Sid Roth - Holy Spirit Secrets to BREAK Demonic Strongholds for Good
Sid Roth: Welcome! Holy Spirit, we want to be Your friend. I surrender this platform to You. Take over. In the Name of Jesus, I release Your glory all over this studio. My guest, David Hernandez, has been in ministry for over 20 years, since age 13. He has seen thousands of people permanently set free from crippling attacks, but David himself, while all this was going on, was battling severe anxiety and depression, actually since childhood. David, tell me your family's generational history of fighting demons.
David Hernandez: Well, there were generations of witchcraft. My great-great-grandfather practiced witchcraft in Zacatecas, Mexico, and many people would come from around the region to have him place curses on people and even to heal the sick. Of course, he was operating in demonic power. Eventually, my family did come to the Lord, and I believe that the enemy strategizes generationally against people. In other words, the way he attacked one family member, he'll attack the next. Obviously there are different leanings that we have genetically, culturally and so forth. And especially if you're raised in a certain family, the enemy will target you because he knows what worked on former generations will work on you. Now, this doesn't mean that you have to succumb to that attack or that you're a victim of it. It just means that's the way the enemy strategizes against you. So in my case, there was this heaviness, this demonic presence that rested that was broken when my family turned to Christ, but of course, the enemy still attempts the attacks and does what he can. And now, in my case, there were several things that I could look back on in my history of my family, and I could tell you stories of different encounters that I've had with demonic beings. I'm not trying to glorify the darkness, but it's a reality that I've faced, and ever since the age of 7, I can recall battling just this heaviness. I could remember sensing over me this war being waged. I could sense the battle between light and darkness, and I knew that there was a war for my soul, and so from 7 and onward, there was this heaviness and this fear, this anxiety, this anxiety that I couldn't even quite pinpoint. I didn't know exactly where it was coming from. I didn't know exactly how to address it, but it crippled me in many different ways, and that lasted all the way up until I was 11 years old when I was saved. Now, when I gave my life to Christ at 11 years old, it was broken. Jesus broke that power when I received Him. Now, even though I had addressed the demonic power through receiving the Holy Spirit, there were still lingering effects from the deception that was left over from a former mindset that I did not deal with, and because of that, it began to affect me later on in life. Fast-forward: I'm married. I'm in ministry, Sid. I am seeing miracles, casting out devils, preaching the Gospel and still having panic attacks. There were times where, while I was preaching, I would begin to sense the physical attack on my body. I started to sense my heart racing. There were times my heart would race so fast that I would feel my pulse in my neck, and I felt like my vision was becoming tunneled, and I remember sensing paralysis and pain and shortness of breath. And I'm thinking, "Okay, I'm a minister of the Gospel". I felt like a fake. I'm just being honest with you.
Sid Roth: Just like the Bible says, it kind of comes back to test you.
David Hernandez: Right, and demons, when they come back to attack the believer, they're very limited on what they could do. They're very limited because they can't affect you in the same way that they did before you received Christ, but they come back to see what they can do. Now, when I began to battle this, I began to question, "Lord, am I going to end up like some of these preachers that I've read about who lost their minds because of their emotional and mental struggles"? And so I remember crying out very simply, "I need help". I said, "Help me, Holy Spirit". And I remember being so frustrated because the pastors tried to pastor it away. The prophets tried to prophesy it away. The teachers tried to teach it away. I had oil poured on me, shofars blown over me. I went through deliverance sessions. I went to revivals, conferences, worship meetings. You name it, and nothing seemed to be working, and if it did work, it would last maybe for 2 or 3 weeks, and then it seemed like I slumped back into that bondage. And it wasn't always as intense as it was at its peak, but there were moments where I remember just saying, "Lord, I've got to be rid of this. Surely this isn't Your will for my life". And I knew deep down that God did not create us to live in depression. God did not create us to live with anxiety. Many times, we treat spiritual bondage as if it's a regular part of the Christian life when it's not. Even some... A very subtle form of spiritual pride can set in where we say things like, "Well, the enemy is just attacking me because he knows how much a threat I am to his kingdom". I'm thinking, "If he saw you as a threat, he would stay far away, not come closer". And so we begin to tell ourself these things, and we start to think like victims instead of as the victors that we are in Christ. We don't recognize our identity. We don't recognize our inheritance, and therefore we settle for the ebb and flow of back-and-forth, doing good, then not doing good, suffering and then not suffering. Look, the Christian life is filled with turmoil. Of course, Jesus said, "In this world, you will have tribulation". We will face trials, temptation, tragedy. Things of all sorts will come against us, but whatever comes against us, we are meant to live victoriously from within. Whatever we're facing, we can have joy and peace and love and live in perfect spiritual stability. And now I know by the power of the Holy Spirit, by revelation given to me through God's Word, how to live free. I know that I don't have to settle for spiritual bondage. I know I don't have to slump into those places where I feel like I'm being swallowed by darkness. I don't have to live with that, and neither does anyone else who's redeemed by Christ.
