Ask Pastor Mike Fabarez

Speaker 1

The Festival of Lights. What could that possibly mean for folks like you and me? Well, today on Focal Point, Pastor Mike Fabarez offers an enlightening perspective on the Jewish celebration of Hanukkah.

Ever wished you could get a cup of coffee with your pastor and have some one-on-one conversation time? Well, grab your mug and join us in the pastor's study today on Focal Point. We're pressing pause on our regular programming with Pastor Mike to ask him some questions from listeners.

Now, if you have a question of your own, I'll share our contact information shortly. Right now, let's join Focal Point's executive director, Jay Worton, for a look at Hanukkah. It's a special holiday edition of Ask Pastor Mike.

Speaker 2

Thank you, Dave. I'm here with Pastor Mike and Pastor Mike. Next week marks the beginning of Hanukkah and a listener asks us, what is Hanukkah and should I be celebrating it?

Speaker 3

Well, yeah, there's no need to celebrate it.

Although the interesting thing is that in the Bible we find in John chapter 10 that Jesus was there at the feast of dedication, which by the way, is what the word Hanukkah in Hebrew means. It means the dedication.

The festival of the feast of dedication is Hanukkah there in John, chapter 10, verse 22. So Jesus was there. It was certainly part of the Jewish Hanukkah.

And he makes a theological point about himself at that celebration.

Speaker 2

Well, where does the menorah and the dreidel and the lighting of the lamp and where does all that come from?

Speaker 3

Well, the historical background for Hanukkah and the reason they were celebrating it in the first century is because in the second century before Christ, there was a huge victory that the Jewish people had accomplished. They were celebrating the taking back of the Temple Mount from the evil Seleucid king Antiochus. Antiochus was a product of a split kingdom. After Alexander the Great ruled up in the north, he wanted to go and attack the Ptolemaic kingdom down in Egypt. Rome intervenes, and he's upset and frustrated. Coming back from Egypt, he decides to attack Israel and makes all the Israelites in the middle of the 2nd century BC pledge their allegiance to Zeus, their God. He goes into the temple, desecrates it, and sacrifices a pig there, telling all the Jews to sacrifice pigs.

Well, there was a priest named Mattathias who had five sons, and they chose to resist him. This resistance started a year-long revolt. Eventually, Mattathias dies, and his son Judas, known as Judas Maccabeus, picks up the mantle. He was quite a leader who fought to take back the Temple Mount. In the winter month of Kislev on the Jewish calendar, on the 25th of 165 B.C., he succeeded. Everyone was excited, and they celebrated by lighting the torches on the Temple Mount to reconstruct things in the temple. They relit the candelabras that were there, and it became a huge celebration.

Now, all the stories that you may have heard about Hanukkah, such as the cruise of oil that lasts, were not part of this original celebration. In fact, that narrative didn't even appear until about 600 years later in the Talmud. Josephus gives us clearer insight into it in the first century. He writes that it is a celebration of the taking back of the temple. They called it the Festival of Lights because they were lighting torches and celebrating this new light, metaphorically representing the recovery of the temple and the ability to celebrate all the customs of Judaism again after this terrible time of occupation by Antiochus Epiphanes.

Speaker 2

So this wasn't a regular feast time from back in the old Old Testament days. This is something that came about in the first or second century B.C.

Speaker 3

Yes. There's no mention of the Feast of Dedication in the Old Testament because it hadn't happened yet. The Old Testament ends around 400 B.C., and then the Feast takes place in 165 B.C. By the time of Christ, he is present while the culture is celebrating this great victory, much like some cultures may celebrate an independence day or something similar.

During this time, he makes the point that he ultimately is the light of the world. This becomes a significant platform for him, similar to the various things he does throughout his ministry. For instance, when he fed 5,000 people, he later turned around and said he was the bread of life.

In the middle of the Gospel of John, he calls himself the light of the world. One of the interesting aspects of this is that it coincides with the time period when he is celebrating the Feast of Dedication, which Josephus referred to as the Feast of Lights, the festival of...

Speaker 2

Lights, and the gift giving that goes on on the consecutive days during this time period. Is that part of that particular tradition or did that come out later? What do those represent?

Speaker 3

Yeah, came about later along with some of the kind of the mythical things that are discussed about Hanukkah are all late additions, centuries after the fact.

