Rabbi Schneider - How Can You Forgive Someone Who Hurt You

This is such an important topic, because we're never gonna be walking in the peace, and the fullness, and the shalom, and love, and joy that's ours in Jesus unless we learn how to take authority over demonic power. As I began weeks ago teaching, people today hear that word demon, they think it's archaic, but the reality is almost one third of Jesus's ministry in the New Testament involves setting people free that were in bondage and being afflicted with demons. Those same demons that walk the earth during the day of Jesus beloved, the like-kind are still here today, and they're still intended on doing the same harm to people. But praise God the Bible says that Jesus came to set us free, hear it now, and to destroy the works of the devil.

The devil is real. Peter said that your adversary the devil is roaming around, looking for someone to devour and that we need, Paul said, to put on the full armor of God in Ephesians 6. We're in a battle, we can't run from it, we can't hide from it, we must face it and subdue our enemy. If we're gonna enter in beloved to the freedom that is ours in Jesus. If you're at school and someone is picking on you like I shared last week, and they're a bully and they have no heart, they're not gonna go away until you turn around and face them and exert authority over them.

You know, sometimes we think that we can make all things right by being nice, but I want you to hear: Jesus was more than just a mister nice-guy. It is true. As children of God that have been filled with the Holy Spirit, there should be a quality about us that perhaps some would describe as "Nice", but that's just not the only dimension that reflects who Jesus is. He also is coming beloved and a white horse from heaven with the sword coming out of his mouth, and the armies of heaven behind him. The Jesus that we believe in is the Jesus that walked into the temple and drove out the money changers from it. And even as the money changers beloved, needed to forcefully be driven out of the temple by king Jesus, so to spirits that have no right to be in our space, that are from the realm of darkness need to be focused on, faced, and driven out. Just like Jesus focused on, faced, and drove out the money changers from the temple which was God's space.

In this series self-deliverance that I began weeks ago, we've been talking about how it is that demonic spirit can enter a believers life. Now once again I want you to understand: I do not believe a Christian can be possessed by a devil, but I believe that if you're worrying all the time it's because of a demon. I believe if you're fearing all the time it's because of a demon. I believe if you've got an addiction in some area of your life it's because of a demon. You see, sometimes what starts out to be a physical problem, when we don't control it, it becomes more than a physical problem, it becomes a spiritual problem. The point I'm making beloved is that many Christians like to tell themselves that a Christian can't have a problem with the demon, but that's not what the Bible says. This is nothing to be afraid of we have an enemy.

Let me ask you this question: can a Christian get a virus? Can a Christian get a cold? Yes, the virus or the cold or the infection they're just squatters, they're invading us when they have no right to be in us. And in the same way that a Christian could get a virus, an infection, or a cold in the same way a demon can be occupying some of our space, and it needs to be confronted and driven out. If you're constantly beloved fearing, it's because there's a demon that's occupying a space of your mind, and it needs to be focused on, confronted, and driven out, and you can do that. But first we have to wake up and realize where the battle is, we have to get the courage to be able to face the demon and call it what it is, just like Jesus said when he spoke to the demon and he said "What is your name"? And then he cast out the spirits with a word. We need to get that same enlightenment, operate in the same courage beloved, to be able to drive out enemy passing in our space from our own life.

And so last week I was talking about how spirits that are not of God can gain entrance into our life. And I had talked in the previous broadcast about spirits that are passed down from family trees, I'm not going to go ahead and review that again, get the previous broadcast, and I also talked about how when we sin we take ourselves outside of God's protective covering, and the enemy then can get a way into our lights. Today as I continue, I want to talk about the problem get this now of unforgiveness. I know as a young believer myself I didn't realize how serious unforgiveness was. I mean I knew that Jesus said in the Lord's prayer he said, you know, pray in this way, and then he talked about forgiveness "Father forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespassed against us". And then Jesus says for if you don't forgive those who trespassed against you, neither will your Heavenly Father forgive you. And I heard that, but I didn't really comprehend how serious unforgiveness is.

I want to read you a portion of scripture now, that perhaps some of you have read before, and you didn't quite understand it just like I didn't understand it until God eventually gave me revelation. I'm going now beloved ones, to the Gospel of John. And I'm going to verse number 21. Chapter 20 of John's Gospel beginning in verse number 21: hear the Word of God, "And Jesus said to them again: peace", or shalom. And that Hebrew word "Shalom" it is a blessing, complete wholeness. The word "Shalom" means wholeness, so Jesus is speaking complete wholeness unto those who was blessing, spirit, soul, mind and body.

