Curse vs Blessing / Release From Curses

In our previous sessions we’ve been looking at certain aspects of the exchange that took place when Jesus died on the cross. If my memory is correct, we’ve looked at four aspects. Let’s see if we can recapitulate. First of all, Jesus was punished that we might be forgiven. He was wounded that we might be healed. He was made sin with our sinfulness that we might be made righteous with His righteousness. And, He died our death that we might share His life. After you believe that, what do you do? That’s right.

Now we’re going on to the fifth aspect which is curse versus blessing. This is very clearly stated in Galatians 3:13–14, which we’ll look at.

“Christ has redeemed us from the curse of the law, having become a curse for us, for it is written, Cursed is everyone who hangs on a tree...”

And in biblical language, the cross was a tree because the word tree is used for a piece of timber whether it’s growing or whether it’s cut down. Incidentally, for interest, the same is true in the Swahili language in east Africa. Going on in verse 14:

“...that the blessing of Abraham might come upon the Gentiles in Christ Jesus, that we might receive the promise of the Spirit through faith.”

Well, the exchange is very obvious there, isn’t it? The evil is curse, the good is the blessing. And Jesus, it actually says, was made a curse for us, in our place. In other words, upon Him came all the curses that might have come upon us that in return all the blessings that were due to Him might be made available to us. And in particular, it says that we might receive the blessing of Abraham. Now, that’s exciting!

Keep your finger in Galatians 3, if you have it there, and turn for a moment to Genesis 24:1.

“Now Abraham was old, well advanced in age, and the Lord had blessed Abraham in all things.”

In how many things? All things. So what is the blessing of Abraham? It covers what? All things, that’s right. And that’s the blessing that’s made available to us through faith in the exchange that took place when Jesus was made a curse for us on the cross. So this is exciting!

In fact, I have to keep telling you if you don’t get excited about what I’m telling you it’s because you’re not really believing it. Because, it is exciting!

What we need to do is, first of all, look at the background of this statement of Paul, which is very interesting. And then we’re going to analyze somewhat the nature of curses and blessing. Let’s look at the background first. If you look at the top of the chapter, the first verse of the chapter, chapter 3 of Galatians, it says:

“O foolish Galatians, who has bewitched you, that you should not obey the truth before whose eyes Jesus Christ was clearly portrayed as crucified?”

Now, Paul goes on to point out that these Christians had received the Holy Spirit and were witnessing miracles. In other words, if you want to use contemporary language, they were Charismatic. I would say almost super Charismatic. And yet, Paul says they were bewitched. That’s an amazing statement, isn’t it? Why did he say they were bewitched, what was the evidence? The evidence was that they had lost the vision of the cross. He said Jesus Christ was clearly portrayed among you as crucified but you’ve lost the vision. Something has happened to you that has obscured your vision of the cross. An evil, satanic force has moved in and shut off your understanding of the cross. And he called that force witchcraft.

Now, I’m not going to go into the analysis of witchcraft today, but it’s very important to understand that the fact that you are saved and baptized in the Spirit and speak in tongues and all that—which is very wonderful—and see miracles doesn’t guarantee you exemption from deception. Is that right? And it’s still possible for satanic influences to move in among us and the main aim of Satan amongst the people of God is to obscure the cross. Because, the cross is the only basis for God’s total provision for us. And when we lose the vision of the cross we no longer have a basis for God’s provision. Secondly, which I’m not going to point out but it’s important, is that the cross is where Jesus defeated Satan and his kingdom. He stripped principalities and powers of Satan’s kingdom, triumphed over them, made an open spectacle of them in the cross. That’s in Colossians 2:13–15—we won’t turn there right now. Satan can never undo the defeat which he received through the cross. But his strategy is to keep Christians from realizing what was done.

And so, Paul was tremendously concerned about these Galatians Christians. It’s rather interesting, you analyze Paul’s epistle, almost every epistle he wrote to churches he started by thanking God for what He’d done for them. Even the church at Corinth. And later he was going to reprove them for having incest, adultery, drunkenness at the Lord’s table, but he starts by thanking God for the grace of God given to them. But when he comes to the Galatians he’s so upset that he doesn’t even thank God. He said, “I marvel that you are so soon turned away from the gospel.” What was the problem in Galatia? It wasn’t drunkenness, it wasn’t immorality, what was it? Legalism. He was much more upset about legalism than he was about some plain sin of the flesh.

