Chanukah 2020 - A Time Of Turnaround

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Chanukah -The Feast of Dedication & The Festival Of Lights - celebrates a great miracle when a small group of Hebrew believers in Jerusalem, overcame an effort by the Syrian Greek empire to repress their Jewish faith and destroy their spiritual destiny. The slogan for Chanukah is: “A Great Miracle Happened Here!” It is the festival that is celebrated by Jewish people all over the world at this time of the year (10th -18th December this year) and was of course celebrated by Jesus throughout His life on earth. Although the only scriptural reference to Chanukah is in John’s Gospel (where it is called the Feast to Dedication) most Christians are unaware of the story of Chanukah and the message it has for believers of all generations

In 334 BC. The Middle-east had been conquered by Alexander The Great and forced to become part of the Grecian Empire. Greek civilization was advancing everywhere. The Greek language, culture, philosophy, architecture and mythology achieved complete dominance throughout the Middle-east from Asia Minor to Persia and throughout the whole of Egypt.
In spite of the pervasiveness of the Greek culture Jewish life in Israel continued to be tolerated and even favored within the Empire. However, in the year 178 BC when Antiochus IV become the imperial leader of the Syrian part of the Greek Empire, the movement to advance Greek civilization took a giant leap forward. The days of freedom and favor that the Jewish religion had enjoyed were over. Antiochus became an agent of cultural totalitarianism and initiated a vicious persecution of the Jewish religion and faith.

Earlier persecutions such as the efforts of the Persians to destroy the Jews in the days of Mordechai and Esther were primarily aimed at eliminating the Jewish people. Under Antiochus IV a different kind of persecution began, not aimed directly at the annihilation of the Jewish people, but aimed at the annihilation of their religion. Antiochus set out to outlaw the Jewish religion and undo its influence, so that Israel’s culture and religion would be brought into conformity with the rest of the Middle East.
He came against the Jews because of their insistence that Yahweh, the Creator of the universe, the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob is the one true God, and that His code of conduct, given in the Ten Commandments, is the standard of true morality. Furthermore the Greeks were offended by the testimony of the Temple sacrifices: that man is sinful and in need of forgiveness through the principle of Atonement. To them the Jews were narrow minded non-conformists. Their beliefs were an affront to the humanistic and polytheistic beliefs of Greece and had to be suppressed.

This is what Antiochus Epiphanes sought to do in 178 BC when his army entered the Temple and defiled it horribly by sacrificing a pig to their mythical, imaginary God, Zeus.

A Great Miracle Happened
What should the Jewish people in Israel do? The survival of the faith of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob was at stake. They were no match to the great power of the imperial army. What could they do? Most were willing just to let things slide, put up with these abominations and wait for some future miraculous intervention of God at the coming of the Messiah. Others however were aroused to do something about it. One man from one of the priestly families, Judas Maccabeus and his family were incensed at what the Greeks had done. How dare the Greeks with their ridiculous gods defy the God of Israel who had brought His people out of Egypt. How could He
who led His people into the Land of Promise and brought them back from exile in Babylon be
humiliated in this way. Surely He would stand with them if they resisted this insult from the Syrian Greeks. Surely Yahweh was stronger than Zeus!

Judas Maccabeus and his family decided to act. Greatly outnumbered and lacking military resources they were not deterred. They remembered David. They remembered Joshua and Caleb. They rose up and engaged the Greeks in ambushes and guerrilla tactics until they overthrew them and regained the Temple and Jerusalem. Their battle cry was: “Who is like You Oh Lord among the gods!” Their weapons were not merely natural weapons, but faith in the delivering power of God on behalf of those who are loyal to Him. The God of Israel backed up their defiance and their willingness to stand against the might of the Syrian Greeks and overcome the passivity of their majority of their own people who believed there was no point in resisting. It was a great and mighty miracle!
When the Jewish people regained the Temple, cleansed and rededicated the Temple they re-lit the Menorah. Though they only had enough consecrated oil to last one day the oil miraculously lasted eight days until supplies of freshly prepared oil could be prepared. This secondary miracle which is part of the Chanukah victory is celebrated as the Festival of lights. Chanukah therefore celebrates not only the miracle of the overthrow of totalitarian effort to stamp out worship of the true God but also the miracle of the oil lamps.

