Halloweens & Demons

Jacque Carnochan: Welcome to Hot Takes with Jacque Carnahan, where season one is all about deliverance. We're gonna give you unfiltered truth for your breakthrough. On this episode, you might have a demon if you've ever celebrated Halloween. yeah, we're going there. You can just stop right now all you crazy Karens before somebody says wait. Jacque, are you telling me my five-year-old who dressed up like Elsa and got a Twix bar that she's got a demon? No, I'm not telling you that. Come on. I'm not saying that if you went trick-or-treating, you're automatically picking up a whole bunch of critters. But I am asking you as a Christian to take a serious look at what Halloween celebrates. What are you exposing yourself to this season? And why are so many things Scripture tells us to stay away from suddenly becoming acceptable and entertainment during the month of October? Witches, ghosts, demons, spells, death, fear? Occult practice? Communicating with spirits? For most of the year Christians recognize this as darkness. let's get some spiritual warfare out. We don't want any of that touching us. And then October comes around and suddenly we're decorating our houses with all of those items. Maybe the question isn't whether Christians should celebrate Halloween. Maybe the better question is: why are we fighting so hard to participate in something that celebrates the very darkness that Jesus defeated? Where did Halloween come from? And so before we get into all of the things that Halloween celebrates, let's look a little bit of history. Let me be up front and say I'm not here to give you a deep dive on the history, I'm not here to and argue the origins of Halloween. I'm not going down that rabbit hole. You can do that on your own. But historically, modern Halloween developed from a mixture of traditions over centuries. One of those influences was from the Gaelic Festival that marked this transition between the harvest season and the winter, and the traditions surrounding it includes beliefs about the supernatural realm spirits and the dead and then later christian influences also emerged November 1st became All Saints Day, also known as All Hallows Day, honoring Christian saints. November 2nd became All Souls Day, a day for remembering and praying for the dead, not a Christian practice. And then eventually it all became Halloween. So no, I'm not gonna tell you that Halloween was invented by a bunch of Satanists sitting around going, hey, how can we get everybody else involved in sa Satanist activity? Because that's not historically accurate. And honestly, that's not the point I'm trying to make here today. Because I'm not here to argue about who started Halloween. I'm asking you to look at Halloween and what it celebrates now. Look around. I said it before. You see those giant skeletons everywhere, those nasty-faced pumpkins, witches, graveyards, fear, occult imagery celebrating the dead. Our culture takes things that scripture repeatedly warned us about and puts it up for the season and turns it into entertainment. And that's a conversation I want to have with you guys right now. Because regardless of whether every Halloween tradition originated from something purely evil, I want you To look at what you're celebrating and why are Christians celebrating darkness? Let's take a listen to some of the people who actually came out of these occult Satanist witchcraft backgrounds. There's a very, very public testimony. I know some of you guys have probably already heard it, but John Ramirez he is a former occultist and he spoke extensively about his former involvement with Satanism and the occult practices, and he says that Halloween held a Spiritual significance in his former life. Former witch Jenny Weaver also publicly warned Christians about treating occult practices and Halloween casually. Now, their personal experiences are in Scripture, but I'm thinking that their perspective is worth listening to. Because Christians look at some of the stuff and say, meh, it's just pretend. I don't actually believe it, right? But some of the occult people who actually came out of it say, you don't understand what you're playing with. which sounds very familiar to the warnings that we hear in scripture, and at least should make us pause and think. twice. So let's look at some of the stuff around Halloween. What are some of the practices that people do around Halloween? They watch horror movies, movies about witches and demons, they go on haunted trails, haunted houses, ghost tours. They intentionally scare themselves. They're decorating in the witches and the skeletons and the ghosts and all of that. Why? Because suddenly it's just entertainment and it's really not that big of a deal. I don't understand why people would pay money to experience fear. Hey, give me a ticket. Demons? Yeah. I'm gonna go look at one in a haunted house. Witchcraft? Put on Netflix, let's watch some. Death and Torment? they're in my front yard. Guys, we spend the rest of the year rebuking the spirit of fear, and then we'll pay 40 bucks for some to chase us through the woods with a chainsaw. Come on! At some point you gotta ask, why is darkness so entertaining? But y you might say, it's