The results of witchcraft, which we are not going to analyze in detail, were twofold. Or you could say three. They had become carnal. The only thing that can keep us from being carnal is the cross. Once we lose the vision of the cross we can be very religious and very carnal. And having become carnal, they became legalistic. They returned to trying to keep laws in order to achieve righteousness.

Let me give you two simple definitions of legalism because it’s often used as a term to criticize other Christians with. So I’ll give you two objective definitions. Number one, legalism is the attempt to achieve righteousness with God by keeping a set of rules. And God has ruled that out forever. I see some of you look a little somber at that point.

I was talking to quite a large group of Christians once, a year or two ago, and in the course of my talk I said something which, for me, was totally casual. I said, “Of course, Christianity is not a set of rules.” and they looked at me in astonishment! I think if I had said there is no God they would have been less shocked. But that’s the truth. Christianity is not a set of rules. Do you agree? And keeping rules is not the way to achieve righteousness with God. He has ruled that out forever.

My other definition of legalism is adding any requirement for righteousness to what God has already stated in His word. No one has ever been authorized to add to God’s requirement. And God’s requirements are very simple, they’re stated at the end of Romans 4.

“If we believe in Him who raised Jesus from the dead, who was delivered for our offenses and raised for our [what?] justification [don’t forget that word], we shall be saved.”

Nothing more is needed. And no one has ever been authorized to add any requirement to that. So, what was the result? They went into carnality, they went into legalism. And, they came under a curse, which is always the end of people who become legalistic. And so, Paul sums it up in Galatians 3:10:

“For as many as are of the works of the law are under the curse, for it is written, Cursed is everyone who does not continue in all things which are written in the book of the law to do.”

All right. You set out to achieve righteousness with God by keeping a law, if you break any law at any point, any time, you’re under a curse. You’re obligated to keep the whole law all the time or else it’s of no avail to you for righteousness. So, he’s dealing with the problem of these Christians who, in turning away from the gospel of grace to a gospel of works, had come under a curse.

But then, praise God, he doesn’t stop there. He says there is a way out from under the curse. Because, on the cross Jesus was made a curse that we might be redeemed from the curse and come into the blessing of Abraham. And as I pointed out already, the blessing of Abraham covers everything. The blessing of Abraham covers every area of our lives. That’s the blessing that has been purchased for us by the atoning sacrifice of Jesus on the cross.

The problem today is that the majority of Christians that I meet, and I meet a lot, have no clear concept of what a curse is, how it operates or how to recognize it. I mean, if we’re sick we usually know we’re sick. If we’re sinning we frequently at least know we’re sinning. But when we’re under a curse we don’t know what the nature of our problem is or how to recognize it or how to deal with it. So I’m going to devote two sessions instead of merely one to this truth that we can be redeemed from the curse because on the cross Jesus was made a curse with the curse that was due to us that we might receive the blessing.

If you look at the picture of Jesus on the cross as He died, you wouldn’t want to be under a curse. There He hung in shame and agony, rejected by earth, refused by heaven, under a supernatural darkness, uttering a cry of agony, forsaken by His disciples, rejected by His own people, and absolutely with nothing in this world. That’s a curse. How foolish to want to be under a curse!

Now I want to try to explain to you briefly the nature of curses and blessings, or blessings and curses. My problem is I’m writing a book about it and I’m already into the 10th chapter and I’m only about halfway through the book. It is a vast subject. I never realized how vast it was until I got involved in it. I would also say that the lessons that I’ve learned in this context, in which I’ve preached around the world, have made a more powerful impact on the people that I’ve preached to than any other message that God has ever given me. It is a life-changing revelation, when you can receive it.

Curses and blessings are essentially words. They may be written, they may be spoken, they may be simply thought inwardly. But they are words that are charged with a supernatural authority and power. And they impact people and change them. And this is the really significant thing, is very frequently they continue on from generation to generation to generation until something is done to terminate them. There are blessings and curses in the Bible which have been in effect for 4,000 years and are still in effect today. Their outworking is still continuing today.

