'We got tired of Halloween darkness — so our church created a light beacon'

In 2010, I received an email from a leader in another local church; he was angry that darkness always seemed to take over on Halloween and while driving to work, he had a vision of our patch — South Woking — being bathed in light on 31 October.

Following his vision, a number of key players in local churches got together to pray and the idea of setting up Light Beacons in the community came about.

Our idea was to go out to where people in the community were on Halloween and to engage with the ‘trick or treaters’. We identified key areas in our locality where there would be significant footfall, set up gazebos and lit them up.

From these gazebos we gave people a ‘treat’ — hot chocolate and hot dogs — and gave out loads of glow bracelets. We spoke to people and had flyers to give out.

Over the years, the idea has matured. At our beacon we now have a gazebo from which we give out hot dogs and hot chocolate, a gazebo with a light-themed children’s craft activity, and an encounter tent, where we offer a listening ear and prayer.

We’ve found that giving out glow bracelets alongisde age-appropriate tracts and information detailing how the attendees can access other ways we are serving in the community, is a great way of engaging with folks.

We estimate that around 200 people join us at our beacon each year.

Local people look forward to us being out there and those who haven’t come across us before are pleasantly surprised. In short, we are very well received.

We have the opportunity to join them in the fun ‘treating’ aspect of Halloween and offer them a taste of the best treat ever — a relationship with Jesus

One single mum said to me that she felt pressured by her children to go out ‘trick or treating’ but didn’t want to and was very grateful that we were there. She said it felt safe at the beacon.

On another occasion, I bumped into two mums on the school run. One of them said to me, “You go out on Halloween to look after us.”

The theme of safety is one that others have commented on; they say the beacons feel like a safe place and we find that people linger there.

Key lessons learned

1. We are redeeming Halloween

We see redemption in creating a safe place on what can be a fear-filled evening. We are lighting up a dark night – physically, spiritually and by pointing people to Jesus, the light of the world.

2. Meet people where they are – physically and metaphorically

One lovely lady came to our beacon dressed as a witch — she received prayer and was significantly impacted by the presence of God.

There are tears welling in my eyes as I write because we see people coming out to have fun, in most cases oblivious to the darkness of Halloween — we long to rescue them from the darkness and ultimately help them encounter the risen Jesus, who has conquered all the darkness in ourselves and in the world.

Halloween is one night in the year when you can count on people leaving their houses. We have the opportunity to meet them there — join them in the fun ‘treating’ aspect of Halloween and offer them a taste of the best treat ever — a relationship with Jesus.

3. Empower people in evangelism – especially our young people

Another thing that we have learned and hold dear is that the event provides a non-committal way for church members to dip their toe in evangelism and hopefully get a taste for it.

Also, very importantly, it empowers our young people — when all their friends are asking them at school what they are doing on Halloween, rather than be on the back foot, they can say, “We are running a ‘Light Beacon’, come and join us!” Indeed, this is what one of our young people said to her school friends and we see it happening.

If reading this has sparked your interest, we have set up a website that shares what we have learned and can help you take the next steps. My top tip would be to start small; you don’t need to do everything in the first year.

To find out how your church can run a Light Beacon visit lightbeacons.org.uk