This Thanksgiving season of 2013 is a very unusual one. For the first time since 1888, Thanksgiving and Hanukkah will begin at the same time (Hanukkah beginning on the night before at sundown). It is calculated that this exact convergence will not happen again for over 70,000 years. So this special timing should capture our attention.
Hanukkah comes from the Hebrew word "to dedicate" and refers to a miraculous historical event that occurred in 165 BC. A generation before this date, Antiochus lll the Great, the Syrian King, was victorious in battle over the Egyptians and won the Judean territory from Egyptian control, and incorporated it into the Seleucid Empire. At the time, the king guaranteed the Jews the right to keep their ancestral customs, and practice their religion in the Temple in Jerusalem without interference.
However, when this king died, his son, Antiochus lV Epiphanes, did not keep that commitment. He outlawed Judaism, looted the Temple in Jerusalem, banned circumcision, erected an altar to Zeus in the Temple of God, and ordered the sacrifice of pigs on this pagan altar, which would have been a normal practice in that ancient Greek idolatry. These actions caused a rebellion among the Jews, led by a priest's family. The leader of the rebellion was Judah "the Hammer", or HaMakabi. From this we call the rebellion leaders "The Maccabees". The details of their victory over the Seleucid Empire is recorded in 1st and 2nd Maccabees in the Apocrypha, and by the historian, Flavius Josephus.
After their victory, as the Jews cleansed the profaned Temple, and rededicated it to the worship of God, they found only one sealed container of holy oil used to keep the Menorah, or Lamp, in the Temple lit. This amount of oil would only keep the Lamp lit for one day, and the Law of Moses said that the Lamp must stay lighted night and day, continually. A miracle occurred and the Lamp stayed lighted from this small amount of oil for eight days, until a new supply of special holy oil could be made. This miracle and rededication of the Temple of God is commemorated by Hanukkah.
Imagine the thanksgiving to God in Judea over this event. God had confirmed and blessed the victory, and His presence in the Temple among His people, by keeping that Lamp lighted miraculously.
Jesus also observed Hanukkah, as noted in John 10:22-23. It is called in scripture "the Feast of Dedication". At this time, Jesus was in the Temple and the Jews questioned Him again, and said to Him,"If You are the Christ, tell us plainly." Jesus answered them, "I told you, and you do not believe...My sheep hear My voice, and I know them, and they follow Me. And I give them eternal life, and they shall never perish; neither shall anyone snatch them out of My hand. My Father, who has given them to me, is greater than all; and no one is able to snatch them out of My Father's hand. I and My Father are one." Jn. 10:24-30
Jesus made a powerful declaration, and "dedication" that day at the Feast. He declared that His sheep will never perish, and can never be snatched from His and His Father's hands. Like that lighted Menorah in the Temple, the Light of Christ and in His sheep will never be extinguished! The Father will keep that light burning with all of His power, because He is "greater than all".
What a powerful thing to celebrate, and for which to give thanksgiving. It is perfect that Hanukkah and Thanksgiving coincide this year, and, in our hearts, every year.
Our nation is one of the few in earth that have instituted the concept of Thanksgiving to God as a law of this land. Though it may be to many just a day to eat and celebrate with family, to the people of God, it should continue to be a time of true thanksgiving to our Father, to our Creator, who supplies us with all things for our physical and spiritual lives, to the One who keeps our lamps lighted in everlasting life.
At least three of our Presidents have given specific commands to the nation to recognize and honor God with thanksgiving (you can read these proclamations below). It also happens that these proclamations came at turning points in the history of this country. Again, our nation seems to be at a turning point.
The first proclamation, under the presidency of George Washington, came at a time when this country was new and trying to unite and govern itself for the first time. How important it was for us to begin that journey in thanksgiving to God.
Another proclamation was given by Abraham Lincoln. It came as the nation was engaged in a terrible civil war that would effect our history for generations after the war would end. Rebuilding, and reunification would require the help of God. The President asked the nation to offer up a sacrifice of thanksgiving to Him.
