From Witchcraft to Jesus
I was an excellent tarot card reader. I didn’t know, at the time, it was witchcraft. It all began so innocently. But isn’t that just the way of darkness? It uses something seemingly fun and innocent to lure us in. And just to give it a kick, make it profitable.
It was 1997 when a couple of friends and I found ourselves in the same seasonal predicament. We were 20ish, wading in the murky waters of unwanted singleness, and were either unemployed by choice, laid off, or despised our job. That left us with too much free time to while away.
I don’t recall exactly how it happened. Perhaps it was a drunken game of adult truth or dare. Or maybe we saw one of those late-night commercials for the psychic hotline. Regardless of how it got started, I wound up calling a 900 number to get a psychic reading.
The High Cost of Seeing the Future
It would’ve ended there, except my reading materialized. Now, my friends wanted a reading. It became our thing to do. Each reading was done with tarot cards, and each had some element transpire, if not all. This went on for several weeks. The insane amount of my phone bill got me seeking a cheaper way.
A trip to the local bookstore solved the problem. When I asked where their tarot cards were located, the employee went into a back-curtained-off room—a room I had never noticed until that very moment. I felt a chill at the secrecy of it all. Nonetheless, I forked out twenty bucks, and he handed over the cards complete with instructions. I was ready to read the future.
I accurately predicted marriages, divorces, deaths, job changes, miscarriages, births, etc. It wasn’t long before co-workers, friends of friends, and others sought me out for readings. I started charging a fee.
I was making quite a bit of money. But the heaviness in my spirit increased. That empty gap I’d tried all my life to fill got larger. What started as fun and games turned a profit and became deeply unsettling. My readings were still accurate, but they came at a cost to my spirit. I didn’t understand why.
Enter Jesus
Then one late summer night I read the Bible instead of calling psychics or doing readings. The anchors fastened to my soul began to loosen. Even though I didn’t understand most of what I was reading, I felt better. I continued reading nightly. Transitioning from reading the future to understanding the past took time and effort. But little by little, I felt the shift.
I didn’t discuss it with anyone. I didn’t want someone to convince me. If God was real, I wanted Him to tell me. So He did. I read the book of John for about the third time in a row and it hit me. All I have to do is confess my sins and accept Jesus as my Savior? That’s it? That can’t be right. Could it?
I crawled out of bed and hit my knees. I committed my life to Christ, I threw out the tarot cards and never regretted it. Freedom replaced the heaviness that loomed through me. Joy replaced longing. I felt whole.
There is nothing that can fill that God-shaped hole in us except God. Ask Him to show you who He is. But be ready. He may show you in ways you never imagined.