And certainly, it's still celebrated in Jewish circles with a lot of just traditions that have grown up around this celebration.

But it's just a reminder to them of God's providential help, support, and his intervention in bringing back Jewish rule to the Temple Mount in the second century before Christ.

Speaker 2

I've heard some Christians take on that gift giving method of doing it on consecutive days during that Hanukkah period. Is that something we should be doing or not?

Speaker 3

I mean, no. I mean, it's not that it would be wrong for you to do that any more than taking the month of February to celebrate, you know, the substitutionary atonement. I mean, people can do what they want as long as they're celebrating Christ.

But there's no biblical emphasis on this. There's no directions from scripture, there's no instructions about that. And people do a lot of things to exalt Christ at different times and they kind of piggyback on different historical things.

And there'd be nothing wrong with that. But certainly no one should feel obligated to. No Christian should feel obligated to.

Speaker 2

So would you recommend as Christians that we take part in the Hanukkah celebration?

Speaker 3

No. I mean, and I think one of the trends of modern Christianity is a lot of interest in the Jewish feasts and festivals of the Old Testament. There's nothing wrong with learning about those. But the whole point in the New Testament is that Christ has come as the fulfillment of all those shadows. All the ceremonies were shadows. The substance and reality is in Christ.

And like I said, there's nothing wrong with celebrating the greatness of Christ and the gift of Christ and giving of gifts, and all that is great. But the idea of New Testament Christianity is not for us to go back and continue to engage in all of the ceremonies of the Old Testament. And this one in particular is not even an Old Testament instruction for us to engage in. So I don't do it as a family. I wouldn't encourage my family to do it. I certainly don't encourage our church family to do it.

But if someone's doing something in honor of Christ on Memorial Day, okay, I'm not going to say that's a terrible thing. But I don't want us to go back to the ceremonies of the Old Testament or, in this case, the intertestamental period. That's just not what we are. We're Christians, and we celebrate the substance of Christ, the reality of Christ, and we don't have to engage in those forms.

And I know that's controversial for some listening because they love to look at the, you know, the Passover Seder and see the Christological elements. And I get all that. Just like there's Christological elements in the temple or the tabernacle. But I'm not going to construct a temple or a tabernacle for our church to worship the Lord Jesus Christ.

Nor am I going to say, well, let's do a Passover Seder as a genuine expression of biblical obedience because it was prescribed, but it was prescribed for Israel and now it's been fulfilled in Christ. And so we don't celebrate that anymore. We celebrate the Lord's Supper and we celebrate baptism as the ordinances of the church, but not the engagement in Old Testament festivals.

Speaker 2

Well, thank you, Pastor Mike. I'm sure that was a very informative discussion for our listeners. And we're going to hear more on this topic from a message you did called Happy Hanukkah, the day Jesus lit up the Temple Mount.

Speaker 4

Alexander was born in 356 BC. Alexander was the guy who liked to call himself, and other people liked to call him, Alexander the Great. Now, when you meet someone who calls himself the Great, you've met someone interesting. He lived up to his name. He was great. By the time he was 30 years old, he had pretty much conquered half of the known world. The guy was a brilliant military strategist. He had a resolute heart. He was a great thinker, and he was determined to conquer the world. Now, he was Greek. He wanted to Hellenize the world and have Greek culture prevail everywhere around the globe. And he got at his task and he was doing just an awfully good job at it until he was 33 years old. He went to a party, fell sick, and died. He didn't have modern medical treatment, and at age 33, he was dead. He had no children, so there was no one to kind of hand the scepter to. And at 33, his generals stood around and said, "What are we going to do?"

So they had a little meeting and decided, "Here's what we'll do. We'll take the four top generals in Alexander the Great's army and we'll just divide up the world that we've conquered so far." And so it was that two of them kind of turned into nothing, and two of them turned into something. We began two rival dominating dynasties that made a difference from this point on in history. One was the Ptolemaic dynasty with the P in the front. Remember that? From 8th grade history. They all migrated to the south, set up their headquarters here in Northern Africa in Egypt, and they ruled from there. Up in the north, you had the Seleucid dynasty, and they were up here in Syria.

