It's Too Easy to Say "Yes" to the Enemy

I enjoy strange things. No, literally - I enjoy strange things. UFOs, conspiracies, that sort of thing. That doesn't mean I believe everything I read/hear/watch, it just means I like stretching my brain a bit.

For years, I've been listening to a radio show called Coast to Coast AM. It's a show about all the bizarre things in the world. Sometimes I tune out because it gets downright unbiblical. I pick and choose my episodes carefully. Well, it's 7:22 a.m. here and I never went to bed last night. (Thanks, insomnia.) I tuned into an old episode - from the mid-1990s, when I was still in high school - and the guest was Father Malachi Martin, a.k.a., "The Exorcist."

Yup, that one. From the creepy movie. (So creepy, in fact, I decided to add a little facetiousness to the mere mention of it...)



If you didn't know, it's based on a true story. But I assure you, this has nothing to do with the movie or the story itself.

The host of the show at the time, Art Bell, asked Father Martin how someone can be possessed by a demon. His response was lengthy, but something he said struck me. I don't remember his exact words, but he basically said that people say "yes" to many things without even realizing it. We may not utter "yes" from our mouths, but that doesn't mean we don't sign on to do whatever it is.

Actually, ya know what? Maybe we should talk about Ouija boards for a minute here. It's a perfect example.

How many people play with a Ouija board with the attitude that it's just a children's toy? They might do it out of pure morbid curiosity, entertainment, even thinking it's funny. They don't sit down in front of the board and say, "Yes, I hereby open myself up to demonic activity!" But that's still what they're doing. You don't have to say yes to mean it.

Ten years ago this month, I got a book published. I thought I was on my way to...what, exactly? Who knows. Bigger, better things, anyway. Ah, but it didn't happen that way. I've always struggled to "make it" as a freelance writer. It has occurred to me on more than one occasion that if I wrote about other things, I could make more money, but some of those other things are contrary to my faith. I would never sit down and choose to "sell my soul," but if I'd gone that path, I would have been selling my soul, in a way. I would have been saying "yes" to something so dangerous without having ever uttered a word. What kept me from traveling that path? To quote Father Martin, who was answering a similar question for a listener: "The fact that you didn't means that Jesus Christ has ownership of your soul."

I'm a Christian, which means I belong to Christ. I cannot be possessed, but I can still be oppressed. I'd never thought about my decisions this way until I heard Father Martin on the radio this morning. I realized that I say "yes" to a lot of things without recognizing or acknowledging them. Perhaps it's time to take a fresh survey of my life and see how much I blindly let into my heart.