welcome to real Christianity my name is Dale Partridge this is a 100% listener supported audio Ministry of a relearn. Org our mission at realtor.org is to bring the church back to the Bible what do this by offering videos podcast and articles that strengthen biblical and Theological literacy here in the church if you feel the Lord is leading you to support our ministry in any way you can always do so at relearn. Org forward slash donate so today's discussion is something that we've talked about for the past three years on this podcast every year we do a new rendition of this episode adding more content which brings more clarity and more Precision to the discussion about Halloween is Halloween a holiday that Christians should embrace and celebrate what about churches who use Halloween as an Outreach event what is the Bible say about Halloween and are there any valid alternative
 for Christians to do during this time I won't be answering all these questions and more but just before begin let me just make a quick announcement as you guys know the world is changing rapidly it seems like every single day there was a new National mandate or breaking news about something that's never been done before in our generation and we are seeing this change just flooded over us day after day like waves crashing in the ocean and as a result the church will need to adapt and I firmly believe that we are on the cusp of a time of difficulty for the church in the west and I anticipate that the biblical church will be forced to gather in private instead of in public basically instead of the traditional format that we see today in buildings are gathering in homes
 and I think that we're about to see a wave of house churches be planted take Route over the next few years and fortunately the number of house churches required to house the amount of Christians that are here in the west far-out outpaces the number of pastors we currently have is under the traditional Church model you can have 300 people and one Pastor in a few elders but under the house Church you're going to need 20 to 30 pastors and Elders for that same number of people and for that reason I believe it's vital to start training amateur Christian men who have a passion for Ministry to plant biblical house churches in their local community now you guys know our companion Ministry at Reformation Seminary, does this exact thing we are a Missionary Training School
 teaching men how to plant Pastor in preach God's word in a house Church setting we have programs that start every 6 months and our next one is in January 2022 that we have about 5 to 10 spot me 15 left in our available seats for this enrollment. If you're interested or know somebody who might be interested please have them apply at Reformation cemetery.com we have had every single day I'm not exaggerating here every single day I have usually women asking me is their house Church in our area we're looking for a house trailer looking for a good biblical Church where our church is caving to wokeness our church is caving to the the vaccine mandate especially in Canada especially in Australia especially in the UK and I hate telling them no because we just don't have enough men who are stepping up to come and plant biblical house
 so if you're gifted in teaching your mature Christian man in your family is healthy please pray and consider enrolling at Reformation Seminary so the you can lead and plastic Shepherd a local House Church community in your neighborhood all right that's my I guess my soapbox for the moment again that's Reformation cemetery.com
 now to get to the episode content as I mentioned before this is the third year that we are having this discussion should Christians celebrate Halloween now my answer has not changed but every year I'm going to be adding some more and more clarity to the discussion just to help you understand the Bible's position on this matter so again if you listen to this in the past this one is updated and elaborate and hopes to offer more precise understanding for those that are looking for answers on this question so let me begin which is some of the basics just so that we can be reminded of really the historical side of Halloween you know where it came from the how why what's behind it and from that point we can evaluate halloweenhead how it's morphed into the westernized expression that we are familiar with today so Halloween
 originated with the ancient Celtic Festival is called salween in this has happened in 9th century Ireland it's it was a celebration of all things that are dying for that year you think about crops and nature and preparation for winter in the eighth century and I was a hundred years earlier. Pope Gregory the third designated November 1st as a time to honor all the saints in this is called All Saints Day if you go over the Catholic Church you understand now that holiday at tell you it's a actual Church holiday in the Catholic church and likely due to its proximity All Saints Day began to be incorporated into the traditions of Samhain so the evening before All Saints Day which is known as All Hallows Eve and later Halloween
 started to blend together and overtime Halloween produced its own mythological culture and it was believed to be the night that released the dead spirits who control nature that have been held captive underground by the vegetation of life of the previous months but now as they entered the fall those dead spirits come back to life on this night Halloween and this is the origin of things like the jack o'lantern write the idea is that the dead pumpkin has come alive with the lights in the candles in the inside you know from the previous dead Spirits are the previously good spirits and historically speaking Halloween is a night in which people would circle around bonfires dress up in costumes to scare away these dead spirits and in some cases have a seance to welcome the dead or these dead spirits
 and that that's just what it was in the past Celtic and European culture and you can see that just by looking at Wikipedia or the History Channel's website there's no argument over these facts that's what it was now overtime Halloween has evolved especially here in the west into a day of activities that have somewhat sanitize the holiday to make it more