Well, about 150 years after Alexander the Great died, there arose a man in this Seleucid kingdom. They were also called the Syrians. He became a dominant force to be reckoned with. His name was Antiochus IV. Antiochus said, "You know what? I can revive our great, great, great, great granddad's vision to see the world Hellenized, and I need to regain control, the kind of control that Alexander the Great had." So he goes after it. But if you know your history, way across the Mediterranean, there was another emerging world power. Who were they? The Romans, man. And you know what? They were becoming the force to be reckoned with. They sent their ships across the Mediterranean, landed on the shores with official papers from Rome, and they said, "Antiochus, you better not. You got to cease and desist this right now."

Now, I said, Antiochus is a smart guy. Rome's too powerful. Rome's got too many people, too much money, too much stuff. So Antiochus stops. He goes home with his tail between his legs because he's been fronted by the Roman emissaries, and he's frustrated. Now, I'm going home to Syria. I've been down here on the front of the battle line of Egypt. I'm about to come. Who do I have to pass by to get home? Israel. So you know what I'll do? I got all my war machines polished and oiled. Let's just take this little country, Israel, out of the picture. We'll make them part of the Grecian Empire. I can't get Egypt. I can't get the Ptolemies. I'll get Israel.

So he goes after Israel. And you know what? There's no way in the world Israel's going to stand up to Antiochus. Antiochus IV has got too much intelligence, too much stuff, too many army men. There's no way. So they roll over for the most part, and Antiochus says, "This is great. If we're going to be Grecian, all that Jewish stuff got to go away. As a matter of fact, if you would go with me and you would become Grecian, if you would get Hellenized, then you know what? I'll take care of you. I'll grant you favors, I'll build you civic centers." He built a huge gymnasium in downtown Jerusalem. "I will take care of you." And so he did for those that were willing to compromise.

By the way, if that sounds familiar, like the vestiges of that end up in the New Testament, you're right. When you read passages like Acts, chapter 6, verse 1, there was a dispute in the early church between two sets of Jewish people, the Hellenistic Jews and the Hebraic Jews. Do you remember that? That all came from this period of time when this big Hellenization campaign from Antiochus swept through Jerusalem. And village after village and place after place, they compromised. They rolled over, they said, "Fine, we'll become Grecian. That's okay with us." Are you sure? Because there's no more worship of this Yahweh God. You got to now worship our God. And our God is Zeus, the great God of the Greeks.

He marches into Jerusalem, he marches up to the Temple Mount. And then they say, "We're going to desecrate this place so you never see it as a holy site ever again." They burn all the scrolls, they take all the stuff that they can take and desecrate it, including the altar. And they took the most unclean animal that the Jews could think of, and that was a swine or a pig, and they put it on the altar, the sacred altar of God. And they sacrificed the pigs on the altar. And they said, "Here, no more worship of Yahweh. No more lambs, no more bulls. None of that stuff. You know what? This is all desecrated now." And pretty much the country was dilapidated and demoralized.

About 18 miles northwest of Jerusalem, in the suburbs of Jerusalem, if you will, there was an old priest named Mattathias. Mattathias sat there the day the Syrians showed up in his neighborhood. And they said, "We're all going to become Greek now. We're all going to become worshippers of Zeus. Are you ready?" And Mattathias, with a furled brow, said, "No, I'm not ready and I'm not interested." By the way, Mattathias had five sons, all healthy, you know, corn-fed boys from northern Jerusalem. They all stood up behind their dad, Mattathias, and they said, "We're not doing it."

The pastor's kids got in a brawl that day with the Syrian commanders. And guess what? They killed them all. They said, "Our town is in trouble. We're in trouble. I'm sure there's a big price on our head. We're going to have to pack it up and leave." So they leave their little town and go up into the mountains and start a little base camp where they live secretly. They go up there and begin training people to fight against the Syrians. Mattathias leads this, and he starts seeing great success and rebels and angry people who said, "We don't want to become Greek, we want to worship the God, the God of the Bible." They kept rallying around Mattathias and those like him and they said, "We're going to stand up against this." And so they did.

