DARK SECRET OF THE OUIJA
CHAPTER 3
The air felt cold. Night had begun to creep in through the window. Jenny shivered. Her hand fell to the Ouija board.
"Do you think my Dad's ghost is here?"
Carol gave a short, nervous laugh. "This is only a game, Jenny."
"Let's go downstairs," Jenny said, folding the Ouija board. "I'm not sure we should be doing this. It feels—," Jenny searched for the right word. "Dark."
"That's just the sun going down."
"I guess. But I feel like getting out of this room and being around lots of live people." She stood up and looked at the fallen photo on her dresser.
"Just supposing your father's spirit really is here—and I'm not saying he is—how come you don't want to talk to him?"
"Something doesn't feel right." Jenny hurried to leave the room.
On Sunday evening, Jenny went to the Youth Group's year-end party at church. She watched the other kids dance and joke around, but she didn't feel like joining in. Her mind kept leaving the room, pulled away by questions about life after death. Who could help her with them? Not her mother. Jenny thought, Imagine Mom's reaction if I told her I may have talked to Dad!
Could Alan help Jenny? She watched the youth leader joke around with the other kids. The tall, sandy-haired man was leaning back on his folding metal chair, legs crossed, listening to the Christmas tales of John and Micky. Alan was sort of like a big brother, sort of like a father, but most of all an older and wiser friend. Jenny had often shared her feelings about her father with Alan, and he'd always understood.
When a game came out, Jenny wandered to the kitchen for a paper cup of punch.
"Is something bothering you tonight, Jenny?" a deep voice asked. Jenny spun around to find Alan standing in the kitchen doorway. "You seem distracted by something."
Jenny shrugged, watching the red juice swirl in her cup.
"The holidays can be depressing when you miss someone," Alan said.
"It's not just that," she answered.
Alan pulled out two chairs from the table and sat on one.
"Do you want to talk about it?" He motioned for her to sit in the empty chair.
"Can a—can someone who's died talk to us from Heaven?"
Alan raised an eyebrow. "What do you mean?"
Jenny took a step closer. "Well, suppose you play with a Ouija board. And suppose you ask it questions you don't know the answers to. And suppose that when it gives the answers, it claims to be someone who's dead."
"Hmmm. I think the Bible can help us out with this." He went over to the counter that divided the kitchen from the social hall and picked up his copy of the New International Version of the Bible. "Did you know the Bible tells us not to fool with Ouija boards?"
"It does? They had Ouija boards back then?"
"No." He thumbed through the pages. "But it's a form of divination—seeking answers from a supernatural source other than God. And the Bible forbids that somewhere in Deuteronomy." He searched more slowly. "Here. See if this helps you." He handed the open Bible to Jenny. "Chapter eighteen, verses fourteen and fifteen."
Jenny read the verses aloud. "'The nations you will dispossess listen to those who practice sorcery or divination. But as for you, the Lord your God has not permitted you to do so. The Lord your God will raise up for you a prophet like me from among your own brothers. You must listen to him.'"
"Moses wrote that," Alan said. "The prophet he said would come was Jesus Christ. Through Moses, God was telling us that instead of going to Ouija boards or some other form of divination for the answers to our questions, we should go to Jesus."
"But I have asked Jesus—many times—to tell me how my father died. I haven't gotten any answers until now. Couldn't Jesus use a Ouija board to help me?"
Alan frowned. "Would He do that if the Bible says we shouldn't use divination?"
"Maybe Moses meant we shouldn't use divination if we don't believe in God."
Alan paused to think. "When the Ouija board answered your questions, Jenny, where do you think the answers came from?"
"At first I thought they came from my mind."
"But you don't any more?"
"Well—." Jenny put the Bible on the counter. What would Alan think if she told him everything? But if she didn't tell him, who would help her figure things out? "I asked the Ouija board what caused my father's accident. It said a drunken driver did. When I asked it where the answer came from, it spelled out dad."
"You think it meant your father?"
Jenny nodded. "I didn't believe it at first, but when I asked for proof, my father's picture fell over, and it's never fallen over by itself before."
Alan sighed. "Jenny, I know you miss him very much, but it's not possible for him to speak to you now."
Jenny turned away so Alan wouldn't see the tears she suddenly had to fight off. "How do you know?" she managed to ask with a steady voice.
"Jesus gave us a parable that explains it. Remember the story in Luke sixteen, verses nineteen to thirty-one, about the rich man who died? He asked Father Abraham to send someone from Heaven to warn his brothers about the punishment that awaited them. Abraham told him no. Abraham said Moses and the other prophets had already warned them."
Jenny shook her head. "But that doesn't apply to my situation. I only wanted God to send my dad to me to help me understand why he died. Certainly God is loving enough and powerful enough to do that."
"Why don't you ask God to show you the truth about the Ouija board?"
Jenny turned to face Alan. "What do you mean?"
"Why don't you ask Him to tell you where the Ouija board's answers come from?"
Alan's suggestion echoed in Jenny's ears when she sprawled out on the floor of Carol's room the next day. She told her friend about their conversation.
Carol grimaced. "He's making too big a deal out of this game. It's not really divination. As long as it helps you, it's gotta be good, right? And if it's good, it's gotta be from God."
"That's what I think," Jenny said.
Carol's face relaxed into a smile.
"But I want to be sure," Jenny added. "I've asked Jesus to show me where the Ouija board's answers come from."
"Why don't we ask the Ouija board?" Carol headed for her closet and pulled out the game.
"We already did and it said dad," Jenny reminded her.
"So what's the problem?" Carol asked.
"What if it's not my dad?"
"Then it's our own minds. Either way, it's harmless," Carol said.
"I suppose so."
Carol opened up the board and put it in front of Jenny. Let's find out."
When everything was in position, Jenny looked firmly at the planchette and said, "I want to know the truth." Before she could state the question, the pointer started to move.
The girls watched it go to one letter after another. It moved so quickly, it seemed alive. As they realized what it was spelling, Jenny gasped and covered her mouth with her hands. Even without her fingers on the pointer, it still moved. Until at last it had finished.
Carol's fingers still seemed glued to it. "It can't be true," she said. "Don't believe it, Jenny. It can't be true."