The Bryce Crawford Podcast - Can Christians Celebrate Halloween? (EP 144)

Episode Date: October 27, 2025

In this episode, Bryce sits down with Elijah Lamb to discuss halloween, its origins, is it demonic, and can Christian's celebrate it?

What's going on, guys? Welcome back to another episode of the Bryce Crawford podcast. I'm Bryce and today by the title of the episode, you know we are on the Halloween special today. And sitting across from me, I am Mermaid Man. Hey. Oh, my gosh. All right, I got Elijah Land with me.

Elijah and I have been, we're roommates when I first moved to L.A. We wore these costumes years ago to a Halloween thing and we're here. The I holes. dude are so scary. Oh, man. All right. I think, look, here's the reality.

I think, you know, before we get started, I think we need to preface something. I think the issue of Halloween, you can correct me of him wrong. I think the issue of Halloween is like one of Christian liberty in the sense where like it doesn't have to be that serious. I like that C.S. Lewis quote where he's like, don't think too little of the devil,

but don't think too much of the devil. And I think with something like Halloween, we can give him more power than he needs to have. So we're going to kind of, to talk about Halloween. There's some swirl about like the origins of Halloween, what this looks like, what does the Bible say, all that other stuff. But Elijah, thanks for coming on and doing this movie. Thanks for having me. All right, let's define really quick. Let's just define Halloween. All right, the swirl on the internet, I'm going to let you do this. The swirl

on the internet is, some people say, well, Halloween is from pagan origins. Some people say Halloween is a Christian holiday. Some people say neither. I mean, where does Halloween come from? That's a great question. And it's one that's really hard to answer. People, like, overstate their knowledge and sort of like our knowledge on the gloves, man, on where Halloween came from. Halloween as it exists in America, like lots of the traditions, we don't really know. We're kind of guessing.

We'll hear people say things like, well, it comes from Sam Hine, which was a pagan festival. And we don't really know that. And there's not a lot of, the evidence there's really, really shaky. I personally think it basically has nothing to do with that at all. But the name Halloween comes to what are you laughing? Bro, you look so stupid. If you could see your face. Dude,

you look like a different person. I can't take you two eyes. It sounds like you have a cold because you're talking over the star. No, keep the star on. No, you made me. Keep it on.

No, it's fine. Bro, I can't be the only one with something on my face. No, you made fun of me, so I feel insecure. All right. Yeah. Sam Hine. Yeah, what I haven't, you go. I don't even want, I don't even care anymore. You hurt my feelings. No, I'm just kidding. But the name Halloween is basically like an old English rendering of Hallows Eve, which is the old English rendering of the name for Saints Day. So all saints day, most people that are probably Protestant. I'm a Protestant. But Catholic celebrates something called All Saints Day, which is a holiday that goes back to the 700s that was started on November 1st to celebrate, uh, Christian,

Christian martyrs and Christians who had passed away. And the Christians would feast and celebrate together. And they'd celebrate the believers who had died and passed into glory and who were now alive with Christ. That's an extremely honorable thing. Extremely honorable. Yeah. But then now, like, you hear everything Wicca, Sam Hine, all that good stuff.

For those of you that don't know Wicca, it's modern day witchcraft, basically. Yeah. Wicca is, I posted this recently, Wicca. Like anyone who's doing like witchcraft today, particularly in America, is practicing Wicca, which is like you said, modern day witchcraft or like light magic, stuff like that. It's from like the 1940s. It's younger than trick-or-treating by a few decades. That's why I have a lot of hesitation on giving anyone, like, letting them be a voice of authority on how as a Christian I'm supposed to feel about Halloween, just because they're like a quote-unquote ex-witch.

You know what I mean? It's like, and what is that? Why do I care? I'm just saying, I'm glad that you're an ex-witch and that God has made you a Christian. but why does that make you an authority on all things supernatural? I don't think that it does. Yeah. I think the Bible is the authority.

How do you feel about like, because I see a surplus of videos of people that are like X, which is ex Satanist, X, you know, I messed with Ouija boards for three years in high school, right? So you got like this group of people who are all collectively kind of saying the same thing. So how do you reconcile that with calling? Yeah, sure. Just because people say stuff doesn't mean it's true. and people say lots of other things on the internet that are not true.

Masses of people believe things that aren't true. I admire people who come from dark backgrounds who want to avoid darkness. I think that's great. And I think that makes perfect sense. I'm down with that. But we have to be really careful about the way that we come to define things as dark, especially the way that we come to define things as demonic. It's like, what does it mean for something to be demonic?

Well, I'm of the opinion, and I think the Bible's of the opinion, that you can't call something demonic unless it literally comes from a demon. Otherwise, we just water the word down and something being demonic means nothing. Yeah. Right? So, like, I remember seeing these videos of like, oh, you have these demonic decorations on your porch. I'm like, what does that mean? Are they, have you, I've never seen a depiction of a demon on anyone's porch in Halloween before. By the way, we don't know what demons look like, so I don't even know what that would mean.

but does it mean that the decorations come with the demon? You know what I'm saying? How does that work? That doesn't make any sense to me. So if somebody's going to be demonic, that means it comes from a demon. So like a skeleton decoration is not demonic. I have a hard time with that. So my definition of darkness is going to come from the Bible.