So Jesus said peace "Be with you", shalom, wholeness be with you, "'as the father has sent me, I also send you'. And when he had said this", get this now, "He breathed on them and said to them", get it "'receive the ruach ha kodesh, receive", he said, "The Holy Spirit. If you forgive the sins of any, their sins have been forgiven them. If you retain the sins of any they have been retained". Now if you've read that before perhaps like me you thought, why would Jesus say receive the Holy Spirit, and then the very next word that he said was "If you forgive the sins of any, their sins have been forgiven them, if you retain the sins of any their sins will be retained"? Why would he say that in connection with "Peace I give you receive the Holy Spirit"?

And what's going on here beloved, is that Jesus is teaching that if we hold on to a grudge against somebody, it's gonna block the peace of God and the Holy Spirit from being able to fully enter our lives. You see, when we don't forgive somebody else, we let poison have a hold in our own heart. As many have said before, unforgiveness is the poison that we think we're giving somebody else, and without realizing it we're actually drinking it ourselves. Unforgiveness keeps people in bondage and it gives Satan a legal right to torment.

Remember the story that Jesus told about the one that had been forgiven so much, but then after the one that had been forgiven so much had been forgiven, he was walking down the road, and somebody that owed him money came up to him and said, "Please, forgive me this debt that I owe you". But after having been forgiven so much, the one that had been forgiven refused to show grace and forgiveness to one that owed them. And Jesus, when he saw that in the parable Jesus said, "You wouldn't forgive after you were forgiven so much"? Jesus said, "I'm gonna turn you over to the tormentors now". That because this one would not forgive, Jesus said, I'm gonna turn you over to the tormentors. What does this mean? When we don't forgive, once again, we take ourselves outside the Holy Spirit, outside of abiding in the Holy Spirit. And outside of the Holy Spirit is a place beloved where demons can attack. That's why Jesus said we must forgive.

The Lord really brought this home to me in a very personal way again in a dream not so many years ago. And in this dream beloved one, I found myself in a house. And I was running in the house, because there was a tormentor that was pursuing me. I couldn't see the tormentor, I just knew that these people that were tormentors were like pursuing me, and I kept on running through the house from one room, to another room, to another room, trying to escape the tormentors. But wherever I went, the tormentors followed me, and I couldn't escape.

And finally after this went on for some time in the dream me running from these tormentors, but being unable to get away from them, finally in the dream I felt the gaze of God like a beam of light locked down upon me. I felt God looking at me as a beam of light in the dream, and then I heard the spirit of the Lord speak to me in the dream. And when he spoke to me in the dream, he directed my attention to somebody in my life that I had not forgiven, somebody that I was holding a grudge against. And then I heard the Lord say to me, as he caused me to see this person that I was holding unforgiveness against, then the Lord said to me, listen, he said "Release them".

And when I made a conscious decision in my heart in the midst of the dream to release that person that I was holding like an IOU over their life, like you owe me, I'm gonna hurt you now. When I released that person instantly what happened beloved ones, instantly what happened folks in the dream, was the tormentors were gone. And the Lord revealed to me in that dream that when I hold on to unforgiveness, I am opening up a channel for tormentors from the realm of darkness to torment me and harass me. And you know what? The Word of God teaches the same thing about you. Unforgiveness keeps a door open for demons to enter into our space, and to torment us.

I want to give you an opportunity right now, I want to let the Holy Spirit speak to us right now. I'm going to ask father, I'm going to ask Jesus, to cause his Holy Spirit to speak to us right now. If there's people in your life, if there's someone, or more than one person in your life that you are just holding a grudge against, you just have a vengeful spirit towards, and you're holding on to this thing, and you're locked on to this vengeance, I want you to know - that is hurting you. And Jesus is gonna give us an opportunity right now to let that person go, to bless them, so that we can recover beloved one and get free from the torment of darkness.

So I'm gonna bow right now, I'm gonna ask you to kind of join me, and I'm gonna ask the Holy Spirit right now to reveal to you. Perhaps you'd like to get on your knee if you can, and just be open before the Lord. Let's ask the Lord to show you who in your life you need to let go of, who you need to release.

Father God, in Jesus name I ask you right now, Father, because of your great love that you have for us, to show your people that are joining me in their hearts right now as we're looking to you, to show each one of us Father God, who in our life we need to release, who are holding unforgiveness against, and who we need to bless, who we need, Father God, to to position ourselves with above the the natural realm in the supernatural realm of releasing forgiveness towards them, despite the fact Lord that they've done us wrong. Jesus we want to thank you that when you were on the cross, you looked at those that crucified you, and you looked up to the Father and said "Father forgive them for they know not what they do", and we want to be like you, Jesus. So we look at you, Jesus on the cross right now, and we see you saying to the Father about those that crucified you, about those that plucked out your beard, about those that put the spear in your side, we see right now saying to the Father just "Father forgive them for they know not what they do". And now Jesus we're still looking at you, we say to those that have hurt us and wounded us "I release you. I bless you". We love you Jesus.

