Hanukkah (additionally spelled Chanukah) is a Jewish pageant commemorating the rededication of the Second Temple in Jerusalem after the Maccabean revolt towards the Seleucid Empire within the second century BCE.
On this article, we’ll take a look at Hanukkah’s historical past, its New Testomony significance, and what its message of devoted mild means for believers as we speak.
The Bible & Hanukkah
In contrast to Passover, Pentecost, or Tabernacles—festivals explicitly commanded within the Torah—Hanukkah emerges from the historical past of Israel moderately than the regulation of Moses. For that reason, it receives solely temporary consideration inside the canonical Scriptures.
Actually, the one express reference to Hanukkah within the Protestant Bible seems in John 10:22–23, the place we learn: “Then got here the Feast of Dedication [τὰ ἐγκαίνια] at Jerusalem. It was winter, and Jesus was strolling within the temple courts in Solomon’s Colonnade.” The Greek phrase ἐγκαίνια actually means “renewal” or “dedication”—the precise that means of the Hebrew חֲנֻכָּה (chanukah). The Gospel writers assumed their Jewish readers would instantly acknowledge the setting: Yeshua (Jesus), the Jewish Messiah, current within the temple throughout the pageant commemorating its cleaning and restoration.
Though Hanukkah has no direct Torah command, its origins are rooted within the lived expertise of the Jewish folks as they struggled to outlive culturally, spiritually, and bodily underneath the pressures of international empires. Our clearest historic accounts of those occasions seem in 1 and a pair of Maccabees, preserved within the Apocrypha/Deuterocanon (included in Catholic and Orthodox Bibles, although not in most Protestant or Jewish canons).
Daniel’s prophetic visions additionally converse with exceptional precision of a tyrannical ruler, a coming abomination, and a desecrated sanctuary (Dan 8, 11). These descriptions largely match the reign of Antiochus IV Epiphanes, the Seleucid king whose brutal persecution sparked the Maccabean revolt.
The that means of Hanukkah
Understanding Hanukkah, due to this fact, invitations us into the world Jesus inhabited.
Hanukkah focuses us on a world the place Israel resides between empires. Within the second century BCE, the Jewish folks discovered themselves squeezed between the northern Seleucid (Syrian-Greek) Empire and the southern Ptolemaic (Egyptian-Greek) Empire. Two powers, each heirs of Alexander the Nice, fought for management of Judea as if it have been merely a pawn on a geopolitical board.
The Maccabean revolt was not merely an ethnic rebellion, however a battle of faithfulness: a stand for Torah, covenant identification, and the holiness of God’s dwelling place.
By the point Jesus walked into the temple at Hanukkah practically two centuries later, the oppressive northern empire was lengthy gone—however one other empire, far bigger and extra brutal, had taken its place. Rome now dominated Judea with iron authority. As soon as once more, the Jewish folks discovered themselves residing between empires, with a calling to withstand assimilation and maintain quick to the covenant guarantees God had made to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.
Into this world stepped the Gentle of the World, who celebrated the Feast of Dedication not merely as a historic reminiscence, however as one who fulfills its deepest that means. Hanukkah turns into a window into the guts of Jesus’s mission: to cleanse, to revive, to rededicate, and to disclose God’s kingdom within the midst of darkness, on earth because it already is in his presence.
Hanukkah turns into a window into the guts of Jesus’s mission: to cleanse, to revive, to rededicate, and to disclose God’s kingdom within the midst of darkness.
The story of Hanukkah is not only historical historical past however a chance for God’s folks to rehearse his saving deeds in historical past. So whereas the timing and prominence of this vacation simply so occurs to align with celebrating the Messiah’s delivery, Hanukkah is just not a Jewish different to Christmas. Hanukkah represents a chance to disclose and expose the cyclical conflict between the dominion of God and the empires of this world. Hanukkah illuminates the conflict between Israel and the political powers that search to erase the folks and land of the covenant. This Feast of Rededication factors us to the battle between the sunshine of God’s presence and the darkness that resists it.
As we’ll discover, this historical pageant carries profound relevance for the worldwide church as we speak, particularly because the Spirit purifies the bride of Messiah from centuries of inherited anti-Jewish bias. Hanukkah invitations Christians to face with the Jewish folks, to acknowledge the continuity of God’s covenant, and to shine as devoted witnesses in a darkening age.