Why this concerns us is that there may be things in our lives which are problems to us for which we cannot find the source. And the reason is the source can be way back in history. Generations back. And so, we are groping ineffectively with something we don’t know how to deal with until we can identify its nature. So one of the distinctive features of both blessings and curses is that they continue from generation to generation. Not necessarily forever but mostly they continue for several generations. For instance, just to take one example, in the Ten Commandments God said if you worship false gods or make idols, it will come upon you and the succeeding generations to the third and fourth generation. That’s typical of a curse. And having dealt in Southeast Asia with multitudes of people whose ancestors two or three generations back were idol worshipers, I’ve seen how true that is. I’ve also seen the tremendous effectiveness of releasing them from that curse.

Now, the real key source for the revelation of blessings and curses is Deuteronomy 28. It’s a long chapter, it contains 68 verses. The first 14 verses deal with blessings and the next 54 verses deal with curses. That’s a lot of curses. By the time you’ve read through them, if you’ve got any sense, you don’t want a curse in your life.

I have here my little summary of the blessings and the curses. It’s not divinely inspired, you could change it. But I think I’ll put it on the board, putting it in front of your eyes. You’ve got it in the outline if you’ve got it there but I think it’s rather good to... So, here are the blessings. We’ll write B for blessings.

Number one, exaltation. You know what that means. It means being lifted up.

Number two, I put reproductiveness. I hope you can read my writing. I don’t hear any loud ahs so I rather doubt whether you can. That’s the only word I could find to describe the fact that a person who is blessed reproduces in every area of his life. He’s a fruitful person, whether it’s physically or financially or artistically.

Number three, health. How many of you would agree health is a blessing? You probably don’t appreciate how much of a blessing it is until you’ve been sick and then you wish you’d thanked God more often for the blessing that you had while you were healthy.

Number four is prosperity or success. And let me say that prosperity in the Bible doesn’t mean what it means to modern Americans. It’s unscriptural to interpret prosperity that way. For instance, the Lord promised Joshua that whatever he did would prosper and he’d have good success. And he spend the next how many years in warfare, sleeping in the open fields, leading the tough life of a soldier in war. It wasn’t a luxurious life, it wasn’t an abundance of physical pleasures or luxuries but, it was successful. He accomplished God’s purpose. The proper definition of prosperity is to succeed in doing God’s will.

Number five is victory. Blessing brings victory.

Number six, I put head, not tail.

And number seven, which goes very closely with it, is above, not beneath.

Now, I was reading that some years ago and I said, “Lord, what’s the difference between the head and the tail?” And the Lord gave me, I think, a very simple answer. He said, “The head makes the decisions and the tail gets dragged around.” So I’m asking you this morning, how are you living? Like a head or a tail? Do you make the decisions? Are the things you plan carried out successfully? Or are you the victim of pressures and forces and circumstances that drag you around and you just don’t know what will happen next?

The curses are actually the opposite. Curse number one is humiliation.

What’s the opposite of reproductiveness? Failure to reproduce, barrenness. And I would say barrenness is almost invariably the result of a curse.

Number three, sickness of every kind. And let me say there’s one type of sickness or one category of sickness which is particularly indicative of a curse, which is what they call hereditary, which goes from generation to generation.

The next one is poverty and failure.

The next one—they’re really self evident because they’re just the opposites—is defeat. I told you that I worked in east Africa. I worked among a certain tribe which I won’t name. I worked among other tribes. Going on.

Number six, tail, not head. And most of my students were Christians. But they never could believe that God was stronger than the devil. Ultimately, the person they feared most was the devil.

Number seven is beneath, not above. And so, I learned this monotonously repetitive phrase in Swahili, nemay shindwa, I have been defeated. “Please sir, it has defeated me,” they would say. That is a curse.

These are taken from Deuteronomy 28. I mean, you could read the chapter for yourself and I recommend you do. Decide whether you agree with my summary.

