We are taking a break for the next two weeks to talk about the celebration that made the birth of Jesus possible! That’s right—the Feast of Dedication aka Hannukah. This week we’ll talk about the importance of being loyal to God no matter what! Next week, I will explain why there is no Jesus without Hannukah!
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Hi! I’m Miss Tyler and welcome to another episode of Context for Kids where I teach you guys stuff most adults don’t even know. If this is your first time hearing or if you have missed anything, you can find all the episodes archived at contextforkids.podbean.com, which has them downloadable, or at contextforkids.com, where I have transcripts for readers or on my Context for Kids YouTube channel.
(Parents, all Scripture comes from the Miss Tyler Version (MTV) which is from the Christian Standard Bible or from the KJV Apocrypha rephrased so that it is easier for kids to understand).
Now, I did a video series about Hannukah years ago, so I am not going to do a lot of history on it. But I do want to talk about the lessons of Hannukah and the first lesson is loyalty. You see, the only reason Hannukah ever happened in the first place was because the Jewish people living in the Land of Israel were being told to change their loyalty from God to a wicked Emperor named Antiochus Epiphanes. But I do need to go back a bit to give you some context. In 586 BCE, the city of Jerusalem and the Temple that Solomon built were both finally destroyed, and all of the treasures of the city and Temple were taken away to a place called Babylon. Not only that, but all except the very poorest of the people were too—they were left behind to keep doing the farming. Lucky them, eh? They got to stay home while all the rich and educated people were forced to walk from Judah to Babylon. That probably took at least three months—can you even imagine? And it wasn’t like they got to take their stuff because they were exiles and refugees. They were people who no longer had a home.
About fifty years later, the king Cyrus the Great took over the Babylonian Empire, which became a part of the Medo-Persian Empire and Cyrus allowed whoever among the Jews who wanted to go back home, the opportunity to leave. Not many did though, which is very sad because it made it much harder for the ones who did go home to rebuild the walls and the city and the Temple and to grow enough food. The people who were living in the land since they left made it really hard for them to do those things. Then, about two hundred years later, Alexander the Great took over the Holy Land without even firing a shot. In fact, he was welcomed at the city gates of Jerusalem by the most prominent men among the Jews. They were tired of being ruled by the Persians and figured that they had nothing to lose—besides, if they tried to resist they would have mostly ended up dead. Because they surrendered and welcomed him, Alexander was very happy and treated them well and allowed them to just live as they wanted. But then something bad happened. Alexander died a short time later and his Kingdom was divided between his four generals who all set themselves up as kings. For a long time, two of those Kingdoms, the Seleucids and the Ptolemies, fought over who would have control over the Holy Land.
Of course, they didn’t want it because it was holy, they wanted it because no one could do business between Africa and Asia unless they went through the Holy Land and that meant there was a lot of money to be made. Whoever controlled what is now called “the sacred bridge” (aka the Land of Israel) controlled almost all trade in the world as they knew it. Trade is a word that means the business that countries do with one another. Remember that Egypt made papyrus and grew wheat, and everyone wanted it. Some countries mined gold, silver and jewels and others bred cows and sheep and goats. Others specialized in spices. But anyone who wanted to do business in Egypt, or if Egypt wanted to do business with Asia or Europe—they needed control of that land or they would be taxed like crazy (made to pay extra money to get their goods sold). Also, if someone wanted to go to war, they also had to pass through there. It was what we call hot property. Or as real estate agents say, “Location, Location, Location!” Israel was very small but also very important to everyone.
Before we talk about what happened, I want to explain what loyalty is because it will be important. If you are loyal to someone or something then you stick by them no matter what. Like maybe you have a friend and you would never do anything to hurt them—that’s loyalty. Through the Bible, God told His people not to worship other gods and if they did then they were not loyal. Saul tried over and over again to kill David because he was not loyal to him, even though David hadn’t ever done anything to hurt him. David was loyal to King Saul but King Saul tried everything he could think of to get rid of David. That’s just messed up. In a few weeks, in the story of Abraham, we will see that Abraham is loyal to Lot and will even take an army to save Lot when he gets himself into trouble. And that won’t be the last time that Abraham shows loyalty to Lot by saving his life. We show our loyalty to God by following Jesus and keeping the commandments. So just remember, loyalty is sticking with someone else no matter what happens.