The historic origins of Hanukkah
The roots of Hanukkah attain again into one of the turbulent durations of Jewish historical past—a time when international domination threatened not solely Israel’s political freedom however the very core of its covenant identification.
After the demise of Alexander the Nice, his huge empire fractured into rival kingdoms. Judea was wedged between two of probably the most highly effective: the Seleucids within the north and the Ptolemies within the south. For generations, Judea oscillated between these empires, usually struggling not due to something it had achieved, however merely due to its strategic, God-given location. Israel has at all times been greater than a patch of land; it’s the heart stage of redemptive historical past, the place the place heaven touches earth. For that reason, empire after empire fights to dominate it.
This geopolitical rigidity reached a disaster underneath Antiochus IV Epiphanes, a Seleucid ruler who epitomized boastful tyranny. He didn’t merely search political management, he tried to erase Jewish covenant life altogether. Torah scrolls have been burned. Sabbath observance and circumcision have been outlawed. The temple was desecrated with pagan sacrifices, together with the notorious providing of a pig on the altar, an “abomination that causes desolation” (Dan 11:31; see additionally 8:13; 9:27; 12:11) as anticipated in Daniel’s visions. Antiochus understood that if he might sever Israel from Torah and from the temple, he might sever them from the God who had referred to as them. This was not merely persecution: It was a non secular and tactical assault towards the covenant itself.
In response, a priestly household from the Judean city of Modi’in—Mattathias and his sons, referred to as the Maccabees—rose in defiance. Their resistance started not with armies however with constancy: a refusal to bow, a refusal to supply illicit sacrifice, a refusal to betray the God of Israel. What adopted was a exceptional guerrilla rebellion during which a small, outmatched Jewish drive pushed the Seleucids out of Jerusalem and reclaimed the temple.
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When the Maccabees entered the defiled sanctuary in 164 BCE, they tore down the desecrated altar, rebuilt it, and purified the courts. The temple was rededicated (chanukah) to the Holy One in every of Israel.
This rededication not solely restarted temple service, it additionally galvanized folks’s dedication to their covenant calling. It was a declaration that, even when surrounded by highly effective empires, Israel would stay God’s cherished possession. They is perhaps small. They is perhaps oppressed. However they’d not be extinguished.
Jesus & Hanukkah
It’s into this story that Jesus steps in John 10. Practically two centuries after the Maccabean victory, he walks by means of the identical temple courts that had as soon as been full of idols and pagan sacrifices. He stands in Solomon’s Colonnade, the very location the place Jewish academics and leaders would collect throughout the Feast of Dedication to recollect God’s faithfulness. And there, throughout Hanukkah, Yeshua proclaims, “I and the Father are one” (John 10:30), asserting not solely Messianic identification however divine unity.
On this setting, Hanukkah’s themes of sunshine, purity, and holy resistance come into sharp focus. Jesus doesn’t merely have fun the reminiscence of the temple’s rededication: He embodies its final achievement. The place the Maccabees cleansed the bodily altar from idolatrous corruption, Jesus cleanses the non secular temple—the hearts of his folks. The place the Maccabees restored the sanctuary lamp, Jesus declares, “I’m the Gentle of the World.” The place Antiochus sought to sever Israel from its covenant, Jesus reveals the faithfulness of God’s covenant love, made flesh and strolling amongst his folks.
Jesus doesn’t merely have fun the reminiscence of the temple’s rededication: He embodies its final achievement.
Hanukkah thus turns into a kingdom lens by means of which we see Jesus entering into Israel’s story of oppression and bringing true deliverance. He lives inside the rhythm of Israel’s festivals. He fulfills the hopes these festivals anticipate. The Feast of Dedication turns into a remembrance of God’s dedication to his folks in love and a chance to rededicate ourselves to his service.
And but, the story doesn’t finish within the first century. The identical forces that sought to suppress Jewish identification within the days of Antiochus didn’t evaporate with the rise of Rome—or the rise of Christianity. Simply because the Jewish folks confronted the empires of Greece and Rome, so the early church quickly discovered itself confronting the temptation to align with empire moderately than kingdom. Darkness wears many faces, however it’s animated by the identical non secular hostility—a hostility towards the God of Israel, the folks of God, and the needs of his irrevocable calling to the Jewish folks.
