There are a thousand blogs and articles out there on Christians and Halloween. It can be a touchy subject and there are as many opinions on how Christians "should" handle this dark holiday as there are people. This year has been one of conviction for me. Not because of our participation in Halloween traditions, but because of why we have chosen not to participate in the past.
For most of my life I have held the belief that Halloween should be shunned because of its roots in paganism and its celebration of evil. All the celebration stands for contradicts the very foundations of our faith!
I don't know what changed this year, but I began to see quite a few contradictions and even unbiblical thinking in how I approached Halloween. While it is a pagan holiday with traditions based off pagan ritual, so is Christmas and Easter. Both Christian "high holidays" were designed to "christianize" pagan worship. It is very inconsistent to tell my children we can do all the fun things of Christmas and Easter because we have found ways to turn pagan ritual into reminders of God's love, grace and mercy, but we can't do that with Halloween. Why is it God can "redeem" Christmas and Easter, but not Halloween?
My primary goal with school this year is helping the children learn to look for how God reveals himself to us through science, history and literature. Our catechism question this week has been "How does God carry out His decrees?" The answer: "God carries out His decrees in creation and providence." God reveals His plan, purpose and character through the study of creation and His-story. If God's plan of glory and grace is evident through all of creation and all of history, that must include Halloween. Does that mean by ignoring Halloween, we were missing part of God's revelation of Himself?
Its been heavy on my heart the last few days, and this morning I began to see some answers.
1 - God has redeemed Halloween. October 31 is not just Halloween, it is also Reformation Day. It is not an accident that the two celebrations land on the same day. When Martin Luther nailed the 95 Thesis on the church door in Wittenburgh, God was using him to call the Church back to grace. Back to complete reliance on Him for salvation, peace, comfort and redemption. The Reformation called Christians away from practices that relied on human effort to escape the "evil spirits" and back to the One who has already defeated them. In the midst of a ritual that celebrates death, the pounding of nails directs us to the One who died so that we may live. There is no more need to light fires and disguise ourselves to scare away evil, because Christ is The Light, and he, as fully God, took on human form, to completely defeat The Evil one.
2 - The rituals of Halloween point us to God's glory, grace and truth. What Satan intended for evil, God can use for good. The Master Deceiver has taken grains of truth, and twisted them. Jack-o-lanterns and costumes were meant to scare off evil spirits. It is very true that light always repells darkness, but no amount of human endeavor can do it. Instead, the Light of Life has already defeated all Darkness, and as His followers, we take that light to the rest of the world. We are the true "Jack-o-lanterns" - lights on a hill. All of creation must go through a transformation into new creatures to be freed from the entrapment of evil. It is not an outward covering that is needed, but inward transformation that replaces the disfigurement of sin with the righteous perfection of Christ. The entire world is searching for "candy" - something that makes life more enjoyable and worthwhile. As Christians, we are to open our doors and share all the good things God has given us with a world walking around in darkness.
This year we won't ignore Halloween. We will talk about Martin Luther and the Church's return to grace. We will discuss how we have no need to fear anything, because Christ has defeated it all. We paint pumpkins and discussed how we are the light of the world. The children dress as Minions (because it is fun) as we thank God for transforming our hearts. We are not trick-or-treating, or giving out candy, because the younger children are still afraid of many of the costumes that will be in our neighborhood tonight, but I will be thinking of new ideas for next year on how to share God's grace in the midst of all the darkness.
God, in His ever-present, all powerful being, has graciously redeemed even Halloween!
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