Curse of God

“ God's curse comes with a warrant to break open doors, and cannot be kept out by bars or locks. There where the sinner is most secure, and thinks himself out of danger,—there where he promises himself refreshment by food and sleep,—there, in his own house, shall the curse of God seize him; nay, it shall fall not upon him only, but upon all about him for his sake. Cursed shall be his basket and his store, and cursed the fruit of his body, Deut. ”

“ I humbly conceive that good man was perpetually buffeted to curse God, but what I feel is different, and yet so horrible I cannot tell anyone on earth. O my grief, how great it is on this subject, and if it is Satan’s influence, what a cruel Devil he must be, to harrass in this present affliction, but I am a sinner, and the Lord will make me feel it. I have too much given way to Satan, and now he is set at me like a bull-dog, or as a gaping lion, ready to devour me—my faith is weak and my fears are strong. ”

“ In other words, God's curse is the divine law of life—a ruin and a wreck through man's perversity, but Divinity still working amid those ruins to save him from a worse desolation even on his chosen plane. Riches are a blessing to him who uses them aright, a curse to him who makes of them the mere instruments of self-gratification. ”

“ Let God's curse come into his bowels like water and swell him as with a dropsy, and let it soak like oil into his bones. The word of the curse is quick and powerful, and divides between the joints and the marrow; it works powerfully and effectually; it fastens on the soul; it is a piercing thing, and there is no antidote against it. Let is compass him on every side as a garment, v. 19. Let God's cursing him be his shame, as his cursing his neighbour was his pride ”

“ I will even send a curse upon you - I will dispense no more good.
I will curse your blessings - Even that which ye have already shall not profit you. When temporal blessings are not the means of leading us to God and heaven, they will infallibly lead us to hell. ”

“ A greater curse cannot well be conceived. There never was a people that lived a hundred years, or even fifty years, without immediate revelation from God, but they fell into gross darkness and contention, and those hurtful lusts that drown men's souls in perdition. ”

“ Accordingly, they are born for this, — to be destroyed body and soul in hell. And they grow up under the irrevocable curse of God, without any possibility of redemption; for what grace God gives. he gives only for this, to increase, not prevent, their damnation. ”

“ He is cursed, separated to all evil, laid under the wrath of God, as it is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, Rom. 1. 18. Who knows the extent and weight of a divine curse, how far it reaches, how deep it pierces? God's pronouncing a man cursed makes him so; for those whom he curses, are cursed indeed. The curse for Adam's disobedience terminated on the ground, Cursed is the ground for thy sake; but that for Cain's rebellion fell immediately upon himself, Thou art cursed; for God had mercy in store for Adam, but none for Cain. ”

“ And therefore it is that to the household perfidy, in all lands, in all ages, God’s curse seems to cleave, and to God’s curse man abandons it; he does not honour it by hate, still less will he lighten and share the guilt by descending to revenge. He turns aside with a sickness and loathing, and leaves Nature to purify from the earth the ghastly phenomenon she abhors. ”

“ Three several times the earth has been cursed, which curse is gradually removed as man returns unto his God in loving and obedient service. “And now art thou cursed from the earth, which hath opened her mouth to receive thy brother’s blood from thy hand. ”

“ Poor sinners, they are cursed by God, by the angels, by the saints, even in this world every day by all the priests, the religious who proclaim their curse in reciting the Divine office: " Cursed are they that do err from Thy commandments." ”

“ This idea of atonement finally resulted in the belief that the incarnate Christ, the Anointed, the God among us, was to save mankind from a curse by God imposed. Man had sinned, and God could not and did not forgive without a propitiatory sacrifice. The curse of God must be removed from the sinful, and the sinless must bear the load of that curse. ”

“ And so the woman, the man and the serpent—the affection, the intellect and the sensual nature—all passed under the curse. Yet it was, on the part of the human race, an act of self-degradation. The Lord seems to say, "I did it;" but it was not the Lord's will, but his broken law that did it. And so mankind went down, down, until our God-in-Christ came to earth to raise him up again.
Now the lesson here taught comes home to all of us. The curse is evil and sin, and it rests upon the hearts of all who cherish evil. ”