And so, the Jews had a lot of troubles in those days when the Ptolemies and the Seleucids were fighting over who got their land—for about one hundred and fifty years actually, and then a dude named Antiochus Epiphanies became the Emperor over the Seleucid Empire. And he wasn’t as reasonable as Alexander the Great, not by a long shot. Not as smart either. And here’s where things got really complicated in a hurry because there were some Jews who decided that they weren’t really very keen on living lives faithful to God. Instead, they really loved Greek culture—which wasn’t all bad don’t get me wrong—and they wanted things like Gymnasiums where men exercised and wrestled with no clothes on. I would personally never wrestle with anyone who wasn’t wearing clothes—that’s just nasty as heck. And then there was another man named Jason who wanted to be the High Priest because he wasn’t loyal to the one they already had—who was actually his own brother. I know, super awkward, right? Jason decided to buy his brother’s job and so he gave this Antiochus guy a ton of money to have it and his brother had to leave the country. But then three years later, another dude paid even more money and then he got the job.
Well, one thing led to another and before you know it, because of some disastrous decisions and a terrible misunderstanding—caused by that disloyal brother Jason, AGAIN, the Emperor ended up going through Jerusalem and the Temple of God and stealing a ton of money and so many people were killed! And then, the Jews who wanted to be Greek didn’t want to have to follow the commandments anymore. People started doing messed up things in the Temple, like offering up pigs on God’s altar—which God said they must never do. All of a sudden, it became illegal to keep the commandments and they were forced to eat pork, which the Bible says is a big no-no. In fact, they began killing people who were keeping God’s rules. You see, there were a lot of people who were loyal to God even though they knew that it could get them killed but they didn’t think their lives were worth anything if they weren’t staying loyal to God. Do you agree with them? I sure do. We must always listen to what God says, no matter what. There are people in other countries who get hurt very badly because they are so loyal to Jesus. Following Jesus is against the law in many places and people who worship other gods will kill anyone who doesn’t. But this was only the second time in history that people were being killed for being Jews, and the first time they were being killed for keeping God’s commandments.
That’s really sad, isn’t it? But Jesus told His followers that, “If anyone wants to follow me (which means to obey Him and to do what He does), they need to stop living just for themselves, take up their cross (which means they have to be willing to give up everything else), and follow me. Whoever is just determined to live no matter what the cost, won’t really be living at all, but whoever gives up their life because of me will truly be alive (not just right now but for forever!). What good does it do anyone if they get everything that they want but aren’t really alive, now and forever? What could you ever really trade anyone for your life? The Son of Man (that’s Jesus) is going to come with his angels in the glory of his Father, and then he will reward every person for what and for how much they have done.” (Matt 16:24-27)
I know that might have sounded kind of scary but that’s what loyalty to God through His Son Jesus looks like. God wanted Israel to know how He felt about them, “I want you to be totally loyal and devoted to me! I want you to love me like I love you! I want you to look at everything in the world that people want, even their own lives, and see it as a poopy diaper compared to me.” Our life isn’t just what we have before we are dead, okay? Our life is also the way that we choose to live. You guys are kids right now and so you can’t just make any choice you want but as you get older, you are going to be making choices about what kind of human being you are going to become. God tells us, “I want you to be like me so that people can see how much I love them and care for them.” In a way, when we say yes to that and do that, we are giving up our rights to live however we want—when we become more like Him, we are becoming less like the bad parts of us. So, we end up giving up our lives or parts of our lives when they don’t look anything like how wonderful God is. I was twenty-nine years old when I started to live for God and believe me, if you wait that long there is going to be a lot to change. You guys are very lucky that you are getting to learn to live for Him right now. It means that you get to know what it is to really be alive right now, isn’t that amazing?
That’s what loyalty looks like. When we are loyal to God, we do everything we can to make Him happy by looking more and more like Him. We want Him to be loved, and not hated, because of the things we do to others. Looking like Him doesn’t mean that we turn invisible—it means that the things we do look like the things that God does. The good news is that we don’t have to just do it on our own or figure out how. As we follow Him, He whispers to us about what He wants to change and when we cooperate, He can do amazing things. Sometimes, I have gone to bed thinking one way and woke up thinking in an entirely different way. But every single change makes me love people more and not less, makes me kinder and gentler and less angry and mean, more able to forgive others and less likely to try to get back at the people who have hurt me.