Now, some of you have been wounded so gravely, you've been so violated that you just start crying when you think about the pain that's been inflicted on you by the one that's wounded you. And here's what I want to encourage you to do: don't look at the person that hurts you, don't look at the person that wounded you, just look at Jesus on the cross, just see him saying "Father, forgive them for they know not what they do". And if you look at Jesus on the cross, just out of the side, just out of your peripheral, just say to those people "I forgive you, I release you, I bless you".

Don't look at the person, because if you look too much at the person and focus too much on the person, what's going to happen is all that old hurts gonna come back, and you're going to be overwhelmed by the pain again, and find it difficult to forgive. So don't look at the person, look at Jesus, and then just release the person, and speak blessing over them as you keep your eyes focused on Jesus. Just as Peter was able to walk on water when he kept his focus on Jesus, rather than looking at the see. Beloved ones, if we're gonna get victory over the realm of darkness, we're gonna have to learn beloved one, how to walk in grace and in forgiveness.

Now, moving on, I want to share with you how another entry point of demonic influence in our life can come from trauma. We don't realize beloved, that when we have been severely traumatized by something, there is a emotional break that takes place in our life: it can be physical, it can be emotional, a spiritual, but when we go through very very significant trauma, it's like our arm or our protective coating can be broken, and through that brokenness, through that trauma, sometimes what happens is a spirit of torment can enter in and begin to bring affliction. Remember, Jesus rose from the dead to give us victory over all these things. I'm just scientifically sharing with you how spirits get in. There's nothing to be afraid of, but in order to get victory over our enemy we have to understand who he is, and how he operates.

So this is sometimes like if a person's ever been robbed, if a person's ever been raped, if a person's been abused, sometimes war veterans, sometimes someone that goes through extreme trauma, through an illness, during that time of trauma there can be a vulnerability that takes place that a demon could take advantage of. You see, Peter said once again, I've quoted this several times, "That your enemy the devil", Peter said, and notice that he said, church, "Your enemy". He wasn't talking to the unbeliever, he was talking to the church, he was talking to you and i. He said "Your enemy, the devil, roams about looking for someone to devour".

Who is he looking to devour? He's looking, beloved one, hear me now, he's looking for somebody that's weak. Just like when you look into the animal kingdom you see perhaps a lion, and they're going to attack, and who do they look for in the flock? They look for the weakest member of the flock. And so, if we go through a trauma we can get severely weakened in that state, and in that state we can become vulnerable to attack from the enemies spirits. Now, Jesus when he came, he said he came to bind up the brokenhearted.

Father, right now in Jesus name I speak to souls, Father God, that right now you want to heal. And Father, in Jesus name, by the authority that you've given me, I release healing into each and everyone right now, king Jesus, whom you're working in. I speak the healing of the Holy Spirit, Father God, into their soul, over their soul, into their hearts Lord, into their mind, over their mind release shalom Jesus, release healing to your church right now, to your body, to your beloved ones, in Jesus name. By Jesus stripes beloved, we've been healed I speak healing now to the brokenhearted, Jesus, right now. Breathe life and power into your beloved ones, amen, amen, and amen, and amen.

And so, we've talked about entry points of how demons can gain access into the believers life. They don't possess us, but they can occupy space. And we talked about recognizing that this is not some far-off archaic superstitious problem, but the problems beloved that you and I deal with oftentimes are originating from the realm of darkness. Inordinate fears, inordinate anxiety, addictions, the things like alcohol, drugs, pornography, being angry all the time - these are actually spiritual problems.

We talked about how these spirits can enter our life - they enter through our family tree. The sins of the parents are passed down from one generation to the next, we read about that in the torah, in Exodus 20, as well as the fact that even in the Gospel of John chapter 9, Jesus's disciples recognize this principle. We talked about demons entering through personal sin. We talked about demons entering beloved ones, through unforgiveness. And finally today we concluded by talking about how demons can enter through brokenness and trauma.

I'm just so happy to tell you today, that Jesus loves you. All we're doing is looking at the problem, but the problem is this big, and Jesus is so, so, so, so, so, so big. And all we have to do beloved is face the problem in Jesus. Continue to move forward in him, and what's going to happen is the problem is going to get smaller and smaller, and your awareness of Jesus presence in your life is gonna get bigger and bigger. I bless you right now, and I release an apostolic blessing over your life. I release church a blessing of love, and of unity. I released the blessing of vision over you, and I released the blessing of increase over you. God bless you. I love you in Jesus name, and shalom.