Confessions of a Christian Magician

Confessions of a

Christian Magician

Jim Reiher

Smashwords Edition

Copyright © 2016 by Jim Reiher

All Rights Reserved.

Foreword

This book has been a long time in coming. I have written other ‘heavier’ books before this, including: a work book for Koine Greek students; a book on Tarot cards; another on ‘Prosperity Teaching’ and its failings; another on Women in Leadership in the Church; and some Biblical commentaries on the epistle of James, the book of Acts and the Gospel of Mark.

It seems that every time I write a new book, I lose more friends and alienate another ‘wing’ of the Christian Church!

• My book that debunked prosperity teaching in the church was not all that well received by the churches that teach that worldly doctrine.

• My book on why women should be fully equal in the church, was not so well received by the parts of the church that want to have men only be the leaders and preachers.

• My book on Tarot cards was not all that well received by yet some other sections of the Christian church: the fundamentalist conservatives who think any use of ‘new age material’ is inherently flawed and sinful.

• My commentary on James angered Christians who supported the Iraq War and who think it is quite appropriate to use violence to solve problems in the world.

• My commentary on Acts upset some evangelicals in places.

• And I am well aware that for some parts of the Christian church, this book will be somewhat controversial.

Nevertheless, this book is definitely lighter than my other writings, and it is purposely fun-filled. It is a light hearted exhortation to encourage creative ministry.

Just prior to the decision to write on the experiences of a ‘Christian magician’ I was experiencing the infamous ‘writer’s block’.

Then it happened. A light bulb went off. Well, not an actual light, but the idea came to me for a book on slight-of-hand magic, and faith. Such a book could achieve a number of goals:

• It might inspire creative ministries in churches.

• It should give the reader a joyful reading experience that isn’t too heavy.

• It will reflect on certain aspects of Christian fundamentalism.

• It definitely encourages tolerance and acceptance of other people’s gifting.

• And in the midst of all that, it conveys some serious food for thought.

My joy in doing magic has been life long. It started when I was 10. And I am still a big kid at heart. My family enjoyed and endured my obsession for years. My children are so used to my tricks now, that they don’t give them a second thought. One of the little pleasures in life is finding a new card trick that the adult ‘kids’ can’t work out, and then, after some time, (maybe) letting them in on the secret. One of my greatest challenges is to dazzle my daughter with a new trick. She is too smart! She usually works out the secrets, but every now and again, she gets stumped. But the whole family have been encouraging over the years, and wonderfully supportive, especially when criticism (from fundamentalist Christians) has come my way.

Time passes and children grow up and move on. Now I have some delightful grandchildren who are old enough to get perplexed by the egg disappearing and reappearing in its egg cup, or by the balls that go into a tube in a certain order and then come out in a different order, or by my wooden duck that selects a chosen card with its beak, or by the hundred other tricks that I have used and reused over the years to bring a bit of laughter and joy into people’s lives.

I hope this book brings a joy into your life as well.

Table of Contents

Introduction

Part I: My discovery of magic

1. How I First Became Interested in Magic

2. Harry Houdini, my Boyhood Hero

3. My First Party

4. To Have an Assistant or to Not Have an Assistant: That was the Question

5. Finding Faith, and how it Impacted my Hobby

Part II: The Clash: Magic verses Fundamentalism

6. Meeting Fundamentalists for the First Time: my new Friend Sam

7. More Conflict With Some Christians: the Family That Left our Church

8. Ways to Soften the Blow

Part III: Merging Magic with Clowning

9. Combining Magic with Clowning: My Humiliating Start

10. Taking Clown/Magic Further

11. Our First Full Routine – An Example of a Clown/Dance/Magic Act

12. Performing with Guy Sebastian

Part IV: Practical Tips

13. Developing a Message From a Trick

14. When a Trick Goes Wrong

15. Magic in Different Settings

16. Some Great Card Tricks

Part V: Harry Potter and Jesus Christ

17. What do we do with Harry Potter?

18. Putting the fun Back into Fundamentalism!

Introduction

Question: Why does a man in his 50’s still get toys for Christmas?

Answer: Because his hobby is magic.

Question: But seriously, isn’t that something you grow out of?

Answer: I’m sorry, but I don’t understand the question...

Question: Isn’t it a bit inappropriate that a person who calls himself a Christian, should be doing magic?

Answer: It all depends on what you mean by magic. Maybe we need to define some terms here.

The word ‘magic’ affects different people in different ways. For some, their hearts stop. I have occasionally met some Christians over the years who have nearly wet themselves when they find out that I do slight-of-hand tricks for a hobby. They read their Bibles! They know about thirty verses out of the thousands and thousands that are tucked away in that huge book. They know that when ‘magic’ is mentioned in the Bible, it is a bad thing. It is linked to the occult, to other religious practices, and to activities done by bad people in the Scriptures.

But ‘magic’ done by an entertainer today, is not the same ‘magic’ that such people are thinking of. The same five-letter word is used, but it does not represent the same thing. ‘Magic’ in the Bible is about sorcery – tapping into occult powers and allowing spirits to do unnatural things through you. That is a million miles away from what a professional entertainer called a ‘magician’ does today.

