing the war. As
America listened on their radios and read the
daily reports from Dayton in their newspapers they
witnessed the jury return a guilty verdict and the
judge assign a $100 fine to the evolution
teacher. But, due to the questioning of
William Jennings Bryan as he tried to defend the
Bible from a position that combined his political
arrogance with his unprepared responses to the
attacks on the Bible the second
generation of Americans loss even more
confidence in traditional Christianity and the
relevance of scripture.
Scopes
was slapped with a $100 fine but with it the open
minds of the public were purchased. The
public mentally accepted the concept of teaching
evolution. This set the stage for an
immediate reversal of the principle of this
law
in the third
generation.
While
the church was succumbing to modern liberalism and
the public was embracing freedom from their
responsibility
to a God formerly known as their creator, a
religion entirely knew to America called
humanism was organizing its
ranks. In 1933 the Humanist
Manifesto I was
signed by 34 people and published in the May/June
issue of the The
New Humanist.
It begins as follows:
"The time has come
for widespread recognition of the radical changes
in religious beliefs throughout the
modern
world. The time is past for mere revision of
traditional
attitudes. Science and economic change have
disrupted the old beliefs. . .In every field of
human
activity,
the vital movement is now in the direction of a
candid
and explicit humanism. In order that
religious humanism may be better understood we,
the undersigned, desire to make certain
affirmations which we believe the facts of our
contemporary life demonstrate."
"There is
great danger of a final, and we believe
fatal, identification of the word religion with
doctrines and methods which have lost their
significance and which are powerless to solve the
problem of human living in the Twentieth Century.
. .Today man's larger understanding of the
universe, his scientific achievements, and his
deeper appreciation of brotherhood, have created a
situation which requires a new statement of the
means and purposes of religion. . .To
establish such a religion is a major necessity of
the present. It is a responsibility which
rests upon this
generation.
(bold
and underline mine)."19
The
Humanist
Manifesto then
lists fifteen affirmations. Here are just a
few of the affirmations:
1)
"Religious humanists regard the universe as
self-existing and not
created."
3)
"Holding an organic view of life, humanist find
that the traditional dualism of mind
and body must be
rejected."
8)
"Religious humanism considers the complete
realization of human personality to be the end of
man's life and seeks its development and
fulfillment in the here and how. This is the
explanation of the humanist's social
passion."
9)
"In place of the old attitudes involved in worship
and prayer the humanist finds his religious
emotions expressed in a heightened sense of
personal life and in a cooperative effort to
promote social well-being."20
Number eleven
is the clear introduction that man's problem is
not the sin nature but the lack of
knowledge.
11) Man will learn to face the
crises of life in terms of his knowledge of their
naturalness and probability.. .We assume that
humanism will take the path of social and mental
hygiene and discourage sentimental and unreal
hopes and wishful thinking."21
The
application of affirmation number eleven is going
to result in an emphasis on the attainment of
knowledge. The humanist believes that their
salvation rests in the area of education and the
attainment of knowledge to solve and control
life's problems. The humanist reference to
"social and mental hygiene" is obtained by
discouraging "sentimental and unreal hopes and
wishful thinking." What are these "unreal
hopes and wishful thinking" that need to be
discouraged so modern man can "face the crises of
life?" The humanist are referring to
traditional Christianity as "unreal hopes and
wishful thinking."
Obviously
knowledge is considered a very good and necessary
thing in the scriptures. The lack of it is
presented as a sure path to destruction. The
contrast between humanist knowledge and Christian
knowledge is more clearly seen when we identify
the difference between knowledge and
information. Can you see the difference when
we put the word knowledge into a group of
words? The Bible lists knowledge with wisdom
and understanding. The humanist lists
knowledge with experience, experimentation and
probability. Would you rather have insight
or
information? Would you rather have
truth or an
experience? Would you rather have
wisdom or
probability? Beware of knowledge that
men call good.
The humanist believe man is
pure and good within
himself. They are not concerned with
controlling or
changing his sin nature. They do not
believe the sin nature exist. This is
prophesied in Proverbs 30:12 as "pure in their own
eyes" and stated in their affirmation number three
as "traditional dualism of mind and body must be
rejected." Their answer is more knowledge or
education. More information and more
experience.
The third and fourth
generations will prove that the second
generation's theory had no power to overcome the
sin
nature. The Christian Liberalism and
Humanism of the second generation was a
philosophical abomination. The third and
fourth generations are going to produce such a
decline that the Christian Liberals and Secular
Humanist should easily have recognized their
theology and affirmations are a powerless disaster
in the face of a sin nature they desperately
denied.
This
1933 Humanist
Manifesto I ends
like this:
"So stand the theses of
religious humanism. Though we
consider the religious
forms and ideas of our fathers no longer
adequate,
(bold and underline mine) the quest for the good
life is still the central task for mankind.
Man is at last becoming aware that he alone is
responsible for the realization of the world of
his dreams, that he has within himself the power
for its achievement. He must set
intelligence and will to the task."
22
Thirty-four
people signed the Humanist
Manifesto I
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