Dec 12, 2020 The History and Mystery of Hanukkah (PT1)

there's been a few prophetic signs already i don't know if you've noticed from the singing of the liturgy there was something prophetic going on there to the two ladies bringing the flag around there's something going on there did you notice how many dances there were [Applause] nine with a leader in the middle a hanukiah there's a lot of things going on here right now i just want to say to we've we've heard from a lot of home groups and home fellowships um i'm going to create somebody that you can talk to a liaison or coordinator that you guys can talk to i also have a coordinator that's going to help with the directory so we'll have two people in place already but there's two um a webmaster a beautiful woman out of our congregation in australia she just um put a couple of series on getzell.org one is called discipleship and it's six hours six hours and the other one is heaven-bound more of an evangelistic series and it's three hours you have nine hours so if you're looking for a resource i don't use a lot of resources i don't read books and i don't use them i use a bible in a concordance so i can't recommend resources but i can recommend those things so if you're looking to start a little discipleship in your group this will help you vastly so you can find that on getzel.org just look at the most viewed if for whatever reason you can't find it it's it's pretty explicit you know call the office and we'll help you um find it um as i said today i just wanted to go over the history um you know hanukkah is not something a lot of you grew up with obviously and it's you're very very new to it i'm sure um i wouldn't get too caught up though i see a lot of people coming into the messianic movement and they get very overwhelmed and that's the enemy they think oh my god i have so much to learn i have so much like you don't have that much to learn nobody's asking you to learn traditional judaism you're not a traditional jew you know there's just some basic things you got to grab onto and it's not that much so i don't want you to feel like oh there's so much it's not that much and i just want to tell you up front you know do gentiles have to celebrate hanukkah no why why does it say that in the bible you know the lord's feasts yes hanukkah not necessarily however every single solitary christian that is alive today should know what hanukkah is and should embrace it from a spiritual perspective that is irrefutable as far as i'm concerned so we're going to go over the history next week we're going to do something a little bit more spiritual in a sense go over the mystery of hanukkah because there's a lot of mysteries to hanukkah and it's just has nothing to do with the lighting of the menorah the hanukki not at all i'm not gonna go there i'm not gonna deal with legends um but i'm gonna go a little chronological if you will so the first place we see hanukkah mention is in the book of um no no let's take that off thank you it's in first and second maccabees okay you familiar with the book of maccabees now a lot of people a lot of evangelical folks and a lot of traditional christians you know they get really worried about the apocrypha you know they get light they get you gotta understand something the apocrypha is not legendary apocrypha means hidden away now why was it hidden away because the jewish people regarded the books of the apocrypha hidden because they weren't included in the old testament canon it was a decision that was made okay i don't know if god made the decision i can't tell you but the decision was made to exclude all works post the age of ezra now what do we know about ezra what what time period was ezra what are we talking fifth century bc fifth century bc okay so if they decided to not include anything in the canon after the fifth century bc then anything that happened after the fifth century bc would not be in our bible but it doesn't mean that it didn't happen the jerusalem bible includes it okay the apocrypha just so you know i've read it very very many times the apocrypha does not contradict hear me it does not contradict any teaching in our bible in fact it's the very opposite it sanctions the afterlife it teaches about the spiritual fruits of martyrdom and it teaches about the doctrine of the resurrection of the dead so there's no fear in reading the apocrypha and reading the story of hanukkah also have you heard of the septuagint okay who commissioned the septuagint ptolemy ii and he commissioned it because he spoke greek and the old testament was written in hebrew so he wanted a translation for himself and for his people it's the oldest translation the oldest greek translation of the old testament it started in 283 bc and they finished their translation in 132. so why was the story of hanukkah included in the septuagint because hanukkah happened in 165 and as i said this was completed in 132. so we have it in the apocrypha we have it in the septuagint which is highly regarded um we also have josephus are you familiar with josephus he's his real name was joseph ben mariah he's probably considered one of the greatest historians ever and he's also a hagiographer do you know what integriographer is a high geographer is somebody who studies