 Washington to make it less overtly demonic and more palatable for our Western culture you think of trick-or-treating or carving pumpkins or Festival Gatherings dressing up in costumes eating candy but Halloween is still very much holds a spiritual root and it's becoming more and more obvious I think as the years go by another words a Halloween is not a non spiritual event if you simply look up the satanic calendar on Wikipedia it's a fascinating thing that you're going to see you'll see that the counter revolves around 4 Central events
 number one is your personal birthday this is the celebration of self number two is a holiday they called while burst walpurgis nap while Percocet in this is on the evening of 8th of April 30th and that's just one day later after May 1st which is st. walpurgis night and this is an intercessory prayer for warding off witchcraft so this just interesting that you start to see you know there's this demonic holiday and then the next day of church holiday a grand High climax is the third event on the 10th calendar that December 24th this is a night of indulgence and sex and Demon levels with a focus on birth and children and again just one day later is the church's designation of Christmas right the remembrance of Jesus's birth so again there's a unique thing and then now on
 Halloween October 31st just one day later is All Saints Day which is the remembrance of saints identified by the Catholic Church on November 1st to basically there's either a major coincidence or there's a demonic strategy in play to offer pre satanic or pre de satanic alternatives to historical church sanctioned days it's just a fascinating observation that I made there but the vast majority of the people in the west people like you and me who grew up may be celebrating Halloween our families who are simply unaware of its dark history and spiritual relationships with the Demonic world now that said Christians do need to be aware about the relationship between Halloween and Satanism just because it has become an American holiday where most of the culture and the people that are participating it doesn't mean that there's no spiritual involvement in what's happening on a
 a 31st so again let's get back to the core question should Christians celebrate Halloween in to that verb celebrate the definition of celebrate is is to acknowledge a particular event with social praise praise celebration is definitely affirmation and as Christians we need to be careful what we celebrate but before I I share my position on this question I do want to share Anton LaVey position he's the founder of the Church of Satan and the author of the Satanic Bible in an interview years ago in a discussion about Halloween he said I'm glad that Christian parents let their children worship the devil at least one night out of the year and quote
 see the reality is Halloween is viewed as a satanic Holiday by satanists its roots are deeply demonic at activities even to this day are not Redemptive activities going to give you three reasons why I don't believe Christian should celebrate Halloween but at the end I'm going to you know I'm going to talk about some principles
 it will also discuss how can you be strategically involved in Halloween I'm not saying that you need to lock your doors and shut off your your lights and make sure that nobody comes to your house I'm talking about why should Trish's. Celebrate Halloween and potentially how are we engaged I had to waste your teacher to get involved and Halloween for the furthering of God's kingdom to the proclamation of the Gospel but again at the end of the day these are just principles that I'm going to offer you because the Bible does it speaks to cific lie about Halloween but your level of participation becomes really a matter of conscience before God additionally I'm an offer you again just a few ideas that I think will really help bring some clarity for your involvement based on the maturity of your family the age of your children the calling and giftings that you guys have in your home to really be involved in October 31st I will also at the end offer some Alternatives and things that we've done
 and still due on October 31st so the first principle for why Christians should not celebrate Halloween Halloween is a celebration of death in this is why when you walk through Home Depot or Target stores there covered in morbid to Ducane which is in skeleton right at the season to make children more comfortable with evil and the Distortion of God's image okay it's it's a night to elevate nooses and demons and Gore and horror and fear and this is also why you're seeing Netflix and Amazon and apple flood their programming with horror movies the appetite for horror is cultivated on Halloween
 and in seemingly harmless you know dress up in haunted houses but that appetite matures as a child grows into a desire for something more and movies that demonstrate evil and murder and torture and death find a really significant placement in this narrative in other words if you're comfortable with a playful form of human perversion the degradation in your childhood and you'll eventually become comfortable with a less playful form of it later in life than this is the same case with pornography with drugs and if you have any other form of evil
 so people we have to wake up and realize that Satan is a patient incrementalist and he's aiming to capture the hearts of your young children and he uses Halloween in a very strategic way to do so there's a study that was released on ncbi and that showed an obvious link between horror movies and suicidal Behavior including suicidal ideation hopelessness self-harm low life satisfaction and we know that suicide and depression are on the rise across the world especially since the covid pandemic why would we want to place our children in an environment or an annual tradition that nurtures a desire for an affinity of fear or desired morbidity like why why would we want to put our kids there to make them feel comfortable now so that they would become more comfortable with horror movies and things associated with that later in life to the enemy is strategic and you don't go from Ackley
