Redeeming Halloween

Halloween has become a controversial holiday among Christians, and many professed believers mistakenly believe this evil event saturated in undeniable paganism, superstitions, and witchcraft can be redeemed for Christ. Redeem means to recover the ownership of something you once previously owned. God never owned paganism and never accepted pagan worship. God redeems people: He redeems sinners in need of a Savior when they repent and believe in His Son, but the Bible doesn’t talk about redeeming things of the occult. God warned ancient Israel repeatedly not to take up the ways of the pagans around them. God does not redeem witchcraft and the demonic world. People can be redeemed out of paganism and occultism, but paganism and occultism will eternally be the enemy of Christ Jesus.

Therefore, how can we believe, in good faith, that we can redeem a pagan celebration that glorifies evil and is deeply rooted in horror, fear, death and witchcraft? Can we by celebrating and participating in its gory and gruesome rituals and traditions redeem it to honor God? Absolutely not!! Witches, vampires, and zombies are nothing to be celebrated. How foolish to think that we can participate in any way in a demon inspired celebration and redeem it to honor God. How can we be so arrogant as to think we can redeem what God has forbidden by handing out bags of candy with tracts or participating in “Harvest Festivals” or dressing in ‘innocent’ costumes? That type of reasoning is deciding what is right in your own eyes. We have been commanded to sever all ties with even the appearance of evil.

Is there anything wrong with a child dressed up as a lion? No. Is there anything wrong with eating candy? No. But it is not just a costume or candy we are speaking of here. There is a spirit involved and it is not the Holy One. We are told in Deuteronomy 18:10 to have NO PART in the deeds of darkness (in other words it’s forbidden for Christians to participate in ANYTHING of the occult or witchcraft in ANY form, as it is an abomination to God). To participate in any way in this holiday is a compromise with evil. Ephesians 5:11 explicitly states “Don’t participate in the fruitless works of darkness, but instead expose them.” And again in 1 Cor. 10:21, “You cannot drink the cup of the Lord and the cup of demons. You cannot partake of the table of the Lord and the table of demons.” We cannot serve both God and demons. We must stop making excuses to justify our disobedience.

How does setting aside a day to celebrate evil, fear, death, and the demonic bring God glory? A Christian celebrating Halloween would be like a Satan worshiper putting up a nativity scene at Christmas while singing, “O Come Let Us Adore Him!” The two are in conflict with each other. Light has nothing in common with Darkness. We cannot make something that is evil good. Isaiah 5:20 says “Woe to those who call evil good, and good evil; Who substitute darkness for light and light for darkness; Who substitute bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter!” To give recognition to this wicked holiday and to imitate its practices yet call it good, when it is evil, is spiritual adultery.

The truth is that God has made every day to bring glory to Him, and I cannot imagine a born-again Christian who knows anything about spiritual warfare actually believing that celebrating Halloween brings glory to God. So please stop accusing those of us who refrain from participating in this evil holiday of being legalists and justifying why it is permissible to celebrate this ‘spiritually meaningless tradition’ rather than a masked holiday used to promote a Satanic agenda. I could care less that Got Questions Blog endorses it; I care whether God endorses it! And I disagree that this is a ‘gray area.’ Trafficking in the demonic realm is explicitly forbidden in the Bible! Anything that could cause someone else, including your children, to stumble spiritually or question their faith or yours, should be a matter of grave concern.