But I'll have an admiration for those who will avoid Halloween because they want to avoid any kind of darkness. That's fine. But they don't get to define what darkness is. Yeah. Yeah. No, I like that. I think, you know, when I was wrestling, I was wrestling for a little bit because there's that thing where it's like, where Paul's like, I've become things. I've become everything for all people so that I might win some to the Lord. And he's like, for the Jew, I become a Jew. For the non-Jew, I become a non-Jew. You know, all these things. For those under the law, I become under the law, though I'm free from all these things. And it's, you know, it kind of, he kind of like tells you how to address it when you're in these circumstances of like, hey, if something's a sin to Elijah, if Elijah feels personally personally, convicted about a gray area, right? And I don't feel personally convicted. I'm not going to do that

thing around you. But then it talks about it like one on one, but it doesn't talk about what you do when you're in a group of mixed opinions. You know, it's like, what do you do when you stand in front of people where 50% of the people think Halloween's demonic? And 50% of the people doesn't think, or like they don't think Halloween's demonic. And what's the middle ground. And I like what you said. It's just like, I have a deep admiration for people that have been set free from demonic darkness. but also at the same time, I can't hard to find something like Halloween as that when, I mean,

Hallows Eve celebrating the saints that have been martyred. That's a beautiful thing. Yeah, that is the tension of 1st Corinthians and of Romans. So Paul talks about food sacrifice to idols and the convictions that come with that in 1 Corinthians 8, 9, and 10, and then in Romans chapter 14. And that is one of the difficult things that he'll say is like, hey, don't lead your brother into sin.

don't intentionally do these things in front of people who are confused. Specifically what he says is they're of weak conscience in Romans 14. And that's where I think weaponizing the personal conviction language is really frustrating. Because when you call something a personal conviction, you are saying, I have this opinion from the spirit. And that's not the way that Paul describes it in Romans or in Corinthians. And I'm not saying that those kinds of things never happen. But it's one thing to say, what Paul would actually say about you, if you're like,

oh, I need to abstain from this, Paul says you have a way. weak conscience. He doesn't say you have a special conviction from the Spirit, so it would be a sin for you because the Spirit told you not to. He says, you have a weak conscience. And so you shouldn't violate that conscience because anything not done in faith is sin. So he's like, if you don't have faith for it, you shouldn't do it. And I'll follow that policy. But it's another thing to be like, well, I have this conviction from the Spirit. It's like, well, hold on. Like, we have to be really careful when we put words in the mouth of God. So we can imagine in Corinth or in Rome, we have people saying, no, the Holy Spirit's told me, I can't eat food sacrifice to idols.

Paul doesn't validate that. He says, yeah, they have a weak conscience. So take care of them. And don't gloat about this in front of them and don't lead them into sin and don't confuse them. But he never is like, oh, the Spirit's going to tell you one thing for your life personally is going to tell you and tell this person another thing for their life. Like you're allowed to do this habit, but they're not allowed to. I think that that comes from this temptation to make everything about me, me, me, me, me, me, me, me, me all the time and to make my internal world the most important thing around me. And I think that's a really scary and dangerous way to come to decide what the truth is. So I think if you make a decision about Halloween, it should be rooted in historical,

scriptural theological facts. And then from there, you can decide, like, well, what does my conscious permit? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I'm pulling up that scripture that you were referencing 1st Corinthians 10, where he's talking about the food idol worship, which again, I think it's important. important, right? Because look, something I do respect, right? I respect that when it comes to like these gray areas, tattoos, cussing, Halloween, you know, all these things that we would label Christian liberty. And for those that don't know what Christian liberty is, it's kind of like everything that we've been talking about for a minute, Paul, right, the personal conviction thing. Hard labeling something, right? When we have, I admire that people try to put scripture behind their stuff, but a lot of

a lot of the Halloween takes I'm saying are cherry picking out of context. You know, like when it talks about it in 1st Corinthians 10, don't drink from the cup of demons. Yeah, that's crazy, bro. And then it's like, oh, well, we're drinking from the cup of demons on Halloween. And I'm like, well, hold on a second. Like, I got to read the full passage or even Ephesians 4 that you referenced earlier.

Even Romans 14 that you referenced earlier, there's just a bigger picture inside the scripture. And yeah, I would love to 1st Corinthians 1025 eat whatever sold in the meat market without raising any question on the ground of conscience for the earth is the lords and the fullness thereof. Dude, that verse is a big deal.

Like for people who have confusion about Halloween, that verse is so important because, so people will say things like, you know, oh, Halloween has pagan origins, right? Which I'm not totally convinced by that. But either way, paganism, especially Celtic paganism. So people will, it's so funny, people will like talk about Halloween and how it's demonic and they're like, well, the Celtic people,

and they don't even know who the Celtic people are. Like, we got to, like, can we, like, figure out who that was? So the Celtic people are, they're basically literally ancient ethnic groups from, like, parts of Western Europe, but predominantly up into, like, Ireland, and used to be the United Kingdom, but then it doesn't match. But it doesn't really, we're talking about Ireland, Scotland, and England. And that's where these holidays allegedly come from. Yeah.

Okay, well, the gospel came to those lands in, like, the early Roman Empire. So those lands have been Christianized for a very, very long time. And then there was like literally national Christian revival across that entire island and on Ireland in the like 500s. Yeah. So those lands have been Christian for nearly 1,500 years, a little bit less than that. Paganism died there over a thousand years ago. So let's say it was a pagan holiday 1,200 years ago. Well, that paganism has been long gone for 1,200 years because of Christianity.

So their whole culture, everything they do has been Christianized. Then they come to America, all these Irish immigrants come to America. And all these immigrants from these different places that are coming through Ellis Island on the East Coast, all their cultural celebrations are getting mixed together and secularized. And you just get like a secular American culture that's sort of irreligious. So you've got this, whatever, maybe we take this pagan festival. It runs through a 1,100 years of Christianity and then 100 years of secularism. I think it's just common sense to say, even if it's from paganism, which I don't think it is,

whatever darkness was there has been so diluted by 1100 years of Jesus and 100 years of us, just having cultural, suburban fun, that there is no more darkness involved. People will look at that and they recoil at that and they're like, oh, no, no, no, it's demonic. And I'm like, you know what the Apostle Paul just said in verse Corinthians? He said, hey, I know that meat was sacrificed to an idol this morning, you're good to eat it for dinner tonight. Like, don't go to the temple and sacrifice food to idols, but, but tonight, like the darkness, like it's insignificant. Everything is the Lord, you can eat it tonight. You know what I'm saying?