Thus, Hanukkah continues to shine as a prophetic signpost. It reminds us that the dominion of God advances by means of expensive faithfulness; that mild isn’t impartial; and that imitation of empire, whether or not historical or trendy, stays a hazard for God’s folks. It calls each Jews and Christians into the identical story of holy resistance and covenant loyalty.
Israel & Hanukkah
The conflict between Israel and the empires of this world didn’t finish with Antiochus, nor did it stop with Rome’s rise or Rome’s fall. If something, historical past reveals a sobering sample: All ages produces its personal Antiochus, its personal empire, its personal ideological machine decided to standardize, assimilate, silence, or erase the Jewish folks. From medieval Christendom to trendy nationalism, from Enlightenment rationalism to twentieth-century totalitarianism, an odd and horrible consistency emerges. The powers of this age, nevertheless superior or refined, proceed to stumble over the folks whom God has chosen as a witness to his covenant constancy. The central metropolis in Israel stays, as Zechariah says, “a cup that causes staggering” for the nations and “a heavy stone” they can not raise with out injuring themselves (Zech 12:2–3).
This ongoing conflict is just not merely political. It’s non secular at its core. The identical darkness that animated Antiochus nonetheless resists the needs of God as we speak. It resists covenant in favor of consolation. It resists particularism as if it nullifies universalism. It resists the concept that God has sure himself in faithfulness to a particular folks and a particular land for a particular objective—the final word and common restoration of all issues.
And in each technology, empire reappears underneath new names, typically in secular guise, typically clothed in non secular rhetoric, typically interesting to progress, typically to energy, typically even to peace. However beneath its assorted kinds lies the identical historical impulse: to redefine, take in, or eradicate the folks whose existence testifies that God is actual and that he’s not completed rescuing this world.
Because of this Hanukkah is just not an antiquated Jewish vacation or quaint cultural remembrance. It’s a prophetic reminder of what faithfulness prices in a world hostile to covenant mild. And it’s right here—exactly at this intersection of Israel, empire, and the dominion of God—that the church is summoned into its personal second of rededication.
The church & Hanukkah
For practically two millennia, giant parts of the church didn’t stand with Israel within the conflict; as an alternative, the church usually grew to become entangled with empire. After Constantine, Christian identification merged with political energy, and the church slowly inherited the empire’s suspicion, then rejection, of Jewish presence and Jewish continuity. The tragic end result was that the followers of the Jewish Messiah usually opposed the folks he got here from (and got here to), the Scriptures he affirmed, and the items and calling he declared irrevocable.
However in our technology, one thing exceptional is going on. The Holy Spirit is cleaning the bride of Messiah. He’s exposing the theological sediment that collected by means of centuries of anti-Jewish bias—supersessionism, contempt, blame, caricature, and historic amnesia. He’s reminding the worldwide church that the God of Abraham has not deserted his folks, and that the dominion Jesus proclaimed is just not an empire that replaces Israel, however the achievement of Israel’s calling prolonged to the nations.
That is the place Hanukkah speaks with renewed energy. Hanukkah invitations the church to acknowledge the sunshine that got here by means of Israel—the Messiah who’s the Gentle of the World—and to honor the folks by means of whom that mild first shone. It calls Christians to resign each impulse, express or delicate, that aligns with the “spirit of empire” moderately than the Spirit of God. It urges the bride to rededicate herself to the needs of the dominion: humility as an alternative of triumphalism; covenant loyalty as an alternative of theological erasure; solidarity as an alternative of suspicion.
And maybe most significantly, Hanukkah reminds the church that its calling is just not merely mental however embodied. The Menorah was not hidden in a again room. It was positioned within the Holy Place to shine. In the identical approach, the church known as to bear witness publicly, joyfully, and courageously to the God who retains his guarantees. In an age the place darkness grows extra emboldened, the folks of Jesus should shine with renewed and rededicated conviction. We should shine as a devoted remnant in a darkening world.
For simply because the temple was purified and rekindled within the days of the Maccabees, so the Spirit is purifying and rekindling the church as we speak. Hanukkah invitations us to take part in that work—to reject the patterns of empire, to embrace the methods of the dominion, and to let the Gentle of the World burn brightly by means of a individuals who have been cleansed, rededicated, and despatched into the darkness with holy fireplace.
Thomas L. Boehm’s really helpful sources for additional examine
God’s Appointed Occasions: A Sensible Information for Understanding and Celebrating the Biblical Holidays
Associated content material
Hanukkah (additionally spelled Chanukah) is a Jewish pageant commemorating the rededication of the Second Temple in Jerusalem after the Maccabean revolt towards the Seleucid Empire within the second century BCE.
