Don’t frighten yourself with ghosts

6 November 2026

For an entire week I asked the question, ‘Why is Halloween so big in America?’ And no one really had a good answer. The Americans will spend billions on this one evening. Playful costumes from Mario Kart to the Wizard of Oz make it all seem fairly harmless. The reward system of giving ‘candy’ to children who are dressed up as something out of a horror movie is of course odd. But some take dressing up, of themselves and their homes, to another level. I saw grandma zombies and mass-murdering children. There is a thrill in giving yourself a fright.

But it’s not a smart thing to do.

The Puritan Joseph Alleine (1634-1668) in one of his recorded prayers said,

And will I dig up what you have buried, and frighten myself with the ghosts that infidelity has raised? Is it presumption to take the pardon that you offer, or to receive and claim you as mine when it is only what you have promised?

– From Piercing Heaven – Prayers of the Puritans p.103

Alleine recognises in himself the tendency to revisit past sins even after he has asked God for, and believes he has received, forgiveness. He is digging up what has been buried. He frightens himself with the ghost of his sinful past.

Yet God promises mercy to those who turn to Him in repentance that He ‘will remember their sins no more’ (Jeremiah 31:34; Hebrews 8:12).

Alleine then says it is a false modesty that would refuse the pardon or the promise that has been freely offered. God has not been arm-twisted into being gracious, merciful and forgiving. He has freely offered these blessings and has promised not to count our iniquities against us (Psalm 32:2; Romans 4:8). So don’t go digging up what has been buried.

His use of the word ghosts also reminds us that the old self, the old man, was put to death. Died with Christ on the cross (Romans 6:6). The old has gone and the new has come (2 Corinthians 5:17). What remains of our past sin is now ghostly. Before God it has no substance and no power to condemn. So don’t frighten yourself with ghosts.