But now I’m going to give you seven indications of a curse which I have learned by observation in dealing with people. I made them independently of Deuteronomy 28, but it’s remarkable in my sight how much they agree. Here they are. You’ve got them in your outline but I’ll read them out.

I want to say if you have only one of these problems it may or may not be a curse. Although some of them are pretty likely. But if you have a lot of these problems, you could be almost sure you’re under a curse.

Number one, mental and/or emotional breakdown.

Number two, repeated or chronic sicknesses, especially hereditary. Why? Because that’s the nature of a curse.

Number three, female problems (barrenness, miscarriages, menstrual cramps and a whole host of others). As far as Ruth and I are concerned, when we minister to the sick, if a lady comes forward with those problems we simply assume it’s a curse. And very seldom are we wrong. I have a whole pile of testimonies of women who have been completely set free from those conditions not when we prayed for their healing but when we broke the curse over their lives.

Number four, the breakdown of marriage and family alienation. In other words, where families just can’t stick together and husbands and wives break up and divorce, remarry and very often divorce again. That is usually a curse.

Number five, financial insufficiency. Most of us go through times of hardship financially. I’m certainly no exception to that. But if you never make it, if you’re always struggling, if you never have enough, basically I would say that’s a curse.

Number six, accident prone. You’re one of those people to whom it always happens. You step off the curb and break your ankle. Or you’re in a car and somebody slams into you. And it’s always the fault of the other person but it’s you it happens to. Do you understand?

And number seven, of course, this is in a family, a history of suicide or unnatural death.

Now, that’s the end of my little list but in our next session I’m going to continue. I’ll give a general picture of a curse and then we’ll deal with how to come out from under the curse.

Part 8 – Release From Curses

In this session we’re going to continue with the exchange from curse to blessing. In the previous session I listed a number of examples of blessings and curses, taken primarily from Deuteronomy 28. But then I also added some which were the basis of my own observation. Actually, if you put the two side by side, it’s remarkable how much they agree.

I wanted to go on to say very briefly that apart from specific problems I want to describe to you what it’s like to have a curse in a general term. This is something that God has plunged me into in the last five or six years and He’s kind of taken me around the world and taken me to certain places and certain people as object lessons. I would say leaving aside the specific kinds of problems I’ve listed, a curse is like a dark shadow from the past. You probably don’t know where it comes from but it’s not from your life time, probably has something to do with your family background, and it just stretches out over your life and somehow shuts off the sunshine of God’s blessing. And you can see other people around you in the sunlight. But very rarely do you ever get into the sunlight yourself. And you have no idea what it is from the past that causes this.

Or, to take just another example, you could compare it with a long evil arm stretched out from behind you. And every now and then it maliciously trips you up or pushes you out of the way. Usually it’s like this, you struggled hard to get to a certain point in life where you say now I’ve got it made. And just at that moment something happens and success slips out of your grasp. So you go through the painful struggle again, get back to the same situation and again this evil hand trips you up. And this becomes a pattern in your life. And sometimes when you look back at your parents or your grandparents, or some other relative, you say that used to happen to them, too. It’s just the same kind of thing being repeated in my life story.

However, a curse does not always make a person obviously unsuccessful. I always think of a lady I met in Southeast Asia who was from a royal line and she was highly educated and successful in her career. She was a judge. I was teaching on this and she came up to me afterwards and said, “I don’t fit your description because I’m not unsuccessful. I’ve been successful.” But she said, “I’m frustrated.” She said in effect, “I believe in Jesus but I never seem to get the things that people are supposed to have who believe in Jesus.” So I spoke with her for a few moments and I discovered that she was descended from a long line of idol worshipers. I pointed out to her that is probably the nature of your problem. The essence of a curse, in a sense, is summed up in one word: frustration. And you can be successful and frustrated, how many of you know that? There are a lot of successful frustrated people in the world today.

Now, you say how could such a thing come over me? And I’m going to give you seven possible causes. I mean, there are other possible causes, we’re not going to be able to devote much time to it but we’ll just go through it rapidly. The primary cause of all curses is idolatry, the breaking of the first two commandments out of the Ten Commandments. I would say idolatry invariably results in some kind of a curse. But included with idolatry is the whole realm of the occult because though people don’t realize it, those who go into the occult are turning to false gods for help that they should be seeking only from the true God. So they are making false gods and they come under the same curse that’s pronounced on a person that makes an idol or worships a false god. And in my personal opinion, according to scripture, that inevitably and invariably results in some kind of a curse.

