Q. What is Chanukah?

A. Chanukah is a remembrance of a historical event. Chanukah means "dedication" and it is a time to recall the vents that happened long ago in Israel. What will be given here will be a nutshell version, but it will give you an idea of what this is all about. Alexander the Great died, and his empire was divided among his 4 main generals. Seleucus ruled over Syria and Israel. As time went on, the Seleucid kings became worse and worse. In 163 BCE, a group of priests led a 3 year revolt against Antiochus Epiphanes IV. Antiochus set up false images in the Temple, commanded the people to turn to Hellenism, to depart from the Torah, basically turn from the Commandments on the penalty of death. He would force people to eat pork to show their contempt for G-d. Many complied to save their lives, but an old priest named Matthew refused, and along with his sons, led a revolt against Antiochus. They went into the wilderness and was considered outlaws rather than turn to paganism. Afetr 3 years of fighting, the Greeks gave up and the Temple was rededicated back to G-d. The people missed the 8 day festival of Sukkot a few months earlier, so they decided to have a "delayed Sukkot" and pray for rain. The 1st Temple of Solomon was dedicated at Sukkot, so much of the liturgy and prayers were similar. Chanukah is a minor festival and not found in the Tanach ("old" testament) but is predicted prophetically in Dan. 8. 9-14,11-21-25, Hag. 2.18-23. Yeshua celebrated it in Jn 10.22 and used the occasion to teach about the light of the world and the Good Shepherd. He was, by all accounts, conceived around Chanukah and born around Sukkot. One of the things attached to this festival is the story of the miracle of the oil. This is a myth and was developed in the 1st century to downplay the victory because they were afraid of the Romans. So, instead of celebrating a victory over their enemies as a delayed Sukkot, the Rabbis manufactured the "oil burning for eight days" story to account for the celebration. But, historical acccounts in 1st and 2nd Maccabess and Josehus do not mention this "miracle" and probably did not happen. How is this for us today? We have Hellenism all around us today. Christianity is a hellenistic religion that teaches the people the same things Antiochus forced people to do, turn from the Torah. The people are told that the Law has been "done away with" which is a lie, but the majority of the people believe it and are glad about it. But, there are some who decide not to go along with this. They have been given insight by G-d about this and would rather go into the wilderness and be outcasts than to get involved in the paganism around them. This is the choice we have today, illumination or elimination. Chanukah teaches that we must stand up against Hellenism all around us. One of the biggest lies of the year is Christmas, it is neither of G-d or even true, and yet pressure is put on those who don't want to participate to jion in. It is the greatest time of the year to tell people the truth, and like the Maccabees of old, stand up for the L-rd against tremendous pressure and overwelming odds. I close with the words of Matthew the priest to those who were of the same mind. "Those who are the L-rd's side come and follow me."

Q Is there a difference between the Kingdom of Heaven and the Kingdom of God?