On this article, we’ll take a look at Hanukkah’s historical past, its New Testomony significance, and what its message of devoted mild means for believers as we speak.
The Bible & Hanukkah
In contrast to Passover, Pentecost, or Tabernacles—festivals explicitly commanded within the Torah—Hanukkah emerges from the historical past of Israel moderately than the regulation of Moses. For that reason, it receives solely temporary consideration inside the canonical Scriptures.
Actually, the one express reference to Hanukkah within the Protestant Bible seems in John 10:22–23, the place we learn: “Then got here the Feast of Dedication [τὰ ἐγκαίνια] at Jerusalem. It was winter, and Jesus was strolling within the temple courts in Solomon’s Colonnade.” The Greek phrase ἐγκαίνια actually means “renewal” or “dedication”—the precise that means of the Hebrew חֲנֻכָּה (chanukah). The Gospel writers assumed their Jewish readers would instantly acknowledge the setting: Yeshua (Jesus), the Jewish Messiah, current within the temple throughout the pageant commemorating its cleaning and restoration.
Though Hanukkah has no direct Torah command, its origins are rooted within the lived expertise of the Jewish folks as they struggled to outlive culturally, spiritually, and bodily underneath the pressures of international empires. Our clearest historic accounts of those occasions seem in 1 and a pair of Maccabees, preserved within the Apocrypha/Deuterocanon (included in Catholic and Orthodox Bibles, although not in most Protestant or Jewish canons).
Daniel’s prophetic visions additionally converse with exceptional precision of a tyrannical ruler, a coming abomination, and a desecrated sanctuary (Dan 8, 11). These descriptions largely match the reign of Antiochus IV Epiphanes, the Seleucid king whose brutal persecution sparked the Maccabean revolt.
The that means of Hanukkah
Understanding Hanukkah, due to this fact, invitations us into the world Jesus inhabited.
Hanukkah focuses us on a world the place Israel resides between empires. Within the second century BCE, the Jewish folks discovered themselves squeezed between the northern Seleucid (Syrian-Greek) Empire and the southern Ptolemaic (Egyptian-Greek) Empire. Two powers, each heirs of Alexander the Nice, fought for management of Judea as if it have been merely a pawn on a geopolitical board.
The Maccabean revolt was not merely an ethnic rebellion, however a battle of faithfulness: a stand for Torah, covenant identification, and the holiness of God’s dwelling place.
By the point Jesus walked into the temple at Hanukkah practically two centuries later, the oppressive northern empire was lengthy gone—however one other empire, far bigger and extra brutal, had taken its place. Rome now dominated Judea with iron authority. As soon as once more, the Jewish folks discovered themselves residing between empires, with a calling to withstand assimilation and maintain quick to the covenant guarantees God had made to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.
Into this world stepped the Gentle of the World, who celebrated the Feast of Dedication not merely as a historic reminiscence, however as one who fulfills its deepest that means. Hanukkah turns into a window into the guts of Jesus’s mission: to cleanse, to revive, to rededicate, and to disclose God’s kingdom within the midst of darkness, on earth because it already is in his presence.
Hanukkah turns into a window into the guts of Jesus’s mission: to cleanse, to revive, to rededicate, and to disclose God’s kingdom within the midst of darkness.
The story of Hanukkah is not only historical historical past however a chance for God’s folks to rehearse his saving deeds in historical past. So whereas the timing and prominence of this vacation simply so occurs to align with celebrating the Messiah’s delivery, Hanukkah is just not a Jewish different to Christmas. Hanukkah represents a chance to disclose and expose the cyclical conflict between the dominion of God and the empires of this world. Hanukkah illuminates the conflict between Israel and the political powers that search to erase the folks and land of the covenant. This Feast of Rededication factors us to the battle between the sunshine of God’s presence and the darkness that resists it.
As we’ll discover, this historical pageant carries profound relevance for the worldwide church as we speak, particularly because the Spirit purifies the bride of Messiah from centuries of inherited anti-Jewish bias. Hanukkah invitations Christians to face with the Jewish folks, to acknowledge the continuity of God’s covenant, and to shine as devoted witnesses in a darkening age.