Sid Roth: Darkness takes advantage of lack of knowledge.
David Hernandez: Yes.
Sid Roth: "My people," the Word says, "My people are destroyed for a lack of knowledge". God showed David the missing ingredient for his permanent freedom, and now he is permanently free and helping thousands of others to walk in that same freedom. Be right back.
Sid Roth: David, God showed you the ultimate bondage breaker. Tell me about it.
David Hernandez: He is the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit is the bondage breaker. Now, when I say that, I know someone listening might say, "Well, I've already heard that. I know the Holy Spirit sets us free". But I don't think sometimes we walk in the implications and the fullness of truth because we know things intellectually, but we haven't really grasped things spiritually. Now, when it comes to being set free from a spiritual bondage, of course, you address the demonic aspect through exercising authority. A simple command spoken in the Name of Jesus, demons have to obey. Why? Because Christ is seated in authority, and I am seated in Christ. So when I speak against the demonic power, it's as if Christ Himself is speaking against that demonic power. It has to be silent. It has to stop harassing. It has to stop speaking. That's how demons attack believers, through deception. The only power the enemy can have over us is the power he can deceive us in giving to him. Our belief in that power, our exaggeration of that power in our own minds is often what lends to it such potency, and when we focus on demonic power over the Holy Spirit's power, we insult the Holy Spirit. I think sometimes we imagine that the Holy Spirit is wrestling back and forth with the demon, calling for backup. "Help Me! I need you to do this. I need you to say that. I need you to enact this ritual. I need you to apply this tradition. I need you to jump through these hoops". And I'm thinking, that's the religious approach, not the Holy Spirit's way. And the Holy Spirit isn't fighting in that way. There is no spirit more powerful than the Holy Spirit. Like a child's sandcastle, demonic power falls under the mighty weight of the ocean wave that is the Holy Spirit's power. This is the power of the Holy Ghost that we're called to live in, and we walk in that when we recognize our authority, so that's number one. You deal with the demonic aspect by simply speaking a command in the Name of Jesus. It has to obey. Whatever lingers cannot possibly be demonic itself because you've already addressed that demonic root. Now, what's left over are the deceptive thought patterns that we are left behind by these demonic beings. So the demonic beings speak lies that create deception in the mind. Once you've silenced them through the exercise of authority, sometimes the issue is that if we've been in bondage long enough, we start to repeat their lies to ourselves. And so now we begin to have this stronghold, this reasoning, this mindset...
Sid Roth: And isn't that the flip side of what we should be doing? We're repeating the lies rather than the truth and the Word of God.