the lives of saints in the first century he wrote something in 75 a.d actually called the jewish war or the war of the jews famous famous famous work that is highly acclaimed for its authenticity and truth guess what story is in there yep miguel antiochus these are aramaic scrolls from the second century they include hanukkah you familiar with the gamora portion of the talmud 500 a.d it's the rabbinic analysis it's included there you can look it up tractate shabbat 21 this isn't some old wives tale of the story okay it's also in the encyclopedia britannica it's in webster's dictionary from the 18th century and it's also in the encyclopedia judeo from the 1900s and there's many historical books thousands of books it's tell i can i'll name you three that i would recommend the first one is called rome in the mediterranean to 133 bc it's written by ae austin f.w wolbank and m w fredrickson you can read about hanukkah in that book the history of the ancient world from earliest accounts to the fall of rome susan louise bower you can read about hanukkah in that book and last but not least the oxford history of greece and the hellenistic world john boardman just to name a few it's it's it's corroborated in greek history it's again it's not an old wives tale okay just because you were raised without knowing about it doesn't mean it didn't happen and doesn't mean you should know about it not just if you're messianic this is a very very important story in our history okay this is part of your history the book of genesis is part of your history it's the creation story the the pentateuch is part of your history it's the laws given to the children of israel now that you've grafted in there for you as well the book of psalms the book of proverbs this is all part of your history you you serve and worship the god of who abraham isaac and jacob this is part of your history don't let anybody take it away from you um and and last but not least now we'll look at the new testament and i'm sure you've read this section john 10 22-23 can we have it now so you guys will raise with this right now john 10 is a quintessential section it starts off by talking about yeshua claiming to be the the good shepherd and he said my sheep listen to me they hear me and then he goes on to authenticate the fact that he's the messiah and he uses this portion as he's authenticating it so when you've read this i mean john 10 right i and the father are one nobody can snatch from my hands this is like john is the universal gospel matthew's written to the jews mark has written to the romans luke has written to the greeks this is the universal gospel this is the gospel that everybody reads this is the one we hand out to people in prison right gotta read john gotta read john and this is a massive section in john john 10. and you've read it hundreds of times if not thousands of times and every time you read the feast of dedication you didn't know it was hanukkah did you nope and i don't blame you because i don't know if king james wanted you to he's a massive anti-semite so was the whole church of england sorry it might hurt i'm sorry and then the nasv which is has wonderful wonderful scholarship it's great to look up to do word studies great etymology in the nasd but it says at the time the feast of dedication so when you read this you just thought oh it's some wacky jewish feast right i mean why would they mention this in john 10 why are they mentioning this why are they saying that that yeshua was there in solomon you know solomon's portico that's the east section of the temple and it's got these beautiful columns and that's where people kind of hung out it's kind of like all for you and why did they mention that he was there during hanukkah you won't read it in the niv but now let's let's take a look at the nlt they got it right it says in the new living translation which i don't want you said this is not the living bible the nlt has wonderful exceptional hebrew scholarship it says it was now winter and jesus was in jerusalem at the time of hanukkah you see they know how important this festival is so they translated it and of course the bible that i read and the bible that a lot of you read then came hanukkah they don't even say the feast of dedication hanukkah because hanukkah is hebrew for dedication if you want to translate dedication into hebrew it's hanukkah if you want to translate hanukkah into english it's dedication so as you can plainly see and i'm not giving you this there's a lot more to give and it's not important but as you can plainly see there are so many writings that corroborate the hanukkah story but what i want to delve into which i find just man i don't even know it's amazing to me it's amazing i want to delve into the prophetic evidence in the bible was all we see because it there's no canon after ezra we only see it in the new testament now if you ask the average christian in the universe where is hanukkah mention the bible they're going to tell you old testament they just go old testament without even realizing or they go i don't think it's there but nobody would tell you the gospel of john right except for that kid yeah and you guys because now you know and look i don't want to i don't want to be accusatory but some of you