It's time to come against the devil's Christmas
by Michael H. Brown
Look around you. Halloween has changed. It has blossomed into a holiday that has begun to imitate Christmas. There are orange porch lights, lamppost decorations, trees decorated with ghouls, and figurines of witches, vampires, and assorted monsters. A couple years ago when I was speaking in Catskill, New York, a woman told me that at a house nearby was a "nativity" scene with demons instead of Jesus, Mary, and Joseph.
This is not just kid's stuff anymore. It's serious business. Halloween is an old flashback to pagan idolatry, and while Christianity replaced it with a holiday to honor the saints in the eighth century, the devil is in the process of taking it back and making it his own Christmas.
I realize the danger of seeing a devil under every rock. There's no use getting paranoid. For most, Halloween is just an excuse to have a little fun, and in the right way, it can be fun.
But the bottom line is that Halloween is based in occultism and I don't think it's wise for our society to become immersed in that. Paganism and Druidry (which is ancient witchcraft) recognize eight feasts during the annual cycle, and Halloween, or Samhain, eve of witchcraft's "new year," is the most popular. It ranks up with Walpurgis Night. It is one of the high feast days of witchcraft and satanism.
Look at the ghoulish faces on TV. Look at the macabre celebration of the dead.
Where Christ and God and the Holy Spirit focus on life, the devil focuses on death.
For centuries paganism -- which Christ came to specifically defeat -- has been
kept alive as children dressed as spirits went from house to house demanding a
treat. "If they received none, they performed an unwelcomed trick,"
points out an article on the Christian Broadcasting Network. "They were
play-acting the part of evil spirits that had to be appeased, just as in the old
Samhain festival the people believed they really did have to appease
spirits. While today children and adults innocently imitate ancient Celtic
customs, darker practices persist. Witches and Satanists still consider
Halloween to be one of the strongest times during the year to cast a
spell."
Immersing oneself -- aligning oneself with that -- may not be as harmless as we like to think. When we invoke an energy -- when we honor it with a statue or image -- we invite forces in. Am I saying that dressing as a demon will cause a child to become possessed? I'm not saying that. I'm asking questions. Do we want our kids to treat the devil as a game? Do we want them to revel in death?
As CBN recently pointed out, "God says, 'Don't imitate evil!' (Deuteronomy 18:9-11). If our children dress as witches and sorcerers, if we hang cardboard ghosts in our windows, if we entertain with tales of ghouls and haunted houses -- what are we doing but imitating that which is evil?"
You may believe this is going to an extreme, but Halloween is more fiercely demonic than it used to be and think about it: would Jesus enjoy kids dressed up as His nemesis?
Dress your kids as angels and saints. Bring back All Saints' Day. And take back evil territories just as Christ conquered pagan strongholds. As for trick-or-treat: what's wrong with a Bible tract to go along with the Reese's Peanut Butter and Hershey's and Nestle's (or as I have done, a pair of plastic rosaries)?