Should You Celebrate Halloween?

 

     We are not your typical couple. We had a unique wedding full of symbols of our faith.. we dont do santa claus or easter bunny etc for our kids, and we definitely dont do halloween.

 

     I believe Christians should not. There are things we are told to celebrate, but these holidays have a lot of pagan origins and are overflowing with commercialism. Actually, Im not interested in doing anything just because everyone else does. Im not a fan of big glasses or new styles and trends usually. Halloween is the biggest one for me... how many people into witchcraft get married on halloween etc.. its their favorite time of the year! 

 

     Why would anyone want to decorate with bloody corpses.. celebrate death and try to scare kids.. or have a fake body hanging in their front yard..! (What about the people who actually found a real body hanging that are reminded as they drive by...) its horrible and absolutely unnecessary. What is there at all to like about it.? 

 

     I know kids dressing up and getting candy sounds great but its the holiday that says its great to focus on awful things. I am sooo thankful our church has an alternative night: to dress up.. get treats and watch a movie. We support that! For the families who are not into death witches zombies and devils etc.. now there is a place to go with your kids so they dont resent you and your convictions against the typical "halloween". I am happy to teach my kids to make their own informed choices and not do things just because everyone around them are. I am pleased with all my long conversations with my kids so far in life. 

 

     Do your own research and decide what You choose to believe and do. I personally think Christians are supposed to be set apart.. and a light in the darkness... going against the grain of society and focusing on the most important things in life. No need to follow the crowd.. my question is: Whom are you following? Just food for thought to my other Christian friends.. not trying to argue with anyone. Each person can choose for themselves of course.

 

Our family is a rare thing nowadays.. sometimes its discouraging, hence my little rant haha..

 

https://www.bibleinfo.com/.../it-wrong-celebrate-halloween this is a great article I found, worth reading.

Things Im not looking forward to about going back to church:

I havent minded the lack of church. I love the you tube mesages in the comfort of my own home. What I do miss is the corporate worship and alter calls for physical people to confide in and have them lay hands on you and pray. Plus of course having someone teach my kids new worship songs. Thats the good stuff.

What I dont miss are the judements I would make.. feeling like others were having a fashion show and watching weekly group selfies like church is a club.. comments about how smokin hot people looked.. really? is that the goal? Church is about people in need of a savior.. the world around us is a mess... we know the truth and need to be lights in the darkness right? set apart, not acting just like the world... These were adults..! We need to model for our kids not to run after empty goals but to care about the more important things.

No matter our story, we are all people forgiven and undeserving.. we should all be on an even playing feild.. as brothers and sisters. Christians should be down to earth, generous to the poor, not wasting money on hair dos, jewelry and style.. but putting others above ourselves... we are supposed to want to die to self right..? (of course im not there yet, or even close!)

Instead i had a leader from my church recently seem interested in my beeswax wraps at a potluck (before covid) only to laugh to a friend immediately after saying "look at her hat, she probably knitted it herself too".

it made me feel like a joke to her.

in my defense: i'm not a hippie, i care about the environment which I think all believers should.. Im just trying to be responsible to do my part to lower waste in my home... I also save money at the same time.. certainly not extreme. Beeswax wraps arent cheap and my hat was purchased as well... We are told to care for creation which makes me care about the environment and consider the little things i do to impact it.

i guess we are judging each other in opposite ways. thinking someone is cheap vs thinking people are wasting money on things i think are unecessary.

Last night I went to a moms group reunion bon fire and the host was wearing dirty clothes. it was so refreshing! Real people.. not full of pride putting on a show for anyone, just being herself. I felt so comfortable to be myself too.

Thats what church should be like.. no one judged or rejected for being different.. no one trying to impress others. no one passing our star or dot stickers like the "You are special" story. no thanks. Thats not Gods plan for any of us.

i try not to judge either but it sure can be hard sometimes..

We are all imperfect people created by and loved by God. how do you deal with Christians who arent just real imperfect people... accepting their imperfections? or ones that outright think they are better than you? Thats the not so good stuff...

Parenting Advice When Dealing With Inappropriate Things

If Im honest I often feel like Im struggling as a parent.. its very hard work!! But finally something happened to affirm me that I'm doing a good job, and actually have some advice to pass on!

So, the situation was that a boy playing with our daughter said something very inappropriate to her. Of course I let his parents know but our concern more than anything was where he had heard this from.. i actually wondered if he was being groomed for abuse by someone. 

Anyway, the parents came to our door  in a huff, questioning my daughter and said there is no way their son would say such a thing.. they were very upset and told my daughter their son was no longer ever going to play with her if she was making up such terrible things about their son. He had just been crying for 30mins telling them he never said that. They believed him. They also said if he did say that to our daugter he would be in huge trouble. 

We were quite shocked at their reaction. I was also bothered that he was crying and denying it. Really? Why would he cry when being asked a simple question by his parents?

I dont think these parents had any clue how to deal with this type of thing. We had a few months prior have a older boy or our street show our daughter his penis.. well... no one reacted crazy. Kids do stuff like this. It was a teachable moment for each of our families. Better boundaries were put it place.

Then i got thinking... this crazy situation was different because he is an only child. Parents of 2 or more kids get TONS of experience dealing with conflict.. DAILY. Breaking up fights.. . dealing with "he said/she said"... one kids saying they didnt do what they are being accused of.. We learn how to talk and counsell. When kids are both saying opposite things parents dont take sides. If someone is lying you calmly talk to them. The truth is there. We teach honesty above all else. You can always uncover the truth. The most important thing to teach your kids is to always be honest, even if they are going to have a consequence... its the right thing to do and you as a parent can be very proud of them telling the truth even if they did something wrong.

We deal with this all the time. Our daughter never makes up stories about her younger brother. She admits when she does wrong in the face of losing privledges etc. We are proud of her.

There should be no need for a kid to bawl for a long time over a open discussion with their parent over inappropriate things. Parents need to stay calm and ask simple questions to get to the truth. You dont yell and threaten punishments to get your kid to be open and honest with you.. think about it. It would teach them to hide/lie to avoid punishment. Naturally.

For us.. we were saddened this kid had such an experience with his parents. If he had someone try to abuse him he could never open up to them. It was almost a relief though to say he wouldnt be playing with our daughter any more though. All he does to play with her is say hes a ninja and wants to train her getting her to do chin ups and push ups etc... promising her medals and trophys or reaching another level in training. Its not fun for her most of the time. Sometimes he is challenging her to do dangerous things like climb the top of our deck railing and jump off.. or ask her truth or dare questions she is uncomfortable doing/answering. She is always telling us how she has to say no to him all the time. We are always teaching her its healthy and good to say no to something you dont want to do.  We always tell her how proud we are.

So... fast forward a few months, and this boy shows up in our backyard to play again. I had to ask "why are you playing here when your parents said youre not allowed?" His response: "We decided we would give her another chance". 

Ummm... his parents were rude and overreacting. They insulted my daughter! I expected a big apology... not another insult!!! I had to say "sorry you dont need to play here" and send him off. No thanks.

 Our daughter has lots of friends whose parents have never came over to get upset with her and whose kids arent inappropriate with her. We are good.

All this to say, I hope and pray parents out there will sit and talk calmly with their kids. Treat conflicts as wonderful teaching moments. That is what they are. We need to guide and teach our kids how to be great people in their future.

I hope a parent with an only child can learn from this post. Of course its scary to hear your kid is doing something inappropriate but be glad you are aware and its early in their life and you can teach them better. That is all. Parenting is one learning process after another.. for us and them!

Parents: We can do this :)