You know, those Jews who were living when all that bad stuff was happening were a whole lot more like you than like me. They knew God from the time they were born and had been following His commandments since they were little. They grew up understanding that if they were serving God, they couldn’t always do things the way Antiochus Epiphanes or the rest of the world wanted them to. What if someone came around and told you that you can’t love Jesus anymore—that you had to say terrible things about him or burn down a church or a synagogue or stop celebrating His holy days or had to give up your Bible? That’s what happens to people right now in places like Iran, North Korea, Asia, and some parts of Africa. I am very lucky that I have never had to make that kind of choice but if I did, I hope I would choose the right thing. I want to be loyal to God, and He has been very kind to me always. Sometimes I know I disappoint Him but what I never want to do is to choose anything instead of Him. And that’s the choice that the Jews were forced to make. Like the good priest Mattathias, we should learn how important it is to do what’s right.
Almost 170 years before Jesus was born, in the town of Modein, lived a priest named Mattathias and his five sons: Judah, Jonathan. Eleazar, Simon, and John. They lived in that town with their families and at the three festivals and two other weeks of the year, they served God at the Temple in Jerusalem. Their family was called the Hasmoneans. I imagine they were very happy to be priests, serving God and helping the Jews. You see, not everyone could be a priest. To be a priest, you had to be a descendant of Aaron, the brother of Moses and Miriam. Aaron’s family was given the honor of being priests because Aaron served God faithfully and loyally by going with Moses to Pharaoh and speaking the words of God right in his face. And they were not happy words. And it was dangerous work, telling the Pharaoh what he didn’t want to hear. God wanted His people freed from slavery. God hates it when people oppress one another and no one should own anyone else. But because Aaron was so loyal to God, his family was set apart as holy for the priesthood and no one else could just decide to be a priest. It was their job to help the Israelites make their sacrifices at the Temple and to light the menorah and bake the shew bread. In fact, they did a lot of cooking because they had to eat some of every sacrifice so that God would accept it. Not much though, it would have made them super sick.
And so, Mattathias and his sons, if you looked at the family tree of all the priests, it would start with Aaron at the top. This was a very big tree by this point. But when things got messed up in Jerusalem and the Temple, Mattathias and his sons left and went home and didn’t want to go back. They weren’t going to sacrifice pigs on the altar because God said He didn’t want them there and to put them there would make the altar defiled. Defiled means that something isn’t pure anymore—it’s contaminated, messed up, ruined, or whatever. Things that are defiled can’t just be given a bath and made okay again. Like, if someone put poison in your soup, there is no way to remove the poison so that you can eat the soup again. You need to get something else to eat, right? Well, an altar is the same way, because once it is ruined, they couldn’t make offerings to God on it anymore. Altars and soup aren’t anything like people. When we sin, we can defile ourselves—we can wreck our lives big time. But when we ask God for forgiveness and change our lives so that we are not doing those things anymore, the blood of Jesus cleans us inside and out.
So, the altar was defiled—which means that the priests had nothing they could do at the Temple anymore and so they went home to the country. But, you know, just because we leave a bad place doesn’t mean it won’t follow us all the way home and that’s exactly what happened to Mattathias and his sons. The evil king Antiochus Epiphanes had made all of these laws that told the Jews that they couldn’t be loyal to God anymore—they could only be loyal to Antiochus! They had to prove it by doing things his way and not God’s way. Of course, the king didn’t come himself, but he sent some of his important men, his officers, and they went to Modein to meet with Mattathias because the old priest was very respected by the Jews. They made him an offer that they didn’t think he could refuse. They said something like this, “Hey, Mattathias, we know that you are a really great guy and everyone around here really trusts and respects you and we know that whatever you do and whatever you are okay with, everyone else will be too. And the king, if you do the right thing and just offer this pig on the altar to our gods, he is going to make you and your family very important people, and he will give you money and power and stuff and all that. How about it? Do you want to be called the king’s friend?”