The historic origins of Hanukkah
The roots of Hanukkah attain again into one of the turbulent durations of Jewish historical past—a time when international domination threatened not solely Israel’s political freedom however the very core of its covenant identification.
After the demise of Alexander the Nice, his huge empire fractured into rival kingdoms. Judea was wedged between two of probably the most highly effective: the Seleucids within the north and the Ptolemies within the south. For generations, Judea oscillated between these empires, usually struggling not due to something it had achieved, however merely due to its strategic, God-given location. Israel has at all times been greater than a patch of land; it’s the heart stage of redemptive historical past, the place the place heaven touches earth. For that reason, empire after empire fights to dominate it.
This geopolitical rigidity reached a disaster underneath Antiochus IV Epiphanes, a Seleucid ruler who epitomized boastful tyranny. He didn’t merely search political management, he tried to erase Jewish covenant life altogether. Torah scrolls have been burned. Sabbath observance and circumcision have been outlawed. The temple was desecrated with pagan sacrifices, together with the notorious providing of a pig on the altar, an “abomination that causes desolation” (Dan 11:31; see additionally 8:13; 9:27; 12:11) as anticipated in Daniel’s visions. Antiochus understood that if he might sever Israel from Torah and from the temple, he might sever them from the God who had referred to as them. This was not merely persecution: It was a non secular and tactical assault towards the covenant itself.
In response, a priestly household from the Judean city of Modi’in—Mattathias and his sons, referred to as the Maccabees—rose in defiance. Their resistance started not with armies however with constancy: a refusal to bow, a refusal to supply illicit sacrifice, a refusal to betray the God of Israel. What adopted was a exceptional guerrilla rebellion during which a small, outmatched Jewish drive pushed the Seleucids out of Jerusalem and reclaimed the temple.
Use Logos’s Examine Assistant to analysis subjects just like the Maccabean revolt.
Begin your free trial!
When the Maccabees entered the defiled sanctuary in 164 BCE, they tore down the desecrated altar, rebuilt it, and purified the courts. The temple was rededicated (chanukah) to the Holy One in every of Israel.
This rededication not solely restarted temple service, it additionally galvanized folks’s dedication to their covenant calling. It was a declaration that, even when surrounded by highly effective empires, Israel would stay God’s cherished possession. They is perhaps small. They is perhaps oppressed. However they’d not be extinguished.
Jesus & Hanukkah
It’s into this story that Jesus steps in John 10. Practically two centuries after the Maccabean victory, he walks by means of the identical temple courts that had as soon as been full of idols and pagan sacrifices. He stands in Solomon’s Colonnade, the very location the place Jewish academics and leaders would collect throughout the Feast of Dedication to recollect God’s faithfulness. And there, throughout Hanukkah, Yeshua proclaims, “I and the Father are one” (John 10:30), asserting not solely Messianic identification however divine unity.
On this setting, Hanukkah’s themes of sunshine, purity, and holy resistance come into sharp focus. Jesus doesn’t merely have fun the reminiscence of the temple’s rededication: He embodies its final achievement. The place the Maccabees cleansed the bodily altar from idolatrous corruption, Jesus cleanses the non secular temple—the hearts of his folks. The place the Maccabees restored the sanctuary lamp, Jesus declares, “I’m the Gentle of the World.” The place Antiochus sought to sever Israel from its covenant, Jesus reveals the faithfulness of God’s covenant love, made flesh and strolling amongst his folks.
Jesus doesn’t merely have fun the reminiscence of the temple’s rededication: He embodies its final achievement.
Hanukkah thus turns into a kingdom lens by means of which we see Jesus entering into Israel’s story of oppression and bringing true deliverance. He lives inside the rhythm of Israel’s festivals. He fulfills the hopes these festivals anticipate. The Feast of Dedication turns into a remembrance of God’s dedication to his folks in love and a chance to rededicate ourselves to his service.
And but, the story doesn’t finish within the first century. The identical forces that sought to suppress Jewish identification within the days of Antiochus didn’t evaporate with the rise of Rome—or the rise of Christianity. Simply because the Jewish folks confronted the empires of Greece and Rome, so the early church quickly discovered itself confronting the temptation to align with empire moderately than kingdom. Darkness wears many faces, however it’s animated by the identical non secular hostility—a hostility towards the God of Israel, the folks of God, and the needs of his irrevocable calling to the Jewish folks.
