Recently, I was listening to an announcement about upcoming World Cup matches and a radio host mentioned an ocelot in Dorchester would be predicting the outcomes of games. This feline would be using its “special predictive powers” and “channeling his inner soccer spirit” to guess winners. One of the curators at this feline’s zoo stated, “we find a lot of the time when zoos do this, the animals are pretty right on.” While this seems innocent on the surface, the underlying principles and motivations are anything but naïve. Zechariah spoke about the same timeless reasoning—an attitude constantly affecting mankind. “For the idols speak delusion; The diviners envision lies, and tell false dreams; They comfort in vain. Therefore the people wend their way like sheep; They are in trouble because there is no shepherd” (Zechariah 10:2).
The use of supernatural animal powers doesn’t stop at sports predictions. Popular in America and Canada is a weather-predicting groundhog that even has a day set apart for observance. Every February 2nd (Groundhog Day) “the town of Punxsutawney celebrates the legendary groundhog with a festive atmosphere of music and food. During the ceremony…Phil emerges from his temporary home…if Phil sees his shadow he has predicted six more weeks of winter-like weather. If Phil does not see his shadow, he has predicted an early spring.” This ceremony has been celebrated for over 125 years and consistently receives mention on national news.
We can dismiss these practices as simple folly and harmless fun, as do most who take part in them. But the same could be said of Christmas or Easter. Today many of the mainstream holidays originating in paganism are the foundation of those who call themselves Christian. Hosea warned of our tendencies, “My people are bent on backsliding from Me. Though they call to the Most High, none at all exalt Him” (Hosea 11:7).
As God’s people we know better! We should never assume to be completely immune from the pull of Satan’s deceit. In Revelation 18 an angel cries out about the debase nature of Babylon—a description of the world we live in today. “Babylon the great is fallen, is fallen, and has become a dwelling place of demons, a prison for every foul spirit, and a cage for every unclean and hated bird! For all the nations have drunk of the wine of the wrath of her fornication, the kings of the earth have committed fornication with her, and the merchants of the earth have become rich through the abundance of her luxury” (Revelation 18:2-3). And to those of us with God’s Spirit an angel warns us, “come out of her, my people, lest you share in her sins, and lest you receive of her plagues. For her sins have reached to heaven, and God has remembered her iniquities” (Revelation 18:4-5). No amount of sugar-coating can change what God plainly labels as sin. It’s imperative that we focus on His clear voice in an end-time age so filled with confusion and deceit.
