Don’t Be Superstitious!

Word-Of-The-Day: ‘Have nothing to do with godless myths and old wives’ tales; rather, train yourself to be godly.’ (1 Timothy 4:7); ‘See to it that no one takes you captive through hollow and deceptive philosophy, which depends on human tradition and the elemental spiritual forces of this world rather than on Christ.’ (Colossians 2:8)

Throughout the history of man, people have learned to fear that which they should not.  Many superstitions were developed as warnings to avoid hurting yourself (walk under a ladder and bump it, and you may get a painter and/or a gallon of paint on top of you) or hurting others (opening an umbrella indoors could poke someone else’s eye out).  Others were admonitions to avoid evil spirits, wearing certain jewelry would ward off the ‘evil eye’ or wearing garlic would repel werewolves.  (I take a garlic tablet daily, and I haven’t been attacked by a werewolf… Hmmm.) 

Unfortunately, these can lead to unholy rituals, where the ‘attraction of good spirits’ and the ‘avoidance of evil spirits’ led many to worship Baal or Molech, sacrificing their children to ‘keep the peace’.  Today, animistic religions believe all natural items, such as rocks, trees, animals, and even buildings have ‘spirits’ that can have positive or negative influences on people.  Adopted from the Far East, ‘Feng Shui’ is the practice of properly placing furniture and belongings in a domicile or office to create a ‘positive’ living or working environment.  (Someone once mentioned to me we needed to ‘Feng Shui’ an office space; my reply of ‘you Feng Shui in here and you’ll be cleaning that up yourself’ got me a long, evil-looking, silent stare-down – but we didn’t Feng any Shui either. Winning!)

But God tells us not to be concerned about ‘luck’ or ‘waves’.  Most superstitions are tales are to control people with pagan, ungodly evil beliefs and not to protect them.  We are instead to immerse ourselves in God and only be obedient to Him, having Him to control His Creation.  The most powerful weapon against evil is Jesus, and knowledge of Him and His Word!  We see this in Matthew 4:1-11, where Jesus is tested by Satan, and each temptation is thwarted by Scripture.  We can be fooled to accept a ritual or a superstition through temptation.  Not all temptations are lustful or coveting, some are out of self-preservation; throwing salt over your shoulder after spilling some on the table is to avoid ‘bad luck’.   (In reality, all you did was make second salty mess behind you.)

Paul and his protégé Timothy provide for us that growing in the knowledge of Christ will remove the mystique of the myths that people have kept alive.  There is no ‘luck’ or ‘waves’ that people ride throughout life.  Only God can determine the path a person will take, through their belief (or disbelief) of Jesus as the Lord of All.   It’s not superstition, it’s all in God’s Plan.