Saturday, November 30, 2024

Halloween and the Concealing of the Spirit World

 


I work with 20 somethings that have a propensity of knowing what they like. My coworkers seem increasingly enthusiastic about Halloween year after year. Many state it’s their favorite holiday. One even said “I like Christmas more but the ambiance of Halloween is better.” As demonic end caps showcasing death, the occult, and the macabre go up in the store, so does my praying. This is the first year I can recall that Target is selling Ouija boards. Perhaps if my life didn’t go through a season of being demonically possessed, I too would be wrapped in a Care Bear onesie going down the street collecting free candy as I did before I knew better. Now I know the darkness Satan and his cronies intentionally bring on this day.

 

 Thankfully this holiday has become a goldmine to engage in spiritual conversation with unbelievers at my work. They cannot contain their plans out of excitement so I always overhear. When people find out that I don’t celebrate it and I have young kids there is something inside of them that cries “foul.” Like they feel bad that my kids are born into my family for Halloween’s sake.  I know some Christian families that give me the eye-roll as if to say, “come on really?” The question I usually ask when a strong reaction is given to my abstaining is this: “What are we celebrating?” When asked, there is almost always a pause. Most of my coworkers will say that it’s a day for kids to dress up and get candy. This year I had a lady say “well historically it’s a time where witches celebrate and crazy things happen, it’s just great.” 

 

The reply that gave me the best opportunity to share the gospel came when another coworker replied, “It’s death we celebrate.” To which I replied, “sure, but my experience with death is grievous, not something fun to celebrate.” Without thinking she raised her voice and blurted out: “but it’s the most natural thing in the world!!!” Her protest caught me off guard, I paused and calmly replied, “I could not disagree with you more. I believe death was never meant to be.” Before we parted ways, I was able to tell her that God’s creation originally did not include death. She gave a laugh and walked away.

 

What do we celebrate on Halloween? The Occult? Witchcraft? Death? Being something or someone you are not? Or maybe an appropriate question is what do others celebrate on Halloween? In my opinion, as we go further down this post-Christian hole as a society, the spirit world becomes deemphasized and the tangible world has consensus and is therefore preferred. Halloween shows that the material world can conceal spiritual things more and more. The world of our senses is ruled by Satan and leveraged by mankind. However, in the spirit world, the supremacy is Christ’s. My greatest treasure is knowing that those two worlds coexist but only one of them is eternal.

 

When Halloween came this year, we had our third annual Reformation party complete with a printing press activity, the 5 sola’s, and a look at the biblical objections Martin Luther had of the Catholic church. We also passed out tracts with our candy and prayed as the neighborhood came to us.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Well said, brother. Thank you.