February 5, 2019 is Chinese New Year. We greet our Chinese friends a happy new year. But with this celebration comes certain practices that if you wear this certain color or put this certain thing in an area in your house, or if you are born in a certain year, you will either become lucky or unlucky.
That certain color or thing is probably good in aesthetics or as a decoration, but it should never be an object in which you put the destiny of your life into.
Paul warned Timothy in 1 Timothy 4:7 (ESV) “Have nothing to do with irreverent, silly myths. Rather train yourself for godliness;” Timothy was in a certain context which was full of practices that if you follow it, your life will be blest by the gods. Paul told Timothy not to put his hope on those practices but to put his hope in the Living God, Jesus Christ.
Back in the Old Testament, Moses warned the Israelites in Deuteronomy 18:10-12 (ESV) that “There shall not be found among you anyone who burns his son or his daughter as an offering, anyone who practices divination or tells fortunes or interprets omens, or a sorcerer or a charmer or a medium or a necromancer or one who inquires of the dead, for whoever does these things is an abomination to the Lord. And because of these abominations the Lord your God is driving them out before you.”
Why is telling a fortune or interpreting omens among other things in these verses an abomination to the Lord? This is detestable in the sight of God because you have transferred your faith into these practices or objects rather than in God.
So the next time you come across your “fortune” or “destiny” in a newspaper or what your life will be if you are born in this year, or what color or object is lucky, ask yourself a question: should I put my hope in these things or in Jesus Christ, the Creator of this world?
Rev. Francis Neil G. Jalando-on
#SeedsOfFaith
#BinhiSangPagtuo
February 4, 2019