Mattathias knew that, according to the laws of the Greeks, to say no would be to die but he was a good and faithful servant to God and so he told them, “No way!” The Greeks were killing moms and babies and burning Bibles, so it isn’t like killing an old priest was going to really upset them. Mattathias was very brave, and He trusted God. He knew that when he died, he would be resurrected again in the world to come and that he would be with God forever in paradise because God is loyal to the people who are loyal to him. There was nothing that the Greeks could give him that was as good as that. It would have been ridiculous to take money and stuff and miss out on life forever with God, right? Even though some people make that choice every day, Mattathias believed God and loved Him and so he wasn’t even tempted.
But there was another man in town who didn’t love God as much and he jumped up and was ready to sacrifice to the false gods of the Greeks and Mattathias had had enough. He wasn’t going to let anyone in his town do such a terrible thing to God and especially not in the Land God had given their ancestors. That was a terrible insult to God! Maybe this man was afraid to die or maybe having all that money and power sounded good to him; we will just never know. Mattathias killed him to stop him from doing such a horrible thing. He killed him right on the altar of the Greek gods so that no one else could use it either. And then Mattathias killed the man whom the king had sent and he tore up the altar too. For an old guy, he was pretty spry and strong when he was defending God and protecting the people of his town from making a terrible mistake. But, of course, now he was in big trouble with the king so he had to do something fast. He shouted to the town that everyone who loves God and His commandments should follow him and they all ran and hid in the mountains. They had to leave everything behind except for their families and their animals. They were very brave and loyal to God but sometimes it can cost us a lot to be true to Him. They were willing to lose everything they had just so that they could follow God, even if it meant dying because they knew that if they saved their lives by giving in to Antiochus, it would be a terrible trade because they would be giving up their lives with God.
Life was very hard living in the wilderness, and what Mattathias did led to a war that lasted for many years. But all through that war, his army was faithful to God and when he died, his son Judah led the troops. And it took a long time, but they went through the land destroying the altars that had been built for the false gods and they made sure that people started obeying God again. Because they were so loyal to God, God was loyal to them and they were able to drive their enemies out of Jerusalem and out of God’s Temple and they rebuilt the altar that had been ruined, and they relit the menorah lamps in the Temple and made the shew bread. And the people were so happy because they were able to serve God safely again in the areas where the Maccabean rebels (that’s what they called the followers of Judah Maccabeus) had driven out the Greeks. It took many more years before the Greeks gave up and went home, but on the 25th of the month of Kislev, in the winter, when the altar had been rebuilt and the menorah relit and the bread baked, the people celebrated the very first Hannukah. The word Hannukah comes from the word meaning “dedication” and because they had removed everything that was dedicated to the Greek gods and had made everything new again, they rededicated the Temple to God and celebrated for eight days.
Why did they celebrate for eight days? Well, because they hadn’t been able to celebrate God’s festivals for years and they suddenly could again! God’s parties are all about honoring God and celebrating the wonderful things He has done and so instead of waiting, they decided that they needed to do something right then and there to show God how thankful they were that His house had been given back to Him, cleaned up, and all of his enemies driven away. And they did that not only because they were so happy but because of their loyalty to God. Why do we celebrate the Passover and the Lord’s Supper? Because we are so grateful for our salvation! We celebrate the release of the children of Israel from slavery because of God’s mighty miracles, and we celebrate what Jesus did for us at the Cross. Why do we celebrate First Fruits and the Resurrection? Because the world changed forever when Jesus rose from the dead! Why do we celebrate Shavuot/Pentecost? Because that was the day that the children of Israel worshiped God at Mt Sinai and also the day that God sent His Holy Spirit to everyone who was loyal to Him. And He still does that today! Why do we celebrate the Fall Festivals? Because we are happy that God is king of the universe and that He made Jesus the King of kings over all of us and that someday when He returns we will celebrate the Feast of Tabernacles with Him in Jerusalem! What a party that will be!
But, you know what? We can also celebrate other things. Any time that God does something amazing for us, we can have a celebration. July 2 is Rosenquist Day at our house. It’s the day when we were finally able to adopt our twins, Matthew and Andrew—that was one of the happiest days of my life. And God made it happen. When we are being grateful, we are also being loyal. I love you. I am praying for you. How do you show your loyalty and gratitude to God and to Jesus in your life? It’s a good thing to think about.
that was exciting!