That's really insane. That's really insane. Whatever darkness is there by dinner time, it's. diluted. Paul was like, yeah, buy in the market and eat it. But we're like, well, it might have been, it maybe, might have, maybe, maybe, maybe might have been pagan 200 years ago. And so there's still demonic attachment. I'm like, that is pretty crazy. And I even think too, like defining what paganism is, right? Because you mentioned it earlier. Like a lot of these modern, even current witches and ex-witches, ex-sateness and all these things, they're defining paganism back from the 20th century with all that whole nine yards. And then when you

if you go look at back at first century paganism, I don't think the pagans today would be like, I'm doing any of that. No, of them, bro. They're what's called neo-pagans. Like, it's all of these people who are trying to, like, recreate the pagan thing in rebellion to Christianity. But as listening to my friend Nathan talk about this,

and he says, like, yeah, but they're just Christians. Like, they still believe in, like, the virtues of love and kindness and generosity. That's Christian. That's decidedly Christian. Nobody in the world did that until Christianity came on. the scene. The real pagans were like, you know, it would be awesome if we killed a lot of innocent people all the time. You know, like that's real paganism. Like, let's sacrifice our kids and be evil and horrible constantly. You know, neo paganism has no attachment to ancient paganism whatsoever.

Yeah, it's so interesting how like I'm, I'm kind of comparing it right now to like the satanic temple, right? The satanic temple and they don't even worship Satan. It's just. They're idiots. Yeah, it's just like an activist movement. You know what I mean? And, but it's crazy how like stuff manifests nowadays because back of the first century they're like live sacrificing children and then now like we're like abhorting babies. Yeah. And we're like doing stuff like that. You know, so I feel like it manifests in different ways. But again, yeah, it just blows my mind. I don't think any human being in America with two sense in their brain would remotely do any of the paganism that's going on. So I think when we label paganism, we have to understand like they're like most everyone that, you know, is having this, the the ex-witches,

ex-aedness and all this stuff. They're having this perspective of modern. Wicca versus like actually live sacrificing children. But yeah, I think that is very important what you said. They're sacrificing the meat in the morning to idols, but it's okay for dinner time. I wanted to bounce over to Romans 14. There's a couple scriptures I want to talk to you before. And then we're going to get into,

we're going to get into some claims that I've written down that I've heard verbatim on TikTok and Instagram. Amazing. Which I think is fun. And we're not, and again, I'm not going to say, who said them. I just want us to talk about the claims because we read stuff. Dude, it is so hard to flip pages in the Bible. I know. I'm at Romans 14. I can read some of them. Okay. Read actually,

can you start at the top? Because I think it's important. Yeah, great. Okay. Paul says, verse one, except anyone who is weak in faith, but don't argue about disputed matters. That's the weak conscience thing I was talking about. One person believes he may eat anything, while one who is weak eats only vegetables. One who eats must not look down on the one who does not eat, and one who does not judge one who does, because God has accepted him. Who are you to judge another's household servant? Before his own Lord, he stands or falls, and he will stand because the Lord is able to make him stand. One person judges one day to be more important than another. Someone else judges every day to be the same. Let each one be fully convinced in his own mind. Whoever observes the day, observe it for the honor of the

Lord. Whoever eats, eat for the Lord, since he gives thanks to God, and whoever does not eat, it is for the Lord that he does not eat, and he gives thanks to God. For none of us lives for himself, and no one dies for himself. If we live, we live for the Lord, and if we die, we die for the Lord. Therefore, whether we live or die, we belong to the Lord. Christ died and returned to life for this, that he might be Lord over both the dead and the living. But you, why do you judge your brother or sister? Or you, why do you despise your brother or sister? For we will all stand before God. We will all stand before the judgment seat of God, for it is written. As I live, says the Lord, every knee will bow to me and every tongue will give praise to God. So then each of us will give an account of himself to God. And this is the

really important part. Therefore, let us no longer judge one another. Instead, never put a, but a, instead decide never to put a stumbling block or pitfall in the way of your brother or sister. I know and am persuaded in the Lord Jesus that nothing is unclean in itself. Still, to someone who considers it a thing to be unclean to that one, it is unclean. Or if your brother or sister is hurt by what you eat, you are no longer walking according to love. Yep. For the kingdom of God is not a matter of eating and drinking, but of righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit.

Whoever thus serves Christ is acceptable to God and approved by men. And I think 1st Corinthians 10 at the end of that passage, it says whatever you do, do it for the glory of God. I think, according to Scripture, you can make anything in today's society for the part unholy, unrighteous, pervert it, anything. I mean, that's what we do with things like sex. We pervert sex. We pervert what it means to be sharp and sober-minded by abusing substances and running other things. And you can even do it on the, pretty much in anything. But I love how the scriptures are like, whatever you do, do for the glory of God. And I'm thinking of that vision

and acts that Peter has, when the four corners of the heavens come down. And he goes, what is made, what is now what now is uncommon has been made clean when God is like everything has been made clean so go go be it

and I just feel like it's a hard I feel like I'm making a pretty bold claim I feel like the same people that label Halloween as actually no I don't feel that way

there's people that label Halloween as demonic and then like when the third week of November gets here we're going to be hearing Christian saying that Christmas is pagan

Yeah. And I'm like, what are we doing right now? What's the point? Yeah, I think that there's definitely bigger things to worry about. There's bigger fish to fry. There are bigger fish to fry. Because we're like that thing. That's what we are.