forget where you came from and you act like these people people in your family your friends your brother christian brothers sisters are idiots well then you were that idiot once right that's that's dirty pool in my book that's not right okay you only got it because you've been coming here or you studied so be patient you know just try to be patient and loving obviously loving um to see the prophetic aspect of of hanukkah we have to go into the book of daniel now let me say this there is no book in the bible like the book of daniel if if you want to look into the end times then if you go to matthew 24 25 you'll get an overall picture 97 verses of an overall picture just very very summarized if you want to go into details you've got to go into the book of revelation and a lot of those details aren't explained i'm just letting you know they haven't really been explained to us yet but if you want to get into timing there's no other book you can go into except for the book of daniel daniel is so impeccable as far as its predictions and its prognosticating that this book is not believed to be written prior to the events by scholars you remember daniel on the lines then i call the book of daniel in the critics then no it's so accurate that nobody people like nobody can do this not not nostradamus nobody was that good well nostradamus isn't god okay god is that good because there's no history to god there's no future events to god it's all done there's no time with god it's all done so of course he knows what's going to happen so i just want to go over a little bit of this and it's astounding just astounding the first chapter we're going to go into is daniel 8 and this is daniel has this vision of rams and goat nations that's his big vision okay it says after that first vision which was what daniel 7 and what happens in daniel 7 i mean everybody likes the the the guys in the fiery furnace and like daniel in the lion's den with king darius of but this is the meat daniel 7 he sees the four beasts and these are the four kingdoms right what kingdoms are they babylon was the first persia was the second greece and and of course this is very prophetic about when you get into daniel 11 and 12 it talks about this revised roman empire and not an antichrist like antiochus but it will be the antichrist not an abomination but the you follow if this book is priceless guys priceless to just look at it because you know the lion's mouth was shut i mean that's exactly what satan wants you to know about this book this book is amazing so he says after that first vision of the four kingdoms it was in the third year of the king belshitsar now the reason the timing is incredible because when you go to history books you can compare we can we know just like we know when yeshua was born we know in the book of luke it tells us based on the tours of the priests we know everyone i mean billy you know a.t robinson this is like the guy in the baptist world he wrote many books but one of the books he wrote was called harmony of the gospels and on page 167 he states like we all know that he was born in the fall cat's out of the bag there is no reason to celebrate his birth in the first place because it would have been celebrated it would we would have been instructed but nevertheless if you want to at least i mean celebrated at the right time i did a study on it i'm not going to get into it this week or next week i'm not interested it's a waste of my time it's a waste of god's time okay i don't care if you want though i've i've talked about it i can i can show you within 10 minutes when he's born i can't give you the day i can't give you the day but i can absolutely tell you it was fall and since everything that god has done with the messiah has been on his feast days right he dies on passover he's buried on unleavened bread he rises on first fruits he sends the holy spirit on shavuot what do you think the shot is that he's not going to pick up feast dayton to be born why do you think it says in john 1 14 and he tabbed our knackled among us i'm i'm i'm not being facetious here it's like come on and i've also told you don't don't be mean around this season you know grandma loves this time right she loves the tree she loves the whole thing she loves the coco she loves the mistletoe she has no clue what it's about but this is what i would tell you grandma no grandma if i go to grandma's house and i say grandma i love you that's why i'm here but you've asked me 150 times why i don't celebrate and i've told you 150 times and the truth isn't good enough for you so let's just have a nice time i'm here you follow i don't care if it's grandma i don't care if it's my wife i don't care if it's my kid who is my mother and who is my brother but those that do the will of my father god first last and in between [Applause] after that first vision it was in the third year of the reign of king belchadzar that another vision appeared to me daniel i looked up and as i watched there in front of the stream stood a ram with two horns the horns were long but one was longer than the other and the longer one came up later than the other now i'm gonna i'm gonna interpret these things for you but i just want you know this is interpretation that all decent theological