Good Monday morning to you my “Walking with Jesus” friends,
I wonder if you have discovered, and do you spend much time in, the ancient book of Proverbs in the Bible? There is great wisdom in every verse, much of it penned by King Solomon, the man to whom God gave an unusual anointing of great wisdom. (2 Chronicles 1:7-12) Here’s a powerful statement from Proverbs 1:8 “Listen my son to your father’s instruction and do not forsake your mother’s teaching.” Those same words are echoed in Proverbs 6:20. I like to link that with this wonderful declaration in Psalm 61:5 “You, O God, have heard my vows, You have given me the heritage of those who fear Your name.” Is that you, my friend? Do you thank God for a wonderful spiritual heritage? If not, are you beginning such a heritage in your generation for the descendants who follow you?
In our journey through the kings of Israel today we meet one of the most fascinating of them all: the boy king Josiah. Because yesterday we learned his father Amon was so wicked he was assassinated by some of his own governing officials, we can presume young Josiah did NOT receive much helpful instruction as a boy from his wicked Dad.
2 Kings 22:1 introduces us to Josiah’s mother: “Josiah was eight years old when he became king, and he reigned in Jerusalem 31 years! His mother’s name was Jedidah, and she was from Bozkath. Josiah did what was right in the eyes of the LORD and followed completely the ways of his ancestor king David, not turning aside to the right or to the left.”
Now that’s really fascinating to me, for young Josiah’s Dad was such a wicked leader that he was assassinated by his officials, and yet Josiah was a remarkably good man! So, we can assume his mother Jedidah did a remarkable job of countering the negative influence of wicked Amon in young Josiah’s life. Who was this remarkable woman? Sadly, this one verse is all we know of Josiah’s mother. She’s not even mentioned in the 2 Chronicles 34 account of Josiah. All we have is her name, her father’s name and her hometown. But she must have been a special woman to have put up with wicked Amon while passing along great wisdom and love for God to her son Josiah.
Now pause for just a second and reflect. Do you know any women who are or have been in dysfunctional families like this, where they carry the burden of raising the children with spiritual and moral influence and integrity because their husbands are absent or alcoholics or abusive or incarcerated?
I did a little research and found the village of Bozkath, Jedidah’s hometown, to be about 10 miles west of Hebron, the famous town in southern Israel where the Hebrew patriarchs were buried: Abraham and his wife Sarah; Isaac and his wife Rebekah; Jacob and his wife Leah. (Gen. 49:29-33) It’s also the town from which King David reigned the first 7 years of his kingship as he drew the people of Israel back to God after Saul’s failed kingship. (2 Samuel 5:1-5)
I wonder if Jedidah visited Hebron from time to time and perhaps, she pledged to God that if she ever had a son, she’d do her best to raise him to be an honorable man in the heritage of Abraham, Isaac, Jacob and king David?
The Scripture doesn’t tell us but very clearly Jedidah, and probably some other adults, must have had profound influence on this little boy Josiah, for when his father Amon was assassinated by the leaders in Jerusalem, they selected this young boy only 8 yrs old, to be their next king. We have no record of what his life was like from age 8 to 16 but 2 Chronicles 34:3 gives us this very interesting glimpse into the boy king Josiah: “In the eighth year of his reign, while he was still young, Josiah began to seek the God of his father David...”
Oh my, I love that! Does it remind you of some other young teenage men in whom God awakened a deep desire to know God and honor God with their lives? How about young Joseph with his coat of many colors because he was his father Jacob’s favorite son? And you may recall God gave young Joseph significant dreams about the future, but his jealous brothers hated him and sold Joseph into slavery at age 17. Yet Joseph sought God and remained pure in heart and mind despite being a slave in Egypt far from home. (Gen. 37)
Or how about Samuel who was perhaps 5 years old when brought by his mother Hannah to Eli the High Priest to raise her son at the Tabernacle? (1 Samuel 1:21-28)
Or how about David the shepherd boy who killed the giant Goliath with one stone and his slingshot (1 Samuel 17) and later became king of Israel? (2 Samuel 2:1-4)
Or what about Daniel who was taken captive as a young teen and dragged off to Babylon where God protected him and raised Daniel up to be advisor to kings!? (Daniel 1) Can you think of some other young men or women, either in the past or perhaps even alive today, in whom the Spirit of God has awakened a passion for seeking to know God?
You see my friends, that desire to seek the one, true, Holy, Almighty God is not natural. It is a God given passion. Look again at that powerful statement about young Josiah: “In the eighth year of his reign, while he was still young, Josiah began to seek the God of his father David.“ (2 Chronicles 34:3a) His wicked father Amon was dead, but we can assume the wicked influence of Amon was still very powerful in Jerusalem. How do I know that? Look what happened with Josiah four years later: “In the twelfth year of his reign young King Josiah began to purge Judah and Jerusalem of high places, Asherah poles and idols…” (2 Chronicles 34:3b)
Josiah was undoing the wicked legacy passed to him by his wicked father King Amon and grandfather King Manasseh. Remember that in most of Manasseh’s 55-year reign he was a wicked, violent man who erected idols and killed innocent people throughout Jerusalem! Young Josiah was born into and then elevated to be king over a moral, spiritual and decadent mess in Jerusalem in 640bc.
Despite the moral chaos and perhaps thanks to strong influence from his mother Jedidah, Josiah, from a young age, had a heart hungry to know God and a deep desire to understand WHY Jerusalem was such a moral disaster? Over these next few days, if you’ll join me, we’re going to see some amazing things God did in Jerusalem during the reign of this ‘boy king Josiah’.
Still today, 2600 years later, the events which took place during the reign of this young man stand as a high-water mark for the nation of Israel and have profound implications for what is happening in Israel today, so I hope you’ll join me over these next few days.
For today I have a simple but really important few questions for us…
* What moral and spiritual heritage were you born into and how did it affect your life?
* Have you ever had a deep passion to seek God and grow to really know God, like Josiah did?
* Have you been led by God to courageously clean up a moral mess… perhaps your family or neighborhood or school or workplace or even a broken church?
* Did you have a mother or some other special adult who poured God honoring influence into you and it has helped shape who you are? Have you thanked them?
Let’s pause and reflect and talk with God about all this… and here’s a worship song to help us consider the power of God in changing a heritage to a great legacy.
Today’s Scripture: 2 Chron. 34:1-3 & 2 Kings 22:1,2.
Choose below to read or listen.
2 Chron. 34:1-3
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2 Kings 22:1, 2
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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)
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