The Power of Forgiveness: Walk Out of the Prison of Offense

Introduction

Invited by Pastor Samuel Mabboux to the Assemblée de Dieu de Nice Ariane, evangelist Karim Kabli shares that one subject weighed on his heart that morning: the power of forgiveness. For him, it is a "deeply essential" subject for the Christian life.

He says it plainly: offenses and wounds are like venom in the heart of some Christians. Through them the enemy can steal a destiny and put out a spiritual life. But he also announces that this service is a "morning of deliverance": God wants to set free many hearts imprisoned by words, situations and wounds.

The message follows a simple thread: why offense is unavoidable, what it produces in us, how God can even use it, and finally what forgiveness truly is, and what it is not.

Outline of the message

1. Offense, an unavoidable trap

Karim Kabli tells a story from the biography of evangelist Reinhard Bonnke, which deeply marked him. Out in the African bush, a boy of 16 or 17 stands in front of the headlights of his car. He asks for only one thing: "I want the power of the Holy Spirit."
Reinhard Bonnke lays hands on him. Back in his village, filled with the Spirit, the boy prays for a dying baby in its mother's arms, and the child is healed. The village chief sends for him and asks him to pray for his daughter, paralyzed in her legs, who had never walked. She is healed in turn, and a revival begins in the village.
The following year, the evangelist wants to invite this boy as guest of honor. They find him on the street, an alcoholic, broken, having rejected the faith. Because he was young and fragile, people had despised him, criticized him, wounded him. He did not know how to forgive, and "the gangrene of offense" destroys his life and his destiny.
For the preacher, it is an almost prophetic picture: one of the enemy's number one strategies to destroy your destiny is offenses and wounds.
Jesus says it in Luke 17:1: "It is impossible that no occasions of stumbling should come, but woe to him through whom they come!" The word stumbling here refers to offense, dishonor, wounding.
"You will hurt people, people will hurt you." That is the story of all human relationships: parents and children, couples, relationships of authority.
The preacher has understood one thing: the more authority a person has over us, the more we open our heart and our trust to them, the deeper the wound will be. That is why the enemy uses families so much.

2. Offense blocks your spiritual life

In Matthew 5:23-26, Jesus says: if you remember that your brother has something against you, "leave your gift there before the altar, and go your way. First be reconciled to your brother." Otherwise the road ends with the judge, the officer and prison. Karim Kabli also sees an inner prison here.
Every child of God is called to grow: in knowledge, in maturity, in faith, in spiritual authority. "No one is called to spend 20 years of Christian life at the same stage." Not only Pastor Samuel or evangelist Karim, but you too, right where God has placed you.
Offense stops something in God's presence. We can go through magnificent times of worship, an atmosphere of glory, and God's presence passes over us without refreshing us inside.
The preacher admits he has fallen into this trap himself many times: "I could even be in front of you this morning preaching" while the enemy may already have paralyzed his spiritual life.

3. Offense gives the enemy access

The apostle Paul writes in 2 Corinthians 2:10-11 that he forgives "that no advantage may be gained over us by Satan, for we are not ignorant of his schemes." Ephesians 4:26-27 adds: "Don't let the sun go down on your wrath, and don't give place to the devil."
Karim Kabli relates the testimony of a pastor of a church near Paris, whose congregation had plateaued at around 80 members. While he was praying and fasting, a woman of the church manifested a demonic presence and confessed to him that she had come with the mission of destroying the church and its pastor. She had found only one moment of access: the day of a house move when, carrying boxes, he had become angry.
Behind offenses that seem natural, there are spiritual realities. The preacher invites us to change our way of seeing: not to look only at the person who hurts, but at what is going on behind. The enemy often uses the people we love the most.
The word translated "place" is in Greek topos: a location, a specific spot. The unforgiven wound becomes a stronghold in the mind. It changes how we see others and ourselves, and ends up transforming our personality.
He gives examples: rebellion is often born of a wound caused by an authority, to the point that all authority seems dangerous. Christians who were once attacked by certain people can then project that wound onto a whole neighborhood or a whole community. "Why do you think the way you think? Why do you react the way you react?"

4. Bitterness deprives you of God's grace

Hebrews 12:14-15: "Follow after peace with all men, and the sanctification without which no man will see the Lord; looking carefully lest there be any man who falls short of the grace of God; lest any root of bitterness springing up trouble you, and many be defiled by it."
Seeking peace is already our part, our responsibility. And bitterness does not start out huge: it is a simple root that sinks into the personality.
The most serious thing, says the preacher, is that "many will be infected by it." A father wounded since childhood can pass his wounds on to his children, who will pass them on to theirs: a generational cycle of bitterness and destruction.
When we are hurt, that is precisely the moment when we most need God's grace. Letting offense do its work means closing heaven over your life at the moment when you need it most.

