Things are dying, and it’s beautiful. That’s the heart of autumn. Think about it, we celebrate the changing of the leaves . . . they’re dying, really. God put this in motion. This thought set the stage for my unraveling of so-called “spooky season”.
As a Jesus follower, this season can be complicated. Opinions vary wildly. Some people use the season- haunted trails and all, to share the Gospel. Others declare all Halloween celebrations demonic. Some of us just like dressing up like princesses and getting candy. I’ve been thinking about this a lot lately. I don’t believe there’s an easy answer to this season; like most spiritual questions, I believe the answer is deeper and richer than we might first imagine.
I don’t think “eerie” and “evil” are always the same thing. There’s plenty of chilling things in the Bible, after all. Just ask the prophets. Through a lot of discussion and thought, I came to believe that there are even times we can learn a holy thing or two from this season.
I mentioned the leaves earlier. The world is changing from the rush of summer and readying for the glory of Christmas. Maybe this is a good time to look for beautiful death in our own lives. Maybe there’s things in our lives that need to die to make more room for Jesus.
For me, spooky season has become a time to process, to think about the masks we wear, chase the monsters out of the attic, check for scars that need to heal, celebrate mystery (the divine kind, the things God made but we don’t understand), and rejoice over the fact that I’m a new creature in Christ- not the skeleton or zombie that I used to be. To clarify, I don’t like seriously scary things. I’m not a horror movie gal. But I might watch a little “Scooby-Doo”, or listen to “The Phantom of The Opera” this time of year. I’ve come to realize that most scary things are really things that need Jesus. They need love and redemption- or a good holy kick out of our lives.
So how do we draw that line? What’s loveable and what needs kicking out? For me, that’s looked like setting parameters. When looking over content, especially movies or books, a few questions to consider:
- How is evil handled here? If evil isn’t defeated in the end, or is on the winning team, that’s a firm no. This eliminates some horror movies and those that feature witches or “spirits” as the heroes.
- What’s the focus here? If the story is about reveling in fear and gore, then I don’t see much redemptive content. It’s one thing to face a monster. It’s another to show a five minute close up of said monster meeting Cast Member #7 with it’s teeth.
- What kind of evil is being faced? I stay far away from the demonic. There’s no sense playing with fire. (Literally.) There’s plenty of villains bad enough on their own.
- And finally, what will this leave me thinking? Everybody’s different when it comes to temptations and triggers. This is between you and God. But if you think you’ll leave this story scared at night, fighting bad dreams, that’s not good. There’s enough things to be afraid of without inviting them into your mind. Or, maybe you’d be affected in another way. Maybe you like the violence, or find yourself meditating on revenge. Maybe you’d be curious about the occult. If that’s the case, back away.
The thing is, we have to be careful and watch our hearts in any season. But sometimes I think we run the risk of giving the enemy power he doesn’t have. This season is not his. Our God made Octobers. He even made death. So we don’t need be afraid. Instead, let’s celebrate that our God is bigger than any monster we face. He’s bigger than the monsters we once were.
Know Your Story 