Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable-if anything is excellent or praiseworthy-think about such things. Philippines 4:8
It's that uncomfortable time of year again...Halloween. I say uncomfortable because our family does not celebrate it. I used to celebrate Halloween. I saw no problem with the costumes, decorations, candy...just innocent fun, right? I was a Christian and didn't believe in the occult, witches or anything like that. I saw Halloween as just a fun time to dress up and be with my friends.
My views changed dramatically after watching a video of a former priestess of the Satanic Church. She shared the origins of Halloween and how it is celebrated and revered today among Satan worshippers and witches. I realized, for the first time, that there is much evil associated with the history, symbols and practices of Halloween. You can read more about it at Halloween: A Convenant with Death
Now that I had this information, what was I going to do with it? Was Halloween just a holiday about candy and costumes as I had always believed or was there more to the picture? Was I going to participate with others in a holiday that is looked at by Satanists as one of "holiest" holidays of the year. Was I going to allow my children to trick-or-treat on the same night that Satanists, the world over, have been praying for increased demonic activity? Was I going to decorate my house with images of death, horror and evil?
This may seem crazy thinking to many. You see, in America we tend to view the demonic world as something entertaining. The huge increase in occult related TV shows and movies and the incredible popularity of Harry Potter is proof of this. But, if you begin to do any sort of research into other countries and other religions, you will quickly see the demonic world is not about entertainment. It is about absolute control of people's lives. It stands in direct opposition to Christ and the Church. It is real and it is not something we Christians should take lightly. I wrote more about this at Are Harry Potter and Twilight for real?
But my choice to not celebrate Halloween isn't just about my desire to not associate myself and my family with a holiday with evil origins and symbols. It has even more to do with my desire to honor Jesus Christ in everything I do. I just read an email concerning this very heart issue, written by "Daryl" at the website Christian Living. He was talking about whether or not a Christian should play games such as Dungeons and Dragons or Yu-Gi-Oh...games that have to do with witchcraft, sorcery, demonic images, etc. But I think it can apply to Halloween as well.
Question
Hey I’m John and I have a question. Before that I want to let you know Jesus IS in my heart. I have one problem though. I play a card game called yu-gi-oh! I want to know if it’s against good to play it, I mean I'm not obsessed with it, I just like it as a hobby. I play sports and other things also. Please tell me if it’s against God or not, I do not believe in any of the cards or anything like dark magic or nothing. I worship Jesus Christ. So is it a sin to play yugioh???
Answer
Expert: Daryl - 9/12/2006
Great to hear that Jesus is your Lord! He is mine too! If Jesus is our Lord, then we need to make sure that we do everything here on earth for His glory, which means that when people look into our lives, and see the way we live, they will see Jesus! I’m glad that you are doing everything that you can to make sure that this is the case in your life.
I asked the same question that you are asking many years ago. Instead of Yu-Gi-Oh, we had Dungeons and Dragons and Masters of the Universe. I often argued with my mom and dad when they told me not to watch those programs or play those games. They said that it was evil, but I couldn’t see what was wrong with them. After all, everyone was doing it and nothing bad was happening to them. I listened to my parents though because the Bible says that we should honor our parents. I knew that I wouldn’t be honoring them if I did what they told me not to do.
I have grown up quite a bit and that was a long time ago, but I can see now that my parents were trying to protect me. Have a look at this scripture in the Bible:
Deuteronomy 18:9-11 (Contemporary English Version)
9Soon you will go into the land that the LORD your God is giving you. The nations that live there do things that are disgusting to the LORD, and you must not follow their example. 10-11Don't sacrifice your son or daughter. And don't try to use any kind of magic or witchcraft to tell fortunes or to cast spells or to talk with spirits of the dead.
Why did God say this? He sounds a bit like my parents when I was younger - “Don’t do that!” I’m not sure if you have read Deuteronomy, but if you have, you will know the story about the Israelites and their journey through the wilderness after God had brought them out of Egypt. God told the Israelites that they were His people and that He would take care of them. He was going to take them to a place called Canaan that had everything they could ever dream of: lots of food, plenty of sheep and cattle, and the land was beautiful. The one problem with Canaan is that it already had a whole lot of people living there. Those people did not follow God. In fact, they worshipped all sorts of other gods.
Let me give you an example similar to this story: Let’s say there is a married man named George who loves his wife and wants to spend the rest of his life loving her. George and his wife have a good life together and look forward a happy future. One day George’s wife leaves him and goes to live with another man, but she comes home every now-and-then for dinner and to pick up some more clothes. Could you imagine how that would hurt George? Everyday up until then George had tried his very best to make sure that his wife knew he loved her. He gave her all the things that she needed to be happy when she was with him, and all he asked of her was to love him back. For her to go and live with another man would really hurt him because he had given her so much.