They started to make a dent in this thing, and people started to say, "Wow, there's a revolt, there's a resurgence, there's somebody standing against this." Well, 12 months into it, Matthias dies. Well, there were five boys to pick up the baton. There was one among them that was wild-eyed and crazy. One pastor's kid that stood out amongst the rest. They said, "If anybody's going to lead a resurgence in a revolt, it's going to be this guy." It was son number three. His name was Judas, and he was so crazy they called him Maccabeus. Maccabees means mallet head, Judas the hammer, Judas the madman. "You are the guy to lead us to victory."

And so Judas takes up the baton of his dad, Mattathias, and here he is and he says, "We're going to fight and we're going to regain this land and we're going to worship our God. We're not going to sacrifice pigs on altars and we're not going to sacrifice our lives to Zeus. Forget it. We worship Yahweh." And you know what? For the next 24 months, he saw more success than his dad could have ever imagined. Well, they knew if we're going to win this thing and really turn the tide once and for all, we got a city we got to take back and we got to recapture that center of our worship. They had their eyes set on Jerusalem. "We got to take that city right now."

There's posted Syrian guards all around it. But one day, we're going to take it. It's incredible odds. All the Israelis came. They mounted the siege against the walls of Jerusalem. They retook the city, they killed the Syrians, and those that were alive ran for their lives, and they took back the Temple Mount. And my goodness, there was a tremendous celebration that day. They began to reassemble this old dilapidated temple that hadn't been used for daily sacrifices now for three years. They started to, with all of their might around the clock with great lamps, four big basins, they say, in all of the courts, the court of the women, the court of the men, all over the Temple Mount, they lit the place up. They could work 24 hours a day restoring the worship articles.

Well, we needed a table for the showbread, we needed an altar for incense, we need an altar for sacrifice. We got to set up this seven-candled lamp in the lampstand, the menorah, if you will. We got to get all this going. And so they instituted Judas Maccabeus, his brothers, and all the whole gang of the army said, "We're going to now institute a festival for eight days." And they began a festival for eight days. Now, why did they do that? Here's the thing. The first of the year in Israel is Tishri. It corresponds with our September. At the end of Tishri, Tishri the 25th, you are to celebrate what's called the Feast of Booths. Have you ever heard of that? The Feast of Tabernacles. You've heard of that? But it really was nothing other than a camping trip to Jerusalem. They did this once a year in Jerusalem and they surrounded the temple mount.

Now, two months before Kiz left, the 25th was Tishri the 25th. And they were supposed to celebrate that then, could they? No way. The Syrians were still posted guard all around the city. There was no way they could celebrate that. But two months later on Kiz left the 25th, they could celebrate it because they had reconquered the Temple Mount. So they said, "We're going to celebrate this. Everyone bring your stuff, gather around. We're going to have a week-long feast. No work. All we're going to do is restore worship in the temple and we're going to celebrate."

Now, why would they do that? If you know anything about the history of the Old Testament, you get to a place where you read about Solomon taking all the craftsmen, all the masons, and building the most extreme and elaborate temple of the Old Testament. It was called Solomon's Temple. When it was done, after long, long months of work, and there finally had a time of dedication and to dedicate the temple, they celebrated. Catch this. Now the festival of Booths, the tent festival, the tent party. Judas Maccabeus shows up and says, "You know what? It's time for us to celebrate. We missed the Festival of Booths two months ago. Let's set up a festival now and dedicate the temple."

And they celebrated it with lamps. They did that because they were working in the temple area. Historians say they lit the biggest vats of oil in the temple area to light this place up. It was a great celebration. And so they did call it, even in the first century, the festival of lights. Now, here's an interesting observation as we go back to John, chapter one. John, chapter one, verse four: "In him was life, and that life was the what? The light of men. The light shines in the darkness, but the darkness has not understood it." There came a man who was sent from God. His name was John. He came as a witness to testify concerning the light that through him all men might believe. Verse 8: "He himself was not the light. That's John. He wasn't the light. He came only as a witness to the light. The true light that gives life to every man was coming into the world." Christ was that light.

Go forward three chapters and you'll see in John chapter three, Jesus, out of his own mouth, talking about this. You know the context. Nicodemus got to be born again, that whole thing. Talking to the Pharisee, Nicodemus, he wraps it up with this: "Light has come into the world, but men love darkness instead of light because their deeds were evil. Everyone who does evil hates the light and will not come into the light for fear that his deeds will be exposed. But whoever lives by the truth comes into the light so that it may be seen plainly that what has been done has been done through God."