scholars have signed on to okay it's not greg hershberg's revelation okay so he has this vision of this ram and goat nations the 30th king belches are it's 550. whose belches are the grandson of nebuchadnezzar the babylonian kingdom we we have so much corroboration for the bible it's no more you can't listen forgive me but an absolute imbecile would say it's written by men i just believe it there is more internal evidence i know you're not going to do this but i'm telling you there's more internal evidence external evidence and bibliography for you it's like well i don't care i just know it's true and i have faith that's great but it says to study to show yourself approved and always be prepared to give a defense for the hope that's in you so you're defenseless when you're up against an atheist you're defenseless when you're up against an antagonist of the faith god has given us too much proof there is more proof for this literary document called the bible than all the books were ever written amen do you think god's just going to keep you in the dark no no shot so we have here belshazzar 550 bc daniel is in babylon and the ram has these horns now horns is always in the bible speaks of strength because horns on a ram what do they do they guard they block and they attack that's what you do with ones you guard you block you defend and you attack so it speaks to strength the ram is clearly the medio persian empire that's why you have two horns the longhorn is the king of persia and the short horn is the king of media now moving on to daniel 8 5 through 7 it says i was beginning to understand i was beginning to understand okay that the the persian empire is coming in to destroy babylon they're coming in to take over babylon so he's understanding it but then he says all of a sudden in my understanding a male goat shows up from the west now what is west of of of the middle east is greece so it's got to be somebody from greece and it was passing over the whole earth without touching the ground meaning it was swift it was moving so swift it was taking over the goat had a prominent horn between its eyes it approached the ram with the two horns meteo persia which i'd seen sitting in front of the river lollygagging it got comfortable and charged it with savage force didn't even see it coming came out of nowhere i watched as it advanced on the ram it was filled with rage against it and it struck the ram breaking its two horns destroying its kingdom taking away its power the ram was powerless to stand against it it threw the ram to the ground and trampled it down and there was no one that could rescue it from the goat's power the male goat is greece as i said the prominent horn is alexander the great he conquered the mighty persian empire we know this from history with amazing speed he did it from 334 bc to 331. now moving on to daniel 8 8 the male goat then became extremely strong but when it was strong the big horn was broken greece the big horn being alexander the great and in its place a rose would appear to be four horns in the direction the four wins easy easy the male goat is alexander's kingdom extended all the way to india it exceeded any kingdom of its size over 1.5 million square miles the four horns he has this untimely death in 323 and four of his generals divide the kingdom over four regions one egypt syria syria babylon asia mine and greece north south east and west simple but scholars can't deal with this this can't be accurate they say this has to be written after the fact no no it was prophetic daniel 8 9-10 out of one of them out of one of them came a little horn which grew extremely big in the directions of the south and the east and the direction of the glory it grew so great that it reached the army of heaven it hurled from the army and the stars to the ground and trampled on them so you have this little horn and everybody agrees that it's antiochus the fourth epiphanies he rules from 175 bc to 164. the direction of the glory what's the glorious land israel israel the army of heaven this is god's people god's people and what did he do he persecutes and starts murdering jews left and right verse 8 uh verse 11 in daniel 8 yes it even considered itself the little horn antiochus as great as the prince of the army the regular burnt offering was taken away from him and the place of his sanctuary was thrown down antiochus kills the high priest he goes after the high priest first his name was anais iii and 170. then he negated worship on the sabbath he caused all the sacrifices to cease all festival celebrations circumcision reading of torah and kashut were absolutely forbidden the temple was desecrated and he ordered the worship of zeus as the supreme god listen the bible speaks of the abomination that causes desolation twice it's a near and far prophecy this was the abomination to put up a statue of zeus and sacrifice pigs on the altar in the holy of holies that is an abomination of desolation but we know what the abomination i don't know what the big guys i don't know what you're so confused about when the antichrist comes and goes into the holy of holies and declares to be the christ that is the abomination there is nothing more abominable to god stop looking for some code and as far as you guys thinking