The third proclamation was by Franklin Roosevelt. It came as WWll was ending. The history of the world would be changed by that war forever. Old empires crumbled, and the United States would become the premier world power. Europe was in a shambles, and would require rebuilding for years, and at great expense. It was obvious that even as that war ended, the world would have to now deal with the rise of aggressive communism, both in Europe, and in Asia also, with the coming end of the Japanese empire. The President of the United States again called the nation to prayer and thanksgiving.
Thanksgiving is an elemental principle in scripture. Sometimes thanksgiving to God comes with a great victory and with joy. Sometimes it comes as a sacrifice in times of trouble. It is a powerful spiritual weapon of warfare, and is a beacon for a mighty move of deliverance from God.
The prophet Jonah, in a powerful prayer, offered the sacrifice of thanksgiving to God as he was being enfolded in the dark terror and power of the waters of death. After that sacrifice of thanksgiving, God delivered Jonah miraculously from what seemed a hopeless situation
(Jonah 2).
Thanksgiving transforms our situation from darkness into light.
At this time of Hanukkah and Thanksgiving, and every day in our lives, let us lift up a declaration of thanksgiving to our Father, whether we are in joy, or in despair, whether we have plenty or lack. Let us "rededicate" ourselves as His temples, cleansed and purified from the profane of this world, set apart for His purpose, filled with the unending holy oil of the Spirit of God, as lamps lighted and standing in the Holy Place being the "light of the world", as Jesus is, and has commanded us to be.
"O give thanks unto the LORD, for He is good;
For His mercy endureth for ever."
Psalms 107:1; 118:1, 29; 136:1
Our Father is Thanksgiving.
"I Just Want to Thank You, LORD"
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sb1Op5Wo8k0
Three Presidents' Thanksgiving Proclamations:
| A. Lincoln proclaimed Thanksgiving a national holiday in 1863: |
In the midst of a civil war of unequaled magnitude and severity, which has sometimes seemed to foreign states to invite and to provoke their aggression, peace has been preserved with all nations, order has been maintained, the laws have been respected and obeyed, and harmony has prevailed everywhere, except in the theater of military conflict, while that theater has been greatly contracted by the advancing armies and navies of the Union.
Needful diversions of wealth and of strength from the fields of peaceful industry to the national defense have not arrested the plow, the shuttle, or the ship; the ax has enlarged the borders of our settlements, and the mines, as well as the iron and coal as of our precious metals, have yielded even more abundantly than heretofore. Population has steadily increased notwithstanding the waste that has been made in the camp, the siege, and the battlefield, and the country, rejoicing in the consciousness of augmented strength and vigor, is permitted to expect continuance of years with large increase of freedom.
No human counsel hath devised nor hath any mortal hand worked out these great things. They are the gracious gifts of the Most High God, who, while dealing with us in anger for our sins, hath nevertheless remembered mercy.
It has seemed to me fit and proper that they should be solemnly, reverently, and gratefully acknowledged, as with one heart and one voice, by the whole American people. I do therefore invite my fellow-citizens in every part of the United States, and also those who are in foreign lands, to set apart and observe the last Thursday of November next as a day of thanksgiving and praise to our beneficent Father who dwelleth in the heavens. And I recommend to them that while offering up the ascriptions justly due to Him for such singular deliverances and blessings they do also, with humble penitence for our national perverseness and disobedience, commend to His tender care all those who have become widows, orphans, mourners, or sufferers in the lamentable civil strife in which we are unavoidably engaged, and fervently implore the imposition of the Almighty hand to heal the wounds of the nation and to restore it, as soon as may be consistent with the divine purpose, to the full enjoyment of peace, harmony, tranquillity, and union.
In testimony whereof I have hereunto set my hand and caused the seal of the United States to be affixed.
Done at the city of Washington, this 3d day of October, A.D. 1863, and of the Independence of the United States the eighty-eighth.
Abraham Lincoln
By the President:
William H. Seward
Secretary of State.
By the President:
William H. Seward
Secretary of State.
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