You got to put that star back on your face. I don't want to. You hurt my feelings. I need you to put it back on. All right. Yeah, I just, I think like when we're reading the scriptures, so we see Romans 14, whatever you do for the glory of God. And I wanted to, I wanted to highlight, just bounce over to the

this last scripture is. And Romans 14 is super great for this because he says, like, don't judge your brother or sister. So for me, I can tell you honestly, my temptation is someone who doesn't want to celebrate because of some reason I disagree with. I want to judge them. I'm just going to be honest with you. I want to be like, dude, you're being so dramatic and weird. Like, why are you doing that? That's how I feel. And they're looking at me going, you're not holy. You're not set apart from the world you're this that and the other and paul's like can you just knock it off like can you just knock it off like we're trying to be holy we're trying to do our best but on things like on things like this man there's there's there's not like a policy paul comes in swing and he's like hey here is actually is the

truth of the situation you're totally allowed to just eat the meat it doesn't matter and first christians eight he's like we know there's only one lord yeah like there's no other gods like it doesn't matter everything is gods don't let don't let don't let the dominion of darkness take what is our inheritance as the children of god which is the earth and everything in it like you know, don't do that. But if somebody feels, I gave up, if somebody feels convicted, that they're,

or they, at least if their conscience does not permit them to celebrate Halloween without feeling fear or anxiety, like I'm like, oh, then absolutely don't do it. Yeah. Don't do it. And I'm not going to judge you for it.

Yeah, we're not definitively, I think that's the thing. We're not definitively saying, oh, if you don't celebrate Halloween, you're an idiot. We're more so saying when it comes to why you don't celebrate Halloween

and like definitively defining it, at least that's how I feel because I'm like that's the problem I'm having outside of just Halloween with like I see so much stuff homosexuality sex all this other stuff where I just reacted to a few videos last week where this lady said sex before marriage is okay and her only evidence was well I feel and I think and this is my opinion and so be it and that's why it's true yeah and I'm like well I can't get behind that or with the homosexuality thing well homosexuality's not a sin because what I feel and I think and this is my perspective. And look, I think experiential evidence is a part of why we do or don't do things. It's a reason why I believe in Jesus. It's the reason why you believe in Jesus because God's going to work in your life. God's going to work in my life. But the foundation of who Jesus is in my life and what I'm following comes from the word.

And so when I'm like, you know, having a hard time with these things, it's not that, yeah, It's not that I don't have respect for the X-witches and the X-8ness. It's not that I don't appreciate them. It's just I think when we definitively label something like Halloween as this, this, that, and the other when there's really a little bit more to the picture, we just have to be careful. I think the last scripture that was on my mind was Ephesians 4, right? When it says, be angry and do not sin. Do not let the sun go down on your anger and give no opportunity to the devil.

And 1st Peter 5 talks about like being watchful. and things like that. Now, I guess, can be the segue into the first reaction. Last year, we saw a video where someone had claimed that celebrating Halloween gives a foothold to the devil in your life. Meaning, when you celebrate Halloween, it cracks open the door for the devil to grip you in whatever way, shape, or form. Now, I'm, I love, I love that, I love the scripture.

Because it kind of defines what gives the devil a foothold in their life. Does your little four-year-old girl or boy putting on an Elsa costume and picking up kick cats at the front door, does that give the devil a foothold? Well, Scripture doesn't say that. Scripture says that unrepentant sin gives the devil a foothold. I mean, we're cherry-picking, but when you read the whole passage, you know, he's talking about unity in Christ, in the body of Christ, and then he goes into this thing about new life that you have in Christ. now that you've had faith in Christ, you have this new life, he's saying to put off your old self, which belongs to your former manner,

and it's corrupt through deceitful desires, and be renewed in the spirit of your minds, and put on the new self, created after the likeness of God and true righteousness and holiness, therefore having put away falsehood, what's the falsehood that's being put away? It's your sin. Let each one of you speak the truth with his neighbor,

for we are members of one another, be angry and do not sin, do not let the sun go down on your anger and give him no opportunity to the devil, but the thief no longer steal, but rather let him labor doing honest work with his own hands, like just addressing unrepentant sin. And I think that's, like, reflect on your life. Like the real footholds in our life does not come from me putting on,

me and Elijah putting on a mermaid man and barnacle boy costume. The real footholds in our life are, do I have unrepentant sin in my life that I'm not dealing with? From what I understand, like the, when I read the New Testament, and I can't think of a single instance where the New Testament talks about the devil gaining power or authority in a believer's life that is not caused by sin or deception. So the devil's two things is temptation and false teaching. And those are the two things I can think of that actually puts the church in a place of susceptibility to being harmed and affected by the devil in a negative way. So that's where we need to see.

The temptation for a lot of people, especially newer Christians, is, and I did this, is to drive. drop the bar to the floor. And what I mean by that is, if you can make righteousness into, I don't celebrate Halloween, then you can congratulate yourself. And you can feel good about that decision. And you can say, oh, yes, look, I've conquered the devil. All these Christians are out here giving permission to the devil in their lives, opening up demonic portals into their households.

And look at me, my lights are off. And I'm not wearing a costume. And my children have no candy, so we're free of that demonic influence. Meanwhile, you're a heretic and you're an unrepentant sin. And it's like the which of these is weightier, you know? And so the same kind of thing is that I'll be honest with you. The thing that frustrates me the most in the Halloween conversation is when people say things like, oh, but we're meant to be set apart from the world. And I kind of have to pause there and go, well, hold on.

Is that what you think that means? People do the same thing with tattoos, right? Like I'm sure you get the comments. You have tattoos. Yeah. I have them as well. Can't see them because I'm green. But if you, you know, I'll talk about tattoos and people will say things like, oh, but that's not very set apart.

I'm like, whoa, pause, bro. Like, why do you think that being set apart is only consistent, like, aesthetic stuff? I'm all down for, like, modesty. So, like, clothing is, like, important, obviously, and our appearance is important. But do we think, like, the world's understanding of evil, un-Christian people is people who have tattoos? So they see you with tattoos and are like, oh, you're just like me. And you definitely don't know Jesus. And you're evil.