the mark of the beast you've taken it or it's in a it's in a vaccine you've lost your mind read revelation 13. the mark is only spoken about three times there's 31 102 verses it's spoken three times and it clearly says that the antichrist has to be revealed and his image has to be revealed and you have to bow down you'll die and if you do bow down and wash him then you get the mocks you can buy and sell it's not out yet crazy look i don't know god maybe as well as some of you but i know i'm pretty good i've spent every day of my life with him the past 31 years okay every single day and the god i know doesn't speak in riddles he speaks very clearly satan speaks in riddles now let's go to 8 14. now that i got that off my chest the first said to me 2 300 evenings and mornings after which the sanctuary would be restored guys i know a lot of people think that like the story of hanukkah went like this like antiochus was mad he slapped a few women around judas came out knocked them out and then they restored the temple this went on for a long time two thousand three hundred nights can we corroborate that yes yes all jewish rights and traditions were outlawed for 2 300 days that was from 170 to december 14th 164 bc when judah the maccabee cleansed the temple imagine that god got it right again exactly 2 300 days now we move into daniel 11 chapter 11 speaks about specifically the wicked reign of antiochus epiphanes okay i'm just going to give you a couple of verses the i just want you to see i'm trying to help you see that this hanukkah story is legit okay that's all i'm trying to do i'm not trying to be a know-it-all i'm not trying to attack i'm not telling you have to celebrate hanukkah i'm tell i'm trying to explain to you and the mystery part of it you're gonna see how why every hanukkah i cry every day of hanukkah now you might say wow rabbi i thought it's supposed to be festive it is festive it is festive we play dreidel last night we lived a hanukkah but to me guys this is my heart this is my people man and they get a bad rap constantly it says in in the in the book of romans romans the book written to gentile believers right romans 3 what's the big deal about being a jew what's the advantage and he says oh everything because they guarded the bible do you understand this every time you open up your bible you should say thank a jew now if you think i have an agenda you're right if you think my agenda is get you to be jewish you're nuts my agenda is to get you to be godish and understand that it's judeo christianity not just christianity you can have traditional judaism without christianity there's tons of traditional jews but you cannot have traditional christianity without judaism [Applause] daniel 11 21 22 it says they will arise in this place a despicable man how often do you use that word i mean that's reserved for somebody very evil despicable there will arise in this place a despicable man not entitled to inherit the majesty of the kingdom but he will come without warning and gain the kingdom by intrigue large armies were broken and swept away before him as well as the prince of the covenant okay so seleucist iv was the rightful heir to the throne not antiochus if you read greek history celestis iv but he was imprisoned in rome so antiochus said i'm gonna take over i'm gonna take over and he took the throne even though royal majesty had not been given to him but the kingdoms were inundated he was a rebel and they were inundated by his military might and of course who do you go after first go after the kingpin kill the high priest strike the shepherd the sheep scatter go after the kingpin daniel 11 25 he will summon his power antiochus and courage against the king of the south south obviously is egypt with a great army and the king of the south will fight back the ptolemaic kingdom with a very large and powerful army but he will not succeed because of plots devised against him also history his campaign against egypt he's trying to take over egypt receives special attention here the king of the south is ptolemy vi but he was not able to withstand him because treachery was found in his own camp and his own kingdom 1127 these two kings these two kings the king of syria antiochus and the king of egypt bent on mischief i mean are you at least i know this is overwhelming and you can listen to this uh during the week what are you getting how prophetically accurate and perfect this is that's the point of nothing else if nothing else you know what i'd like you to do just worship god a little bit better and and get a little bit more faith in these crazy times the fear is is overwhelming to me just overwhelming and uncalled for unprecedented these two kings bent on mischief will sit at the same table speaking lies to each other but none of this will succeed because the appointed end has not come yet so here you have both kings the king of syria and the king of egypt okay they're engaged in this deceitful conference all right that's king antiochus the fourth and ptolemy vi they conspire against ptolemy the seventh who's told me the sixth brother okay but neither them we're going to keep the covenant they're not going to keep their word and no intention to keep in the covenant so we get to 1128 and it says then