The Lord Jesus Christ warned the disciples regarding those being led by blind leaders. When a blind man leads another blind, both will fall into a pit. (Matthew 15:14) However, humans tend to love, listen, and live loyal to those misleading leaders. “So do not listen to your prophets, your diviners, your dreamers, your fortune-tellers, or your sorcerers.” (Jeremiah 27:9) Interestingly, Jeremiah lists five kinds of blind leaders.
False Prophets: They are imitators of true prophets. God uses prophets who are holy, faithful, obedient, and listen to the voice of the Holy Spirit. False prophets do not like all these spiritual disciplines, and presume, this is what God’s message is and deliver them as God’s message. They are familiar with God, His word and even acquainted with true prophets, but they are pretenders and hypocrites.
Diviners: They also pretend to be leaders in the community. By spreading the word about their prowess through friends or social media, they gain attention. When people go for guidance, they do elaborate rituals and declare certain objects as holy, and that object becomes the medium for God to communicate. The object could be a lemon, a flower, a book (even a Bible), or anything.
Dreamers: There are mystics, who go into trance and claim to see something invisible to other people’s eyes. They claim to visit heaven in their dreams, have direct communication, and even have some time for meals with God. With creative imaginative powers, they could tell wild dreams as if they were real. Sadly, many people fall for the dreams they tell and harm themselves.
Fortune-Tellers: These people use some tools. It could be a horoscope, the position of stars during the birth of a person, numerology, tarot card readings, and reading the rays in the palms. According to them, the mysteries of the destiny of a person are hidden in these and they have the special power to decode them.
Sorcerers: They use magic and even tantric powers they gain through some strict rituals, mostly in graveyards using human bones including skulls.
Do I follow blind leaders?