My oldest son, Bubba took his girlfriend to dinner and a show recently in what we refer to as the “Big Apple”, good old New York City.

Now, Bubba has been into the city numerous times, he’s been in to see plays, skate at Rockefeller Center, have dinner in some of the finer restaurants, take in a ballgame at Yankee or Shea Stadium, etc. So the city is really nothing new to him.

Anyway, they were strolling down Seventh Ave. The other day when they came upon one of those con men running one of those shell games on the street. Bubba stopped for a minute and watched as the con man asked his customer under which cup the nut was.

The customer said he wasn’t sure and Bubba proudly blurted out “it’s under the middle one”.

The con man said “you’re right, you win” and he threw twenty dollars down on the table for Bubba . . .

The baited hook and Bubba fell for it. Before Bubba finally walked away from that con man and his table Bubba had lost a hundred dollars. He came home after the show and dinner still kicking himself for having fallen prey to the con man.

He said “Dad, I don’t know why I fell for it, it all seemed so easy. I found that first nut without a problem and then I couldn’t find it anymore.”

I reminded him of something Grandpa used to always tell me . . . “Even a blind squirrel will find a nut every once in awhile”.

Well, I finally calmed Bubba down by asking him if he had learned anything from the experience, which he replied yes too.

Bubba had learned a lesson but it had cost him a hundred dollars in the process.

I was thinking about that over coffee this morning. I thought about how Bubba had been deceived by the con man . . . How things weren’t really as they had appeared to poor Bubba during that con game. And then I thought about what Grandpa used to say . . . “Even a blind squirrel will find a nut every once in awhile”.

That got me to thinking . . . Thinking about all these so-called “prophets” who seem to be crawling out of the woodwork since the incidents on Sept. 11th. These “prophets” who claim they prophesized those events or what lies ahead for us. “Prophets” who have come out bragging about other so called “prophecies” of theirs that have come true.

I thought about how these “prophets” are like the blind squirrel who finds a nut once in awhile, because every once in awhile one of their so-called prophecies appears to have come true from the way they explain it. In the meantime they are leading people astray, pulling them away from the Lord and into Satan’s con game.

False prophets and false prophecy . . . Perhaps something for all of us to think about and beware of.

Just a thought!

Durango KR1356@aol.com