the king of the north the king of the north that's antiochus will return to his own land so he's going up to syria with great wealth he plundered egypt and with this heart set against the holy covenant he will take action then return home so he's returning from egypt this is 169 bc he's returning from egypt and he stops off in israel you got to go through israel against syria and he sees an insurrection you know what he sees he sees people worshiping god not worshipping him he sees people monotheistic you realize the jews brought monotheism before the jews there was only polytheism people worshipped hundreds and hundreds of gods the jewish people brought to the world to the world there is only one god he sees this he he sees them married to one woman he sees them loving their children this is not the way it works in pagan society you know so he's he's you know what he is he's convicted like a lot of people are some people sometimes get angry at me maybe it's just the holy spirit convicting you lady like why don't you just go with that some why don't you at least ask you know i've had guys come here they want to like the first time they came for they wanted to fight me i'm like well that's christian i'm not i'm not listen guys i've told you a million times i'm not running a popularity contest it's not an issue to me okay the issue to me is that i bring the message that god wants me to bring that's my responsibility nothing more nothing less so he's returning after plundering egypt stops israel sees this indirect insurrection what do you what what does a dictator do what look he's he's demonic he's demonic if you don't worship him he's gonna kill you you know what i mean like a drug lord look what they do they cut people's heads off and they smile about it they're terrorists they're evil we say how could somebody do that you can't wrap your mind around it hopefully you never will it's demonic i just want you to tell you what happens when he turns his in the span of three days he kills 80 000 people do you have any idea how many people that is do the math he wasn't he wasn't going 24 7 but even if it was 12 hours a day it's unbelievable it's unbelievable that's like 25 000 people in a day in a 12-hour period that's 2 000 people an hour and most of them were women and children especially pregnant women virgins because that's a pagan sick demonic and infants little infants they were just graving them by their ankles and smashing their heads against the rock and and had no problem with it eighty thousand so when you're playing dreidel you're trying to remember these things okay it's very sad to me that children don't understand the story very sad to me two women were arrested for having their babies circumcised so they hung the babies from the woman's necks and breasts paraded them and then threw them down off the top of the city wall this is what you're talking about sick demonic people now we come to daniel 11 32 we almost don't know scriptures then i'll just we'll finish up a little bit says daniel 11 32 those who act wickedly against the covenant he will corrupt with his blandishments but the people who know their god will stand firm and prevail guys i can't stress to you enough the word remnant the numbers we have in christianity are not even remotely accurate not even a little accurate in noah's day how many people got on the boat 603 550 men left egypt how many got into the promised land two in the days of elijah how many people didn't bow down to ba o seven thousand the rest of them did if you think the numbers are accurate by you saying a little prayer then you've been deceived there was a remnant back then and there's a remnant today [Applause] hallelujah this is where it gets really neat to me the word corrupt if you look it up in the hebrew obviously it means to defile that's what satan does he wants us defiled okay listen to me you don't lose your virginity okay you don't lose it you don't wake up one morning go now where did i put that thing you give it away okay to defile to pollute to make godless and lawless what do we know and i'll get into this next week but what do we know about the days of noah yeshua said before he comes back it will be just like the days of noah what do we know what one word describes the days of noah lawlessness guys if you can't see that there is such lawlessness i don't care who you vote for there's dirt on all of them they're all dirty that might hurt you of political feelings i'm not a politician but i know dirt when i see it to defile to pollute to make lawless this is what the enemy wants to do lawless how dare anybody say he nailed the law that's what satan has done satan nailed the law yeshua got nailed for lawlessness and how does he corrupt with blandishments look smooth talk that's how he starts flattery manipulation sweet words it's okay everybody's doing it you're not even close to being that bad i mean who invent which demon invented the term white lie white is pure pure and lie is an oxymoron it's like large shrimp it doesn't work or i'll give you another one today customer service he's out to deceive man and you gotta you gotta you gotta be so close to god you gotta be so attuned to god you gotta be hearing his voice now better than you ever have forget