Are there hidden holds in your life?

Do you find yourself banging your head against walls for one reason or another?

Is there some special aspect that seems to hold you back?

If so, you are anything but odd.

Everyone has sufferings and trouble in this place of testing called earth and there are often unseen reasons for difficulties, reasons that are constant but undetected, invisible.

This can come from harboring unforgiveness; from holding a grudge; from a defect in faith (simply not believing we’re “good” enough); or more mysterious things like curses.

When there are “hidden holds,” Sheol is enlarged; “hell” is bigger. Simply, we are not fully liberated. We have not completely partaken of what Jesus offered at the Last Supper. The size of our jail “cell” or “cage” depends on your sins and bad habits—in short, the inability to rein in, as Jesus did those Forty Days, the flesh and worldliness.

We’re held down by overattachments (to things and people). We’re held down by nostalgia and morbidity. We’re held down, too often, by the past. We’re literally “weighed down” when we overindulge.

But there are also, as stated, those “holds” that are secret and unseen.

This is a problem and it is truth—not ignorance, not “unknowing”—that sets us free.

“My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge,” says Hosea 4:6.

“Therefore My people have gone into captivity, because they have no knowledge,” reiterates Isaiah 5:13-14.

Years ago, a doctor even wrote a book called Unbroken Curses.

“The Scriptures clearly state that God’s people will suffer and eventually be taken into captivity if they continue in ignorance and sin,” wrote the author. “This applies to cases of curses. Far too often, Christians do not realize that curses have been placed on their lives. Thus, they cannot deal with them, but they wonder why they continually suffer afflictions as they do.

“The most common argument we hear from people is: ‘I don’t believe God would hold me responsible for something I don’t know about. I don’t believe He would allow a curse to come on my life when I did not know I was doing something wrong.”

But in fact the Lord does hold us accountable for everything that is in His Word and for not following closely the lessons of Jesus.

Any violation of the Commandments, any of the Seven Cardinal Sins, and any perfection attached to and originating in darkness, can suppress you.

It could be health—an issue that runs through a family. Curses are handed down from one generation to the next. It could be finances, simply not being able to live in God’s sufficiency. It could be emotions: a constant struggle with anxiety or depression. It could be failure in any area.

And it’s not just the wrong we or our progenitors have done that brings the curse. It may be coming from other people. When a person is jealous or envious, when a person doesn’t “like” you, when there is worldly competition, when there are unresolved past conflicts, when we’re misunderstood and others believe we have “dissed” them, the “vibes” they send can hold us back. We are bound in chains we don’t see.

Curses from the devil can be to cause injury, loss, destruction, and even premature death.

Break them, in the Name of Jesus. Break them on special days like Good Friday and Easter. But really, you can identify and bust a “hold” any day of any week if you invoke the Holy Spirit to identify them and then in Jesus’ Name take a hacksaw to the chains.

One thing to make sure of: that you don’t repeat the sins or failings of relatives and ancestors.

Sloth. Lethargy. Anger. Hatred.

Seek not what the devil gives (luxury) but that which Jesus gives (what you need).

We can also be “held back” when we live (again, often unknowingly) in a spiritually-plagued home or live on unclean or cursed land. It could be an object in your home. Or a book or video. Use Holy Water. Mostly, pray from the heart. It can be just a phrase or sentence. This is the prayer that Christ most quickly answers.

Break the “hidden holds” this Lent and all year round, and live in the Love of Jesus.