You have the appearance of evil from 1st Thessalonians chapter 5, verse 22, which is not the best translation of that verse anyway. But I'm like, that is, you're taking righteousness and you're doing what other religions do. You're doing, oh, we'll just pray in this direction or we'll avoid these ingredients and food, so we'll read the food label really closely. Like, we're just going to make the expression of our religion stuff that anybody can do. Okay, well, if righteousness and Christianity is nothing more than like, oh, I don't have tattoos, I don't listen to secular music, I don't celebrate Halloween. Well, you're taking the bar of righteousness, which is the fruit of the spirit, love, joy, peace, patience,

kindness, goodness, gentleness, self-control. and you're going, eh, I'll get to those someday. I'll take righteousness and pull it down here where like I can fit into it. I go, yeah,

I'll avoid the celebration. I'll be careful what comes on the ox in my car. It's like, that's not real righteousness. Yeah. It's not. And to speak of something like Halloween,

which in, Halloween is celebrated in many, many, many, many ways. You know, like, it's not the same for anybody. The way that a five-year-old celebrates Halloween and the way that like

a fraternity bro celebrates to Halloween are very different. Yeah. And there are ways that people celebrate that I want nothing to do with. Like, absolutely. But I heard my friend Austin say something this week that I thought was really helpful. He said, like, if it's not a sin to do any other day of the year, it's not a sin on Halloween.

If it's a sin to do any other day of the year, it's a sin on Halloween. That's just how it works. Yeah. You know? So I think that's important that you have to follow that. It's like, we can't invent new sins that anybody can avoid to make us feel good about ourselves and to give us that sense of superiority over other Christians who dress up like SpongeBob characters, which, by the way, it's not Halloween.

right now. So it's perfectly unsinful for us to wear these costumes. That's right. We are not, it is, it is October 20th. So and, almost your B day. Almost. Dang. I remember you're in October B day. Yeah, you are too. Yeah. I have it in my calendar. Really? Yeah, I'll show you. You missed it. No, I didn't. I text you. No, uh. You called me on my birthday and you, you said, what, do you want to come on the podcast? And I was like, yeah, and then you hung up. No, I did not. You did. Bro, it's literally in my calendar. I got the calls like, oh, Bryce is calling for a B-day.

I was like, what's up, bro? And you were like, bro. You want to talk about Halloween? That's embarrassing because I literally have it in my calendar. I was like, I have yours in my calendar, too. Bro, I will show you. That is so embarrassing. That is actually so embarrassing.

Hey, bro, I'm not offended, bro. Hey, happy birthday. You mean that? I'm offended because you took your star off, but happy birthday. I tried, dude. All right, I kind of want to close out this episode with a few takes that we've seen. We're going to end the takes on Halloween. I mean, not on Halloween, on...

Does it look better? Dude, you look hilarious. We're going to end the takes on horror movies, which will be fun. But first take, these are all things... By the way, these are all quotes verbatim that I've heard on social media. First one.

Costumes, jack-o-lanterns, trick-or-treating, all have a demonic origin, so they're demonic. Okay. costumes, jackalinas, trick-or-treating. Those three things, the origins are not demonic. You ask one scholar of history, you'll get an answer, you ask another, you get another answer. What we understand is like Halloween is like a major phenomenon in America, and it's just developed in like suburban America over time to become the things that they are.

So to assign them to like something that might have resembled them 500 years ago just doesn't work that way. So to call them demonic in origin is one thing. and I don't think there's a really, really shaky case, and I just don't think it's true, especially not trick-or-treating. Now, even if they did, the question then becomes like, what do we do? What do we do with that?

Let's say they have a demonic origin 500 years ago. Again, if we're going to read Paul's texts responsibly and we're going to read the way that Paul was reading, I'm going to go, I think it's still perfectly fine because pumpkins don't gain a demon the moment you carve them. And knocking on someone's door doesn't become a demon if they, doesn't become demonic

if they happen to have candy waiting for you on the other side. Like, that's not how demons work. We're not just like spawning demons in the, like inventing new demons everywhere we go. So I don't think it works that way. If you want to follow that principle, you have to be, my thing with legalism is that you have to be consistent.

So if you're going to be legalistic about one thing, you need to stay consistent. Otherwise, like, you're in trouble, right? So you have to look at the Apostle Paul in First Corinthians and in Romans and say, no, Paul, they shouldn't eat that food. Yeah. It actually, it's sinful for them to eat that food.

Like, you're going to disagree with the apostle. I don't know. That's your standard and you have to be consistent about that. This star is ruining my day. It's over. No, I like what you were saying. but sorry keep going sorry one final thing my wife

said this amazing thing to me my wife is a genius and she was saying to me like oh you know like a lot of people it's like a legend which lots of the Halloween stuff is rooted in legend it's a legend like Nicola Tesla when he made whatever the engine that he made was I don't remember she's smarter than me

he asked demons for help and they help to make it and that's why we have modern cars so everyone who's driving a car well the combustion engine has a demonic origin do you drive a car? Do you know that cars have demonic origin? He also helped invent electricity. Do you have anything with electricity?

This lamp has a demonic origin historically. So there's a demon technically. Right. So we just have to be consistent. Right. So like that obviously sounds ridiculous. And that's why it's helpful to use that example because then you go, well, but Halloween is like spooky. And we're like, well, that's not just be consistent.

Yeah. You know, I think anything that is used wickedly as believers, we should figure out how we can turn it for good. Absolutely. And I think there are ways that we can honor the Lord. I love what you said earlier. Halloween is celebrated differently from a five-year-old versus a frat bro. And there are a whole lot of things that people do to celebrate Halloween that I'm not fond of.