The second, which is very close to it, is false religion and secret societies. And any religion that rejects the revelation of scripture and rejects the particular unique place and function of Jesus is a false religion by biblical standards. I don’t need to tell you that the world is full of false religions. I also include secret societies because, in a way, a person who joins in a secret society has made a covenant with people who are worshiping false gods. And I don’t want to be controversial but the example that Ruth and I have encountered again and again is Freemasonry. My personal conclusion is any family in which there’s Freemasonry is liable to be under a curse. And if I had time I could give you example after example after example.

The next common cause is a wrong attitude to parents. Honor your father and mother that it may be well with you, and you may live long on the earth. Now, honoring your parents doesn’t mean you have to agree with them. They may be very wrong. But you have to treat them with respect. And in this present generation there’s probably a higher proportion of people who have a wrong attitude to their parents than any previous generation in human history. And when young people come to me for help I always try to check on their relationship to their parents.

You can have a wrong attitude to your parents and get saved. You can speak in tongues and you can go to heaven when you die but you will never have it well with you in this life. So you might as well adjust.

The fourth reason is injustice to the weak and the helpless. God is on the side of the weak and the oppressed. And the particular example which is so conspicuous today is abortion, the deliberate taking of a life of an unborn child. Because if there ever was an example of something weak and helpless, that’s an unborn infant. Again, my personal opinion is if you deliberately procure an abortion, you have invoked a curse over your life.

I have to stop at this point and say don’t get too depressed because there is a way out.

The next cause is anti-Semitism. In other words, hating and speaking against the Jewish people. When God called Abraham, He said, “If anybody curses you, I will curse him.” And that was transferred through Isaac to Jacob and to their descendants. Again, I say that no one will truly have it well with him who has a wrong attitude and expresses wrong words about the Jewish people. Let me add I am not Jewish. One of the most amazing examples of this is a close friend of ours, a Palestinian Arab born in Haifa, who is a United States citizen today, to whom I ministered and brought into the baptism of the Holy Spirit. I can’t go into his testimony in detail but he recognized that he and all his ancestors as far back as he could remember had persistently cursed the Jewish people. And when he repented of that, renounced it and was released from the curse, God has prospered him spiritually, in his family and in his business in an astonishing way. And today he boldly tells people and his fellow Arabs if you want the blessing of God you’ve got to change your attitude to the Jewish people.

That doesn’t mean the Jewish people are always right, let me tell you that.

Then, one of the commonest areas is self imposed curses, curses that people pronounce upon themselves. Like, “I wish I were dead. What’s the good of living?” “I know I’ll never make good.” “This always happens to me.” “I just can’t handle this kind of situation.” Do you know what you’re doing? You’re pronouncing a curse on yourself. We have dealt with scores of people who needed deliverance from the spirit of death because they invoked it by saying “I wish I were dead.” Do you know what that is? That’s an invitation to a spirit of death. “Come in, I’m welcoming you.” You don’t have to give many invitations.

Something that isn’t in the list but needs to be mentioned is curses from people with relational authority like parents and husbands. Unfortunately, many parents get provoked with their children and say bitter, angry words to them which they don’t really consider the implication. “You’ll never succeed.” “You’ll never make good.” “You’re a failure.” I’ve dealt with people in their 40’s and 50’s who were still struggling from the effects of words spoken by a father when they were younger than teenagers. Also, the words spoken by a husband to his wife. It’s unfair but it happens to be true. God has given husbands authority over wives.

Jacob said about an accusation that one member of his family had stolen Laban’s gods, he said, “The one that has done this, let him die.” He didn’t know that Rachel had stolen them. She was his favorite wife. The next time she gave birth she died under her husband’s curse. We’re not talking about something small and insignificant, we’re talking about something very, very real.