Words often change their meaning over time. Some words get used for different things. There are lots of examples of this. I remember when you could say that you were ‘gay’ and people thought you were just ‘happy’. That word is not used the same way, most of the time, anymore. So if someone says that they are ‘gay’ today, we acknowledge that they usually mean something else.

The little word ‘let’ used to mean ‘to hinder’. Weird hey! That little word means the complete opposite these days. Now it means ‘to allow’ – but a couple of centuries ago it meant ‘to hinder’. Interestingly there is at least one use of that word even today, where it still means ‘hinder’. Can you think of where? Yes! In the game of tennis. A ‘let’ ball, is one that is ‘hindered’ by the net, when served. But mostly, when you hear it mentioned, it means ‘to permit’. (Okay, I will let you read the rest of this book!)

Likewise ‘magician’ mostly means ‘an entertainer who does tricks, and who tries to hide the gimmick from the audience’. Other than in the Harry Potter books (which are fiction, remember), it does not usually mean ‘someone with real magical powers’. Most people realise that when they watch a modern entertainer called a ‘magician’, they are watching a performer, who is hiding secrets from the audience. Only the very young, or the very naïve, really believe that something genuinely ‘magical’ is happening.

So this book is, amongst other things, a call for tolerance, and understanding. Let’s try to see what is really going on before we judge or condemn someone, or someone’s gifting. I have had a wonderful time over the years with my hobby of ‘magic’ – and not even the nastiest and most ignorant criticism by some Christians has dampened my joy of the craft!

Part 1:

My Discovery

of Magic

1. How I First Became Interested in Magic

It started when I was ten years old. My cousin Clive was considerably older than me. He must have been in his late 20’s. I remember him and his wife visiting our place occasionally. On one of his visits, while he was speaking to me, he suddenly took out of his pocket a tiny red bottle. It was made of wood, nicely painted, and about as long as one’s thumb. It was shaped like a ‘Jeanie’ bottle. Clive held the bottle between the index finger and thumb of his left hand.

‘Watch me lay the bottle down,’ he said. And he did. He gently laid it on its side and it stayed on the table motionless. ‘Now you try to lay it down,’ he added, as he picked it up and handed it to me.

‘Sure’ I replied, and I proceeded to lay it on its side too. But to my surprise, it sprang up and stood completely upright. It was clearly weighted at the base, and there was no way in the world, (it seemed to me) that it was going to lie down! Every time I tried to put it on its side, it just kept jumping right back up.

I then said a phrase that I would later hear more than almost any other comment fired at a magician, after doing a magic trick: ‘Do it again!’ I called out. ‘Do it again!’ Those three words would be and still are one of the most common responses ever made by children (and some adults) when they are stumped by a trick, but when they really want to work it out for themselves. And all good magicians know the correct response to that request: ‘Sorry, I can’t do it again. It’s magic, and it might not happen exactly the same way if we try to make it!’

I have since developed a few other lines that I love to use in response to that request.

To young children (about 5 to 9 year olds):

‘Do it again?...Do it again?... I am not allowed to do it again! I have made a promise that I won’t ever do a trick twice in a row...You wouldn’t expect a person to break a promise would you?’

Or to slightly older children or adults:

‘Do it again? Are you kidding? If I do it again, you might work out how I did it!’ That line usually wins a smile as I acknowledge that the inquirer is actually quite intelligent and I only got away with the trick because for a moment I must have distracted them.

Or for the 10-12 year old boys (usually the most playful and mischievous of my audiences):

‘Do it again? No way! I can’t do that! If I do it again, and you successfully guess the secret, I would have to kill you because you would know too much!’

I save that last line for the bigger boys. I tried it once on a 6 year old and he looked terrified after I had delivered the line, so I quickly added: ‘Just kidding!’ with a big grin.

‘Do it again!’ I pleaded with my cousin Clive, but he only said: ‘Maybe later’. Of course, what that statement means in magic talk, is ‘This is a trick that needs to be ‘reset’ and I can’t do it again right now – not until I am alone, and can reset it unobserved.’ But as a ten year old, uninitiated into the art of slight of hand, I had no idea about the real meaning of such an innocent phrase!

Clive would visit us every five or six months. And he got into the habit of bringing a trick out each time. It was the highlight of his visits for us kids.

There were four of us. My older sister Gail, was two years senior to me. My younger sister Linda, is three years my junior, and then there was the new baby Steve: nine years younger than me. The two girls especially, would end up being my constant audience for practicing new tricks on.

The other trick I recall Clive doing was one I still use to this day. It is a wonderful slight of hand that makes a coin disappear. It can make almost anything small disappear, but works best with the smooth surface of a coin. I prefer to use a 10 cent piece, but any size coin is workable. (If one uses a 50 cent coin, it is so large that it might just add to the possibility of it being seen when the ‘slight of hand moment’ takes place. And for children doing the trick, a 5 cent piece is best. Not because they can’t handle a large budget, but simply because they have smaller hands.)

The first time I saw this wonderful little trick, Clive used a penny. For those who don’t know what that is, it is a coin that is as big as our Australian 20 cent piece, but it was worth – at that time - just one cent. When my cousin Clive showed me this trick it was not long since penny’s and