“ Hence, inasmuch as Christ, coming to save us, finds us under a curse, the first thing in order is, and must be, the removal of that curse of the holy wrath of God, against every one that "continueth not in all things that are written in the book of the law, to do them." ”

“ And worst and darkest of all, when in that stupid, sinful, loveless state of mind, God’s loving Spirit still strives and pleads with us, and tries to awaken us, and terrify us with the sight of the everlasting misery and ruin into which we have thrown ourselves, we may turn those pleadings of God’s Spirit, by our own evil wills, into a darker curse than all which have gone before. ”

“ When you turn round upon a fellow man and curse him, it does not occur to you that you have solemnly called upon God to give his soul over to everlasting damnation. God Almighty alone can tell what effect that curse, so carelessly spoken, may have. ”

“ He finds that sin let loose upon the soul (whether it be pride, anger, or evil desire, whether self-will, malice, envy, revenge, or any other) is perfect misery. He feels sorrow of heart for the blessings he has lost, and the curse which is come upon him; remorse for having thus destroyed himself, and despised his own mercies; fear, from a lively sense of the wrath of God, and of the consequences of his wrath; of the punishment which he has justly deserved, and which he sees hanging over his head; fear of death, as being to him the gate of hell, the entrance of death eternal ”

“ I. The equity of this curse. It is not a curse causeless, nor for some light cause; God seeks not occasion against us, nor is he apt to quarrel with us. That which is here mentioned as bringing the curse is, 1. Despising God, refusing to hearken to his voice (v. 15) , which bespeaks the highest contempt imaginable, as if what he said were not worth the heeding, or we were not under any obligation to him. ”

“ They are in reality independent of the idea of God, since that is called "luck" in some cases which in others is called the favor or wrath of God. And again in some cases, one may be damned by a human curse, although in others this curse of damnation is reserved for divine power. ”

“ But to touch upon this curse, it lieth in deprivation of all good, and in a being swallowed up of all the most fearful miseries that a holy, and just, and eternal God can righteously inflict, or lay upon the soul of a sinful man. ”

“ Thus, by reason of difference in the persons cursed the species is changed, for where special love or reverence is owed a special sin is committed by hatred or irreverence. The gravest curse is that against God, which is the sin of blasphemy (see 887 sqq.) . Next in wickedness is the curse against one’s parents, which is a sin of impiety. ”

“ This perhaps also is, as Professor Westermarck suggests, {131} a conditional curse. Now a curse, like other magical proceedings before referred to, is primarily a relief of overcharged feelings. Uttered with all the strength of those feelings by an aggrieved or baffled adversary, it evokes even in our breasts to-day shuddering and horror. Much more then in days when the man’s orenda was deemed to go out in speech with immediate result upon the object to which he directed it. When gods came to be adopted and worshipped, strength was added to the curse by invocation of the god. ”

“ If they must depart, and depart with a curse, may they not go into some place of ease and rest? Will it not be misery enough for them to bewail their loss? No, there is a punishment of sense as well as loss; they must depart into fire, into torment as grievous as that of fire is to the body, and much more. This fire is the wrath of the eternal God fastening upon the guilty souls and consciences of sinners that have made themselves fuel for it. Our God is a consuming fire, and sinners fall immediately into his hands, Heb. ”

“ It is a restless evil, full of deadly poison. 9 With it we bless our God and Father, and with it we curse men, who are made in the image of God. 10 Out of the same mouth comes forth blessing and cursing. ”

“ Christ was made a curse for us, died a cursed death. Gal. 3. 13. 4. Did thorns come in with sin? He was crowned with thorns for us. 5. Did sweat come in with sin? He sweat for us, as it had been great drops of blood. 6. Did sorrow come in with sin? He was a man of sorrows, his soul was, in his agony, exceeding sorrowful. 7. Did death come in with sin? He became obedient unto death. Thus is the plaster as wide as the wound; blessed be God for Jesus Christ!
20. And Adam called his wife's name Eve ; because she was the mother of all living. ”

