Curses and Blessings by Association 

(1) Because children are curious by nature, an opportunity is provided to tell them about the goodness and greatness of God.

• Exodus 12:26, And it shall come to pass, when your children shall say unto you, What mean ye by this service?

• Deuteronomy 11:19, And ye shall teach them your children, speaking of them when thou sittest in thine house, and when thou walkest by the way, when thou liest down, and when thou risest up.

(2) There is a principle of blessing by association and cursing by association to be found in life. When a nation is under the rod of Divine discipline, the children will suffer. 

Cursing by Association

Some will be left without a father.

• Exodus 22:24, And my wrath shall wax hot, and I will kill you with the sword; and your wives shall be widows, and your children fatherless.

Some will die by wild beasts.

• Leviticus 26:22, I will also send wild beasts among you, which shall rob you of your children, and destroy your cattle, and make you few in number; and your highways shall be desolate.

Some will know physical hardships.

• Numbers 14:33, And your children shall wander in the wilderness forty years, and bear your whoredoms, until your carcases be wasted in the wilderness.

Some will be visited with a plague.

• Deuteronomy 29:22, So that the generation to come of your children that shall rise up after you, and the stranger that shall come from a far land, shall say, when they see the plagues of that land, and the sicknesses which the Lord hath laid upon it;

Some will not be allowed to worship the Lord.

• 1 Kings 9:6-7, But if ye shall at all turn from following me, ye or your children, and will not keep my commandments and my statutes which I have set before you, but go and serve other gods, and worship them: Then will I cut off Israel out of the land which I have given them; and this house, which I have hallowed for my name, will I cast out of my sight; and Israel shall be a proverb and a byword among all people:

Blessing by Association

The children shall not be enslaved.

• Leviticus 25:46, And ye shall take them as an inheritance for your children after you, to inherit them for a possession; they shall be your bondmen for ever: but over your brethren the children of Israel, ye shall not rule one over another with rigour.

The children shall enjoy a national inheritance of land.

• Deuteronomy 1:39, Moreover your little ones, which ye said should be a prey, and your children, which in that day had no knowledge between good and evil, they shall go in thither, and unto them will I give it, and they shall possess it.

• Deuteronomy 11:21, That your days may be multiplied, and the days of your children, in the land which the Lord sware unto your fathers to give them, as the days of heaven upon the earth.

• 1 Chronicles 28:8, Now therefore in the sight of all Israel the congregation of the Lord, and in the audience of our God, keep and seek for all the commandments of the Lord your God: that ye may possess this good land, and leave it for an inheritance for your children after you forever.

The children shall receive a spiritual legacy of instruction in righteousness.

• Joshua 4:21-22, And he spake unto the children of Israel, saying, When your children shall ask their fathers in time to come, saying, What mean these stones? Then ye shall let your children know, saying, Israel came over this Jordan on dry land.

The children shall enjoy parental protection of a spiritual legacy.

• Joshua 22:21-29, Then the children of Reuben and the children of Gad and the half tribe of Manasseh answered, and said unto the heads of the thousands of Israel, The Lord God of gods, the Lord God of gods, he knoweth, and Israel he shall know; if it be in rebellion, or if in transgression against the Lord, (save us not this day,) That we have built us an altar to turn from following the Lord, or if to offer thereon burnt offering or meat offering, or if to offer peace offerings thereon, let the Lord himself require it; And if we have not rather done it for fear of this thing, saying, In time to come your children might speak unto our children, saying, What have ye to do with the Lord God of Israel? For the Lord hath made Jordan a border between us and you, ye children of Reuben and children of Gad; ye have no part in the Lord: so shall your children make our children cease from fearing the Lord. Therefore we said, Let us now prepare to build us an altar, not for burnt offering, nor for sacrifice: But that it may be a witness between us, and you, and our generations after us, that we might do the service of the Lord before him with our burnt offerings, and with our sacrifices, and with our peace offerings; that your children may not say to our children in time to come, Ye have no part in the Lord.
  
  Therefore said we, that it shall be, when they should so say to us or to our generations in time to come, that we may say again, Behold the pattern of the altar of the Lord, which our fathers made, not for burnt offerings, nor for sacrifices; but it is a witness between us and you. God forbid that we should rebel against the Lord, and turn this day from following the Lord, to build an altar for burnt offerings, for meat offerings, or for sacrifices, beside the altar of the Lord our God that is before his tabernacle.

The children shall be restored to Divine fellowship.

• 2 Chronicles 30:9, For if ye turn again unto the Lord, your brethren and your children shall find compassion before them that lead them captive, so that they shall come again into this land: for the Lord your God is gracious and merciful, and will not turn away his face from you, if ye return unto him.

The children shall be guided into a proper godly marriage.

• Ezra 9:12, Now therefore give not your daughters unto their sons, neither take their daughters unto your sons, nor seek their peace or their wealth for ever: that ye may be strong, and eat the good of the land, and leave it for an inheritance to your children for ever.

The children shall enjoy the promise of the gospel. 

• Acts 2:39, For the promise is unto you, and to your children, and to all that are afar off, even as many as the Lord our God shall call.

The children shall be sanctified by a believing parent.

• 1 Corinthians 7:14, For the unbelieving husband is sanctified by the wife, and the unbelieving wife is sanctified by the husband: else were your children unclean; but now are they holy.

(3) As the Lord blesses one generation with providential bounty, so He will bless the children.

• Psalms 115:14, The Lord shall increase you more and more, you and your children.

(4) It is possible for children to learn spiritual obstinacy from their parents so that severe forms of Divine discipline have no effect.

• Jeremiah 2:30, In vain have I smitten your children; they received no correction: your own sword hath devoured your prophets, like a destroying lion.

(5) Parents do have a responsibility to warn their children, not only of the goodness, but the severity of God.

• Joel 1:3, Tell ye your children of it, and let your children tell their children, and their children another generation.

(6) Most parents naturally enjoy giving good gifts to their children.

• Matthew 7:11, If ye then, being evil, know how to give good gifts unto your children, how much more shall your Father which is in heaven give good things to them that ask him?

(7) A penetrating question comes to one generation and the next: what is the power and source of your ministry?

• Matthew 12:27, And if I by Beelzebub cast out devils, by whom do your children cast them out? therefore they shall be your judges.

(8) Parents should weep for their children when they know there is impending disaster.

• Luke 23:28, But Jesus turning unto them said, Daughters of Jerusalem, weep not for me, but weep for yourselves, and for your children.

(9) Parents are not to provoke their children to anger.

• Ephesians 6:4, And, ye fathers, provoke not your children to wrath: but bring them up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord.

• Colossians 3:21, Fathers, provoke not your children to anger, lest they be discouraged.