I had never heard of a Trunk or Treat until I became a children’s minister a year ago. To be honest, I thought it was blasphemous to encourage trick or treating. I found out quickly that it was an excellent outreach event to our community.
For those of you who have never heard of this or want to know more, then this article is for you! Trunk or Treat may be a great option for a Fall church party or carnival. It could be just the right family friendly outreach event. Here are the basics.
How To Do a Trunk or Treat at Church
First, make sure your church is on board with this. Some churches have Reformation parties, others have autumn events or a Fall Festival. As I said, I had never heard of Trunk or Treat before and can only assume it is a regional phenomenon–at the very least it has yet to hit the St. Louis area where I grew up.
Second, you will want to get enough trunks (cars) to make at least two aisles of cars in your parking lot. This will depend on the size of your parking lot, but I found that 6 or 7 cars in two aisles facing one another makes for a smoother operation. It keeps the children on your premises a bit longer and allows you to speak more with them and their families.
Third, provide hotdogs, chips and sodas. This is an extremeley cost-effective way to keep the families around that much longer to be able to evangelize, invite and minister to them.
Fourth, have some games to play. They do not need to be big or involved games. The kids just need to be able to win more candy. You can also hand out gospel tracts as part of their winnings. Make sure that everyone wins every time!
Fifth, and finally, rent a bounce house. Inevitably, the church children are going to get bored. This will give them something to do during the festivities. The children from the community will not want to stick around too long because they want to hit as many houses as possible.
Be sure you have enough candy and make certain you have fun while doing this. Have fun and redeem the time for the Lord!
Share Your Trunk or Treat Ideas
If you have experience with this type of event, please leave a comment to share your thoughts. What type of games worked best? What other attractions did you offer? Was your congregation uneasy about connecting the church and Halloween?
Need More Help? Then read about Trunk or Treat on Kidology or read some tips for planning a church trunk or treat on the Memory Cross blog.
Trunk or Treat Video
Another Trunk or Treat Video
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Great ideas!
Our church hosts a Halloween Festival the Wednesday before each Halloween… because we aren’t on the actual holiday, we have little to no competition and families from the communities come in full force. We advertise it in a million ways… but, my favorite, is telling the kids they get to break their costumes in early. We also like using phrases like – Double the costumes. Double the candy. What’s not to love about Halloween TWICE?!
Also, by having the party/carnival/festival on a night when we typically have children’s programming on campus, we are able to start with a pretty large volunteer pool to help us run the event.
Thanks for sharing your thoughts, Terry… and good luck this year!
We also have done trunk or treat in the past and we had a contest for the kids to vote for their favorite trunk. We gave a framed certificate and small gift to the “winner”.
Share Jesus Halloween 2009!
As a Christian online company, it may surprise you to find out that the months of September and October are the busiest for Memory Cross, even busier than before Easter or Christmas. Why? There are so few Christian resources available for this season of the year. As Christians, we are to take every opportunity to bring Christ into every aspect of our lives.
The Memory Cross, Free Candy Plan of Salvation card can be used for Fall and Hallelujah Festivals, Trunk-or-Treats, Costume and school Halloween celebrations. When else do kids/people come freely to your door asking for a treat? Our vision was not to shy away but to bring Christ into Trick-or-Treating.
Think that about the tag-line “What Would Jesus Do?” Would we find Jesus condemning the pagans/gentiles or would we find him in the church parking lots for the Trunk-or-Treats?; in the fellowship halls for the harvest festivals?; on the front porches connecting with children and their parents as they “trick-or-treat?”
We have testimonials from parents, explaining about how they watched their elementary age children share their faith, for the first time, with this simple little card.
There are two different designs; choose the one that fits your ministry needs.
#1) You never know where these Free Candy cards may end up, so Memory Cross has partnered with http://www.NeedHim.com to have a resource for those who have questions about accepting Jesus Christ as their Savior, or… I’m a Christian, now what?
#2) The other version has a blank space instead of the NeedHim information for your church or ministry to put their specific contact information for outreach purposes with an address label or stamp.
What could be sweeter than free candy?…God’s love of course!
We knew there would be questions and comments about this “Halloween Plan of Salvation” but again… what could be sweeter than Free Candy?… God’s love! That is the message of this card not Halloween. Halloween is the opportunity for delivering the message of God’s love and how to become a part of His glorious kingdom.
Tony, if you would like to do Free Candy card give-aways from your web site, let me know
Prayerfully submitted,
Sandy Simpson
We have a harvest party every year on Oct 31st. We like to offer an alternative for children to keep them off the streets on Halloween nite. I usually have a theme each year. I have done a Cowboy theme with pony rides and other games relating to cowboys. at the end give everyone a large bag of candy. Last year I did a sports theme, they came dressed in their favorite sport or team and each station was a different sport where the coaches did some drills. I had a drawing and gave away 4 bicycles, several different balls, gloves, etc. again a bag of candy as they left.
This year I believe I will do hotdogs and have a scavenger hunt. changing it up a little. but they will still get the big bag of candy when they leave. about 80 children attend this event yearly!
Thanks for the ideas!!!
The cup cake walk is one of favorites at our Trunk or Treat. Play contemporary Christian music as people walk around a large circle drawn in sidewalk chalk on the parking lot. I draw squares with numbers in them around the circle. I have corresponding numbers on pieces of paper. When the music stops I usually draw 2 or 3 slips of paper. If a mom or dad is carrying a young one they all get cup cakes. Have plenty of cup cakes available this is very popular!
