58 Sermon Illustrations on Occult

The X-Files. Shirley MacLaine. Aliens. Harry Potter. UFOs. Many people are fascinated and intrigued with the supernatural. Even in some churches today there are people who are looking for supernatural healing, supernatural experiences, and supernatural ways to communicate with God.

You may be going back for another semester of college, or perhaps you’re starting for the first time. You will be bombarded with new thoughts and challenges about what you believe, what truth is and how to find it, how–or if–you can know God, or maybe who or what is God to you. You may even be advised to seek out the supernatural in answer to these questions.

I too can get caught up in the sometimes-exciting world of the supernatural. But when I think about God and who He really is (as much as I can truly know), I realize that God Himself is supernatural. We’ve been reminded much throughout this past Christmas season that God sent His Son to earth as a baby who was conceived of a virgin(!) through the Holy Spirit. And if that wasn’t enough, that child became a man and died a horrible death on a Roman cross for the sins of the world, and rose from the dead 3 days later (read the gospel of Luke). Because of Jesus’ death on that cross, if I receive Him, God accepts me and calls me His child (1 John 3:1; Galatians 4:4-7). Ask and receive. It’s so simple, yet so very profound–and totally supernatural!

I’m amazed when I think about God and realize all that I take for granted. I can talk to Him–as I can with any other person–yet He is the God of the universe. Not only did He create it but He holds the earth and stars in place, and keeps it all in order (Colossians 1:17). He’s preparing a place in heaven for me and other believers. Best of all, He loves me and wants to have a relationship with me. Now, that’s supernatural!

Father, thank You for the supernatural gift of Your Son to the world. I stand in wonder and amazement when I consider who You are and all You’ve done. You are God! Thank You for including me in Your awesome plan.

Halloween in some form or another has been around for a long time. What we call Halloween originated in two other autumn festivals -- the ethnic Celtic celebration of Samhain and the Christian All Saints Day.

The Celtic harvest festival of Samhain (Gaelic - perhaps “Summer’s End”) possessed multiple facets in Celtic folklore that celebrated harvest, the dead and even the Celtic new year. Samhain probably derived from an earlier pagan celebration. Following custom among early and medieval Christian churchmen, Christian leaders often placed their holidays near popular pagan celebrations to wean their converts away from the pagan festivals. Hence, Pope Gregory III moved All Saints Day from May 13 to Nov. 1. Although never stated in any source that Gregory’s motive in the move was to counter the popular autumn festivals with pagan roots, his decision seemed to conform to previous practice.

All Saints Day, and its variants, All Hallows Mass and Hallowmas, never entirely disassociated itself in the popular imagination from the earlier association with pagan fall festivals and superstition. Much to the chagrin of church leaders of the medieval ages, popular observances preserved some of the older pagan features of the holiday, such as manifestations as autumn bonfires (from “bonefires”), maintaining links to the occult, folk magic and superstitions concerning the dead. These features were thought to be deployed most prominently on the evening before All Hallows -- therefore the modern name Halloween or “All Hallows Evening.” The term itself originated in Scotland.

In addition, new customs evolved that had little direct connection to the church-sanctioned holiday of All Saints Day (or the later All Souls Day on Nov. 2). For instance, some burned candles or used lighted hollowed-out turnips (“jack-o-lanterns”) to drive away the malevolent spirits of the dead on the eve of All Hallows. The custom of adults and children disguising themselves to fool these spirits and beg for food and coins on or near All Saints Day (“guising”) emerged as the origin of “trick or treating.” This popular custom of adults participating in guising even drew the negative comment of Shakespeare in his play “The Two Gentlemen of Verona” when the character Speed accuses his master of “puling [whining or whimpering] like a beggar at Hallowmas” (Act 2, Scene 1).

Not at all unlike many Baptist pastors today, both Roman Catholic and Protestant leaders of the Reformation era condemned the survival of pagan, occult and superstitious customs observed around All Saints Day and Halloween. Later, some Protestants eventually encouraged their people to observe instead a “Reformation Day” as a replacement for Halloween since Martin Luther started the Reformation on the eve of All Saints Day in 1517. This practice simply continued the long trend of supplanting questionable popular holidays with Christian observances.

In the early United States, some success in eradicating the pagan and occult practices associated with Halloween occurred. Many of the Christian groups who settled America like the Pilgrims, Puritans, Quakers and Baptists refused to observe All Saints Day -- let alone Halloween.

Nevertheless, Halloween was rekindled as Celtic immigrants from Scotland and Ireland poured into the United States in the 1800s. They substituted the American pumpkin for the turnip to make their jack-o-lanterns; thus the most prominent decoration of the holiday became fixed in American culture.

