Fall Outreach Idea: Reverse Trick or Treating

Every kid is familiar with trick-or-treating. You dress up, walk to a neighbor’s house, ring the doorbell, say “Trick or Treat!” and you get free candy! But what if you could REVERSE this fall activity and utilize it as a community outreach and family service project? 

Lynne Howard, one of our amazing vendors (check out all of Lynne’s resources here), had the brilliant idea to host a Reverse Trick or Treating event with her families. In this Fall outreach event, instead of going door-to-door asking for candy, families from her church went door-to-door to hand out candy and collect donations for a local charity! It helped her church people get outside the church walls together to have fun AND served their community at the same time. You could host a similar event as a Halloween-alternative that can be done before, on, or after Halloween.

Here’s a sample schedule of Lynne’s event: 

• 6PM – Meet at the church, open with game and devotional
• 6:15PM – Assign teams, give instructions and supplies to each team; designate neighborhoods
• 6:20PM – Travel time
• 6:30-7:30PM – Reverse Trick-or-Treating
• 7:45PM – Bring donations back to church

The beauty of this idea is that this event could be done as an all-church event around Halloween time or a children’s ministry-only event. You could also pass out the instructions to the families in your church and let them do the activity on their own whenever they want. Plus, if you also pass out an invite to your church or details about your service times with the candy, it’s a great way to let people in the community know they’re invited to worship with you. 

Hosting a Reverse Trick or Treating Event with the families at your church? Let us know how it goes! And if you want help with the planning, prep, and promotion, we can help. Click here to download a full package with social media graphics, event graphics, a planning guide with a shopping list, volunteer list, planning timeline, sample schedule and script, a devotional, a game, and instructions for participants.