I’ve been writing in my book about the imaginary case of a husband that says to his wife, “You can’t cook. I’m sick of your food. You’ll never be able to cook!” The result is she never cooks. She’s talented and able in many other areas but when she gets into the kitchen she falls apart. And that continues for the rest of her life.

On the other hand, he didn’t know but he pronounced a curse on himself. He said, “I’m sick of your cooking.” For the rest of his life he has indigestion, you see? You can laugh, I agree, but it works. I happens. That’s the way it is.

Now, we have to tell you if you feel there’s a curse of death over yourself, there’s a wonderful way to get out of it. Psalm 118:17. You couldn’t count the number of times Ruth and I have said this. We are in a spiritual war ourselves. We’re not sharing theories, we’re sharing things we know. Psalm 118:17:

“I shall not die but live, and declare the works of the Lord.”

How many of you would like to say that? All right, say it after us the first time.

“I shall not die but live, and declare the works of the Lord.”

Now we’ll all say it together.

“I shall not die but live, and declare the works of the Lord.”

Amen, thank you, Lord. Then the last is witch doctors, shamans, tohungas, it depends on what part of the world you come from. jewogee if you’re from east Africa. Practitioners of satanic power. They’re very real, their power is real and they can kill. And lots of people are killed by witchcraft. There are today covens of witches in almost every major city in this nation that specifically pray against Christians. And pray against the marriages of Christian ministers. Their supreme aim is to destroy the church of Jesus Christ. There is again a real source of curses. Having lived in various countries like Palestine and Africa, where people specialize in that, that’s the man with power is the witch doctor. He’s the person everybody goes to. And in lots of countries people who’ve become Christians up to a certain point, if they can’t get what they want from God will go to the witch doctor.

Now, we come to the steps to get out of it. We’re going to do this very quickly. I’ve got four words, each of which begins with RE there. Recognize. Ask God to show you what your problem is. The whole aim of what I’ve been saying is to help you to recognize. Recognize. I feel that some of you have recognized. Suddenly a light has come on. You say now I understand why my life has gone that way. Now I understand what the problem was with my parents. I want to tell you there’s hope.

Number two, repent. If it’s your personal involvement in anything evil, repent of it. If you’ve been involved in the occult, you’ve been to a fortune teller, you’ve played with a Ouija board, you’ve studied books on the occult, you need to repent personally.

However, it may well be that it wasn’t your involvement, it was the involvement of your parents, your grandparents, your great-grandparents or other people. In that case, you repent on their behalf. You’re not guilty but you’re suffering the consequences. Do you understand what I mean? Whereas if you’ve done it you’re both guilty and suffering the consequences. But in order to clear that thing from your background, you need to repent on behalf of your parents or whoever it may be.

Number three, renounce. Declare this is not for me. I have been saved by the blood of Jesus. My faith is in the atonement of Jesus. On the cross He took all the evil that was due to me that I might receive all the good that is due to him. That’s renouncing it. The Bible says submit to God, resist the devil and what will happen? He will flee. Do you really believe that? Do you really believe he will flee from you? He’ll only flee if you’ve submitted to God first. He’ll laugh in your face if you haven’t submitted to God.

But the problem with many Christians is they’ve reversed that. They submit to the devil and resist God. Some of you may be doing that. You’re lying down under Satan’s pressures and attacks, you’re letting him walk over you. That doesn’t please God, that’s not humility. That’s unbelief. Stand up, take your stand. Say, “I’m a child of God. This doesn’t belong to me. I’ve been redeemed by the blood of Jesus out of the hand of the devil.” Do you know what Psalm 107:2 says?

“Let the redeemed of the Lord say so.”

Your redemption doesn’t really work until you say, till you make it your personal testimony. They overcame Satan by the blood of the Lamb and the word of their testimony. Let’s say that. I’ll say it the first time.

“I’ve been redeemed by the blood of Jesus out of the hand of the devil.”

All right, let’s say it again.

“I’ve been redeemed by the blood of Jesus out of the hand of the devil.”

Let’s say it once more.

“I’ve been redeemed by the blood of Jesus out of the hand of the devil.”

