Several years ago, Natalie and I visited Sedona, Arizona — famous for its beautiful red rocks. Every direction you turn is like looking at a postcard.

One morning, a tour guide drove us around the area and introduced us to stunning rock formations like Cathedral Rock, Steamboat Rock, and my personal favorite — Coffee Pot Rock. It’s a paradise for hikers, climbers, and mountain bikers.

During the tour, we also were told that many people come to Sedona for its healing energy and vortexes. The tour guide pointed out several areas across the valley known for their mystic power.

One Sedona company explains it this way: “Sedona [is] world-renowned for its ability to transform, awaken and heal those who enter it…” One visitor wrote in a review, “It truly felt as if we had an initiation from the rocks that will take us to a whole new level in our healing practice.”

As you drive down Highway 89 through Sedona, you encounter crystal shops, vortex tours, psychics, tarot readings, astrology sessions, apothecaries, labyrinths, indigenous herbs, bones, feathers, and spell supplies. I’ve seen the same thing in places like Ojai, Joshua Tree, and Lake Arrowhead. There are even a surprisingly high number of psychic shops right here in the San Fernando Valley.

Sedona is beautiful and I highly recommend it for those who enjoy the outdoors, but it’s a striking example of how neo-paganism is on the rise. Don Veinot writes, “the belief and adoption of pagan worldviews is growing. Witchcraft is no longer in the world of make-believe and television entertainment, but is more and more mainstream belief which includes the appropriate spells, spiritual retreats, mindfulness workshops, incantations and positive thoughts necessary to transform creation to conform to their will.” (Journal of Modern Ministry, 1.1, p. 146-47).

As our society drifts further away from the knowledge of God, what we see is not the absence of religion, but replacement of true religion with man-made religion. Neo-paganism contains elements of mystery, transcendence, and superstition, blended with personal experience, religious objects, holy space, sacred ritual, and ideas of a higher power. What is absent is the God of the Bible.

I shared more about this in a recent sermon at Calvary Church. Afterward, several church members came up to share their own experience and concerns over the rise in paganism. In this study of Judges 17-18, we learned…

• Signs that neo-paganism and the occult are on the rise
• The lure of paganism in ancient Israel
• A “hippie priest” and his new home
• Dan’s discontentment
• Common features of neo-paganism
• Practical ways to stay pure in a pagan culture

Here’s the audio link…

Thanks for listening. Click here to find more sermons to help you grow in your walk with God.