David Hernandez: And that's what it takes to get to the root. So there we see that the deceptive thought pattern grabs hold, so that deceptive thinking produces a way of feeling and acting. That way of feeling and acting becomes a behavior pattern. That behavior pattern becomes a cycle, and that cycle is what we call spiritual bondage. And here is the problem: Many believers address the symptoms of the spiritual bondage without getting to the source, and the source is always going to be deception. At the root of all spiritual bondage is spiritual deception. Jesus said, "You will know the truth, and the truth shall set you free". That means if you're still bound, there's a truth that you've not yet fully come to realize, and the Holy Spirit is the one who helps us to realize these truths. Look. I tried it all the other ways. I remember. I taught it. I practiced it, and it's not necessarily a bad thing, but look. I can go from California to Florida by driving, or I can get there by flying. We can either do it man's way, through tradition, our own way, not necessarily the bad way, but there's a better way. There's a more powerful way, and that is to step into Christ by faith, by the power of the Holy Ghost to take up that truth. Now, here is the battle because all spiritual warfare truly is the fight to believe God's Truth over the enemy's lies. And if you're not careful, we become cynical, and we say things like, "Well, I already tried that. Well, I know. I know. I'm supposed to believe the truth". But that right there is a re-enforcing lie that keeps us from addressing the primary lie. And so the enemy has a lie that keeps us bound in strongholds like accusation, which is living in the constant memory of your past sin, like anxiety, like depression, like addiction. These are all strongholds that are based on deception, and if you want to overpower that stronghold, you have to first get to the root of that deception and then come to fully realize the truth that will set you free.
Sid Roth: In your new book, "Holy Spirit The Bondage Breaker," you identify many strongholds. How do you get to the root of the deception?
David Hernandez: You get to the root of the deception by discovering truth. You discover truth through the Voice of the Holy Spirit, through knowing the Word of God, through listening to anointed men and women who teach the Word. And as you do these things, it's progressive. Look. You can avoid spiritual crisis if you just do the spiritual basics. People would be amazed at how many of their troubles would cease to be troubles if they simply practices prayer and reading the Word on a daily basis. But the problem is, many believers are not even doing the basics, and because they're not doing the basics, they find themselves spiritually malnourished, in bondage, confused, depressed, anxious, and they don't know why. And I tell them: If you just do the basics, if you just walk in simple obedience, if you're just making daily contact with God, then you begin to walk in new levels. Look. When you're walking in the glory of God, there's no devil that can walk on your level. Demons cannot swim in the depths of God. So I think the problem is, we address the symptoms, and we become worked up by the symptoms, and I think the bigger problem in the church is not necessary demon oppression but demon obsession. We're so focused on what the enemy can do. Darkness this, darkness that, look at what the enemy is doing. I'm saying to them, "Do you know who lives in you"?
Sid Roth: So if we can just discover the lie, we can get free.
David Hernandez: That's it. That's why the old saying goes, "The devil exposed is a devil defeated". All of these strongholds, again, are mindsets that are rooted in the mind of the believer, and those mindsets become behavior and feeling patterns which become cycles, and those cycles ultimately are what we call spiritual bondage. So for example, let's take the stronghold of depression. Now, there are elements of depression that are spiritual. We have to acknowledge that. And often what you'll find is that the individual who is depressed is ultimately believing a lie either about themselves, about God or about the way they think God perceives them. For me, the lie that I was believing when I was battling with anxiety was based on the remnants of a legalistic mindset where I walked in a constant fear impairment. Look. God calls us to walk in vigilance, but so many believers are walking in paranoia when it comes to the supernatural. And what happened with me was that I deep down in my heart believed the lie that God was angry with me and that He intended to harm me. Now, I never said that outright. I never spoke that aloud and said, "This is what I believe". Intellectually, I knew that wasn't true. I read it in the Scripture, but I never allowed myself to truly be immersed in that truth to where I was set free from anxiety. And the moment I finally realized, "Oh, my goodness". Even looking back on my life as the Holy Spirit spoke to me, I noticed that lie from childhood and onward in many different forms, coming at me in many different seasons of my life. It was manifested in different ways, but it was always the same lie that I wasn't loved by God. Once that lie was broken, then I was set free.
Sid Roth: Now, with this revelation, so many people are getting set free. What happened in Costa Mesa?