 and pure childhood to enjoying movies about fear and Gore out of nowhere right there's a process that allows you to get there and I believe that the entire secular carnal Halloween season in the west is designed to Kindle that process in your children as Christians we don't look forward to physical death we don't celebrate death physical death is our final enemy in the cost of our scent and well death is merely an entrance to Glory by Christ has come to give us life and life abundantly physical death is not something we celebrate we celebrate life we don't look forward to the rising of the Dead to torment Humanity a zombie looks of the resurrection of the Dead some to judgment and some to eternal life
 other words Christ came and conquered death on the cross we don't celebrate what Christ came to conquer the Hebrews 2:14 says since they're for the children share in Flesh and Blood he himself likewise partook of the same things that through death he might destroy the one who has the power over death that is the devil but later in Revelation 1 17 through 18 it says fear not I am the first and the last and the living one I died and behold I am alive for Evermore I have the keys of death and Hades the Christ conquered death and through faith in him we conquered death to therefore to celebrate what cost Christ so much is to not see the value of our own salvation than we are a holy people set apart of peculiar people people as it says in Peter's epistle
 therefore we are to live in a world but not be a part of it we're to be here on Mission but not in participation in finding the balance between these two requires careful discernment number one number two is Halloween is a celebration of Darkness beside the reality that it's a nighttime holiday it's a holiday that celebrates spiritual darkness and let's just look in a few verses that speak to spiritual Darkness Ephesians 5:11 says have no fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness rather expose them first John 15 says this is the message we have heard from him and Proclaim to you that God is light and in him is no Darkness at all 1st John 1:7 what if we walk in the light as he is in the light we have fellowship with one another Matthew 5:14 you are the light of the world a city set on a hill cannot be hidden John 8:12
 again Jesus spoke to them saying I am the light of the world whoever follows me will not walk in darkness but will have the light of Life John 12:46 I have come into the world as light or the whoever believes in me may not remain in darkness John 14 through 5 in him was life and the life was the light of men the light shines in the darkness and the Darkness has not overcome it he has ultimately darkness is the opposite of light right people who are not saved love darkness and concealment and secrecy in ambiguousness because they like to hide their sin John 3-19 through 21 explains this exactly it says and this is the Judgment the light has come into the world the people loved the darkness rather than the light because their Works were evil for everyone who does wicked things hates the light and does not come to the light lest his Works should be
 supposed but whoever does what is true comes to the light so that it may be clearly seen that his Works have been carried out in God Christians love the light because we know first and foremost that spiritual Darkness stands against God and second we know that we are safest when we walk in the light we also know that although State disguises himself as an angel of Light Satan is the Prince of Darkness now he is no more a prince on Halloween then he is on any other day but that is that your sensitivity and awareness of Darkness should not change because of the holiday would you participate in these dark Halloween Traditions if they were everyday and if not then why are you participating in them at all on October 31st is our important questions for us to evaluate so that's Point number two number three is Halloween is a celebration of evil
 so talk about Halloween is a celebration of death Halloween is a celebration of darkness and now we're going to talk about Halloween Halloween is a celebration of evil I'm not saying that all non-christians have Halloween celebrations that are over the evil I'm not saying that people are intentionally having evil Halloween Gatherings I'm saying the Halloween specifically is rooted in evil and generally elevates things that the scriptures directly tell us not to elevate 1st Thessalonians 5 22 says abstain from every form of evil can't we must remember that in a world filled with suicide murder wickedness and fear we can't believe that dressing up these little whores and cute Decor one night per year makes them any less of what they truly are which is evil
 now I know many Christian parents who struggle with viewing Halloween is evil and have you know the freedom of conscience to participate as adults but may I remind you that this is because you have the mental and emotional faculties available to discern the moment meeting that you understand that a ghost is fake or the goblin or Frankenstein is folklore but what a lot of parents Miss is how influential informative these moments and visual images can be for their small children and I know that are you know just a quick story our friends at a he was 5 years old
 are they took him out trick-or-treating and past few haunted houses and scary front yard who is traumatically scared from one night just to being out on Halloween and I've had my own kids asked me about ghosts and zombies and Witchcraft after seeing them hanging in department stores just here in our own small town the Bible speaks specifically to this situation in 1st Corinthians chapters 8 through 10 what it teaches that Christians who have the freedom of conscience to partake in certain activities the context is an eating and drinking certain foods but it actually teaches us to out of the love for one another to limit those freedoms for the sake of others versus Joe chapter 8 12 through 13 it says sinning against your brothers and wounding their weak conscience
 you sin against Christ therefore if food or anyting else makes my brother stumble I will never eat meat again lest I make my brother stumble we should be willing this is the same reason that we don't drink in front of a recovering alcoholic or take a pornography person to struggle and pornography to the beach in the Summer where there's women walking around in bikinis and there's just we care about those things the same is true that while we might want to participate in Halloween as an adult because we have a freedom of conscience and understand the realities that are going on our children do not