“ If the blood of Christ be sprinkled upon our consciences, it will be our protection from the wrath of God, the curse of the law, and the damnation of hell, Rom. ”

“ For in our time the blasphemies are threadbare. Pessimism is now patently, as it always was essentially, more commonplace than piety. Profanity is now more than an affectation—it is a convention. The curse against God is Exercise I. in the primer of minor poetry. ”

“ The sickness, pain and corruption of our bodies, is brought upon us by ourselves, in the same manner as the dark, hideous forms of the devils are brought upon them. * How absurd, and even blasphemous would it be, to say, with the scripture and the church, that we are by nature, children of wrath, and born in sin, if we had that nature which God at first gave us? What a reproach upon God to say, that this world is a valley of misery, a shadow of death, an habitation of disorders, snares, evils, and temptations, if this was an original creation, or that state of things in which God created us? ”

“ A soul in the state of grace is beautiful beyond expression: it is a brilliant image of God himself; the Holy Ghost dwells in it. But when mortal sin is allowed to infect it, its beauty is lost, its light is extinguished, the Divine Spirit departs, the devil takes possession: all then is darkness, filth, and deformity. If a God-man, dying, was a dreadful spectacle, mortal sin is yet more dreadful; for Christ died but to atone for sin, and sin can daily frustrate all his merits: he is crucified over and over — his blood is trampled upon by ungrateful sinners. ”

“ Thus the holy books every where represent the state of sin under the idea of a shocking death; and it seems as if the Spirit of God had found that melancholy image the most calculated to give us, at least, a glimpse of all the deformity of a soul in which sin dwells. ”

“ But the greatest torments of hell affect not so much the bodies as the soul of the damned. Think for a moment what pain home-sickness inflicts upon the soul of him who endures it, and then consider the lot of him who is condemned to hell. The reprobate will know and feel what he has lost by his sins. The pain of loss is immeasurably great. Never shall he enjoy the beatific vision of God; never shall he enter heaven, the home of the saints, the place of everlasting happiness and joy. What horror, what torment, what despair, will seize upon the souls of the damned! ”

“ So sin, a corroding drop, a dark, deadly, vexing, torturing thing, fell upon God’s fair creation, threatening to inoculate it with a poison that should leaven the whole lump, and change its beauty into corruption. But around the dark sin-spot, and because the sin-spot was there, divine love showered down, like the impalpable silver gathering on its object in the electrotype, embracing, surrounding, covering, killing the evil and bitter thing that threatened to destroy the works of God. Death was swallowed up in victory. The Son of God came into the world because sin was on it. ”

“ What a terrible misfortune if you found yourself on the left hand, cursed and rejected by your Lord, separated from those dear to you, and cast into everlasting fire with the devils! To be rejected and cursed by Jesus, and separated for ever from God, who is the source of all happiness, would be such a terrible disaster, that we cannot even picture it to ourselves! ”

“ I was driven by the devil, allured by sin and corruption, and deceived by my own evil heart.”
About this time likewise, it pleased our Lord to visit him with a fit of illness, by which his fears and misery were considerably increased. He often bewailed himself in the uttermost anguish of spirit, with weeping and lamentation, breathing out his soul in moans. “O the guilt of sin; when charged home upon the conscience by the Spirit of God, what an intolerable load! A wounded spirit who can bear!” ”

“ And separate evil sealed it thine—thy curse, Annihilation?
Heed thou this; there is a Sacrifice; the Maker is Redeemer of His creature;
Freely unto each, universally to all, is restored the privilege of essence:
Whether unto grace or guilt, all must live through Him,
Live in vital joy, or live in dying woe:
Death in Adam, Life in Christ; the curse hung upon the cross:
Who art thou that heedest of redemption, as narrower than the fall?
All were dead,—He died for all; that living, they might love;
If living souls withhold their love,—still, He hath died for them. ”

“ Holy Scripture says that he has put on cursing like a garment; that it has entered in unto his bones. In the old law a blasphemer was stoned to death. And in our own times God often anticipates the wrath to come by sending sudden death upon profane men. I lately read in the papers that a man, standing at a saloon-counter, cursed his own soul, and instantly sank down upon the floor stone dead. ”