The tradition of the miracle of the oil has overshadowed the greater miracle that God preserved the faith of Israel through the brave resistance of a small band of faithful warriors. At Chanukah we are invited to remember the astonishing victory of a tiny minority of believers over a mighty empire. It remains a major feast in the Jewish calendar because the ancients knew that the same kind of conflict would be repeated throughout history. The struggles and the victories of the past must be recalled so that every generation may be stirred up to stand firm in their faith in the God who gives us light and life and resist efforts to repress our beliefs.

The Events Of Chanukah Have A Message For Our Times
In recent decades Christianity in the West has faced a similar attack as Israel faced in the days of the Syrian Greeks. Taking advantage of the failures of Christianity to live up to its standards, atheistic secular humanism has been able to take control over most of our western culture. Its champions are relentless in their efforts to persuade people that faith in the God of the Bible is a form of narrowness, that the moral code of the Bible is too restrictive and that we are all better off free from the yoke of the 'outdated morality' and beliefs in the Bible. They abuse the principle of tolerance for ALL, which is one of the cornerstones of our western civilization, to first marginalize and then exclude Christianity. They abuse the principle of tolerance to defy the claims of the God of Israel, the God and Father of Our Lord Jesus Christ, the one true God to be the object of our worship and the One to Whom we are all accountable. They remove any recognition of God in public life and have man as the only god they recognize.
Daniel foresaw that the Antiochus would not only defile the Temple but that he would also “cast truth to the ground” (Daniel 8.12.) This is exactly what is happing today as the cultural totalitarianism of the international world order, takes control of our media, news, entertainment
and university systems and seeks to defy and ignore the truth of God’s word and God’s unshakeable standards.

The success of atheistic secular humanism has been astonishing, first it succeeded in disestablishing Christianity in every nation where it had been the established faith, then it works
to discredit it, then to marginalize it and finally plans to exclude it. The majority of believers have remained passive.

However in these days, God is once again stirring up the spirit that inspired the Maccabees to action. In the West, believers are finally learning to push back against empty, meaningless, atheistic humanism that prevails in our culture and nations. They are determined that the worship of God will not be quenched or marginalized, but will become front and center in the lives and consciousness of our nations. True believers want the presence of God of to be welcomed throughout their culture and for all people to learn the amazing mercies available to them when they turn to Him and invite Him into their lives. These believers will not be silent, nor will they allow the destiny of their nations stolen. The Maccabees did this and they prevailed with the help of God’s miraculous support and intervention. With His help – the help of ‘The Ancient of Days’ we too can prevail, if we refuse to roll over in passive compliance and stand up, speak up and exercise faith until we see His Kingdom prevail and advance.

Our Fight Is Similar, But Our Weapons are Different
We fight not with ‘carnal weapons’ but with the weapons of truth, love, proclamation prayer, forgiveness and compassion. We do not agree with our enemies, but even as we resist their schemes, we love them and seek to do them well. Because our weapons are not carnal, we never succumb to unforgiveness, bitterness or ill will. We are never menacing. We never threaten. We never retaliate. But we do stand! We will shout our faith from the roof tops and let the whole world know that our nations belong to Him, and that He should be listened to. Chanukah reminds us that we can reverse the efforts of atheistic secular humanism to usurp our destiny as a people under God, made for His purposes, plans and ways.

Daniel actually foresaw the events of the first Chanukah 400 years before they happened. He saw the leader of the Syrian-Greek empire make “war on the saints” and prevailing until God, Himself stepped in and turned things around and supported the fearless actions of His people.
“I beheld, and the same horn made war with the saints, and prevailed against them; until the Ancient of Days came, and judgment was given to the saints of the most High; and the time came that the saints possessed the kingdom." (Daniel 7.21-22)

How we need The Ancient of Days, God Himself, to intervene and to work with us to save us from the emptiness of atheistic secular humanism, which threatens to engulf our civilization. As we pray, speak and act He will surely visit us with mighty spiritual awakenings that will restore us to our destiny. Expect a miraculous breakthrough for the Kingdom of God this Chanukah - for His light to triumph over darkness. We will then repeat the slogan of Chanukah “A great miracle has happened here – where we live, in our time!”