Imagine driving down the highway and encountering a line of roadblocks that force you to get off at an exit that doesn't go where you're going. Then imagine your irritation when you find out that someone with no authority put those roadblocks up, and they were actually made of paper. They were just painted to look like the real thing. You could have just nudged them out of the way and kept going if you had only known that they were fake. Instead, you got off the road and didn't get to your destination.

The devil has invented a number of paper roadblocks to healing. You can just mow them down and drive on and get your healing, unless you're convinced that they're real. Then you will stop yourself from getting what's yours.


"Bound sins"


According to this line of teaching, if someone else has unforgiveness toward you, they are binding a sin to you, and this can hurt you and hinder you from receiving from God. This is supposedly supported by Jesus' statement in John 20:23: "Whose soever sins ye remit, they are remitted unto them; and whose soever sins ye retain, they are retained." If the other person continues to "retain" your sins, you are supposedly penalized, and will have trouble receiving from God. Hah!

Was Jesus really saying that you can make someone else pay the penalty for his sins by not forgiving him? This would be contrary to everything else taught in the New Testament. God has washed you clean in the blood of Jesus. Jesus has already taken all the penalties for all your sins. God cannot force you to bear these penalties again just because someone else won't forgive you. The person who is in unforgiveness opens himself up to the devil and paves the way for destruction in his own life.


If we believe that someone else can get in the way of your healing through his unforgiveness, we have established a new priesthood between you and God. But the only priest you have is Jesus, your High Priest. Under the New Covenant, we are all kings and priests (Revelation 1:6). No one else can stand between you and God.

Your pastor (or rector, or priest, or whatever your group calls him) does not mediate between you and God. Under the New Covenant, Jesus is the only mediator between God and men (1 Tim 2:5). You still need a pastor. But that pastor is responsible to God to care for, lead and protect the congregation. He does not stand in an Old Testament-style priestly position. The man is on the same level as you as far as his standing in Christ. He is equipped by the Spirit to serve a specific function in the Body of Christ. Even if he doesn't forgive you (he should know better), that can't interfere with your own walk with God.


So, what was Jesus saying? I believe the point was that the disciples were entrusted with the message of eternal salvation. If they would publish it, people would believe and be forgiven. If they would hold back, the sins of those people would not be forgiven. This applies today as well. If no one tells a person about forgiveness of sins, that person will not believe, not be forgiven, and be lost forever. However, this cannot apply to people who are already believers.

Although you cannot ruin someone else's life with your unforgiveness, your forgiveness can affect someone else. According to 1 John 5:16, you can hold off trouble from someone who is sinning (to some extent) by asking God to forgive that person. If you are in unforgiveness toward that person, you can hurt him only to the extent that you do not pray for him this way. If the person willfully persists in sin for a long time, eventually Galatians 6:7-8 will come into play and he will reap corruption. (See Galatians 6:7-9.) This is a spiritual law that no amount of prayer can set aside.



Generational curses

Another fallacy is that a curse on your family could stop you from getting your healing. That is sheer nonsense; Jesus redeemed you from all curses when you were born again. I am not saying that curses on families are not real; God indicates in many places that children and future generations can be harmed by your sin. But once you are saved, you are free from any curse from your ancestors' sins. Your spiritual lineage is now very simple -- God is your Father, and he does not have any curse on him!

I could go on at length, but to keep this particular topic shorter, I have expanded on this in a separate topic, entitled Breaking generational curses.


Prior occult involvement

I used to be involved in the occult before I was born again. I renounced everything to do with it when I gave my life to Jesus Christ and I have never done anything occult since then. (Why should I when I have something far better now?) Yet some believers tried to tell me that I needed special ministry to break some supposed curse that would linger over my life even as a Christian because of my prior occult involvement. One fellow even took it upon himself to do some special little ritual for me to supposedly sever my spiritual ties to the occult. I'm glad no one was watching; I was embarrassed for his ignorance. All this proves is that some people have more faith in the devil than in the cleansing blood of Jesus Christ.


When you are born again, sin has no dominion over you (Rom 6:14) and you are delivered from the power (authority) of darkness and brought into the kingdom of God's son (Col 1:13). Well, are you delivered or aren't you? Yes, you are. You need no special ritual or prayer to get something you already have as a believer -- total dominion over Satan and all of his works in your life.


Hexes

If a witch decides to curse you, can that stop you from getting healed? Your answer is correct. I haven't even heard your answer, but it is correct. If you say that it can, it can. If you say that it can't, it can't. Of course, I prefer that you would say what God says -- that you are delivered from Satan's power. Colossians 1:13 says that you were delivered, so it is a colossal mistake to think you need to do something to "get" delivered from Satan's power. God promises that a curse causeless shall not alight on you (Prov 26:2). There is no cause for a curse on a righteous man whose standing with God has been secured by the blood of Jesus. This is probably why Satan hates talk about the blood of Jesus. If you know that you're blood-washed and clean before God, you know that no curse has any right to affect you.


