So I have been "Celebrating" Christmukkah for the last 6 or 7 years. But I have kinda stepped up my game a little bit every year. Learning more and more about Hanukkah. So here is kinda of a lengthy explanation of a little bit of "Hanakkuah" or my CHRISTmukkah"! Some of it is a little wordy.. so u can just scan through it if you want. But is is kinda long.. so if you make it through CONGRATS!!! :)
Always being mindful that JESUS is the reason for the Season!!!
SHALOM PEEPS! :)
Hanukkah Means Rededication to the Lord"
If we would not have the holiday of Hanukkah, we would not have SALVATION! If God would have allowed success to the “Tyrant” of 165 BCE by the name of Antiochus Epiphanes, all Jews would have been annihilated off the face of the earth! But God, in His grace and mercy, interceded because of His promise to the forefathers, Avraham, Yitzchak and Ya'akov. Therefore, “when the fullness of time was come God sent forth His Son, born of a woman, born under the Torah.” (Galatians 4:4) The promised Messiah came to the Jewish people and to the rededicated Temple to become the Redeemer of all mankind who will receive Him. The attempt to destroy all the Jews by Antiochus was an attempt by Satan to stop the coming of Messiah. Even as the Holocaust was an effort by Satan to prevent the formation of the State of Israel, thus preventing Messiah’s return to Zion. So, without Hanukkah there would be no salvation, because there would be no Savior born to the Jews! When the world by-and-large is busy preaching a Jewishless Messiah in December, we also have the opportunity to exhort with great patience and instruction the Jewish people about the Good News of the Jewish Messiah.
Often we are told that Hanukkah is not a Biblical festival, commanded by God, therefore it is not important for Israel to celebrate it. Our response must come from both, a historical and a Brit Chadashah perspective. At the time of the great victory of the Jews over Antiochus Epiphanes in 165 BCE, the Temple was cleaned of the satanic image of Antiochus — at which all Jews were being forced to bow down or die — and rededicated to God. As a matter of Scriptural truth, which the Brit Chadashah bore witness two centuries later, the Shechinah, or Presence of God, returned to the Holy of Holies and stayed there until the death of Yeshua upon the Roman execution cross.
When the Temple was rededicated the Macabee family led the nation in the observance of Sukkot, according to the historical account found in the Apocryphal - Non-Scriptural - but historic book of II Macabees 10:6-9. And so, the holiday referred to as Rededication, as it was later surnamed, was actually the observance out of season of the Feast of Tabernacles or Sukkot. According to the historical account the Menorah was re-lit in the Temple with only enough kosher oil for one day. The miracle was that it lasted seven more days - through the eight day holiday of Sukkot.
But, how about Christmas? One might have logically concluded that December 25 used to be a pagan holiday, but now we celebrate it unto the Lord in honor of Yeshua’s birth. But the problem with this is that God asked us not to be a stumbling block for the Jews. In Deuteronomy 12:29-32 God instructs Israel that they are not to worship Him as the nations worship their false gods. The Holy One commands, “You shall not behave thus towards the Lord your God.” In verse 30 He states, “... do not inquire about their gods, saying, ‘how do these nations serve their gods, that I may do likewise?’“ God does not want Jews to worship Him on pagan days or in pagan ways, because Moses (Torah) is read in Synagogues in every city every Shabbat. This is why the apostles decided that Gentiles, who converted from their pagan ways to Torah true Judaism, should not either. In Acts 15:28, the Spirit of God writes, through the apostles, “For it seemed good to the Holy Spirit and to us...” Plainly then, God does not want the Ekklesia, His Bride, to use customs and rites that the heathen used — even though they might be well intentioned.
So many Christians take stumbling the Jews lightly, but Yeshua doesn’t. In Revelation 2:14-16, we see that Yeshua is coming back to make war with the Congregation of Pergamum for placing stumbling blocks before the children of Israel. He is returning in wrath to them. At the time of Hanukkah, in 165 BCE, December 25 was celebrated as the birth of the sun-god Jupiter, but it was Jupiter that the Maccabees sought to cleanse the Holy of Holies from. When they succeeded they established the holiday. Hanukkah stands in opposition to paganism, not in favor of Judaism being expressed through pagan days and customs. The Menorah is a light glowing in protest to Jupiter and his day. The saying at Hanukkah, “Nes Gadol Hayah Sham” — “A great miracle happened there” — is in reference to the Presence of God in His rededicated Temple.
