Kicking the Habit

[HKHaugan]

Kicking the Habit

 Folks, it’s a bad habit.  Telling people ‘good luck’ is meaningless.  I know we are conditioned by the culture to say it.  I know it’s almost a natural thing to do. We may even say, “ I guess I’ve been lucky” when people ask about our lives having been long and productive.  Just harmless words, or so we think. What I’m just suggesting is there might be a better way.  How about “Be blessed?” But why?    

 There’s a big ‘why?’ in this. Luck and those other words, like fate and karma, don’t exist.  Superstitious practices don’t work.  Superstitions like a rabbit’s foot, lucky charm, potions, it’s-in-the-cards, knock on wood, horseshoe over the door,  picking your feet up when crossing railroad tracks, throw salt over your shoulder, walking under a ladder, palm reading, avoiding the 13^th floor, Friday the thirteenth, whatever anyone conjures up as a personal superstitious practice, they’re all fear things we think we can control.  These are all spiritual enemies, spiritual frauds, inducing hidden anxieties.  They’re scammers trying to keep us uneasy.  They are subtle temptations sent by the spirit of fear, the devil’s spirit, getting us to think we can be in control of what can’t be seen. 

 The force behind them is evil, its source the devil.  They are momentary distractive strategies he uses to move us away from reliance on the presence of Jesus through the Holy Spirit.  ‘Good luck’ does nothing. It’s devised as a way of making people feel good about themselves when they say it and the people who receive it to feel they’ve been supported by the sayer.  When you hear a sports reporter wish a player good luck, he does it to the opponent as well. What’s that all about?  And, there’s always that subdued ‘thankyou’ that follows.

 Think about the other cultural explanations like “It was just his fate.”  You hear that and the result is a non-verbal sigh of acceptance.  Fate and ‘the fates’ are myths also based on fear.  Then you hear that something bad happens, but it was ‘karma’ at work.  Karma is simply giving in to a spirit of despair.  ‘Whatever goes around comes around’ is actually an avoidance meaning ‘just give up trying to understand.’ It defies the truth that every next moment is a new moment with new possibilities filled with hope, hope that God will make something new out of every circumstance.  All these cultural icons condition us to see life as a fearful place that can only be dealt with by meeting every circumstance with worry, despair and surrender to apathy since tragedy is always waiting for us.  A simple ‘good luck’ may seem harmless but start piling them one on another and a Godless spirit builds an interior attitude.  What happens is that we start conceiving all the frightening things that might take place.  It lies hidden in the heart. 

 The images freeze us into superstitious habits from which only the Lord Jesus can free us. You can kick the habit and have a Holy Spiritude. His Holy Spirit takes the wraps off of evil, exposes it for what it is, empty, meaningless and powerless.  It is for freedom that Christ has set us free. One time when Jesus crossed a lake, he was met by a man filled with a legion of spirits that had taken him over.  Jesus drove them out and freed the man (Mark 5:6-13). When we are spiritually free, we are free everywhere for all time.  In whatever you do today and every day, may God bless you.  Be blessed. Have a blessed day. I hope your game, your coming tasks, your relational encounters are blessed.  A blessing is God’s touch.  Share it in praise and thanksgiving.