Furthermore, as Irish politicians, policemen and fireman became dominant in the larger urban cities, they revived the old medieval custom of guising, but this time limited the practice to children. Reacting to their large Irish populations, big city mayors (often Irish themselves) of the 20th century declared an official “trick or treat” day usually on Halloween itself. Since many urban neighborhoods were thought unsafe for children, the Irish-dominated police and fire departments often provided Halloween costume parties or trick or treat stations at police precincts and fire stations. These and other Halloween customs among Scottish and Irish Americans quickly became accepted in mainstream American culture and even spread to rural areas of the South and West. By the mid-20th century Halloween was well on its way to joining Christmas in becoming the two top holiday events in the American cultural year.

Yet, even as most Americans, including its evangelical Christian community, found little harm in such Halloween customs as trick or treating, carving jack-o-lanterns, yard and home decorating or even costume parties for adults and children, a darker side of the holiday traced its genesis to the 1960s. The counterculture that emerged in that decade expressed some sympathy for genuine occult and pagan practices associated with the holiday. Groups that claimed pagan or satanic connections celebrated the holiday as their own. Real and exaggerated reports of trick or treat candy tampering (most reports usually turned out to be false) originated during this decade, and many parents questioned the wisdom of allowing their children to participate in civic-sponsored trick or treat observances. Although Halloween possessed a long history of largely harmless pranks, the 1960s witnessed outbreaks of “hell night” or the “devil’s night” in some communities that took human life and millions of dollars in fire damage. This destructive phenomenon largely was identified with Detroit and other large cities. The introduction of “gore” into Halloween culture, costumes and makeup owed much to George Romero’s 1968 film “The Night of the Living Dead.”

By the early 1970s many Christians had soured on these features of the Halloween holiday and they began an internal discussion about the holiday, asking themselves, “What do we do with Halloween?”

Since the 1970s the evangelical Christian and Baptist community have answered this question with diverse responses. Some Christians overlook Halloween’s excesses and allow their children and young people to participate in community and civic events, while other Christians have remained adamantly opposed to the holiday and renounce all features of the festival. Other Christian community leaders have used the time around Halloween to conduct “Hell Houses,” “Operation Nightmare” and similar events. These are designed as evangelistic events with the purpose of revealing to young people the reality of hell and a life without Christ. Although these are provided with the best of intentions, Hell Houses remain controversial and even many Christians have lamented that evangelistic efforts like these may lead to questionable conversion results.

The most emergent contemporary response to Halloween in the evangelical Christian community is to provide a Christian alternative to the popular holiday. Under such names as “Fall Festival,” “Holyween,” etc., many churches now offer the church itself as the focal point for providing a Halloween alternative. These festivals may provide some or all of the following: “trunk or treat” or a trick or treat alternative for young children, a fall décor for the church, costume parties for both children and teens, fall-themed games and amusements, seasonal foods and refreshments, bonfires, and other related seasonal activities. Generally, these churches discourage costumes with occult, pagan or “gory” themes and they refrain from calling these events Halloween parties. In addition, these churches also offer prayer and devotion before their festivities and also pass out evangelistic tracts to visiting community members.

Pastors who favor this response believe that it is better to embrace this option rather than allowing their people to participate in the popular but largely secular Halloween activities of the general culture. Ironically, this approach mirrored historic and contemporary efforts by Roman Catholics and Protestants to provide alternatives for the unpleasant associations of the autumn holiday. It is doubtful that “Fall Festivals” will replace Halloween on the calendar, but the churches that provide these Halloween alternatives serve a useful function. Parents of children and teens like the idea of a safe and Christian-themed environment for their Halloween alternative.

However Christians respond to Halloween, two certainties remain: Halloween will survive and Christians, following a centuries-old tradition, will offer alternatives to the festival’s worst features.

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Stephen Douglas Wilson is dean emeritus and chair of the history department at Mid-Continent University in Mayfield, Kentucky.

Question: “What is your perspective on Halloween?”

Answer: There are a number of reasons why I think it is unwise for Christian parents to permit their children to go door to door collecting candy on Halloween. First of all, dressing up like witches, ghosts, or goblins is incompatible with a Christian’s testimony.

Furthermore, many of the customs of Halloween are associated with the worst kinds of pagan beliefs and ceremonies; they are usually centered on sinister things such as demons, witchcraft, and superstition.

