Proverbs 8.36 says, but he that sinneth against me wrongeth his own soul. All they that hate me love death. Ever since my earliest memories, there's been a holiday that never made much sense to me as a child or as an adult, and that's Halloween. New Year's Eve, New Year's Day make sense. Easter and the resurrection of Christ, Fourth of July and Independence, Labor Day, Columbus Day, Memorial Day, Veterans Day, Thanksgiving, Christmas, all those holidays have always made sense to me because there's something worth celebrating. Even President's Day and Valentine's Day are at least about something enjoyable or pleasant or educational. But Halloween, I never understood it. The school hallways and classrooms would be littered with decorations, in quotes, cobwebs, spiderwebs, skeletons, grave markers, vampires, bats, witches, ghosts, goblins. It just always seemed insane to me. What are we celebrating? No one could really answer that question because no one wants to say, oh, we're celebrating death or we're celebrating the occult. But that's what is being celebrated. Our text is about wisdom, which is personified and incarnate in the person and life of Jesus Christ. And again, it says, but he that sinneth against me, this is wisdom incarnate, but it's Christ. He that sinneth against me wrongeth his own soul. All they that hate me love death. Before I became a Christian, I got caught up in this culture of sin and death during my junior high and high school years before being saved and becoming a follower of Jesus Christ at the age of 19. Immediately after becoming a Christian, I found one verse where Jesus is talking, and it became one of my favorite Bible verses. It's John 11, 25, when Jesus is about to raise Lazarus from the dead, and he's talking to Martha, and we read, Jesus said unto her, I am the resurrection and the life. He that believeth in me, though he were dead, yet shall he live. And everywhere you turn in the Gospels, you see Jesus creating life, healing the sick to spare a life, raising the dead to life, and only the wicked who reject him are given over to eternal death. In John 14.6, Jesus saith unto him, I am the way, the truth, and the life. No man cometh unto the Father but by me. Those who love life and want eternal life turn to Jesus who is the life. But those who reject Jesus Christ do so because they choose to hate him rather than to love him, and they love death. As our proverb says, all they that hate me love death. For that reason, I've just never liked Halloween since becoming a Christian. The darkness, the glorification of death, even when done with an attempt at humor, or even when folks say, oh, it's just for fun. I can't get myself to love this annual celebration of death, not to mention the costumes with people dressed as caricatures of Satan and devils, evil beasts of various sorts, decapitations, and so many lewd costumes with immodest apparel. It's really just sickening to me. Over the years, the only thing associated with Halloween that I have anything to do with at all is trick-or-treat. And the only reason for that is that it gives me the opportunity to give a piece of candy and a chick gospel track to some unsaved boy or girl. There might be a Christian kid in there from time to time during trick-or-treat, but it's clear that most of the kids in our town don't know Jesus. And that gospel track might be the most important treat anyone ever gives them. So even as the world turns the entire month of October into a celebration of death and evil, we can counteract that by discussing Jesus, who is the life, and his gospel. whenever possible or at least giving others the gospel in the form of a tract and Consider some of the final words of Jesus Christ who left us with this offer in Revelation 21 6 and he said unto me it is done I am Alpha and Omega the beginning and the end I will give unto him that is a thirst of the fountain of the water of life freely Give the gift of life in the gospel of Christ this Halloween. I