about just reading the bible you better be hearing god's voice for these last days yes yes i told you at the end of 2019 hanukkah i specifically said and i quote 2020 is going to be a crazy year there was no coronavirus yet it was everything was grandiose and i said i pray that god gives us strength to get through listen to me 2021 you're going to be wishing for 2020. don't shake your head in fear my god come on we're coming around the clubhouse turn man [Applause] oh but my daughter was gonna get married you know what you know what marriage i want to go the wedding feast of the lamb if that's okay with you so at first now get this antiochus created a hellenized judaism what is hellenized judaism hellenized judaism was a combination of jewish traditions and elements of greek culture it's a defiled religion why do you think we celebrate christmas on december 25th it's the winter solstice it's it's the high holy day in saturnalia for the pagan world who who invented who who who decided to make it that day what was his name from her own constantine and constantine wasn't a believer my god you know what his testimony was uh i saw a cross in a star and you buy that is born again i was in rome there's statues that he erected anybody who's born again wouldn't erect a statue of themselves don't make a graven image he did that so why did he have the day he wanted all the money he wanted the power he didn't want an insurrection so you make people happy drug lords go into neighborhoods and give people sneakers to get them on their side it's the same thing and he wanted to make these pagans happy so he said you know what we'll make it their day so they still feel like they're celebrating on their holiday no no if it's not pure throw it out okay you can't be a little pregnant amen so he mixes it he gives the jews just stuff and he starts saying to them things like god you know are you enjoying this these feasts and these fast days and the pounding of your chest on the ninth of august and he builds what does he build a gymnasium a gymnasium next to what where did he put it next to the temple and he's basically saying look we still have most of your holidays lighten up aren't they saying that to you today you're so uptight lighten up we have whole denominations coming against the bible the word of god every single denomination yes including the southern baptist convention is now replacement theological they won't admit that because they don't even know what replacement the theological is but yes it's official every denomination in the world is replacement theological now yes yes your daddy's little baptist church yes sorry that's the way it is and i will predict that within the next 18 months there will be a massive split in the southern baptist convention you can't be part of a denomination you can't be part of beth yeshua you either are the remnant or you're not [Music] [Applause] so he mixes it you know he mixes the culture in there so it's no longer biblically pure it's no longer according to god's word that's what satan does he makes it plausible he doesn't come at you and go you're going to worship me he tricks you did god really say you can't touch it he didn't say nothing about touching it he messes with you man that's why you have to know so when he comes and knocking you can go get behind me satan but once smooth talk didn't work once flattery didn't work what happens you get angry satan gets angry right when you don't buy what he's selling then it's on right so this this little group of jews didn't buy what he was selling so then he resorts to terror tactics he commands he commands his subjects with their part of his kingdom to bow down to pagan gods to bow down to idols to eat swine you want to know why i don't eat swine man you say i can eat whatever i want you could eat whatever you want now i don't go near it because of all the people my people that were forced to eat it to protect their lives won't go near it man no way no how on the 15th day of kislev 167 he erects this statue to zeus the god of jupiter in the holy of holies he sank he sacrifices pigs on the altar because he knows if he can control the temple he gets seven judaism at its source that's the source so he goes after it satan smart in 167 a solution troop commanded by a palace you know the story goes to modine modin is just 17 miles northwest of jerusalem this is the first town and there's a high priest there the high priest didn't live in jerusalem they went to jerusalem on their tour of duty they lived outside and he was closest and he had a very very good reputation his name was mata yahoo he was the high priest not a levite the high priest one of them so the solution army consisted of a hundred thousand foot soldiers 20 000 cavalry all expertly trained and experienced in battle and warfare so now let's pick up the story we just have a few verses in maccabees and we're done let's pick up the story first maccabees 2 17 18. the kings commissioners then address so the king antiochus sends this troop commanded by a palace and they addressed matthias as follows quote you are a respected leader you gotta get to the leader you are a respected leader a great man in this town of modine you have sons and brothers who support you they all look up