If we as Christian parents simply disregard the unchristian aspects of such practices as mere fantasy or superstition and then encourage our children to participate in them, we run the risk of communicating the message that the spiritual battle waged by the rulers of darkness (Ephesians 6:10) is not to be taken seriously.

Halloween has its origins in an ancient Celtic harvest celebration. The superstitious Celts believed that demons, ghosts, and hobgoblins roamed free in the dark and barren days of winter, and the end of October was the onset of that season. Their celebrations grew out of their superstitions, and they have been passed down to the present day, along with other pagan and satanic beliefs.

Another reason I don’t advise parents to permit their children to celebrate Halloween by dressing up and going door to door is the issue of safety. The possibility of a child’s being struck by an automobile, kidnapped, poisoned, or otherwise injured is greater on Halloween than on any other night of the year.

Still, I think it is wise for parents to give their children a creative alternative to celebrating Halloween. They shouldn’t feel like they’ve missed something because they are Christians.

Our family likes to spend Halloween together. We plan special activities that are more fun for the kids than begging candy. In the past, we have all gone out together for ice cream, or we might stay home and have a special evening together doing something just for them.

That way when the children face the inevitable pressure of talking with their friends about what they did on Halloween, they can share their faith in positive terms, rather than having to speak of what they can’t do because of their parents’ Christian faith.

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Transcribed by Tony Capoccia of

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The supposedly “ancient” stories on which Wicca is based are almost certainly bunk, historians say.

Wicca, or witchcraft, and similar “neopagan” faiths are among the fastest-growing religions in the country, with as many as 200,000 adherents, says Charlotte Allen, writing in The Atlantic Monthly magazine.

Many who practice Wicca, also known as the goddess movement, are white, middle-class, highly educated, and involved in environmental and liberal causes, Allen says. Two-thirds are women. Wiccans say they practice a harmless magic and do not worship Satan.

Many adherents come to Wicca after reading the history of the faith, its teachings, and rituals in The Spiral Dance: A Rebirth of the Ancient Religion of the Great Goddess, a book by Starhawk, also known as Miriam Simos, a California witch, the Monthly reported.

Simos says in her book that the religion began more than 35,000 years ago. Its early adherents worshiped a female deity, she said, making images of the goddess all over prehistoric Europe, and lived for thousands of years in societies that were egalitarian, attuned to nature, and focused on women.

Then invaders swept across the region introducing warrior gods and patriarchal society, the book says. This was followed by Christianity, after which religious and secular authorities began a 400-year campaign to eradicate the Old Religion, as it is also known, the book says. Nine million people, most of whom were strong, independent women including midwives and herbal healers, were exterminated, it claims.

Stories about the goddess today not only infuse the neopagan movement, but inform the philosophies of modern feminists such as Gloria Steinem, the Monthly reports.

But probably not a single element of the Wiccan story is true, the magazine reported. Scholars say they have concluded that Wicca is not an ancient religion at all, but “a 1950s concoction” influenced by Masonic ritual and the occult, according to the Monthly.

They have concluded that Wicca was created by Gerald B. Gardner, an English civil servant and amateur anthropologist who died in 1964. Gardner was influenced by the German Romantics of the 19th century, the occult, and Freemasonry, according to Philip Davis, professor of religion at the University of Prince Edward Island. In 1950, Gardner claimed to have rediscovered a religion he called Wica, with that spelling, but in fact copied rites borrowed from occult rituals, Davis said. Ronald Hutton, a University of Bristol historian, also concluded that Gardner’s “ancient” religion was concocted from modern sources. The ancients did not worship a single goddess, but were polytheists, building shrines to many gods and goddesses, he said.

The debunking of the official Wiccan narrative has not fazed adherents of the religion. They say they are not concerned that their understanding of the origins of Wicca may be mistaken. Instead they consider the stories inspiring legends and continue to follow the faith because it gives them a sense of connection to the earth’s cycle of birth, growth, and regeneration, and affords a sense of the spiritual.

Some Unitarian congregations are moving closer to Wicca. A year ago, Pleasant Valley Unitarian Universalist Church in Garland, Texas, became more “earth-centered,” holding rituals in which members lit candles for the elements of earth, air, fire, and water. Sermons focused more on natural themes, and worship leaders began using the words god and goddess, The Dallas Morning News reported. Although some members left, the church decided to “go pagan,” the first such Unitarian Universalist congregation in Texas and the third in the nation to do so.

“We respect the earth we live on and seek to live in harmony with all who share it,” the church’s literature reads. “We believe that there is no ‘one true way’ to spiritual enlightenment and invite all gods to share their wisdom with us.”