A. The terms “Kingdom of God” and “Kingdom of Heaven” are not found in the Torah, Prophets or Writings (Tanak) but were developed by the Rabbi’s in the sect of the Pharisees. It can only be found in rabbinic writings and the New Testament. The terms are not found in the Dead Sea Scrolls, Apocrypha or Pseudopigrapha .During the Second Temple period there was an aversion to using the name of God in fear of taking it “in vain.” Certain synonyms were used in order to convey the same idea but without using God’s name. Terms like “makom” (place), “shalom” (peace) , “hashem” (the name) were used and many more. Yeshua followed the practice in order not to shock His listeners. The term “malkut shamayim” or Kingdom of Heaven and “heaven” is just a synonym for “God” just as we use it today when we say “thank heaven” or “heaven knows” and so on. The two terms Kingdom of Heaven and Kingdom of God are interchangeable. Yeshua used these terms the same way the Rabbis did in the first century. It was a spiritual term that meant God’s rule over anyone who keeps or begins to keep the written commandments, or the Torah as found in the Scriptures. When a person confessed the God of Israel as his God he came under His rule and authority, thus coming into the Kingdom of God. Once you have accepted His authority you were to began to keep the commandments. People who say they have accepted the Lord must also keep the commandments or the Kingdom of God has not come to you. Yeshua spoke with this understanding in Matt. 7.21 where He said not everyone who says “Lord, Lord” will come into the Kingdom. Now this term is not understood as a place but a movement. God’s kingdom is rooted and grounded in two things, the confession of His authority and the doing of His will. So, the Kingdom is limited to only those who follow Him. The Kingdom is not God’s providential rule or the furthering of the Kingdom by sword or the placing of Christian leaders over the unconverted. The Kingdom of God appears whenever a person takes on the rule of God in their life. You can’t have God’s rule without His commandments. Being “free from the Law” is the antithesis of being in the Kingdom of God and that is why those that did not keep the commandments were considered “lawless.” That is how the terms “kingdom of God” and the “Kingdom of Heaven” were understood by Yeshua and all the writers of the New Testament. Matt 6.10 makes the same point when it says “your will be done on earth as it is in heaven.” The Kingdom of God therefore is the movement led by Yeshua. Other verses that illustrate this point can be found in Luke 11.14-26, Matthew 19, Mark 10 and Luke 18 with the story of the rich man who was told to give his money to the poor and follow Yeshua, and he didn’t. Matt 21.31-32 Yeshua is talking about individuals who become part of a group called the Kingdom of God. Matt 11.12 talks about the Kingdom of God “breaking forth” and is an allusion to Micah 2.13 where the sheep (believers) pass through the gate of the sheepfold and are being led by the King into the pasture, or the Kingdom of God. Now, whenever there is a miracle of healing or a demon is cast out God’s rule is demonstrated or in other words the Kingdom of God is present. God takes charge wherever the Kingdom is. There are some false teachers who are trying to further their agenda void of the commandments of God and calling it furthering the Kingdom of God, but it is not His Kingdom they are presenting. In the last days the gospel of the Kingdom (God’s rule=Torah) will be preached and then the end will come. The deluded ones of today think that these media ministries are furthering the Kingdom of God but they aren’t because they don’t know what the Kingdom of God is. If you are not following the Torah, the Lord is not in charge (ruling) so therefore the kingdom of God is not present. I hope this answers your question.

Q. I opened the Bible to read and it was Jeremiah 44.19. It spoke about pouring out drink offerings to the Queen of Heaven. I backed up to v 15 which

A. Let’s look at this portion from v 15-19 in context. Jeremiah was sent to give prophecies about the destruction of Jerusalem because the people had turned to idolatry instead of worshipping the one true God. This chapter contains a message to the Jews who fled to Egypt to escape the Babylonians. He tells them that the land of Judah was destroyed because of the idolatrous practices of their fathers and gives a prophecy in verse 24-30 about what was going to happen to those who thought they escaped to Egypt. The Lord was going to seek them out for evil, not good, and the sign that this was going to come to pass was that the King of Egypt was going to be given over into the hands of the King of Babylon. So, they were not going to escape punishment. Now, going back to your verses it seems that the wives of the Jewish refugees were continuing to give various offerings to a pagan deity called the “Queen of Heaven” and they said they were not going to listen to Jeremiah’s message. The “Queen of Heaven” is a term given to a moon goddess in its simplest meaning, the sun being the “king of heaven”. This “goddess” went by many names, depending on the culture. She was known as Asherah, Ashtaroth, Astarte, Ishtar, Venus, Diana, Artemis, Europa and was the consort of the sun deity. This title is even given Mary, Yeshua’s mother in some Christian denominations and the name Easter comes from “Ishtar” and carries some of the same themes today because some of the practices in apostate Christianity is based more in Mithraism (sun-god worship) than the Bible. The great benefactor of Christianity was the emperor Constantine and he was the “pontifus maximus” (yes that’s where the term “pontiff” comes from for the pope) of Mithraism and a sun-god worshipper to the day he died. He said that one of the reasons for calling the Council of Nicea was to “root out the last vestiges of Judaism”, in other words stop people from keeping the commandments found in the Torah. That’s why it is important to follow the commandments of God found in the Torah and to stay away from the practices of the nations (Jer. 10.1-5) because their holy days and practices or just “made up” as they go along or are grounded in paganism. Well, these women were not going to listen to Jeremiah and gave the following reasoning. They said that while they offered sacrifices to the Queen of Heaven they had material prosperity and when they stopped they had nothing but lack and persecution (v 17-18). So, they went back to these practices and fared better and did it with the consent of their husbands. This is a very important concept. People today follow the same thing and use similar logic when they justify their pagan practices and false doctrine. Many times it’s the wives who go to congregations with the children with the consent of the husband who won’t or can’t stand up to their wives. He knows it’s not of God but gives in. When someone sent by God comes to give them the truth they will not listen either. They will say that they are” set free from the Law”. They keep Christmas and Easter, eat pork and that Sunday is the Sabbath and they will say that God has “blessed” them financially and they have a peace in their hearts about it. The children are trotted off to Sunday school where they learn to perpetuate the deception to their children and “the beat goes on.” They have legitimized idolatry even though they are committing the same sins these people did. Replacement Theology is the doctrine of Apostate Christianity and you can see it all around you. Idols, images, statues are everywhere. They offer you material prosperity and testimonies about how God has supposedly prospered them when they started following these practices when He did no such thing. That is exactly the “proof” they are giving Jeremiah in rejecting his message. God is not prospering any ministry that teaches rebellion against the Lord and His Torah no more than he prospered the people who were doing the same things in Jeremiah’s day and he told them so by saying that the Lord was going to punish them in Egypt so that they would know He was against them. You see, when you participate in practices that are not found in the Torah you offering strange fire to the Lord. Prayers are like incense and when you are offering them in relation to things God didn’t sanction it is like offering incense to another god. What passes as worship to the Lord today is nothing but a waste of time because it is not the Lord they are honoring but another god they have fashioned after their own image and likeness. They don’t have a God who has good commandments that are holy, righteous and good but they have their own ideas. They don’t want to change so they develop a god and a worship system made after their owns designs. When their desires change, they go find another group who has a god that fits their image and likeness and begin attending there. And as long as the god of that particular denomination doesn’t get too “pushy and demanding” they will stay there. But if there are too many rules, commandments or demands, they leave and either find one that fits what they want, or they will design one themselves. But the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, the God of the Bible says we are to conform to Him and isn’t really concerned how we feel about it. This can only be done through the Spirit of God who changes our desires to fit the Lord’s heart. That’s what a changed heart means. Well, the people in Jeremiah’s day rejected Jeremiah and his message and the people today do the same thing and that is the message of Jeremiah 44.1-30. I hope this answers your question.