to you you're a man of integrity a man of great regard be the first to step forward and conform to the king's decree it's like being nice to them you know building them up right entry right blandishments as all the nations have done they've all done it outside of israel every single nation bowed down to antiochus not little old israel it it it just kills me how a christian is in love with the jewish people only satan could pull that off but don't blame satan blame yourself you have the same bible i have don't blame your pastor don't blame your grandmother read the bible be the first to step forward and conform to the king's decree as all nations have done and the leaders of judah and the survivors in jerusalem you and your sons shall be reckoned the jews were bowing down just like some christians are bowing down we got we got to lighten up we've got to be more relative stop for god's sake stop trying to be liked well it's my business if i say something i lose my business then your money is your god be rich in hell you and your son shall be reckoned among the friends of the king you and your sons will be honored see just bow down we're going to take care of you you're going to be rich you're going to have everything you'll be honored by the king many presents so they come to the hometown the family of the khan name and they want to manipulate the priest let's look at this incredible response raising his voice matthias retorted see they were whispering to him but he wanted everybody to hear because they were all there they all came out and he said even if every nation living in the king's dominions obeys him each forsaking its ancestral religion to conform to the king's decrees i my sons and my brothers will still follow the covenant of our ancestors may heaven preserve us from forsaking the law and its observances as for the king's orders we will not follow them we shall not swerve from our own religion either to the right or to the left you better get this because this is coming let's take a look at a couple more verses in the third chapter we're done but as soon as these saw the force advancing to meet them they said to judas like now the forces are coming he has a little detachment but now they're coming and they're like we're doomed we're not trained we don't have an army have you lost your mind so they say to judas his son how can we few as we are engage in such overwhelming numbers we're exhausted as it is we have no food they cut off their food supply we're starving it is easy judas answered it is easy it's easy for a great number to be defeated by a few indeed in the sight of heaven deliverance whether by many or by few is all one for victory and war does not depend on the size of the fighting force my brothers heaven accords the strength [Applause] last three verses 20-22 they come against us in great insolence and lawlessness to destroy us and our wives and our little babies and to spoil us but we fight for our lives and our laws he himself will crush them before us as for you do not be afraid of them don't you hear him saying this to you a hundred thousand soldiers gonna take out their kids and you're deathly afraid of a virus listen to me and listen to me good there are things in this life worth dying for things that are more meaningful than life itself jews jews are willing to give up their lives for judaism not because god needs people to die for him no god doesn't but because the ideology of torah is something without which humanity is doomed in other words these maccabees were thinking about their children and their grandchildren and future generations they were thinking about you and they were saying that a world without torah is doomed without the ten commandments we're doomed our society is doomed and they were willing to give up their life so you could sit comfortably in this place today with air conditioning hearing the word of god how can you not celebrate [Applause] maybe just maybe that's why yeshua was celebrating in solomon's colonnade maybe he was telling these people about the vessels maybe he was saying to himself wow hannah and her sons eliezer the priest judah the maccabee they died and they didn't even know me they died for a torah words on a page and in essence if they were dying for the word of god weren't they dying for him [Applause] overall hanukkah is a real david and goliath story and i love it once again the jewish people are against all odds they're outgunned and outmanned and they're called to assimilate into a pagan culture but a remnant decides to be dedicated and because of their dedication strength and resolve god responds miraculously from heaven and in turn they have victory listen to me people of beth yeshua stay steadfast stay resolved stay faithful and you too will see god's victory my name is greg hershberg and i approve this message let's stand together now may the lord bless you and keep you may the lord make his face to shine upon you be gracious unto you and may the lord lift up his confidence upon you and give you his peace in the name of the prince of all peace yeshua [Music] is shalom guys i love you

Channel: Getzel

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Id: 0xt7kSYPdCA

Length: 52min 38sec (3158 seconds)

Published: Mon Dec 14 2020