Yet, Messianic believers know that the fulfillment of the Hanukkah miracle was not that God’s Presence dwelt in the replica of the Temple from heaven, a replica built of stones with human hands, but that God’s Presence dwelt in human flesh in David’s Greater Son — Yeshua, the Messiah of Israel. Now we can say with the deepest understanding “A GREAT MIRACLE HAPPENED THERE” — for God is now present among His people in a new Temple, which is the Messiah Himself.
How can we then celebrate the holiday? We could tell the story of Sukkot — the glorious King has come to us in His humble Sukkah to fellowship with man. But there is one aspect of the ‘out of season Sukkot’ — Hanukkah — which is unique, the lighting of the Hanukkah Menorah. Even though great lights were burning on huge pedestals to completely enlighten Jerusalem on Sukkot, this feature has been lost to Sukkot, but retained in Hanukkah. It was at the Feast of Sukkot that Yeshua said, “I AM THE LIGHT OF THE WORLD.”
John 1:4 tells us that in Yeshua was life, and that it is the life of Yeshua which enlightens our own lives, that without Him we live out our lives in dark fear and striving against one another. On the Menorah this symbolism is born out beautifully. The Shammash, or servant candle, represents the light of Messiah. It is the ninth candle and represents God the Servant Messiah. When that great light touches our darkened lives, we become lights too, and Yeshua said to us, “YOU ARE THE LIGHT OF THE WORLD.” In Matthew 5:14-16, He said that we were to share the light, letting our lives shine before all people through the good we can do in His Name. John 10:21-22 tells us that the Messiah came to His Temple at Hanukkah and proclaimed that He was the Light of the Menorah.
Proclaiming Messiah to the Jew first and also to the Gentile is the reason we live and endure. We announce through the Festival of Lights that God is present with us — IMMANUEL — Yeshua the Messiah of Israel. The question we must deal with is “Does my life reflect that light of the Service Candle?"
This Hanukkah, we dare not to shrink from proclaiming Messiah, even as Moses raised up the despised and rejected serpent upon a pole in the wilderness, so that the people of Israel looked up to it and were healed — that was a type and symbol of our Messiah, that although we have - as a nation - looked up to Him upon that Roman cross with abhorrence despising the One who claims to be our King — it is to that despised and abhorred One that every Jewish person needs to look for the healing that leads to life, not just temporary as in the wilderness of Sinai, but to life eternal! As Yeshua is with the nation, so may He be with every Jew as we reflect the light of God’s Holy Presence that shines so brightly from the Hanukkiah at this time of year!
The importance of all Jewish holidays which God gave must find their significance not only in looking backward at what God had done, but also in looking forward to what God will do, how He will fulfill His Holy Days. In the case of Sukkot, we find that it is the celebration of God with us, in Messiah reigning upon David’s throne in the Millennial Kingdom. Zechariah 14:16 says: “And it shall come to pass, that everyone who is left of all the nations which came against Jerusalem shall go up from year to year to worship the King, the Lord of hosts, and to keep the Feast of Sukkot.” We also ascertain from Scripture that Yeshua, at His first coming, was born at Sukkot when is His birthday party for those who received Him in faith and repentance, but in the same time we look ahead at His second coming when all Israel will enter into the greater meaning of the High Holy Days including Sukkot.
God has called the Jews to observe the feast of Sukkot and has called the Messianic believers to magnify its meaning in His Son - for all the holidays are shadows of Messiah. The historical truth is that Hanukkah is Sukkot so, through a New Covenant principle, enunciated in II Timothy 4:1,2, by Paul, at Hanukkah we have a perfect opportunity to preach the Word concerning Messiah out of season, even as we do in season during the High Holy Days.
Shabbat joy, peace and blessings! Shabbat Shalom!
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