The Devil Doesn’t Get A Day

For as long as I can remember, Halloween has been promoted at best as a day for celebrating all things magical and spooky or, at worst, as a day devoted to celebrating the devil. I was raised in the church and have experienced many of the church's different expressions or “streams” in my lifetime. That experience has taught me that Halloween has been a day for great confusion regarding how Christians should treat the day.

Now, my family and I personally do not celebrate Halloween. But I did when I was growing up. I was also the kid who wrapped myself in toilet paper like a mummy and went to my neighbors asking for candy…in July. But when I was around 11 years old, I became aware of some of the very real evil things that some people engage in on Halloween—things that nobody ever wants to acknowledge because they are just too dark and gruesome to think about while our streets are filled with ridiculously cute kids dressed up and asking for candy. As a pre-teen, I began to sense a major “dissonance” when participating in the fun Halloween stuff while knowing all those other things were happening. So I made a personal choice not to participate in Halloween and that I would not participate in it when I had a family. That is my personal conviction, and I do not have any issues with people who do celebrate Halloween. And I certainly do not cast any judgment or shame. It’s a decision I made for myself. A decision my wife and I made for our family. But we tell our kids that when they live on their own and have families of their own, they will need to decide for themselves what to do with Halloween as followers of Jesus.

I also want to be clear that this post is not about debating the many origin stories of Halloween, which elements are or are not rooted in evil practices, or if alternatives to Halloween are acceptable or not. I’m not interested in getting lost in the never-ending arguments about trick-or-treating, creating jack-o-lanterns, or kids dressing up. I’m interested in how we approach Halloween as followers of Jesus commissioned to bring kingdom transformation to our communities. 

With that groundwork laid, allow me to get to the main course: what we do with Halloween as disciples of Jesus.

Even though we do not participate in dressing up and going trick-or-treating, we do not ignore what is happening all over our neighborhood on Halloween. We are followers of Jesus, who have been charged to be the salt of the earth and the light of the world. But I have found that it is impossible for salt or light to be effective if they are kept in isolation.

There is an odd mindset among many disciples that believes that Halloween is a day of evil, darkness, and demonic influence—the “devil’s day.” As a result, whether out of fear or disgust, many believers have taken the position to pull away from engaging with their neighborhood and community on Halloween to be holy—literally, “set apart” from the ways of the world and unto God.

However, the big problem with that is the fact that when the Bible commands us to be “set apart,” the understanding was never that we would live in isolation to ensure our holiness but that we would be holy in the midst of the sin and mess of our culture and community—as beacons of light in the darkness.

So our family does not pull out of our community on Halloween. We throw our doors wide open and greet our neighbors with as much love, kindness, and generosity as we can. We do this with the conviction that every one of them will get a glimpse of who God is reflected through us. We hand out popcorn, hot chocolate, candy, hot dogs, stickers, glow sticks, etc. We make sure we have the “king size” candy bars for all the parents. We talk, get to know our neighbors, laugh, have fun with our kids, and rate the creativity of people's costumes. This is not a church event that we host. This is what we do as a family of Jesus followers. Why? Because we have a responsibility to our neighbors to let them experience the love of Jesus through our presence in their lives. And what other days in the year do I have all my neighbors knocking on my door to greet me? This is a kingdom, God-sized opportunity!

We’ve gotten some serious flack for this from some other people we have served as pastors in the past who could not understand what we were doing—most of them protesting our actions by saying, “That’s the devil’s day! You can’t be part of that!”

Um…hard pass on that “advice.”

Let me explain. No, there is too much. Let me sum up! (Princess Bride? Anyone?)

Psalm 118:24 states, “This is the day that the Lord has made; let us rejoice and be glad in it.” The psalm speaks of a great victory in Israel and of giving God credit for that victorious day. However, this is also a Messianic psalm interpreted by Jesus and the apostles to mean that Jesus has brought His people a great victory as the “cornerstone” (118:22). And here’s the best part. Before the cross, the powers of evil, sin, and death held humanity in daily bondage. God often broke through that bondage in isolated moments in history, bringing great victory to His people. However, sin still held on to its captives tightly every single day.

But when Jesus stepped into history, He broke the power of sin and evil and set humanity free! Now, in this new life of the New Covenant with Jesus, the day the Lord has made is not just referring to those special moments where God moves on our behalf. In this new reality, every day is the day the Lord has made!

What does that mean for Halloween? It means that the devil doesn't get a day! There is not one single day, hour, minute, or second in our world that belongs to the devil. It all belongs to God. Every second in time is under God’s dominion. And as followers of Jesus, my family lives with that conviction.

So we hand out candy on Halloween. We give hot chocolate to warm our neighbors up. Our kids gorge themselves on all of our candy and hot chocolate (because we go overboard on purpose!). We smile big. We greet our neighbors big. We serve our neighborhood big. We let everyone know that there are followers of Jesus living a few doors down from them with a ridiculous love for them and a deep desire to see them blessed and made whole by Jesus.

Even if you can’t bring yourself to hand out candy on Halloween, may the Spirit of God challenge you to open your eyes to see the many opportunities to love your neighbors. And may He give you creative and intentional ideas to show them His love.

Happy Hallow—

Just kidding!

“This is the day that the Lord has made; let us rejoice and be glad in it.” Psalm 118:24

Be free.