Home(school) Where We belong: Leaving the "Treats" up to God!

If you have been with me here in blog land since the beginning, maybe you remember our last Halloween. If you have not been here the entire time, surely you have gone back and read EVERYTHING I have written-right?!? Well anyway, you can always take some time tomorrow to catch up on all that..hehe..but for now, back to my story. As halloween was approaching I started to get a little nervous. Our convictions were so strong but now that we have had an entire year to forget the power of our decision, how would we pull off the no halloween thing? Thankfully our children are not in public school and therefore not completely surrounded by halloween, halloween parties, teachers asking everyone what they would dress up as on dress up day at school, and hundreds of kids all feeding off each others excitement to go out on one night with the purpose of getting a free bucket full of candy. They were not surrounded by it and therefore did not even think about it. I started thinking the day may pass without anyone ever even noticing. Well that was a little bit of wishful thinking. I mean, Kenyon IS 11 and has trick or treated every year of his life. About a week before halloween, when the kids started noticing neighbors putting pumpkins and scarecrows out on the porch, the conversations started. Keslee was concerned that maybe I had forgotten that I "promised" we could make caramel apples and popcorn balls at home. She took every opportunity to remind me that we had not bought the supplies to do so. As the day got closer and closer, Keslee started thinking maybe she wanted to go down town and "just watch" the other kids but she did not want to trick or treat herself. Kenyon was the one that was still struggling with the idea of free candy being handed out and him not being in line to receive it. The discussion began with...

"if WE don't believe in the spirits and other un-Godly parts of halloween but just get the candy, that isn't so bad is it?" Well son, if we participate with everyone else how would anyone know that we do not approve of ALL the parts of halloween.

"What if we dress up like Bible people and tell people about Jesus WHILE we get the candy." In all the running around and excitement of getting candy you forget to even say "thank you" at lots of houses so how are you really gonna remember to stop and tell every person about Jesus?

"But we can MAKE halloween about God for us." You know some people do try to make halloween about God and they use the day to pray for people that have already died but they pray to saints and not even to God. "WHAT? Why are they praying for dead people? They are already dead so what is the use in praying for them now? And why would anyone pray to a saint when only God can hear and answer our prayers?" See son, TRYING to make something about God when it is NOT about God does not work.

"Well if they make a holiday that IS about God that lets us dress up in NOT evil, gory costumes and get candy but it is NOT on halloween and it really IS all about God THEN could we do it?" IF they make a holiday like that then we will talk about it when it happens son.

We finally got the caramel and the apples and some popcorn and were all prepared to make treats together on halloween day. The day was a typical lazy Saturday with Monty watching some football, me catching up on the laundry and the kids playing in the falling leaves outside. Kenyon came in and said that Mrs Barbara, our neighbor, asked them if they would be trick or treating and they told her that we don't do that anymore. She let them know that she had gotten some candy just for them and Kenyon wanted to make sure it would be ok if they had it. I let them know that because Mrs. Barbara loves them, she got candy especially for them and was going to let them have it if they were trick or treating or not so it was perfectly ok for them to have it. Of course this news brought lots of smiles and they realized they did not have to participate in halloween just to get candy. Candy is always available. As they night went on and the sun went down, I got a phone call from my mom. Jacinta was with my aunt and she just saw Soffie. As I am sure you remember, since you have gone back and read ALL my post, Soffie is our most favorite cat. Our cat that is so beautiful that people often try to steal her. The cat that my kids have prayed for since she has been missing (this time) for over a year. Kenyon and I hopped in the car and headed across town to the area Jacinta described. I thought I saw Soffie so I stopped at the end of the block, got out and called her name. The cat jumped off a porch about 2 doors down and ran straight to me-IT REALLY WAS SOFFIE!!! We picked her up, got in the car and headed home. Kenyon ran into the house and called the girls in the living room and said "GIRLS! WE ALL DECIDED NOT TO DO HALLOWEEN BECAUSE WE WANT TO HONOR GOD, RIGHT?" yes "WELL LOOK WHAT GOD JUST DID!!" and with that he opened the front door to reveal me standing there holding our long lost Soffie. The girls were ecstatic and Monty got a big 'ol smile on his face as we all took turns loving and petting our cat. She purred and rubbed on us all and then took off to get reacquainted with her home looking under every bed and table and dresser and toy box.

Once again, God has done an amazing thing for my children. They struggled with following through with a conviction but persevered and God rewarded them immediately. Once again God has shown them that He does hear and answer prayer, in His time. Once again He has shown us all that when we love and honor Him, He will give us the desires of our heart.