Good News - December 2018

Without Hanukah There Would Be No Christmas Dr. Richard Freeman Chosen People Ministries As we look forward to the Christmas season, the time we remember the birth of Jesus Christ, Our Messiah, Savior and Lord, it’s easy to get dis- tracted with the worldly stuff that has become part of the season. Black Friday is now Black Thursday and Friday and the focus often is on the receiv- ing of stuff, usually expensive. As Christians we need to stay focused on the gift of Jesus, the true reason for the season. That baby who was born in the manger came to die for our sins and give us eternal life. Here in South Florida we have a large segment of our population, our Jewish friends, who don’t celebrate Christmas but instead celebrate an eight day holiday known as Hanukkah. The Hebrew word Hanukkah means dedication and the holiday is called the Feast of Dedication or the Festi- val of Lights. John 10:22-23 re- counts that Jesus celebrated Hanukkah at the temple in Jerusalem. For eight days a Hanukkah menorah is lit to commemorate the defeat of the tyrantAntiochus Epiphanes and the dedication of the temple. Tradition says that the reason for the eight days is that when the templewas reded- icated the only oil found to light the temple lamp was a one day supply, but the miracle is that it burnt for eight days so that more oil could be located. As a Jew, I grewup believing that Hanukkah was sort of the Jewish Christ- mas, in that it was celebrated around the same timeof the year and you did get presents. I had no idea of the spiritual signifi- cance of the holiday until I be- came a believer in Jesus. In fact, I found out that without Hanukkah there would be no Christmas. The Hanukkah event took place in 167 BC, long after the prophet Malachi, so there is no mention of it in the Old Testa- ment. When Alexander the Great died without any heirs, his kingdomwas divided among his four chief generals. One of those generals, Seleucus, eventually ruled most of the territory of the Middle East, including Israel and Judah. His descendant Anti- ochus IV, known as Epiphanes (God manifest) was ruler during this time. The local Jews in Israel called himAntiochus Epimanes, which meant the mad one. Like so many before him, Antiochus was hell-bent on destroying the Jews. In an act of contempt and disrespect, Antiochus raided the temple in Jerusalem, stole its treasures, and set up an altar to Zeus. He even had pigs sacri- ficed on the altar. By defiling the temple, hemade it impossible for Jews tomake sacrifices and thus practice their faith. When the Jews expressed their outrage over the profaning of the temple, Antiochus’ responsewas tomur- der a great number of the Jews and sell others into slavery. He issued even more horrific de- crees, making it a capital crime for Jewish mothers to have their malebabies circumcised, and for Jews to read the Torah scrolls. His intent was not only to destroy the Jews but to remove any trace of the Jewish religion. The Jewish response was to take up arms and fight. In 167 —166BC, JudahMaccabee led a severely outnumbered army, and the Jewswona series of vic- tories over the military forces of Antiochus. After defeating Anti- ochus and the Seleucids, the Jews cleansed and restored the temple on the twenty-fifth day of Chislev, 165BC. What if Antiochus had been successful in destroying the Jews? Like the Egyptian Pharaoh in the book of Exodus and Haman in the book of Es- ther, there have always been at- tempts to destroy the Jews. Satan knows that if the Jews can be destroyed then God’s prom- ises of a coming Messiah could be thwarted. So truly without Hanukkah, without the defeat of a satanically inspired tyrant trying to destroy the Jews, there would have been no birth of Jesus, no Christmas. And if you wonder where the25thof December for Jesus’s birth came from, look no further than the date of Hanukkah, the 25th of Chislev, the Hebrew month that falls in December. Maybe, just maybe, Jesus was actually born on Hanukkah and that’s why we celebrate it when we do. Dr. Richard Freeman is vice president anddirector of churchmin- istries and conferences for Chosen People Ministries. He can be reached at rfreeman@chosenpeo- ple.com. Palm Beach County