Dream – Defiled

 

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We have all been defiled.

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Dream 5/19/18

A friend has a nice tapestry / scroll she uses in a religious ritual where she sincerely lights candles and has soft waves of smoke to honor God at Hanukah time.

Somehow its gets dirty, and she rejects it as no longer usable for the Lord.

I take it.

I see the dirt as defilement, but also as a sign of grace…That we are all forgiven.

It is a reminder that none of us is perfect, and that our new forgiven condition, being made clean, is not due to our own efforts, but due to the shed blood of Jesus / Yahshua.

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End of Dream

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This dream comes at the time of Shavuot (Pentecost) – the giving of the 10 commandments (Old Testament), and the coming of the Holy Spirit (New Testament)

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Defilement usually refers to idolatry, sexual immorality, and shedding bloodshed, and other sins. –

Thus were they defiled with their own works, and went a whoring with their own inventions. Psalm 106:39

Son of man, when the house of Israel dwelt in their own land, they defiled it by their own way and by their doings: their way was before me as the uncleanness of a removed woman. Ezekiel 36:17

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It also refers to unbelief, bitterness, and the lack of grace in a person’s life

Unto the pure all things are pure: but unto them that are defiled and unbelieving is nothing pure; but even their mind and conscience is defiled. Titus 1:15

Looking diligently lest any man fail of the grace of God; lest any root of bitterness springing up trouble you, and thereby many be defiled; Hebrews 12:15

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Part of the instructions given to Moses– the giving of the 10 commandments

And if you will make me an altar of stone, you shall not build it of hewn stone: for if you lift up your tool upon it, you have polluted it. Exodus 20:25

This indicates that man’s efforts to create holiness fails to be worthy of God’s approval.

Man must use what God has created, and not use his own creation, like the tapestry above.

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This dream also had to do with Hanukah

http://www.ldolphin.org/hanukkah.html

Hanukkah is a festival which commemorates the purification and rededication of the Temple by Judas Maccabeus on Kislev 25, 165 BC (usually in December) .

Three years prior, Antiochus IV, the Seleucid (Syrian) king, defiled the Temple by erecting an idol to Baal Shamen (Zeus) , sacrificing a pig on the altar and proclaiming himself to be a god.

Some of the coins he minted had his features on the face of Zeus along with the words “Theus Epiphanes” meaning “the god manifest.”

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He also decreed that Torah (the Law of God) could not be studied under penalty of death, circumcision was forbidden and the Sabbath was not to be kept.

This brought an internal struggle within Judaism out in the open. On the one hand there were the observant Jews who wanted to keep Torah, and on the other, the Hellenized Jews who wanted to assimilate into the Greek culture around them and become “born again” Greeks!

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When the Greeks attacked the Holy Temple in Jerusalem, they didn’t try to destroy it or burn it down.

Rather, they defiled it.

They offered pig sacrifices and brought a statue of Zeus into the Temple. The Greeks transformed the Temple into a house of idol worship.

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No longer did light stream from the Temple; the word of God was silenced.

The Greeks carefully scoured the Temple grounds searching for pure flasks of oil (bearing the seal of the High Priest).

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They knew that defiling the oil would silence the light of the Menorah — the light of Torah which reflects the depth and meaning of Jewish national and religious life.

The Greeks knew that was the way to best “conquer” the Jewish nation.

Maccabees were fighting against this.

Which explains why, when the Jews were victorious, they made it their first order of business to purify the Temple and light the Menorah.

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Lesson

In order to stay holy, we must have a reminder as to what defiled us to begin with.

Defilement starts with shutting down the word of God, and quenching the Holy Spirit, so that sin can rule.

We cannot remain holy on our own, but need the grace and forgiveness of God.

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