Christian Halloween?

Every year at this time I struggle with Halloween. It's not that my immediate family participates in it nor do we think that we are missing out on anything. Rather, I struggle with Christian family and friends who feel that Halloween can be modified into something acceptable. They insist that by choosing costumes that don't glorify death or by going to their churches' Harvest Party that Halloween has somehow become something a Christian family can participate in.

However, this same kind of attitude ended up by creating a mess in Christianity during its early days. When Christianity became the official religion of the Roman Empire there were many, many pagans that were compelled to become Christians. Thinking that the incorporation of some pagan rituals and traditions into Christianity would ease the pagans' transition to their new religion, Christianity became polluted and contained elements that God had not desired. Hence Christmas and Easter came into existence full of pagan rituals and traditions. Even pagan holidays had been co-opted and supposedly sanitized.

But no matter what you do with a pagan holiday it remains a pagan holiday! Another example of this is the new craze of Christian yoga. What? Just ask a Hindu and you will be met with scoffing. The principles behind yoga are not Christian, they are Hindu. Christian yoga is still Hindu!

God's Word says it best.

2 Corinthians 6:15-17 (KJV) 
¹⁵ And what concord hath Christ with Belial? or what part hath he that believeth with an infidel?
¹⁶ And what agreement hath the temple of God with idols? for ye are the temple of the living God; as God hath said, I will dwell in them, and walk in them; and I will be their God, and they shall be my people.
¹⁷ Wherefore come out from among them, and be ye separate, saith the Lord, and touch not the unclean thing; and I will receive you, 

If we are to remain separate from paganism and pleasing to God we have no business trying to sanitize Halloween into a Harvest Party or its traditions into Christian traditions. There can be no compromises!!

This Do in Remembrance of Me

1 Corinthians 11:25 (KJV)
²⁵ After the same manner also he took the cup, when he had supped, saying, This cup is the new testament in my blood: this do ye, as oft as ye drink it, in remembrance of me.

Christians will recognize that 1 Corinthians is referring to the ordinance of communion. Some churches do this every week during the church worship service, while other churches observe this practice once a month, or twice a year, or even once a year. Needless to say, Christianity has seemed to have gotten the idea down pat.

However, Christianity has forgotten the context of when Yeshua made this statement. Let's go back to Luke to find that context.

Luke 22:13-19 (KJV)
¹³ And they went, and found as he had said unto them: and they made ready the passover.
¹⁴ And when the hour was come, he sat down, and the twelve apostles with him.
¹⁵ And he said unto them, With desire I have desired to eat this passover with you before I suffer:
¹⁶ For I say unto you, I will not any more eat thereof, until it be fulfilled in the kingdom of God.
¹⁷ And he took the cup, and gave thanks, and said, Take this, and divide it among yourselves:
¹⁸ For I say unto you, I will not drink of the fruit of the vine, until the kingdom of God shall come.
¹⁹ And he took bread, and gave thanks, and brake it, and gave unto them, saying, This is my body which is given for you: this do in remembrance of me. 

These verses were uttered at the Passover Seder just before Yeshua's death. When Yeshua commanded His disciples to "remember Him," the disciples would have realized that the next time that they would be in this situation would be a year from then at the next Passover Seder. But why would Yeshua tie communion to Passover? Why can't the churches just decide on their own when and where they want to observe communion?

The annual Passover Seder was instituted by God as a memory device.

Exodus 12:14 (KJV)
¹⁴ And this day shall be unto you for a memorial; and ye shall keep it a feast to the LORD throughout your generations; ye shall keep it a feast by an ordinance for ever.

What were the Israelites to remember on subsequent Passovers? They were to remember how God delivered them out of Egypt and how He redeemed them and made them His people. The Passover and the Exodus are types of the salvation that Yeshua provided in His own death and resurrection. Our remembering Yeshua and His provision of salvation by observing communion connects us to the Exodus and the Passover. This is how God works!!! The blood of a lamb kept the Israelites from death and the blood of the Lamb of God (Yeshua) keeps believers from eternal judgment and death.

Can churches do their own thing and observe communion as they want? The story of Cain and Abel, the laws in the Torah, and the history of Israel's faithlessness all point to God's desires for correct worship. At the very least we are missing out on the connections that God has provided.