This is what happened with God and the Israelites. He had given them everything that they needed to be happy and He was always willing to help them. He did all of that and all that He asked of them was to love and obey Him. God told the Israelites that when they entered Canaan, they mustn’t do what the Canaanite people did. They mustn’t practice the things the Canaanites practiced, and most of all, they mustn’t worship the Canaanite gods.
Unfortunately the Israelites didn’t listen and did exactly what God told them not to do.
Can you imagine how God felt? He had given them so much. He helped them to get out of Egypt where they were slaves for over 400 years. He gave them food and water every day while they were in the desert, and then gave them a beautiful land to rebuild their lives in. After all that God had done, they still disobeyed Him.
It hurts God’s feeling when we disobey Him, because that means that He isn’t our Lord - something else is.
What does that have to do with playing Yu-Gi-Oh? I went and had a look at what Yu-Gi-Oh is about. I saw that it has been made into games and movies and came across a couple of descriptions of these. Here is one of them:
“Yu-Gi-Oh tells the tale of Yuugi Mutou, a shorter-than-normal high school student who was given an ancient Egyptian artifact known as the Millennium Puzzle in pieces by his grandfather. Upon completing the Puzzle, he is possessed by another personality which is later discovered to be the spirit of a 3000-year-old (5000-year-old, in the English anime) Pharaoh, who forgot everything from his time.”
It goes on to say that Yuugi Mutou has to help the Pharaoh to get his memories back. I read quite a bit more, but this particular piece was what grabbed my attention. There may be very slight variations, but one thing is still the same. This game has to do with wizards, magic, and being possessed by spirits. If you look at Deuteronomy 18:9-11, you will see that God warned the Israelites not to have anything to do with these things. Why? Because these things have to do with other gods. Things that take us away from God, like worshipping the gods the Canaanites worshipped, come from one person - Satan. Take a look at what Jesus said about the subject:
Luke 11:23 (The Message)
23"This is war, and there is no neutral ground. If you're not on my side, you're the enemy; if you're not helping, you're making things worse.
Jesus is very straight-forward about this. We cannot be on both Satan’s side, and Jesus’ side, and we can’t be in between. As He said; there is no neutral ground
What I have tried to show you is that the games and programs of my time; Dungeons and Dragons and Masters of the Universe, all had one thing in common. They all had witches, wizards, magic, spells, and spirit possession. God is clear about what He thinks of these things. He doesn’t like them because they are from Satan. Have a look at the scripture to see how much dislikes these things:
Deuteronomy 12:29-31 (The Message)
29-31 When GOD, your God, cuts off the nations whose land you are invading, shoves them out of your way so that you displace them and settle in their land, be careful that you don't get curious about them after they've been destroyed before you. Don't get fascinated with their gods, thinking, "I wonder what it was like for them, worshiping their gods. I'd like to try that myself." Don't do this to GOD, your God. They commit every imaginable abomination with their gods. (Witchcraft, wizardry, talking to the dead, etc.) GOD hates it all with a passion. Why, they even set their children on fire as offerings to their gods!
John, Jesus loves you so much and He wants you to have the best He has to offer. Satan knows that and is trying everything He can to get people to do things that take them away from God. But Satan is clever. He doesn’t just go to people and tell them to leave God. They would see what he is trying to do straight away. This is what the Bible says about Satan:
1 Corinthians 11: 14b
…Even Satan tries to make himself look like an angel of light.
Satan will trick people into thinking that there is nothing wrong with something he has made by making it look soooo good. Like an “angel of light” He will do that by making it extremely fun. He makes the characters look harmless, and they are even on the ‘good’ side. The problem is that they are using Satan’s tools to fight evil. Tools like magic and wizardry.
If Satan can hurt God, he can get Him back for kicking him out of Heaven. When my parents told me not to watch Masters of the Universe and play Dungeons and Dragons, they weren’t doing it to be mean. They were helping me to love Jesus as much as I can. So now that I am older and understand more, I know that everything that I do should say “I love you Jesus!”, and that includes the programs I watch and games I play.
John, I don’t want to make your mind up for you, but I do want to make sure that you have all the facts so that when you make a decision, you make the best one that you know to make.
So whatever you do, whether it is eating, sleeping, watching TV, or playing games, make sure that you are doing it so that when people look at you, they can say “Wow! John really loves Jesus!”
If you have read this far, I encourage you to read the website I mentioned previously. Halloween: A Convenant with Death Whether or not to celebrate Halloween is an issue I believe each of us needs to seriously consider. I've shared my convictions...now it's up to you to make a decision.
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