Well, we made it through another
Halloween. Our party was quite
successful this year. Chris counted
thirty people who made their way into our house at some point or other during
the night. That includes the Stone Clan
who stopped by right after we turned out the lights. We ended up giving away two hundred really
cool-looking, camouflage-covered New Testaments and two hundred Scripture-based
encouragement cards in addition to the bags and bags of candy folks brought
over. We had a lot of pizza left over,
though. We now have quite a stash in the
freezer for future grandchildren consumption (them of the pizza, not us of
them).
Costumes were once again colorful and
varied. Lots of princesses and superheroes,
of course. More, in fact, than the
traditional scary witches and zombies and the like. We were visited by a Star Trek crew member
carrying a Tribble that actually purred and vibrated. The Sta-puff marshmallow man was here. Among the more frightening (to me)
apparitions was a very large teenager who had some kind of pillowcase with ears
attached to his head. He looked kind of
like a washed-out Winnie the Pooh with a bad case of the flu. There was one young mother who stopped by
with two children. Actually I don’t know
if the kids were hers or not. I know she
was a young mother because she was incredibly pregnant. And I know she was actually incredibly and
not in a costume because (hold onto your hat) the costume she wore bared her
stomach area, so it stuck out – way out.
Not to be deterred, however, she had added to her depiction of the
festive season by painting a jack-o-lantern on said stomach. It looked, well, amazing, but as I said,
frightening.
I think one of the most creative costumes
was the lady who dressed all in pink and wore a plastic bag around her
shoulders. On her head she had affixed
an old tennis shoe. Have you guessed it
yet? She was an old wad of gum stuck to the
bottom of someone’s shoe. The plastic
bag indicated someone’s attempt to wrap it up before it was smushed. Nice. And
then there was the little fireman who won my personal award. Every year I pick out a costume theme ahead
of time, and the first child to show up in that costume wins a grand
prize. The last two years the award has
gone to firemen, simply because they are so rare as a costume, but not totally
absent. I saw two three firemen this
year. One was my son Nathan, who is an
actual fire fighter, but he wasn’t in uniform.
The second was an adult walking around with his kids. To his credit, the costume was made for a
child, so he looked quite funny in it.
But the award is for a kid.
Finally a little boy fireman arrived.
I jumped up, scaring him a bit, I think, and had him stand to the side
of the crowd. He was somewhat confused,
but complied. I ran in the house where I
had stashed the grand prize for this year, a tin box stuffed full with one of the
New Testaments and loads of candy. I
think he was pleased with his costume choice.
While I was making the presentation, another child sadly commented to
one of our Seasiders, “I’m Kermit the Frog, what do I get?” He assured her she would still get some candy. Better than one of the other responses
suggested later when he told us about it.
Someone said, “You could have told her we’d get her some flies.” Ah, I get it.
Kermit the FROG. Frogs eat
flies. OK.
One grandmother shared that her granddaughter
remembered two houses from last year.
One was the highly decorated-with-animation place at the end of the block. The other?
The house that gives away Bibles.
Wow. We rank right up there with
skeletons in the ground and bats in the trees and ghosts hanging from the
eaves. And all because of the Word of
God.
One kid saw the New Testament dropped in
his bag and commented, “Look, that the biggest piece of candy I have ever seen
in my bag.” Hope he’s not too disappointed,
but he’s not wrong. That candy is
sweeter than a honeycomb and it will never lose its flavor.
Psalms 19:9-10 says, “The fear of the Lord is pure, enduring forever. The ordinances of the Lord are sure and
altogether righteous. They are more
precious than gold, than much pure gold; they are sweeter than honey, than
honey from the comb.”
Father, use your word to touch some folks
this year. Amen.
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