Happy Fall Y'all

 

The exhaustion from the dog days of summer that seem to never end, has finally lifted here in Texas. The weather is cooler, (thank you jesus!) We are enjoying football season, pumpkin spice everything is starting to show up,  and we got our fall décor bins down from the attic last weekend. Keishun said "I thought you would have waited for October, Mom." Ha, I said.
It is only a week away, my son.

 

Ain't nobody got time to wait around for that.

 

And here it us, upon us. The décor is up. I am ready. There are pumpkins and fall leaves, and candles galore. But I also have "Boo" written on my wreaths and jack o' lanterns adorning my shelves. There are black and orange candy corn dishes and a little black metal haunted house lantern on the piano.

 

And this brings me to an interesting post. For the past several years, I have been faced with a battle of the evangelicals, if we want to call it that. It is kind of like this line in the sand where the "Oh, we don't DO Halloween. Don't you know the origin?" people stand on one side and the "Oh we do it ALL because it is harmless fun, fun, fun" people stand on the other. Then you have the ones straddling the line who say... "we dress up and go trick or treating, but we don't decorate for Halloween. Because we are Christians, and all. Or "We trunk and treat, fall festivals only....lock our doors and shut off the lights"...and so on. I get it all. I really do. I understand there is a dark side in this world. And we are not in it.

 

Look...I'm not here to judge one way or the other what anyone's personal convictions on the subject happen to be. I just thought my blog readers might be interested as to where we stand.

 

We decorate. We party it up. We buy candy and receive candy. We dress up. We drink cider. We have even been known to hang a cobweb or two.  We walk the neighborhood on the 31st. We are okay with it. And we go to bed that night dreaming of next Halloween. We don't do witches. We don't do vampires. We don't do devils.

But we DO love princesses, pirates, super heroes, and Disney characters.

We know very strong Christians who use all Hallows Eve to be a source of light to their neighborhoods...hosting traditions like serving up burgers and hotdogs on their front lawn while projecting The Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown on their garage doors. This is done with this logic: if all of your neighbors come knocking on your door one night out of the year...then as an ambassador of Christ's message of love and forgiveness, why wouldn't you use that time to honor him by loving your neighbors and finding common ground to connect on?

Great thing to ponder.

Can it be that we use something that man has made into his own to be a thing that we take back to glorify God? I believe so. Even if glorifying God is simply loving our husbands and children well through traditions and events.

 Some of my very best childhood memories involve Halloween. I always knew I wanted my children to have that too. 

Making the most of our family moments has been a big deal for me as a mom. I want my children to feel my love wrap around them as I dress them up and shoot dozens of photos. "When are we going to the pumpkin patch, Mom?" they start asking right around this date every year. They know that pumpkin patches are my favorite.

And for one of my kids who didn't grow up in a place where anyone much cared whether he was coming or going on the 31st of October, the fuss I make about holidays and birthdays and vacations...brings a sense of peace, love, and excitement.

A sense of belonging to something bigger than yourself.

 

So yes...I will continue to love Fall and all that this fresh, cool season brings with it.

To be in the world, but not of it.

Knowing that God is glorified in the small things of life, like  roasting pumpkin seeds with your children. Or making pumpkin bread and filling their tummies and love banks.

Yes, friends...God is honored and glorified even in an orange pumpkin in October.