just a movie. Well let's talk about some of those movies. Now I know that I am going to step on a lot of toes, but that's okay. I can handle it, because these were to that my toes were stepped on. Harry Potter, Practical Magic, Hocus Pocus, The Craft, Vampire Diaries. How about the new Minions movie? Hmm? Hundreds of movies and TV shows fill the airways with witchcraft, spells, demons, vampires, communicating with spirits, occult themes. And what is the favorite excuse again? It's not real. It's just a movie. I mean, I used that excuse for years. I mean, that's what I grew up believing. Magic's not real. Real, witches aren't real, spells aren't real. I knew the demons were real, but everything else, that's not real. You know, the Bible says that the spirit realm is real. In fact, it's more real than our natural realm is. Hollywood might be pretending, but the spirit realm is very real. Let's talk about those horror movies. We're literally having an entire genre of entertainment designed around fear, murder, torment, demonic possession, witchcraft, and death. And we just sit down with popcorns and gummy bears and say, Entertain me for two hours, right? And then we try to go to bed and we can't fall asleep and we say, Jesus, please help me, because I'm afraid of the dark, or you have nightmares. Come on, guys. Philippians 4.8 says, Whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable, let's think on those things. Psalm 101.3. I will set no worthless thing before my eyes. Ephesians 5:11. I will take no part in the unfruitful works of darkness, but instead expose them. These scriptures should really challenge. You to evaluate what you are consuming. You cannot continually feast on darkness and wonder while you're struggling to walk in the light, or why are you dealing with fear, or why are your kids dealing with fear, or while you're having anxiety when you're constantly sitting down watching this stuff, It just doesn't work. What if you say, well, that stuff doesn't bother me? Actually, that's a little bit more concerning because you know, if you're like, I can watch all that stuff and it's totally fine, I'm totally fine. that's not necessarily showing, like, hey, I've reached a spiritual level of maturity that I can just watch all of it and it doesn't affect me. I'm gonna wonder: have you just become so desensitized and have seared the Holy Spirit so much and that you're not willing to listen when He's saying, Hey, turn that off. Your eyes and Your ears they matter. Jesus says in Luke 11:34: Your eye is the lamp of your body, and when your eye is healthy, your whole body is full of light. But when it's bad, your body is full of darkness. What you're continually putting in front of you matters. What you continually entertain, you eventually normalize. And when you normalize it, you stop guarding yourself against it. Ooh, let me say that again for those of you who aren't listening. What you normalize, you will stop guarding yourself against. Okay, here it is. But Harry Potter's not real. And it's just a really great storyline. Let me just tell you: I was the biggest Harry Potter fan. Midnight showings, book releases. I there was like a club of us. Harry Potter all the way. Loved it. In fact, me and my good friend we had the idea of a Harry Potter theme park before Harry Potter theme park ever existed. Okay? I wasn't just into Harry Potter. I loved Twilights. I loved the vampire things. I loved the City of Bones trilogy. What's interesting is I knew that witchcraft wasn't good. And I would never say that I actively participated in any witchcraft. Yet I would read books and watch movies that were casting spells, talking about warlocks, talking about demons, talking about all things witches and the dead, and coming back from the dead and drinking blood. I remember watching TV shows where they're casting spells. Do you wonder what's coming into your house when you're allowing that? Do you think that nothing's actually happening? Uh-uh, I'm gonna tell you what, there was a season of time when this is my reality. I was watching it, I loved it. I didn't really have a good sense of what really was okay and not okay. I had kids during this time and they were getting sick all the time. And I was plagued with fear. Every time a cough came, I'd freak out and I would give in to the fear. But then a shift came in my life, and the Holy Spirit began to teach me and I began to learn about the godly supernatural and I began to see the reality of what was really going on. I got rid of that stuff faster than you could say, Harry Potter, I got rid of it, threw it all away. I burned what I could I didn't turn anything on, and you know what? That next year. My kids were so healthy, because I stopped giving authority to the enemy. I stopped giving my authority over to fear and I started praying for healing over them, and we saw a dramatic transformation. So here's the reality: the spiritual world is very real. And now, huh? I turn a TV show on and I see a hint of it, mm-mm, turn it off. Can't do it. And why is that? Because once you recognize darkness for what it really is, it's really hard to call it entertainment. listen to what the former witch Jenny Weaver said. She publicly said the movie The Craft sparked her fascination. Think about that. Started out just watching a movie, then she became fascinated, and then entertainment became the invitation. That is why we have to stop pretending that everything that we hear, see, and experience doesn't affect us. when it comes to all of these things that Halloween celebrates at its core, fear, terror, the occult, Why are we intentionally feeding ourselves with that? With fear, terror, torment. 