INSIGHT FOR TODAY WITH CHUCK SWINDOLL.
Insight for Today provides practical, relevant insight into today’s issues with Biblical principles applied. This devotional will help you connect with God on a daily basis, while also equipping you with a Bible-based approach to transforming your everyday life. Insight for Today” is a daily devotional written by Chuck Swindoll.
The Topic of Chuck Swindoll Daily Devotional 1st February 2025 is “Superstition”.
Scripture: Isaiah 29:13 (NLT)
And so the Lord says, “These people say they are mine. They honor me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me. And their worship of me is nothing but man-made rules learned by rote.
TODAY’S INSIGHT – 1ST FEBRUARY 2025.
And so the Lord says,
“These people say they are mine.
They honor me with their lips,
but their hearts are far from me.
And their worship of me
is nothing but man-made rules learned by rote.” (Isaiah 29:13)
The Great Plague stretched across London like a thick, drab blanket. It came as a thief in the night . . . unannounced, treacherous, silent. The mortality rate was astounding.
Someone came up with the foolish idea that polluted air brought on the plague. So people began to carry flower petals in their pockets, superstitiously thinking the fragrance would ward off the disease. Groups of victims, if they were able to walk, were taken outside the hospitals. Holding hands, they walked in circles around rose gardens, breathing in deeply the aroma of the blooming plants. As death came closer, another superstitious act was employed with sincerity. Many felt if the lungs could be freed from pollution, life could be sustained. So ashes were placed in a spoon and brought up near the nose, causing a hefty sneeze or two. But nothing retarded the raging death rate. Not until the real cause was discovered—the bite of fleas from diseased rats—was the plague brought in check.
The awful experience gave birth to a little song which innocent children still sing at play. It was first heard from the lips of a soiled old man pushing a cart in London, picking up bodies along an alley:
Ring around the roses,
A pocket full of posies;
Ashes, ashes, we all fall down.
Conceived in the mind by ignorance, superstition cultivates insecurity and sends a legion of structural cracks through our character. It feeds on exaggerated, self-made lies which grow so thick that the boughs hide common sense—and worse, God.
You find superstition in sports. Some basketball players testify they simply cannot play the game unless they go through their strange warm-up ritual. The manager of one professional baseball team doesn’t dare step on a white baseline. Several pro football running backs have superstitious “dances” that follow their touchdowns—and you’d better not try to stop them! The news media reported that one of America’s Olympic skiers stuck a four-leaf clover in her jacket pocket before she hit the slopes.
Superstition enslaves many an entertainer. You wouldn’t believe the mental contortions they go through before their performances. Students are superstitious about getting good grades. Mothers are superstitious about their babies at night. Men are superstitious about their success in sales or the future of their careers. Multiplied millions are superstitious about their astrological forecast.
The worst? Superstition regarding the Lord God. The Reformers were among the first to see it and call a spade a spade. They wrote of it, preached against it, publicly exposed it—and were martyred because of it. Religious superstition is ruthless.
Before you write this off as applying to anyone but yourself, take a long, hard look at your own life. The goal of superstition is bondage. Remember that. If anything in your Christianity has you in bondage, it is probable that superstition is the breeding ground. You see, our Savior came to give us the truth and set us free. Superstition, although prompted by sincerity, brings the plague of slavery. Sincerity doesn’t liberate; Christ does.
You may be sincere. As sincere as a pocketful of petals or a spoonful of ashes or a song in the alley. But what good is a song if it’s sung to a corpse?
About Chuck Swindoll Daily Devotional “Insight for Today”.
Today’s Insight is written by Chucks Swindoll. Chuck Swindoll has devoted his life to the accurate, practical teaching and application of God’s Word and His grace. Since 1988 he has served as the founder and senior pastor-teacher of Stonebriar Community Church in Texas, but his listening audience extends far beyond a local church body. The radio broadcast of this devotional program has aired for more than 35 years. Read more.
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