Q. I heard a TV preacher say that David danced “stark naked” before the Ark. Is that true?

A. Of course not. The story is found in 2 Sam 6.1-23 so let’s look at that chapter. King David wanted to bring the Ark of the Covenant from Baal- Judah (Kiriat Jearim-Josh 15.9) to Jerusalem. They prepared a new cart for it which symbolizes the way man tries to improve on things God has already said (Replacement Theology for instance). They were singing and dancing thinking they were really offering God true worship when the road got rough and the Ark began to topple. A man named Uzzah reaches out to keep it from falling when he is struck dead. His name means “man’s strength” and it symbolizes the way we want to do things contrary to what the Lord has said. You see, God never said to transport the Ark on a new cart, or any cart. It was to be carried on the shoulders of the Levites and only with poles (1 Chr 15.2). What the Lord was saying in this is that the work of the Messiah (Ark) doesn’t need “man’s strength” or help and God was protecting the validity of what the Ark teaches. Many today have done the same thing with other Torah instructions by changing things like the Sabbath, Festivals, biblical diet restrictions by saying that has been “done away with.” Well, God never changed that and it was done away with by spiritual Uzzah’s and it doesn’t matter if you sing and dance your way to what you think God wants, the end result is death. In our passage they disregarded several commandments and people died, how much more when false teachers do away with whole chapters of the Torah ( Heb 10.28-29). David was very afraid to move it after this and the Ark was placed in the house and care of a man named Obed-Edom the Gittite. He was a Levite from one of the Levitical cities called Gath-Rimmon (Josh 21-20-25). God blessed the house of Obed-edom for three months when David went back to the Torah and moved the Ark according to the Scriptures. In v 13 it says that when the bearers of the Ark went six paces he offered sacrifices. Six is the number of man and sin but it also symbolizes that after six thousand years Yeshua will return to Jerusalem. In v 14 it says that David was dancing before the Ark wearing a linen ephod. This made it easier to move, having laid aside his kingly garments. Well his wife Michal, Saul’s daughter ,saw this and was very angry with him and says in v 20 “ How the king of Israel distinguished himself today! He uncovered himself (laid aside his kingly garments) in the eyes of his servants’ maids as one of the foolish ones shamelessly uncovering himself!” She was like her father in many ways and David says in v 20 that if you think this is bad I plan to be more so. As a result, David left her childless teaching that the seed of David did not “mix” with the seed of Saul (see Lev 19.19).A similar case can be seen in Jn. 21.7 where Peter is stripped for work, wearing what amounted to “swimming trunks” but he was not naked. He just laid aside his outer garment because it gave him free movement to work. So, as you can see, David was not “stark naked” but had laid aside his kingly outer garments so he could be free to move.