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Once again, it’s that time of year for cute little goblins, witches and ghosts to come gleefully knocking on your door with bags open ready to receive their “treat”! Harmless fun? In 2009, I presented a teaching on Halloween in our church in Orillia under the strong leading of the Lord. Truth always sets people free, and as you read this teaching in its entirety, regardless of your own personal feelings or decisions concerning this dark night, may your spiritual eyes be opened to the reality of “The Other Side Of Halloween!”
The following are three of the responses I received from several churches that were contacted for prayer support leading up to my teaching in 2009. I have changed the names of the persons to respect their privacy.
“Thank you, Pastor Mike, for taking on this task of exposing “The Other Side of Halloween”. I will put you on our prayer prompter and we will be praying for you. Thank you again for your courage and faithfulness.”
Janice Torrence
Church Administrative Assistant
“Dear Pastor Knoll, I just received a prayer request in regards to your teaching on Halloween. This needs to be done in all Church ministries. God Bless You! Yes we will be praying for you.”
Robert Carson
Regional Director
“Dear Pastor Mike, greetings in the wonderful name of our Lord. We will stand in the Gap for you in prayer that parents would understand that teaching that you are going to do about this very evil night and yet many parents are blind; they think it is just having fun! You are covered and will continue to be with our prayers.”
Pastor Lawrence and Pauline (Haiti)
THE OTHER SIDE OF HALLOWEEN By Rev. Mike Knoll
On October 31, 2022, over 6 million Canadian teens and children under the age of 14 will be exposed to the demonic powers from hell. Ephesians 5:11 warns us to “Have no fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness, but rather expose them.”
Halloween is not a night of harmless fun for little kiddies to dress up as cute cartoon characters—it is a night of spiritual darkness, deception & death. Parents need to open their eyes to the truth that this is a satanic holiday to entirely avoid. Proverbs 14:12 warns, "There is a way that seems right to a man, but its end is the way of death." Many Christian parents are unknowingly giving the enemy legal access to deceive their children. God warned in Hosea 4:6, My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge."
Halloween Can Be Described In One Word-That Word Is DARKNESS! That is why Jesus said in John 3:19 “men love darkness rather than light, because their deeds are evil.” Who exactly is Jesus referring to? Witches? Satanists? Psychics? NO! US! Our old nature was in darkness, but God brought us into His marvellous light! Fallen man’s spiritual nature is inherently evil! That’s why Jer 17:9 “The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked:”
History of Halloween
Halloween is a festival of Scottish-Irish origin that had its beginning in the medieval days in Europe, also known as the Dark Ages around 500 A.D. Even as far back as 300 years before Christ, the Celts celebrated a yearly Festival called Samhain. Samhain was their god of Death. On this day, the Celtic god was to have called up the spirits of the wicked dead who had died during the past year. It was the most significant holiday of the Celtic year and it was celebrated on November 1, which was the Celtic New Year.
DARK AGES
In the midst of the spiritual darkness that prevailed during the Dark Ages there was a great spread of witchcraft and Satanism. During this time there developed the belief that on October 31st witches traveled to their covens flying on brooms, guided by evil spirits in the form of black cats. The Festival of Death continued without interruption for centuries, as the most important night of the year for witches and all Satanists, celebrating death and evil and the Church was totally ineffective in opposing it.
DRUIDS
In the early centuries of the first millennium, divination, spiritism and sorcery of all kinds prevailed on the night of October 31st , midnight bringing darkness, fear and death as many human sacrifices were presented to the god, Samhain, the Celts practiced a demonic religion through their priests, known as the Druids. The wearing of masks and costumes also came from the Druids. Often they wore the skins of these animals. Villagers also dressed in hideous masks and costumes in an effort to disguise themselves from the evil spirits. The Druids were so controlled by satanic forces that they had strange and frightening powers and demanded blood sacrifices.
TRICK OR TREAT
On October 31, the Druids would travel from house to house, threatening the people with “trick or treat” The ‘treat’ was to be a young virgin who would be offered as a human sacrifice to Samhain. If the ‘treat’ (the young woman) pleased the Druids, they would light a candle made of human fat and insert it in a hollowed out turnip to protect those inside the house from being killed by demons. The Druids would assault their victim and then brutally sacrifice her to their gods. The families that were unable to meet the demands of the Druids had to face the ‘trick’. A hexagram was drawn on the front door of their house, and it was said that Satan or his demons would kill someone in the household through fear that night.
During this night of satanic rituals, the Druids sacrificed animals and humans. Huge fires were made where they would throw the remains of the bodies into. The next morning all that was left were the ashes and bones. Thus the name of these fires were called “bone fires” where we get the name bonfire. Druids also on this festival of the dead, burned huge, wooden cages known as wicker men. The wicker men were sometimes filled with animals, prisoners of war, criminals, and other human sacrifices.
So how did this totally pagan festival, Samhain become connected with the Roman Catholic Church? By the end of the 1st century, the Roman Empire had conquered most of the Celtic lands. In the process of integrating the Celts into their society, the Roman Catholic Church adapted some of the Celtic idolatrous traditions as part of their own religious observances in order to indoctrinate them into Roman Catholic faith.
For example, In the eighth century, Pope Gregory IV, established All Saints Day on November 1st in an attempt to get the Celts to abandon the festival of Samhain with all of its occultic practices and turn to the traditions of the Catholic Church. All Saints Day was a Roman Catholic holiday—a yearly anniversary in honour of all the martyrs of the Church.