This year we will have folks that speak Spanish on site to hand out tracts and see if there is any interest in starting a Bible study group.
we also have a party(Halleujah Party) on Oct,31 as an alternative to Halloween, We have games ,a cake walk, a costume contest =extra points for biblical charcters -with a prize for all age groups ,we have a big turn out ,
It is a big event in our area open to all children in our area as an alterative to bring safe,loving,giving to all that come.all businessess and people donate candy and prizes.everyone receives candy and prizes.we love it!!
I would like to say that all of these ideas have really inspired me to win souls for Jesus on Halloween night, we tend to always speak about not participating in this particular holiday, but it is truly an opportunity to witeness for Christ, I used to hand out tracts talking against the holiday, maybe this year I can steer people away from that one, and help them to experience the love of Christ, thank you so very much for your wonderful ideas.
God Bless every one of you for being the witness that you are and allowing God to use you in so many talented ways.
Betty A. Alexander
Betty, thank you for your humility and willingness to serve Christ. While we would all agree that Halloween in and of itself is an “evil” holiday, we should use it as an opportunity to shout from the rooftops about the light that has come into the world.
Your comment was very much a blessing to read. Thank you again and God bless.
“we all would agree” is a pretty bold statement.
Terry is not speaking for everyone.
I, for one, do not think that a holiday – that has been largely co-opted by Hallmark – is any more an “evil” day than a day like Valentine’s Day.
The church-at-large has a strong history of redeeming cultural holidays and using them to further the Gospel message.
Halloween shouldn’t be any different.
Somehow this reminds me of a Calvinist pun about Election Day.
I first experience the trunk in treat out in Louisiana, I never believed in letting my kids trick or treating and when I moved to the south from California my cousin brought us there. I thought it was the most amazing thing and I loved it!!!!! My kids enjoyed it they have fun jumps games and also food for them to purchase. I am now back in California and I am going to bring it to my Pasto’s attention and see if maybe we can get other churchs’ in the neighborhood involved. If you havent tried ii you must and I promise you it will be a well worth family time!!!!
Hey, just to let you know the American Tract Society (www.atstracts.com) has a great collection of tracts for Halloween. Use rubber bands and wrap tracts around your candy for the treaters. So what your church doesn’t have a party or event, you can still be a witness by turning your porch light on and handing out candy and gospel tracts! Same concept just on the smaller scale. God’s Word calls us to “GO” Matthew 28:19-20 so whether our churches go (which they should) we ourselves need to be following God’s commands as well. Hope you have a great outreach event whether it be in church or in private!
Maybe this will upset the Christian World and some of you, but listen to all of it first. We do Halloween night and guess what we call it Halloween Extravaganza! Yes, people in our church question such a thing. We have SERVED 1800-2000 people the last nine years and some have gotten saved. I ask you how many lost people come to a Hallulejah Ho Down? In our town not many. We have done a blacklight presentation to present the gospel at the beginning for the last nine years too. Yes, we provide a bag of candy, dinner, snowcone, popcorn and cotton candy, games and inflatables, all FREE. I thought after the first year the lost would realize the gospel is first and wait to come late, but we more than pack out our church. No, it’s not for all but it works for our community. I don’t have to do as many flyers now, everyone just knows on Halloween night we are here.
We hold a Trunk or Treat each year on the Saturday prior to Halloween. We offer all activities free to the community and invite our church families to decorate their car/van trunks. We have games, jumpies, and all the other stuff. It is one activity that we do that really reaches out to our community and helps people to see us as friendly neighbors. We have some opposition to the holiday but we have been able to educate those people to understand that this is a safe, family friendly way to present the love and light of Jesus. We always have information about our church available, and give away prizes that tell the Gospel story.
This will be our third year for Trunk ‘n Treat. We have it the same day and time as our city trick-or-treating. We have had around 18-20 trunks in our parking lot. I have the people decorate their trunks with a Bible story or Christian theme. This helps us keep a Christian focus for the event. I have the kids vote for their favorite trunk. This gets them looking at the trunks and seeing the stories. We then have the families come inside the church for carnival games and more candy!! The memory crosses are a big hit. Kids and adults love to play with them. This year, I will add a craft station and have the kids make salvation bracelets. Adults will be helping and will explain the meaning of the color of each bead as they make them. We have a few hundred people go through and have received thanks from many parents for this alternative to traditional trick-or-treating.
Growing up I lived in a large city where we knew all of our neighbors! Trick or treating was all about candy to us, so we participated. Safety wasn’t an issue and Halloween equalled candy. Since moving out to the country almost 16 years ago, trunk or treat became our option because walking from house to house required wheels and safety has become an issue.
Our church has a great turn out and we hold our trunk or treat or “fall festival” on Halloween night. We want an alternative for families and kids as opposed to traditional trick or treating. While providing that opportunity, we have over 200 folks each year. The entire church supports this function with every Sunday School class running their own booth. The WMU even run the cupcake walk. We provide hotdogs, punch, cotton candy, etc.
This year we have a new youth pastor that is finishing seminary and he thinks we are not following the Bible. He believes that by holding this fall festival we are supporting the “evil” of Halloween. I told him to tell one person about Jesus that night and God would win and the devil would lose. Thinking that Halloween is the only day “evil” takes place is about as narrow minded as thinking going to church on Easter and Christmas covers you for the year.
Just wondering how everyone else deals with negativity towards this successful event.
To be honest, I think trunk or treat is not good in a couple of ways. Aside from mimicking an ungodly holiday in a very parallel way, it is training children to take candy from the cars of strangers! I’m just astonished by this trend of churches doing this!!
Thankfully, most churches in England recognise that Hallowe’en is a non-Christian festival. A lot of us put on special Christian parties for the children so they don’t miss out on having fun, but it is centred on Jesus, not on Satan and evil. Unfortunately, schools and the rest of society don’t take this view and have been sucked in to Hallowe’en celebrations because the shops are now full of stuff. Ugh!