Celebrate Halloween

I owe the heart of this essay to James B. Jordan who always has some way of helping you see familiar biblical texts and Christian issues in enriching ways. Many of these words are his, I only added and altered to suit a word limit requirement for a newspaper publication.

Christians CAN Celebrate Halloween

A myriad of tracts, letters, and articles in Christian magazines "exposing Halloween" are published annually. If we must talk about it every year let's at least be clear, biblical, and historically accurate.

"Halloween" is simply a contraction for All Hallows' Eve. (to ‘Hallow-Even’ => ‘Hallow-E'en’ =>’ Halloween’.) The word "hallow" means "saint" or “holy one” in that "hallow" is just another form of the word "holy" ("hallowed be Thy name"). Since the Biblical day begins in the preceding evening, in the Church calendar, the evening is the actual beginning of the festive day (e.g. Christmas Eve). So, All Hallows' Eve (Halloween) begins All Saints' Day. It is the memory of martyrs and a celebration of victory of the saints in union with Christ. The observance of various celebrations of All Saints arose in the late 300's, and these were united and fixed on November 1 by A.D. 835. The origins of All Saints Day had nothing to do with Celtic Druidism, or the Church's fight against Druidism. It is thoroughly Christian in origin. True, its modern observance (as in ancient times) is secularized (like Christmas and Easter) and some even inject anti-Christian occult themes.

With the coming of the New Covenant, the Bible tells us that our primary battle is against principalities and powers, against fallen angels who bind the hearts and minds of men in ignorance and fear. We are assured that through faith, prayer, and obedience, the saints will be victorious in our battle against these demonic forces. The Spirit assures us: "The God of peace will crush Satan under your feet shortly" (Romans 16:20).

Now, the concept was quite simple - each year the history of Satan's defeat was rehearsed. October 31^st, the demonic realm tries one last time to achieve victory, but is banished by the joy of the Kingdom. Because the power of Satan (and the demonic realm) has been broken, children mocked him by dressing up like ghosts, goblins, and witches. The purpose was to show the believers' supreme confidence in the utter defeat of the enemy by Jesus - we have NO FEAR!

The most common error made by Christians in discussing holidays or traditions is one of logic. Some examples:

• Some ancient people carved out gourds and put lights in them to represent the face of a dead person, whose soul (supposedly) continued to have a presence in the fruit or vegetable. Therefore, carving gourds and pumpkins is evil.
• Pagans used evergreens as a part of their cultic worship, therefore it is evil to use evergreens to celebrate Christmas.
• Now, let's take it to the level of absurdity (totally making this up): Pagans popped popcorn before sacrificing their children in idol worship, therefore (popping) popcorn is evil.

You get the point - just because something good, say an object (like pumpkins), or fun activity (like carving), or a symbol (like a pentagram) is found in some evil context or was intended for evil use, does not make it evil! And let's face it, it's FUN to go house to house and get candy! It's FUN to carve pumpkins! It's FUN to decorate the Christmas tree. How and what we celebrate for our own godly reasons is up to us! (Colossians 2:16; Romans 14:14-21, 22-23).

The Festival of All Saints reminds us that though Jesus has finished His work, we have not finished ours. He struck the decisive blow, but we have the privilege of working in the mopping up operation. Thus century by century the Christian faith has rolled back the demonic realm of ignorance, fear, and superstition. Though things look bad in the Western world today, this work of the gospel continues to make progress in Asia, Africa, and Latin America.

Don't you get tired of taking your cues from the unbelieving world and its ignorant ravings? If someone asks, "Doesn't Halloween celebrate fear and the occult?", the biblical answer is, "Only if you want it to." Heathen corruption of these things should not be the reason why we don't participate in the celebration and enjoy the benefits of this historic tradition of the Church. As God's triumphant people, the Church Militant, let's see ourselves as people called to have dominion in the world. We should set the standard for the world not the other way around. AMEN.