And there are things that I look at. And I'm like, yeah, that's pretty sweet. Like, I enjoy that. And so I think my role as a believer is do things for the glory of God. And I love what you said. If it's a sin on any other day, it's going to be a sin on Halloween. And if it's not a sin on any other day, it's not going to be a sin. There's a sin for me to eat a candy bar.

Is it a sin for me to reach in a clear bowl in my kitchen and grab a candy bar? No. Why is it a sin for me to reach into an orange bucket and grab a Kit Kat? Would it be a sin to celebrate Halloween on October 30th to do literally all of the same things? I'm just wondering what the standard is. That's what you, it's just all arbitrary. So like everybody is just making up the. rules as they go. And I think that's, I think that's shaky. And if you apply that to any other

issue, you'll end up with really dangerous results. So let's take that principle and apply it to some other issue, like sexuality or like drugs or something like that. And you end up with, the results get crazy really, really, really quickly. And you can make room for some really terrible things. Yeah. Okay. Next quote, we heard, weeks before Halloween, witches and warlocks are walking the streets, taking back God's territory. What does that mean? I don't know. I'm not even trying to be mean. I'm just like, what does that mean?

I'm a big fan of saying stuff that makes sense. Wait, hold on. Have you ever stepped foot in a Spirit Halloween, Elijah? I have. Confession. I bought both of our costumes, Spirit Halloween. Hence why you have a demon and I don't.

And, you know, here's the reality is, you know, Spirit Halloween is making a Christmas chain called Christmas Spirit. Shut up. Game over for all the Christians that celebrate Christmas. No, we can't even buy Christmas. decorations anymore. Nope.

Did you know that Santa is an anagram for Satan? You expect me to believe that that's on accident? Christmas is pagan and it's from the devil. Okay. Well, you know. Okay. Weeks before Halloween, witches of warlocks or walking streets taking back God's territory. Dude, it's too bad that warlock is such a cool word.

We should call them something that sounds dumber. You know? Poop lock. Yeah. I'm just kidding. War fart. Dude, if there's... You got them, Bryce.

You told them, bro. Poop-lock, they're all going to quit. If I was a warlock, I'd quit right now. What is that? First of all, I'm once again asking the world... I'm having too much fun right now. I can't. I can't.

We're getting a little too silly. All right. All right. I'm once again asking the world to not believe everything you see on the internet. Like, I'm... Here's what I'll do. I challenge someone who thinks Halloween is demonic. to set up a prayer post in the aisle of a spirit Halloween

and rebuke all the demonic forces and wait and watch and scan to see if you see any witches come by and, you know, curse the aisles of this Halloween store. I just don't think it's going to happen. Maybe it's just because I'm a doubter, but I think it sounds ridiculous. There's a lot of Spirit Halloween's in the world. There's not nearly enough witches to make it happen.

That's number one. Number two, even if they were, I literally don't care. I've heard, even last year, we heard that, like, witches of warlocks would go through the aisles and cast hexes on the costumes. And I'm like, what is that? Did we get lucky? You know, like, I'm like, what?

Did we just dodge a bullet? Like, did they miss the one in Van Nuys? And we, you know, we... No, definitely. If they were going to go to one, they would go to that one. Like, bro, I put... They sell mascot heads now, like the mascot costume heads. And I put on a Scooby-Doo.

Mascot head the other day. Ro-roll, Reggie. Right. You're so weird You are so weird A little I've never You're gonna be the first

Like scoops You're gonna be the first kids I've ever told it Get out of my house Get out of here Really you'd say that to me No I actually want you to move in I'm married Okay

Well Can she move in as well No Okay That's not gonna work then Yeah it does sound ridiculous It does sound very ridiculous To say that

I mean look I Yeah, I'm just going to move on the next problem because that one just, I read it out loud and it doesn't make sense. That's a verbatim quote. They're taking God's... Everything I've written down is a verbatim quote. Read that last part again. Taking back God's territory.

Okay, that doesn't, that's not how that works. It doesn't work. That doesn't happen. Everything is the Lord's. And the kingdom of God is winning. Like, that's just the story of the Bible. I don't believe in, in the, I have as a, in the New Testament, I see the world through the lens of victory. So the Lord is always taking.

Like we're always gaining back what has been lost to evil. And I just think that to speak of witches as though, you know what you'll notice when you read the New Testament? The Apostle Paul doesn't talk about witches. It's not that witchcraft didn't exist. He says witchcraft is a sin. But all that talk about the resistance to the kingdom of God that the church was facing, he gives literally zero attention to the influence and the power of the people in those pagan spiritual positions.

He doesn't talk about them. that's interesting. Yeah. Because you have all these Christians who are like obsessed with the people who are doing light magic or they're in the atheistic church of Satan. And I'm like, man, in the Apostle Paul's world, it was worse. Well, bro, I think you have like, at least where I grew up, the Bible to me was more like, like, do this thing.

And like almost like work, work, work, work, do the Bible and that was it. And I was like spiritually numb to just a spiritual realm in general. Yeah. Our battle is not against flesh and blood, but against principalities. And then, you know, then you move out to L.A. And I started seeing stuff that I didn't know existed. And look, it's, it's, like, there's real demonic stuff. There's also real, like, good, beautiful things that we experience in spirituality,

according to Christianity. Yeah. Yeah. But, I mean, I feel like if you care, right, if you really care that Halloween is so demonic, I feel like we would do anything in our power to go reach those people. Yeah. You know, like, if it's like, you know, we're going to this area, this area, this area, it's like, I feel like sometimes we get hyper-fixated on these minute issues like Halloween.

Like, oh, Halloween is so bad. And you've got like children dying. Yeah. And it's like, oh, we're just going to watch them take God's territory and do nothing about it. If you really think they're taking back God's territory, like, and you're the best act of resistance you could come up with is like a harvest party at the church or like turn all your lights off. Like, go to war, bro.

