Good morning my “Walking with Jesus” friends,
Some of you may remember the significance of this date 11/22 in the year 1963. It was the day President John F Kennedy was assassinated in Dallas, Tx. That event sent shock waves around the world which still reverberate today. You’ll remember the remainder of that decade was very turbulent with assassinations of both Martin Luther King and Robert Kennedy, as well as civil war in the Belgian Congo and the ramp up of the Vietnam war. What a dramatic day it was 61 years ago today and may I invite you to another dramatic, world changing day?
Yesterday I left you with young King Josiah in Jerusalem while he awaited news from his officials whom he had sent to inquire of God. As they enter the king’s court, let’s rejoin the scene to witness this historic moment found in 2 Kings 23, “The king’s officials took Huldah’s answer back to the king. Then King Josiah called together all the elders of Judah and Jerusalem. He went up to the temple of the LORD with the people of Judah, the inhabitants of Jerusalem, the priests and the prophets – all the people from the least to the greatest. King Josiah read in their hearing all the words of the Book of the Covenant which had been found in the temple of the LORD.” (2 Kings 23:1,2)
As we saw yesterday, Huldah’s message from God for King Josiah was that God would be sending His judgment upon Jerusalem in response to all the wickedness of the kings and the people who had preceded Josiah and his generation. I don’t know for sure, but I imagine Deuteronomy 28 was one of the very important chapters which Josiah read to the people that day.
In that chapter God very clearly outlines His promise of great BLESSING if His people are faithful to the Covenant with God, they had established at Mount Sinai with Moses. But in that same chapter God also outlines, in great detail, the JUDGMENT which He would pour out on His people if they did NOT keep God’s Covenant and if they turned their back on God to fabricate and worship false idols and practice the immorality and wickedness of the nations around them.
I wonder if Josiah continued reading all of Deuteronomy 29 and 30, Moses’ great challenge to the Jewish people to be sure they followed God’s commands and lived God honoring lives in the Covenant relationship God was offering His people? Perhaps then when Josiah came to this verse from Deut. 30
King Josiah read it with great emotion and application to the generation and great throng of people who stood with him that day in the Temple in Jerusalem: “This day I call the heavens and the earth as witnesses against you, that I have set before you, life and death, blessings and curses. Now choose life so that you and your children may live, that you may love the LORD your God, listen to His voice, hold fast to Him for the LORD is your life…” (Deut. 30:19,20)
The record of 2 Kings 23 tells us Josiah renewed his commitment to the Covenant of God that day “…to follow the LORD and keep His commands, statutes and decrees with all his heart and all his soul, thus confirming the words of the covenant written in this book. Then all the people pledged themselves to the Covenant.” (2 Kings 23:3) Oh my, what a glorious moment that must have been in Jerusalem!
What a dramatic contrast with the type of morally failed leadership Manasseh and Amon had given Jerusalem and the people for so many decades! This was a monumental, defining moment in the history of Jerusalem, the Temple, and the people of Israel!
What follows in 2 Kings 23 is a remarkable, detailed account of how King Josiah led the people in demolishing the standing evidences of the wickedness of their parents and grandparents, including Josiah’s father and grandfather Kings Amon and Manasseh.
The record says: ‘Then King Josiah ordered Hilkiah the high priest, the priests next in rank and the doorkeepers to remove from the temple of the LORD all the articles made for Baal and Asherah and all the starry hosts. He burned them outside Jerusalem in the fields of the Kidron Valley and took the ashes to Bethel. He did away with the idolatrous priests…He took the Asherah pole from the temple of the LORD to the Kidron Valley outside Jerusalem and burned it there…He also tore down the quarters of the male shrine prostitutes that were in the temple of the LORD, and the quarters where women did weaving for Asherah.” (2 Kings 23:4-7)
I don’t know about you my friends, but I am stunned, shocked, repulsed by what I’ve just read, for it describes the level of immorality and wickedness in Jerusalem and even in the great Temple of the God of Israel, which is beyond my ability to imagine or comprehend.
It was in this sacred place, the Temple, that King Solomon had bowed before God, surrounded by thousands of priests and Levites and fellow Jews to dedicate this great temple upon its completion. It was here God sent fire from heaven to the great altar of burnt offering to burn up the sacrifices they brought to the LORD. (2 Chron. 7:1) It was here the cloud of God’s Presence descended from heaven and filled the Temple so that neither the priests nor the king himself could enter for God’s Presence was so holy!
Are you astounded at the contrast of what Josiah found and destroyed, as compared to what Solomon had experienced with Holy God here at this Temple? It’s a picture my friends of what can happen in any place, any city, any church, any family, any person, when over time God is ignored or actually pushed away and rejected! Have you seen it somewhere in your past?
While there is much more detail in 2 Kings 23, may I point out just one more cleansing action which king Josiah took? 2 Kings 23:10 says: “King Josiah desecrated Topheth, which was in the Valley of Ben Hinnom, so that no one could use it to sacrifice their son or daughter in the fire to Molek.” Yes, it’s true! A place of human sacrifice had been erected just outside the western city wall of Jerusalem, for the purpose of parents and grandparents bringing their children to offer as live sacrifices to man-made idols and the gods of the wicked nations around them!
Likely it was Josiah’s grandfather King Manasseh who had erected this evil altar, for during the years of his reign Manasseh actually sacrificed his children there! (2 Chron. 33:6) Is there anything more vile, more inhuman than parents sacrificing their children alive in their demented, demonic worship? But wait, more than 100 million living children have been sacrificed in abortions around the world in the past several years! What does that say to God about our recent generations?
What a day it was 61 years ago today as a President was shot in America. What a day it was 2600 years ago when King Josiah led the people in repentant demolition of so much wickedness in Jerusalem as they renewed their Covenant commitment to God! As we worship with this song of renewal, what is God saying to you and me about anything we need to remove from our lives in our commitment to God?
Today’s Scripture: 2 Kings 23:1-10.
Choose below to read or listen.
 |  |
Bible images provided with attribution to www.LumoProject.com.
Have a comment or question about today’s chapter? I’m ready to hear from you, contact me here.
Pastor Doug Anderson
“Let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us, with our eyes fixed on Jesus…” (Heb. 12:1,2)
Archived back issues of “Walking with Jesus” and other resources are available by clicking here to open our ‘home page’ (or go to HOME at upper right of this page).
Share with friends. Subscribe below for daily “Walking with Jesus”.