Halloween is an easy holiday to redeem because we invented it in the first place. “Hallow” means “holy” and “een” is just short for “evening”. So this is the evening before the day of holy ones, All Saints’ Day.
We also know it as Reformation Day when we celebrate the starting gun of Reformation, Martin Luther nailing his 95 Theses to the door of the church in Wittenberg. What better way to celebrate the creed of the Reformation semper reformanda, always reforming, than to enjoy the eve of All Saints’ with food, fellowship, and love for our neighbors.
How can we do this while gore and ghouls mark the holiday? Remember that All Saints’ on November 1st became a celebration in the early church. Ephraem Syrus mentioned it in AD 359 and Chrysostom preached on it also in the fourth century. So many people gave their lives as martyrs for the gospel that the Church made one day special instead every other day cluttering the celebration. All Saints’ Day is the victory day to remember how Christ’s people follow in His train, triumphing over the enemy, Satan, his works and effects. The evening before became symbolic for the last hours those miscreants have before the victory of the saints. And so believers dress up to celebrate and laugh at the lame and flailing efforts of evil.
We should be wise about who we mock. Not even Michael the archangel brought a reviling accusation against the devil, Jude says (verse 9). The gore and skank of how many celebrate Halloween is sad, but that shouldn’t ruin it any more than people turning Christmas into consumerist commercialism does for our celebration of the incarnation.
God is the Lord of the harvest, the one who will raise the saints from the dead, the one who tells us to love our neighbors as ourselves. This is the only night of the year when you can give candy to kids and not be a weirdo and introduce yourself to many of your neighbors. It’s easy to have a happy Halloween.