It eventually came to be called “All Hallows Eve” Since Samhain always occurred on the evening before All Hallows Eve, it came to be called “Hallow E’en” as we know it today. However, Pope Gregory’s cunning attempt to abolish Samhain failed and the celebration of Halloween continues today 1200 yrs later.
HOW DID HALLOWEEN COME TO NORTH AMERICA?
When our Puritan forefathers came to America in the 17th century, they strictly forbade all such occult practices and pagan festivals. The Puritans had nothing to do with Halloween, the Festival of Death; they were well aware of the satanic origins of this night. Then in the 18th and 19th centuries, there came a flood of Celtic immigrants to the then colonized America, bringing with them their pagan superstitions, and as a result, Samhain, the Festival of Death, now known as Halloween infiltrated America and it is alive & well on planet earth! For over 200 years, October 31 has been the most important day of the year for satanists & witches. It is the very highest satanic holy day. Witch covens gather together on Halloween to observe satanic rituals, to cast spells, to oppose churches and families, to perform sacrilegious acts, and to even offer blood sacrifices to Satan. Dogs and cats are often sacrificed to the devil on Halloween. In rural communities it is not uncommon for farmers to find the mutilated remains of their farm animals (cows, calves, chickens, even horses) that were slaughtered in Satanic sacrifices.COMMON HALLOWEEN SYMBOLS
WITCHES
Witches today are not the old, ugly woman with warts in a black hat, stirring a caldron —they are completely average looking people in business and social life.
BEWITCHED was a popular T.V. sitcom that ran from 1964—1972 about a witch, named Samantha Stevens married to Darrin, who reluctantly used her magical powers to solve family problems – it all seemed like quite harmless fun, but this is how the devil conditions the next generation for the occult to become more acceptable.
WENDY THE GOOD LITTLE WITCH, made her debut in 1960. She’s not called Wendy the Little Witch/ she is called Wendy, the Good, little witch—more conditioning.
GHOSTS
CASPER, THE FRIENDLY GHOST This cute little spook is not called Casper the Ghost, he’s called Casper, the friendly ghost –again, conditioning.
GHOST WHISPERER was a popular TV series that followed the life of Melinda Gordon, a young woman who has the ability to see and communicate with the dead. Melinda lives with her husband Jim, and is the owner of an antique shop. Ghosts seek Melinda's help in relaying a message or completing a task that will put their spirit to rest, and allow them to cross over into The Light. There are no such things as ghosts, or departed spirits—these are deceptive demons or familiar spirits impersonating the dead—this is what occurs at séances when mediums attempt to conger up the souls of loved ones from the dead.
VAMPIRES
Hollywood has made modern vampire shows more appealing to youth! Buffy the Vampire Slayer was a popular television series that aired from 1997 to 2003. The latest vampire movie series is TWILIGHT—a young adult vampire romance movies which include characters that look like nice, normal, average kids-your typical church youth group! What exactly is a vampire? Vampires are creatures of the night that have come back from the dead. They exist by drinking the blood of humans. Vampires would cause deaths in the neighbourhoods where they lived when they were alive. They are evil, inhuman creatures! But at Halloween, sometimes vampires are just plain cute! You can even purchase a vampire t-shirt and even a vampire doll for your little child to take to bed with after they’ve had a bowl of vampire cereal for a bedtime snack. This is called conditioning innocent children to the occult.
PENTAGRAM
A pentagram is an upside down star with five points representing five different objects of worship 1. spirit 2. air 3. water 4. earth 5. fire- it is a pagan/Wicca symbol meaning oneness with nature. The inverted pentagram represents the goat head, or Baphomet, also known as Lucifer, the god of the witches. The inverted pentagram is known by Masons as the "Blazing Star," and is found at the center of every Masonic Lodge. It is the official emblem of the Order of the Eastern Star, which is a Masonic Lodge for women.
JACK-O-LANTERN
On the night of Samhain, each Druid would dress in a hooded robe, carrying a large, hollowed-out turnip with an oil lamp burning inside. A demon face was carved into it, which represented the Druid’s spirit guide. When the Celts immigrated to America, they carved out pumpkins for Halloween celebration, which became known as “Jack of the Lantern” referring to the demon spirit inside of it.
WHAT ABOUT CHURCHES TODAY?
QUESTION: Should the church be involved with Halloween? 1 Thessalonians 5:22 tells us to "Avoid the very appearance of evil." Can anything about Halloween be redeemed for God? The fact is: Halloween does not have one single redeeming virtue. It is an idolatrous custom born out of pagan superstition. It is a demon-inspired, devil-glorifying, occult festival. The Word of God clearly states,"what fellowship can light have with darkness?"
In his book “The Dark Side of Halloween”, Tom Sanguinet, a former Wiccan high priest wrote "Halloween is purely and absolutely evil, and there is nothing we ever have or will do that would make it acceptable to the Lord Jesus."
The whole theme of Halloween is one of darkness, death, destruction, fear, threats, violence, vandalism, and evil! It is a night of witches, bats , ghosts, , skeletons, death, and monsters. We dress our children as demons, witches, ghouls, vampires and werewolves and send them out into the streets in the dark to reenact the Druids' practice of demanding treats from people under the threat of tricks or curses if they don't comply. We take a pumpkin and carve demon faces in it and decorate our homes with it. On Halloween night, there will be witches & warlocks practicing their divination and calling up evil spirits. There will be seances and ouiji boards all in the name of fun and excitement. There will be sacrifices of dogs, cats, , chickens, goats and even humans on this satanic night! That’s why God instructed the prophet Ezekiel to “teach My people to distinguish between the unclean and the clean, the profane and the holy” Ezekiel 44:23.Now you know the "other side of Halloween".
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