As I write this story, Christian organizations are donning the armor of God in preparation of Halloween.
Shibuya Evangelical Church and The Altar IHOP Tokyo have organized a massive outreach that will plunge into the heart of the largest Halloween street party in the world in Shibuya, Japan.
The outreach commences Oct. 31 and ends Nov. 1.
With the help of The Christian and Missionary Alliance, T4T, 7Media and YWAM, they will walk the streets, as well as man prayer rooms at the Shibuya Evangelical Church.
“We expect Him to show up. In the prayer room, we expect His presence to be tangible. We expect a whole new release of prophetic words that speak destiny and life over Shibuya, Tokyo and Japan. We expect hearts to be moved for what moves His heart,” Altar IHOP Tokyo founder Jennifer Gracey tells Charisma News.
“On the streets? Wow, … we expect Him to blow our minds. We expect Him to show us who to talk to, and give us words of knowledge for those people. We expect Him to heal … basically, reveal Himself as ‘the answer’ to questions many young people are secretly asking in Japan, ‘What am I here for? Why does my life mean anything? Is this all there is?'”
Shibuya hosts the largest outdoor Halloween street festivals in the world. No official organizer leads the charge, but thousands gather for a night of immorality and self-indulgence. Several street parties are hosted by various organizations, and missionaries want in on the action.
Their preparations began rather suddenly, Gracey says.
“Nothing moves in Japan without first having the foundation of relationship well-established. Recognizing ‘God connections’ when the arise and trusting there’s a plan for them down the road even when nothing much seems to be happening in the immediate,” Gracey says.
“(We’ve reached this point by) sowing years of relentless prayer by speaking these kinds of things into being and choosing to believe God is who He says He is and does what He says He will do. There have been so many baby steps over the course of years that the Lord has orchestrated to bring us all to this particular point of convergence. It would take weeks to outline them all, save to say, ‘The timing of this was right and we all had a yes in our hearts.'”
Halloween is most celebrated in Ireland, with its Celtic origins, and in the United States, where many downplay the spiritual significance of the holiday.
Yet the demon-inspired revelry is on the rise around the world as more countries adopt Western cultural traditions.
In Japan, Gracey says, most revelers fail to grasp the dark spiritual history. Instead, they see it as a heavily commercialized industry that Americans indulge in annually.
Japan’s traditional religious system obviously strays from Judeo-Christian values, so most people don’t associate evil costumes such as witches, ghosts or skeletons with witchcraft or Satanic rituals.
Thus, Christians are going war on behalf of their country.
“As believers, we can’t allow ourselves to get wigged out by Halloween and what it represents to us, and we need to reframe our perspective on the holiday. When people don’t know God, what reason do they have to not celebrate Halloween? None, really. As the church, we need to start asking ourselves, ‘What can I do to introduce people to Jesus and give them a reason to want the kingdom of heaven?’ instead of walking around acting like I’m going to get contaminated from sitting at the sinner’s table,” Gracey says.
“We’re crazy expectant. Japan is at the cusp of a major tipping point, it’s tangible in ways it’s never been before and the atmosphere is electric. We can literally taste it. This Halloween outreach and prayer event is the first fruits of what has been a very long season of plowing.”
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