Thus, Hanukkah continues to shine as a prophetic signpost. It reminds us that the dominion of God advances by means of expensive faithfulness; that mild isn’t impartial; and that imitation of empire, whether or not historical or trendy, stays a hazard for God’s folks. It calls each Jews and Christians into the identical story of holy resistance and covenant loyalty.
Israel & Hanukkah
The conflict between Israel and the empires of this world didn’t finish with Antiochus, nor did it stop with Rome’s rise or Rome’s fall. If something, historical past reveals a sobering sample: All ages produces its personal Antiochus, its personal empire, its personal ideological machine decided to standardize, assimilate, silence, or erase the Jewish folks. From medieval Christendom to trendy nationalism, from Enlightenment rationalism to twentieth-century totalitarianism, an odd and horrible consistency emerges. The powers of this age, nevertheless superior or refined, proceed to stumble over the folks whom God has chosen as a witness to his covenant constancy. The central metropolis in Israel stays, as Zechariah says, “a cup that causes staggering” for the nations and “a heavy stone” they can not raise with out injuring themselves (Zech 12:2–3).
This ongoing conflict is just not merely political. It’s non secular at its core. The identical darkness that animated Antiochus nonetheless resists the needs of God as we speak. It resists covenant in favor of consolation. It resists particularism as if it nullifies universalism. It resists the concept that God has sure himself in faithfulness to a particular folks and a particular land for a particular objective—the final word and common restoration of all issues.
And in each technology, empire reappears underneath new names, typically in secular guise, typically clothed in non secular rhetoric, typically interesting to progress, typically to energy, typically even to peace. However beneath its assorted kinds lies the identical historical impulse: to redefine, take in, or eradicate the folks whose existence testifies that God is actual and that he’s not completed rescuing this world.
Because of this Hanukkah is just not an antiquated Jewish vacation or quaint cultural remembrance. It’s a prophetic reminder of what faithfulness prices in a world hostile to covenant mild. And it’s right here—exactly at this intersection of Israel, empire, and the dominion of God—that the church is summoned into its personal second of rededication.
The church & Hanukkah
For practically two millennia, giant parts of the church didn’t stand with Israel within the conflict; as an alternative, the church usually grew to become entangled with empire. After Constantine, Christian identification merged with political energy, and the church slowly inherited the empire’s suspicion, then rejection, of Jewish presence and Jewish continuity. The tragic end result was that the followers of the Jewish Messiah usually opposed the folks he got here from (and got here to), the Scriptures he affirmed, and the items and calling he declared irrevocable.
However in our technology, one thing exceptional is going on. The Holy Spirit is cleaning the bride of Messiah. He’s exposing the theological sediment that collected by means of centuries of anti-Jewish bias—supersessionism, contempt, blame, caricature, and historic amnesia. He’s reminding the worldwide church that the God of Abraham has not deserted his folks, and that the dominion Jesus proclaimed is just not an empire that replaces Israel, however the achievement of Israel’s calling prolonged to the nations.
That is the place Hanukkah speaks with renewed energy. Hanukkah invitations the church to acknowledge the sunshine that got here by means of Israel—the Messiah who’s the Gentle of the World—and to honor the folks by means of whom that mild first shone. It calls Christians to resign each impulse, express or delicate, that aligns with the “spirit of empire” moderately than the Spirit of God. It urges the bride to rededicate herself to the needs of the dominion: humility as an alternative of triumphalism; covenant loyalty as an alternative of theological erasure; solidarity as an alternative of suspicion.
And maybe most significantly, Hanukkah reminds the church that its calling is just not merely mental however embodied. The Menorah was not hidden in a again room. It was positioned within the Holy Place to shine. In the identical approach, the church known as to bear witness publicly, joyfully, and courageously to the God who retains his guarantees. In an age the place darkness grows extra emboldened, the folks of Jesus should shine with renewed and rededicated conviction. We should shine as a devoted remnant in a darkening world.
For simply because the temple was purified and rekindled within the days of the Maccabees, so the Spirit is purifying and rekindling the church as we speak. Hanukkah invitations us to take part in that work—to reject the patterns of empire, to embrace the methods of the dominion, and to let the Gentle of the World burn brightly by means of a individuals who have been cleansed, rededicated, and despatched into the darkness with holy fireplace.
Thomas L. Boehm’s really helpful sources for additional examine
God’s Appointed Occasions: A Sensible Information for Understanding and Celebrating the Biblical Holidays
Associated content material