How about John chapter 8? Can't miss this one. As Jesus presents himself on the Temple Mount at Hanukkah, it says in John 8, verse 12, "When Jesus spoke again to the people." Don't miss this one. Underline it. He said, "I am the light of the world." What a powerful statement. "Whoever follows me will never walk in darkness, but will have the light of life about me." Light. Chapter 10. Here's what he says. "At the feast of lights, the feast of dedication at Hanukkah in winter, walking in Solomon's colonnade." He says in verse 24, as the Jews gathered around him, they said, "Let's start with that. How long will you keep us in suspense?" They're a little irritated. "If you are the Christ," what does Christ mean? Messiah. "If you're the Messiah, if you're that great deliverer of the Old Testament that we're supposed to be looking for, tell us plainly."

Do you think it's ironic that they're asking him about the deliverer on the day of the celebration of the great deliverer, Judas, the mallet head? Yeah, that's huge. And Jesus says, this verse 25: "I did tell you. Chapter after chapter, sermon after sermon. I've made it clear. I told you. But you did not believe the miracles that I do in my Father's house." Remember chapter nine, in my Father's name? Rather, chapter nine, healing of the Man Born Blind, which was the discussion that ensued at the beginning of chapter 10 as they tried to explain this thing. He said, "The miracles I do in my Father's name, they speak for me. But you do not believe because you're not my sheep. My sheep, underscore it, listen to my voice. I know them, and they what? They follow me."

You know what? Jesus is calling for these folks on the Temple Mount, on Hanukkah, to look to Christ, the Messiah, the Great Deliverer, and says, "Hey, I'm the guy. Believe me. Follow me." It's an amazing thing. Embrace the light of the world who lays down his life for the sheep. Great. That's great. Now what? Here's what Christmas is all about. Celebrating this fact that we, as his sheep, have heard his voice and we're following Him. Look at verse number 28. Here's what he does for us: "I give them eternal life, and they shall never perish." See, the Great Deliverer delivers you, and he delivers you with such certainty that right on the heels of that, he says, "I just want to make this clear. It's a permanent deliverance."

Look at this: "No one can snatch them out of my hand." If I am the shepherd, you hear my voice, you choose to follow me. "I've got you now. You're adopted in the flock. You're a part of my team, and you're not going anywhere." And if that isn't good enough for you, verse 29: "My Father, who has given them to me, is greater than all. And no one can snatch them out of my Father's hand." So picture two concentric fists here. You got the Messiah's fist. The Great Deliverer, he says, "If you want to follow me, I got you. You're a part of my family." And you know what? If that isn't good enough for you, the hand of the Father is wrapped around mine, and that's not. You're not going anywhere. You're part of my team.

There are two things we long for, man: significance and security. And you got them both in one verse right here. "I love you. You're my king. I'm going to die for you. I'm going to lay down my life for you. I will deliver you. And by the way, that ain't ever changing. Good days, bad days. Hard seasons, not hard seasons. Good months, bad months. I'm your shepherd. I'll take you through this thing to the end." Let us celebrate your deliverance. Celebrate the fact that the great deliverer, the light of the world, the good shepherd, presented himself in the festival of lights and said, "Hey, you know what? I'll deliver you. All you got to do is hear my voice. Follow me."

God, we love you very much. For those of us that have heard your voice and are now committed to being a follower of the good shepherd, we celebrate Hanukkah today with a real sense of gratification that you not only deliver us temporally like Judas Maccabeus did, but you know what? You deliver us ultimately from the power of death, the bondage of sin. That's worth celebrating here in this Christmas season. God, thank you that Christmas is made all that much more special because we understand something of the significance of Hanukkah.

Speaker 3

Thank you so much for all that.

Speaker 4

We have to celebrate. In Jesus name, amen.

Speaker 1

Amen. You're listening to Focal Point with our special weekly segment we call Ask Pastor Mike Now. To hear this message again, or maybe share it with a friend, go to focalpointradio.org and that's also where you can submit your questions for an upcoming edition of Ask Pastor Mike.

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Dave Drouy here inviting you back after the weekend as Mike Fabarez continues his study on Luke Monday on Focal Point. Today's program was produced and sponsored by Focal Point Ministries.

Speaker 2

It.