5. Wounds God uses to shape you

Karim Kabli says it with caution: certain offenses and certain wounds, God allows to produce sanctification in us. By dint of learning to forgive, God makes his own feelings grow in us, and the ability to forgive quickly.
Lived from within God's presence, these wounds produce an inner death and resurrection. They touch things in us that God could not have touched without this breaking.
The Canaanite woman of Matthew 15:21-28 is the picture of it. She comes for her daughter tormented by a demon. Jesus does not answer her a word. The disciples say: "Send her away." Then Jesus speaks to her of the children's bread that is not thrown to the little dogs. She could have given up everything, wounded by Jesus and rejected by those who represented him.
She bows down instead: "Lord, help me!" And Jesus says to her: "Woman, great is your faith! Let it be done to you even as you desire." The preacher prays that God will one day say the same to him.
Joseph too was hated without reason. His only "fault" was being loved by his father, who gave him a coat. His brothers "could not speak peaceably to him" (Genesis 37:4).
Karim Kabli shares his story. Since his childhood, his older sister held an indescribable hatred toward him: she could not say his first name and called him "that other one over there." In the hallway, she pressed herself against the opposite wall so as not to pass in front of him. He specifies that his family has since been converted. For him, some people are hated because of a grace they carry without seeing it.
Joseph's brothers say: "We will see what will become of his dreams" (Genesis 37:20). They did not only want to kill Joseph, but his dreams. At the bottom of the pit, then in prison after the betrayal at Potiphar's house, he must have been harassed by thoughts: "Where is your God now?"
What saved Joseph was a bigger vision, that of Genesis 50:20: "As for you, you meant evil against me, but God meant it for good." In the waves of offense, keep your eyes on what God is accomplishing in your life and through it.

6. What forgiving means

Often, what keeps us from forgiving is a wrong understanding of forgiveness. Wounds from 10, 20 or 30 years ago lock us in an inner prison whose key is on the inside: "Forgiving is setting a prisoner free and discovering that the prisoner was you."
He quotes a saying attributed to Nelson Mandela: holding a grudge is like drinking poison and hoping it will kill your enemies. According to him, doctors have also noted links between physical suffering and wounds of the soul. "There is no healing and no deliverance without true forgiveness."
The heart of the message: our readiness to forgive determines how God acts toward us. "Forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors" (Matthew 6:12).
Forgiving is not waiting for reparation. "You do not forgive because the other person deserves it, you forgive because you deserve to be at peace and to be free." The sign of true forgiveness is the absence of any desire for revenge: you can say "Lord, bless this person."
Forgiveness is an act of faith that leaves justice to God (Romans 12:19). And God's vengeance is not the other person's failure: it is the grace that transforms their heart and leads them to repentance, until the offended and the offender stand hand in hand before God.
"When I am healed, I will forgive": that is a lie. You are healed because you decided to forgive.
Forgiveness is not reconciliation. Reconciliation requires repentance. At the cross, all people can be forgiven, but only those who repent are reconciled with God.
Forgiveness is not denial. It acknowledges the offense, the wound, the injustice, then decides to give a gift beyond: "You owe me something, you hurt me, but I decide to forgive freely."

7. Forgiving at the foot of the cross

"It is impossible to forgive without forgiving from the work of the cross." Karim Kabli tells of being deeply wounded by men he had led to faith, baptized and welcomed for years, and who turned against him. His ministry could have stopped there.
One day, angry with one of them, he took communion in his living room: "Lord, it is hard to forgive, but I need you to do a miracle. I forgive him, I set him free, I place him in your hands."
Two things help us forgive: sincerity of heart, and the cross. Jesus carried in his body every wound, every offense, every injustice. At the foot of the cross, there is a transfer of grace: God's presence lifts the weight and fills us with a supernatural peace.
Forgiveness also touches families. The preacher tells of a woman who came to him after a sermon and said: "I forgive my family and I set my grandchildren free." In the following weeks and months, her whole family was converted.

Key takeaways

You cannot avoid being offended, but you can refuse to let offense become a prison.
Unforgiven offense blocks your relationship with God, gives the enemy a place, and lets a root of bitterness grow that infects many others.
Lived in God's presence, certain wounds become a place of sanctification, as for the Canaanite woman and for Joseph.
Forgiveness waits for neither reparation, nor healing, nor apologies. It is not reconciliation, and it is not denial.
It is at the foot of the cross, with a sincere heart, that forgiveness becomes possible.

Personal application

Is there an offense, old or recent, that has put a "padlock" on your heart and put out your spiritual life?
When you think of the person who hurt you, does bitterness rise up, or can you say "Lord, bless them"?
Are you waiting for reparation, apologies or your own healing before forgiving?
What stronghold of thought has a wound built in the way you see others or yourself?
Whom do you need to place in God's hands at the foot of the cross this week?

Verses cited

Frequently asked questions

Why is offense so dangerous for the spiritual life?

For Karim Kabli, offense is one of the enemy's number one strategies. It blocks the relationship with God ("leave your gift there," Matthew 5:24), it gives access to the devil (Ephesians 4:27) and it lets a root of bitterness grow that deprives us of God's grace (Hebrews 12:15).

What is the difference between forgiveness and reconciliation?

Forgiveness is decided alone: you remove from your heart everything the offense has infected there, and you set yourself free. Reconciliation is a second step that requires the other person's repentance. The preacher compares this to the cross: all can be forgiven, but only those who repent are reconciled with God.

Must you wait until you are healed to forgive?

No. Karim Kabli calls that a lie: we do not forgive because we feel better, we feel better because we decided to forgive. The moment you decide to forgive is the moment the healing process begins.