David Hernandez: Costa Mesa, California: This is a perfect example of what I'm talking about here, and this was just recently. The Holy Spirit gave me this revelation years ago, but when this happened, it was kind of a reminder of, "Wow, I'm so happy that the Holy Spirit revealed this". I'm standing on a platform. The Presence of God is moving. The glory of God is there. Miracles are happening. I raise the microphone, and I begin to very simply speak a command against every demonic being in that room. Demons begin to manifest all over the room all at once, and then I went to lift my mic. Some old mindset is still there, stuck in a religious paradigm. We have remnants of that sometime. I went to lift my mic to rebuke again, and the Holy Spirit said, "Stop. I can take it from here". So I put the microphone down, and I just began to worship, and I literally felt a wind at my back. And as that wind came past me and over the room, those screams that we were hearing all over the room silenced, and that's the power of the Holy Spirit. He overcomes demonic power in an instant. He is not struggling against demonic powers. He's dominating them. That's His power.
Sid Roth: What you're describing is almost a preview of the Holy Spirit operating in not just deliverance, in every Promise of God. The Holy Spirit is so moving in your meetings that people are not just hearing your worship, but they're hearing angelic choirs, and we're making this available for your bonus DVD. America was a great, unfortunately was a great, Judeo-Christian country. We've seen it change so rapidly before our eyes. God spoke to David about this darkness. God said, "You've done what you think you can do. Now I'm going to do what I do". God's Plan for America and the rest of the world, be right back.
Sid Roth: Okay, David. We're on the edge of our seat. What did God tell you about America?
David Hernandez: We've done what we think we can do, and now God will do what only He can do. Look, I understand that the Scripture describes a reality of darkness getting darker. We accept that. We embrace that. That's Scripture. But Jesus said that there would be perilous times in the last days, but He never said that the Gospel would lose its power. There's nothing about anything that's going to happen in our world that will cause the potency of the power of the Gospel to be weakened. I truly believe that before the coming of Christ that we will see the greatest revival this world has ever witnessed, and I know how that sounds because many people have talked about revivals. Many people have used what people would describe as revival rhetoric. Doesn't matter. even as you look throughout the timeline of history, there are moments where God's Hand will sovereignly move. We have seen revivals, and we're going to see another one. And so I believe that in this nation and around the world, we're going to come into this place of glory. I believe that our world and the Heavenly realm are colliding and that something is coming that's going to be bigger than anything we've ever seen. We're poised for it. Think about all of the metrics that are coming together, the culture. Think about the technological aspects, social media, the way information can travel. We're going to see viral revival, and this is going to be bigger than anything and any one movement. This is bigger than a healing movement, a deliverance movement, a prophetic movement, a charismatic movement. We're not getting a movement. I believe that God Himself will be revealed in great power in this season.
Sid Roth: There is so much good for those that know their God. Do you know Jesus? Because if you don't know Jesus, you have something separating you from God. It's called every mistake you've made, and the Torah makes it really narrow. One mistake, you're not going to make it unless you have an animal sacrifice in the temple. No temple, no animal sacrifices. It's Jesus or nothing. Repeat this prayer out loud with me. "Jesus, I've committed many sins". Say it out loud: "I'm so sorry. I believe Your blood washes away my mistakes. And I'm totally clean. And now that I'm clean Jesus, come and live inside of me. I make You my Savior. I make You my Lord. I want to know You better. Amen". Is God showing you anything that's going on with people right now that are watching you?
David Hernandez: Yes. I'm glad you asked because there's somebody watching right now who, even as you were turning on this program, you began to feel the impact of a panic attack. And I want you right now, in this moment, in this attack, in the midst of this darkness, to recognize that God is with you. He meets us in our worst moments, and right now you may be feeling this. Your mind may be filled with torment. You may be wondering if you'll ever be free. Jesus is in that room with you, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty. In the Name of Jesus, be set free from that anxiety. We rebuke it now, and I pray, Holy Spirit, help them to identify the lie that's at the root of that attack. In the mighty Name of Jesus, we pray.