Okay. Now, it’s unfair to stop there. I could say the session is over and you can go and have a good lunch. But some of you would be frustrated. So I want to give you an opportunity personally to do this. If you feel that there’s some kind of a curse over your life, and you may not fully understand the reason but you see it’s there, and you believe Jesus was made a curse on the cross that you might be redeemed from the curse. I’ll be willing to lead you in prayer not addressed to me but addressed to the Lord, in which you cover all the bases. In other words, you fulfill the requirements. So if you would like me to lead you in a prayer, you’ve got to believe for yourself. I’ll join with you but I can’t believe for you. I think I’m going to ask my wife to come and stand with me, we do better when we stand together. If you want me to lead you in a prayer, would you stand to your feet. Please don’t feel embarrassed. Don’t stand because somebody else is standing. It’s entirely a personal matter between you and the Lord. Some of you may have been in a meeting where we’ve already done this. You don’t have to do it.

Now, I want to put this prayer in your lips. I want you to say it, you’re praying to Jesus, not to me. You’re making the right confession, you’re renouncing every contact. Another thing you have to do, I didn’t mention, is forgive anybody that you have resentment against. Are you ready? Please don’t look to me. Just turn your eyes to the Lord Jesus. You can keep your eyes closed or open, that’s doesn’t matter. Say these words:

“Lord Jesus Christ, I believe that you are the Son of God and the only way to God. That you died on the cross for my sins and rose again from the dead. That on the cross you were made sin with my sinfulness that I might be made righteous with your righteousness. And also, that you were made a curse with any curse that might come upon me. And now, Lord, I come to you for deliverance from any such curse. I repent of any sins that have caused it to come, whether by me or by my ancestors. I receive your forgiveness. I take my stand now against the devil and all his pressures, and everything he wants to do against me. And in the name of Jesus, I resist him. I refuse to submit any longer to him. And in the name of Jesus, I now release myself from any curse over my life. Because of what Jesus did for me, in His name I release myself and I receive the release now by faith with thankfulness. Lord, I thank you now. I praise you now. I believe you’re faithful. I believe you are doing what I’ve asked you to do. And all I can do, Lord, is thank you and praise you, commit my life to you that from now on your blessing may rest upon me. Thank you, Lord Jesus. Thank you.”

Now I’d like you to take a little while to thank him in your own words. Forget me, forget the people around about you. Receive with thanksgiving. Thank you, thank you, thank you, Lord. Blessed be the name of the Lord forever and ever. We love you, Lord Jesus. We praise you.

“Lord, Ruth and I stand together on behalf of the people that prayed that prayer now, and we declare them released from this day forward. In the name of Jesus we declare them released in the name of Jesus. Lord Jesus, we give you all the glory and the praise. We thank you that you were willing to take our place on the cross. We thank you for that one final all sufficient sacrifice on the cross, that by one sacrifice you have perfected forever us who are being sanctified.”

Let’s say that.

“By one sacrifice He has perfected forever us who are being sanctified.”

Say it again.

“By one sacrifice He has perfected forever us who are being sanctified.”

Now, if you’ve got the courage to do this, turn around to somebody next to you and say, “By one sacrifice He has perfected forever me who am being sanctified.” All right? Make it very personal. Have the courage to say it to a person.

All right. We have just one or two moments left. I think we have just about two minutes left or something like that. So, I don’t want to waste the time. Let me say to you this doesn’t automatically solve all your problems from this time on. But, it sets you facing in a new direction. I’ve dealt with many people who have been released from curses, some of them had to fight tremendous battles. I think of one man who is now a very successful artist who was a complete failure and flop in life. He’d been deep in the occult because his background was in Brazil. And he heard this teaching and he saw clearly there was a curse over his life. He did what I told him. But it didn’t happen overnight. Sometimes you have to fight, do you know that? You have to have what they call guts. You have to be prepared to slug it out with the devil and say, “Devil, I’ve met the conditions. You have no more claims. Get out of my way, there’s a child of God coming down the road. Step aside.” When he knows you really mean it, he’ll step aside. But it takes quite awhile sometimes for some of you.

So don’t be disappointed if there’s still a few remaining problems. Just know that you’ve set your face toward the light and you’re progressing in the right direction. May God bless you.