2 Timothy 1:7 says, For God has not given us a spirit of fear, but of power and love and a sound mind. It doesn't surprise me when people are engaging in Halloween activities and then end up months later tormented and crippled by fear and tormenting thoughts. It's because they invited it in with their yes. And then they try to pray their way out of it. God, take this fear away. this anxiety is here. But they don't realize that they willingly walked through the door, willingly participated in it, watched the show, maybe set a spell, maybe did a Ouija board. And now that demonic oppression has permission to terrorize you. And so as you're going through this season, The enemy's looking for your agreement, he's looking for access, he's looking For your permission, he's looking for your yes so that he can open a door. This isn't about becoming afraid of the demonic. This is about becoming aware of where you're giving your access to. So, does celebrating Halloween give you a demon? Here's where I want to be very clear. I'm not telling you that dressing up like Spider-Man and getting some Resse's PCs now is gonna say, hey, you need to do an exorcism. Mm-mm. That's not what I'm talking about. I'm talking about the deeper roots. What are you participating in? What are you giving your yes to what are you unknowingly coming into agreement as you celebrate What did you watch? What did you willingly enter? What are you participating in? What are you immersing yourself in? What's the fascination with witchcraft? What's the fascination with the communicating with spirits? What are you trying to find out? What has the Holy Spirit already convicted you about that you've just been ignoring? And yes, all of those things can be open doors that will lead you to need some deliverance. So the question isn't, did I celebrate Halloween? The deeper question is, what did I come into agreement with while I was celebrating it? I don't want you to be ignorant about what's going on in the world around you. Some of you might be asking, Well, do you celebrate Halloween? Do you take your kids trick-or-treating? I used to. I didn't really like it. And finally I reached a point where I was like, no, I'm done. We're not doing this anymore. But I will tell you this: I am extremely mindful about what I let come on that TV. What I let my kids watch, what I allow in the house. I'm their parent. I'm the one who has spiritual authority, and I will protect them as long as I can. I will not. Let a minions movie where they're casting spells and calling up demons to come into my house. I will not let Harry Potter be on my TV. I will not let anything that glorifies the kingdom of darkness come over my TV so that my kids would one day think that it's okay. God is bigger than all of it, so we need to switch our focus. This a hot take for condemnation. This is an invitation for you to connect with the Holy Spirit and ask him to search your heart, search your October, and search your Halloween, And see what he would like you to eliminate from your life. what do you do if you've opened a door? The good news is we can close it. That's what we've been doing this entire season. We can confess, forgive, repent, renounce, and remove everything that you've come into agreement with. If you haven't listened to my podcast, On the Occult, I encourage you to go back and listen to that episode because it's a thorough process. So, in this episode, I'm not going to lead you in a prayer, but what I do want you to do is go back and listen to the occult episode. And in that episode, I lead you through a very detailed prayer and renunciation and repentance and casting out. And that's where you can go when you take everything that the Holy Spirit has spoken to you and you walk through that prayer. But right now, I do want you to ask the Holy Spirit say this Holy Spirit, what have I? Willingly allowed into my eyes and into my ears that you never wanted me to see. I'm gonna leave you with this. Maybe you've been asking the wrong question. Can a Christian celebrate Halloween? Why don't you ask this? Jesus, does this glorify you? Instead of what's wrong with watching this movie? Ask, Jesus, what am I giving myself access to? And does it please you? Because not everything deserves access to you. Jesus defeated darkness. So let's not celebrate it or let it entertain us. And I hope you've enjoyed this episode of Hot Takes with Jacque Carnochan Feel free to share, like, subscribe, and pass this along to somebody else who you know might need to hear it. Remember, Jesus set you free from darkness. Don't open the door that he died to get you freedom from. Join us next time on another episode. of Hot Takes with Jacque Carnahan, where unfiltered truth is for your breakthrough.