However, I have met people who have gotten all upset over curses (actual or threatened) by witches. They panic and think "What am I going to do now?" Laughter over the devil's stupidity would be appropriate. As part of Abraham's covenant of which you are an heir, God will bless those who bless you and curse those who curse you (Gen 12:3). Whatever the witch says will come back on his own head anyway.

I know a pastor who was warned by a witch to get out of town -- "or else." This was in a nearby city that is known as a regional center for the occult. The pastor stood his ground despite her threat of a curse. The pastor was never affected as far as I know. However, the witch's family was constantly having catastrophes, so much so that one of her former followers left because she noticed how many bad things seemed to follow the witch around! Touching God's anointed is dangerous for the person doing the touching, not for God's anointed! You will reap what you sow eventually.


The devil has no authority whatsoever over a Christian unless the Christian hands it to him. The two ways you can do this are deliberate sin (which puts you in Satan's playground) and wrong speaking with your mouth (saying that the devil can do something to you). No curse can affect you in any way -- unless you agree with your mouth that it can. Then you have authorized the devil to act. He does not have the authority to do anything to you. His game is for you to use your own authority against yourself by agreeing with him!

I am not saying that witches do not have any power. Read about what the Egyptian witches in Exodus did, and you'll see that there is such a thing as occult power. I know from experience that these things are real. I am saying that witches do not have any power over Christians.



All hell breaking loose against you

First, all hell never breaks loose against you. You aren't enough of a threat yourself that all the demons will be called off everyone else to get you. Second, even if all hell did break loose against you, you have authority over all the power of the enemy and nothing shall by any means hurt you (Luke 10:17-20). From the standpoint of authority, you are seated with Christ in heavenly places, far above all demons (Ephesians 2:6, Ephesians 1:15-23). The name of Jesus makes every knee "under the earth" bow (Philippians 2:9-11). Therefore, no amount of attack from the devil excuses defeat.


The premise here is that if enough of Satan's forces come against you, they can defeat you. That is totally contrary to the Bible, which states that all of his forces were stripped of their power by Jesus' work on the cross (Col 2:15). The devil cannot defeat a Christian. You can only defeat yourself with wrong thinking and wrong speaking. If you want to speak about how big and bad the devil is and how you think that all hell is breaking loose against you, you are unwittingly authorizing that very thing with your mouth.

Sadly, even ministers of the gospel (maybe especially ministers) use this as an excuse for not walking in victory, bellyaching about their "special" trials they encounter because they are ministers. This proves only ignorance because ministers do not get temptations that are any different from the ones laymen encounter. This is proved by 1 Cor 10:13, which states clearly that any temptation you encounter is "common to man." Even if there were "special" temptations, that would still be no excuse to be defeated, because there is always a way of escape to avoid falling into the temptation (see 1 Cor 10:13 again).


No number of demons can ever stop your faith in the Word of God from working. The number of them "coming against you" is irrelevant.


Principalities in the heavenlies

A similar line of thought is that there are demons in the air trying to stop your answer from coming through to you, and that some kind of special prayer must bust through the demon layer for you to get your healing or whatever else you need. People usually use Daniel 10:12-13 to support this, where the angel sent with his answer was apparently detained by demonic opposers.

That may have been true in the Old Testament, where Daniel, on the earth and with no direct authority over the devil, could only wait the 21 days for his answer. It does not apply under the New Testament, where you are seated with Christ far above any demons that happen to be around. If you are seated with Christ in heavenly places, and you need something he provided, how many demons does your answer have to pass through? None! Your body may be on the earth, but you rule and reign over the devil and sit with Christ in heaven.


Also consider this from the earthly perspective. Daniel was not born again. God did not live in him. God lives in you. How many demons must God go through to get the answer from himself to you when he lives in you? None! Daniel's case does not apply to New Testament believers.

Do you see the silliness of supposing that principalities of the air can stop you from getting your healing, or anything else that you need?

I suppose that people sometimes look for things like this when they get impatient that they do not see the manifestation of their healing immediately. Gee, maybe some demons are holding up the answer and we need special prayer. Wrong. You need patience, not prayer, between the time you believe that you receive and the time that the answer manifests in your body. Besides, it's like praying away demons that are stopping your corn from growing because it doesn't produce full ears the day after you plant it. Some things take time.



Summary

Every one of these paper roadblocks exalts the devil and declares him to have power that he does not really have. He has no power over you. He cannot stop your healing from manifesting when you pray in faith. Only you can stop it, and one way to do so is to get into agreement with the devil that one of these paper roadblocks can really keep your healing away.