 and we need to be very careful about those matters now so those are my three points to quickly closes with other two common questions I want to answer his first is it okay to use an irredeemable event like Halloween as a church sanction evangelism tool I think so as long as the alternative that the Church offers is truly an alternative the current solution for Halloween in the church is almost identical to the world solution the only difference is that it's less in modest there's not women walking around and have you no naked outfits you know the blade and evil is tone down and it's experienced on the church campuses in for a parking lot and not in the streets of the town I think a good alternative would be something like a harvest Community dinner on the lawn with a Redemptive movie and a gospel presentation at the end again in our covid world this is going to be you know
 a weird thing is the community is is basically divided on public Gatherings right now but a place where they can come eat food have a night by a fire pit watching a movie outdoors with other people in your community however I do I would say that I personally wouldn't have kids dress up I wouldn't shut away those who came dressed up but I just think that the mere fact that kids aren't dressed up on Halloween becomes a wonderful case of curiosity to a non looking world's only asking what why don't you guys participate in Halloween and explaining why so that's just my quick answer to the church question the second, question is what is our family to do we just sit at home and lock our doors and turn off her lights do we do anything special do we do do we leverage the night for outreach as of now and our kids are pretty young at this point we usually gather together with our house Church community and invite other friends and family for Apple pressing
 pumpkin pie eating you know just an evening time or we can celebrate Reformation day and so Reformation day is October 31st at the same thing as celebration of Martin Luther's inauguration of the Reformation of the Protestant Reformation of October 31st 1517 when he nailed his 95 Theses to the castle door and didn't burn Germany so this is a really cool thing it's a great alternative for us to do on Halloween and celebrate God's bringing a fall and the changing of seasons and then during that night I usually offer small teaching on the five Solas of the rest of the reformation and then we close by either watching The Animated edition of Pilgrims Progress which is fantastic if you have sensitive little children there's some pretty intense scenes they're even for a cartoon but it's a fantastic movie that we watched together as a family and for our older kids know if we have older children may be teenagers
 always watch the Martin Luther documentary that's produced by Ligonier Ministries and I believe every single October they make that documentary free to stream from their website so that's a great alternative as well we also have considered and will likely incorporate some sort of gospel tracts as our kids get older getting out and engaging with the community in some capacity so if your family is mature older children who can understand and discern the moment I would encourage you to do that as well it's a great time to get out in the community and engage but not to go participate but to actually be on Mission and so that would be my encouragement to you so the bottom line
 this episode is really best guard your little ones or during the Halloween season a train up your older ones to be the light and defend the truth in the world and you know that's looking for answers and learn to use Halloween and every day actually for that matter to make a way for the Strategic gospel presentation that are available to you for those that don't know Christ and so Halloween should be any different but it is a unique opportunity because you have people coming to your house and knock on your door and what a wonderful opportunity of my happy to share that gospel presentation again if it's if it's with your family's timeline so as always I believe you guys are just a few resources
 little offer further understanding of the top if you can find them on the post page for this episode a tree learn.org one of them is an article on the grace to you website from John MacArthur it's called Christians and Halloween you can check that out and just get some history some more inside lot of things you would see their you've heard on today's episode but you know John MacArthur's got a fantastic perspective in his community and his the people that are teaching on Grace to use a great Community there the second would be an article by John Piper called thoughts on Halloween you can find that desiringgod.org as always if your regular listener to this program. Thank you so much you're just loyal listenership has continued to make the show a top 100 Christian podcast worldwide and so we have just been floored by your faithfulness and your support of our ministry if you've not left a review would you consider doing that you don't need to write anything just
 the Stars every review really does help me expose your of our show and we have over 6,000 reviews at this point and it really does help other people find are showing because the algorithms Lift us up because of our high reviews if you don't always also follow me on Twitter and our ministry at Instagram and we would love to have you there on Instagram and I am posting their multiple times a day sharing a Biblical narrative we love to have you there Twitter also is available at Dale Partridge we would love to have you on social media as for this episode we have to close it up my name is Dale Partridge this is real Christianity and I'll see you next week
 thank you for listening to this episode of real Christianity if your regular listener to the show would you personally consider making a donation to support our ministry efforts simply visit relearn. Org forward slash donate again that's relearn. Org forward slash donate and for those looking to explore the idea of joining or planting a church in your home you can download our free pdf ebook title the basics of biblical House Church by visiting relearn. Org forward slash house lastly do you have a theological question you would like answered on the show submit your question at relearn. Org forward slash question thanks for joining us on this episode of real Christianity we will see you next Wednesday