Yeah. If that's really what you think, like, you better do something about. that. If that's really the way that you see things, you know what I mean? Yeah. He who lives and is greater than he was in the world. Go be the light. All right. Next one. According to the Church of Satan, costumes swap your identity in the spirit. The Church of Satan said that. The person that I heard quoted, I kind of like, I had to put it. She's, they said something about Church of Satan, like Church of Satan says that costumes swap your identity in the spirit. Okay, so just to put the boogeyman to rest, the Church of Satan started in the 60s.

They're even younger than Wicca, than Witchcraft, and they're atheist by creed. Like, you can go read all of their stuff. They don't believe in spirits. They don't believe in any such thing as the spirit. They don't believe those things. They don't believe in demons. They don't believe in Satan. They don't believe in God.

They don't believe in any of that stuff. Have there been people in history who've done, like, devil worship? Yes, that those things have existed, but that's not what the Church of Satan is. Is the Church of Satan good? absolutely not. It's an evil institution and it is from darkness. It is satanic whether they realize it or not. It is influenced by the devil. But I think it's important to like just help people understand this. The devil is getting his work done in the world around us, not through, at least not especially through demons and people in the church of, or excuse me, witches and people in the church of Satan, which are a teeny, teeny tiny minority in America. If that's his only battalion, he shouldn't have as much influence. influence as he does. So evidently, the devil is using things that we might accept as everyday normal stuff and stuff that we would never call demonic, and the devil is using them significantly more powerfully than he's using Satanus or witches. You know what I'm saying?

I agree. I agree. I don't think, my personal opinion, I think that the devil is using this unity amongst the body of Christ, distractions, social media, procrastination, more. than Halloween. Pornography. Yeah. Like it just tears apart families and people. Like there are so many other things that the enemy is using. Money.

Like there's so many things. Like is money demonic? The Bible says the love of money is the root of all evil. So why do you have any money? I mean, why even get close to money? Why even go there? You know, you're keeping all that money. Are you just seeing how close you can get to the fence?

You need to get rid of all that money because it's demonic. I get the principle, you just have to be careful. But as far as the like, it changes your identity in the spirit, that's not biblical language. The Bible does not describe things that way ever, ever. Not one single time. Does the Bible talk about things in the spirit, identities, anything like that, or ways that your identity in the spirit can suddenly just be changed.

The Bible doesn't, it's not biblical language. Yeah. That's totally inventive. And so if we're going to be Protestants and we're going to believe in what's called Sola Scriptura, which is that the only authority in our lives that we believe can tell us the truth without faith. without ever being wrong is the Bible. And so anything that adds theologically onto the Bible

and invents things that are not in the scripture, we have to be really, really weary of. It doesn't immediately make them wrong. But if they contradict anything in the scripture, we go absolutely not. We don't believe that. Right. So it's just wrong to accept people who talk like this

about your identity change in the spirit because of a costume to like take that as Bible. Yeah. Because the Bible doesn't ever talk that way, ever. Yeah. Yeah, I agree. again, these are things This is a list of things

that I heard on social media Okay Seances and sacrifices Are performed To, and I fit this in here To like prime the Halloween atmosphere Just let's keep moving

I mean it's kind of the same premise This is the last one Just the hands up Last one This is about horror films Demons come out of your TV when watching horror films. Now, before I let you respond, I just want to give my, my, my personal opinion on this.

I don't watch scary movies. I don't. I don't watch horror films. I don't like them. They make me feel weird. They make me feel gross. Me either. I don't like, I don't like watching murders on the screen.

I don't like watching blood slasher. I don't like watching that stuff. It makes me feel weird already. So I'm not endorsing personally. I'm personally not endorsing horror films. are scary movies. I don't like them. I don't think they're beneficial

and I want what I consume to not be that. I just, I don't want that. Now, the demons crawling out of the TV, I, bro, what is it going on? Well, my problem with that on like a really nerdy level

is it gives qualities to demons that we shouldn't think that they have. So demons are now omniscient. They know everything. So the moment you press, play on the horror movie, they've been alerted. So it's like, it's like, it's like Harry Potter. Yeah. Like you said the name Voldemort. So now all the death eaters know where to go. They know exactly where you are. And I just, I don't know why you would think that that's the way that works,

if I'm being honest. And also they're now, they're also omnipresent if you don't think that. Right. So if demons, if it's not because they've been alerted that you've started the horror movie, it's because they were already there. And so that means there's demons around you constantly all the time, which I, demons are real beings that actually exist and can only be in one place at once. So people say, forming your demonology is really important, like, and angelology and everything, all the things you believe about spirits that are not God. You first inform us, you got to figure out your theology. If you've got to complicate a demonology, you don't have a good theology, like, you need to fix some stuff. Your priorities are out of whack. And it's, it's probably because

you're someone like me and you have a temptation to like fall into like the conspiracy theory stuff. And I'm prone to that kind of stuff too. Like I'm, I get, I, I, by, I, by, I, I, by, I, I, the hook, man. And like, I can go there. And so I understand. But we need to get our first things first and figure out who is God. For sure. And be focused on those things. But as far as the Bible never, the Bible does not have the obsession with demons that many of us have. It talks about them. But it's the way it talks about it is like, yeah, in Colossians chapter two, Jesus put to shame the enemy. He literally embarrassed the devil on the cross. He conquered the devil. And he's been dealt with. Jesus, he says in the gospels that he went into the strong man's house and he tied him up.

And so Satan is left. He's like bound and basically, and kind of just like fighting for his life to like get something done before Jesus Christ returns and ultimately cast him into hell forever. So Christians are meant to approach these things with victory. It's just weird to ascribe all these powers

and things to demons that the Bible doesn't give them. My favorite quote about demons I ever heard, I can't remember which one of my friends said this. I think it was my friend Nathan that I talked about before, but he says, you don't catch a demon like you catch a cold. You know, you don't catch a demon by like brushing shoulders with some room the demons happen to be in and now you have a demon. You know, that's just, it's not the way that that works. And the Bible never talks about,

again, the Bible talks about demonic influence coming from unrepentant sin and from false teaching. And so what you need to do, if you want to be safe from demons, you need to repent of your sins, ensure that you're not living in any secret sin. And you need to not believe any false teaching. Yeah. Get the truth down, right? But you don't catch a demon like, like you catch a cold. And if we're going to like work with this mentality of like when you watch a horror movie, or if when you celebrate Halloween, you'll instantly catch a demon. You'll instantly catch a demon. from Halloween, or you'll get a demon from celebrating Halloween. By that same principle, we should say that when people celebrate secular Christmas, they get the Holy Spirit. Yeah. You know what I mean?

Yeah, yeah. And that just, that's just, we all know that's not how that works, because Christmas has been secularized. And so you don't, you don't get the Holy Spirit from waking up and opening Christmas presents. Yeah. Because it's just a, it's just a thing. It's just a material thing. It's not more than it appears. Can you, can you receive the grace of the Holy Spirit if you celebrate Christmas in a Christian way? and you go and you worship and you call to mind the gospel? Like absolutely in the same sense, if you go do horrible, evil, wicked things, be they sinful or like dark witchcraft intentionally seeking the demonic things, yes, that will have a harmful effect on you. But there is this, there's the secular middle ground that we're all participating in. It's okay to participate in

some things in culture, not evil things, but there are neutral things where we go like, oh yeah, it's just a holiday. We're just kids. In fact, the things that Halloween celebrates are like really pure in often. So like for horror movies, I'm like with you. They celebrate. things that are not pure. And they often contradict the Bible and the true story of the world, which is the victory, the conquering of good over evil. And horror movies often twist that, and that's why they make us feel gross. At least that's what I think. Whereas Halloween is like families coming together, communities hanging out together. You know, like neighborhoods, like in America, we've lost that sense of communal identity. We're so individualistic,

individualistic where we don't even know our neighbor's names. And Halloween is like, we're going and we're just like sharing. And there's this mutual trust. And it's, It's fun and it's silly. Like, those are good Christian biblical things. It's a good thing to seek unity. It's a good thing to have fun. It's a good thing to bless children in their innocence with like going and being silly. Like those are pure, really, really good things.

And Halloween makes those things possible in the same way that lots of holidays do. Like Thanksgiving and Christmas, they actually bring out virtues. So you might have some kind of resistance to like skeletons and scary decorations. Maybe you're not the kind of person who likes spooky. stuff and that's okay. But that does a way with so much of the imagery of the Bible, an imagery that's been used by Christians and the building of churches and art for literally forever. You know, like we make fun of death, actually. You know, like we do these illustrations and paintings of skeletons and stuff like that because we know that death isn't the real thing. Yeah.

You know, so like we're not scared of that stuff and we don't need to be. Yeah. So that's everything I think about Halloween. That's good. That's good. Now, I want to emphasize some, one last thing before we pray is that all those quotes and things I read, all the evidence, because I watched the full videos, and these are just, I was cherry picking from multiple different videos, but all of the videos,

the evidence was, well, trust me, I saw this, or I see demons and angels and I do this. And, well, I used to be this thing.

And again, it's like, well, that same logic, I have issues with when it comes to secular ideas like homosexuality, sex, substances, and all these things. Well, it's like, well, I feel and I think,

and I do this. And it's like, well, you can't, I mean, sure, but like there's no, it's very shallow. It's extremely shallow to just leave all of your evidence for a belief on what I think and my, I feel in my experience. Because, dude, it could be the same thing with something like, depression medicine.

You can get one person that took depression medicine and had the worst experience on the planet. They're like, yeah, depression medicine is the worst thing on the planet. Don't take it as demonic. And then you talk to a thousand people that are like, well, I took an antidepressant and it actually helped me. And it's like, well, it's very shallow to put all your basis on

don't do this thing out of your personal experience. I think we need something greater than just personal experience to back what we, like what we say and what we believe. And that's why we're trying to bring in some scripture and some history. just to kind of give you some peace of mind. Ultimately, this is like, look, if you're someone that's watching this that doesn't want to celebrate Halloween,

praise God, you do you. If you're someone that says, I want to celebrate Halloween, if you're someone that says I want to celebrate Halloween, the reality is, is make sure that what you're doing on Halloween is glorifying to God, because what you can do outside of Halloween

that doesn't glorify God is going to be a sin on Halloween. And what you can do to glorify God outside of Halloween is going to be done on Halloween. But I promise you, Elijah and I do not have a demon because we are in SpongeBob costumes. Yeah. I don't live in fear of anything that pagans started. I don't care.

Christianity conquered paganism. W. W. Get lost. W. Anyway, so if you feel, if your conscience doesn't prevent you from celebrating Halloween, then I think you should be okay to do it. Just stay sober,

dress modestly. Don't dress as anything horrible and evil and disgusting. Like, don't imitate some kind of evil in any way. mermaid man and barnacle boy are perfectly chill and uh and i think i think it'll be fine yep let me pray for us really quick jesus thank you so much for today i thank you that you give us peace love joy kindness and goodness god outside of just a holiday like hallowing god may we bear the fruits of the spirit even on a day like halloween if we partake in halloween may we bear your fruits love joy peace patience kindness goodness faithfulness gentleness and self-control may everything that we do

to you. Jesus, we love you. Thank you for freedom. Thank you for the cross. Thank you for the word of God. Thank you for your peace and your Holy Spirit. We love you, Jesus. It's in your name. We pray. Amen. Amen. Guys, thank you so much for watching and listening to this episode. If you guys like it, subscribe to us on YouTube, follow us on Spotify, Instagram, and TikTok. Bless you guys and see you guys next week for the next episode.