Witness: Josiah
Notes
Transcript
Witness: Josiah
2 Kings 22-23
As a child playing on my grandfather's land. Carrying a bb gun looking for something to shoot. Chasing the dogs as they tree a squirrel. Next thing you know you aren't sure where you are. I knew to follow the sun until I got to the road.
Slowly letting idols into our home. Things that for awhile are not a problem can become a problem. Our priorities slowly get out of wack. How are we to find out way out? We must follow the Son.
Josiah finds himself and all of Judah a million miles away from where they needed to be. He witnesses to the nation and becomes the example for them to find their way back to God.
1 Josiah was eight years old when he began to reign, and he reigned thirty-one years in Jerusalem. His mother’s name was Jedidah the daughter of Adaiah of Bozkath.
2 And he did what was right in the eyes of the Lord and walked in all the way of David his father, and he did not turn aside to the right or to the left.
3 In the eighteenth year of King Josiah, the king sent Shaphan the son of Azaliah, son of Meshullam, the secretary, to the house of the Lord, saying,
4 “Go up to Hilkiah the high priest, that he may count the money that has been brought into the house of the Lord, which the keepers of the threshold have collected from the people.
5 And let it be given into the hand of the workmen who have the oversight of the house of the Lord, and let them give it to the workmen who are at the house of the Lord, repairing the house
6 (that is, to the carpenters, and to the builders, and to the masons), and let them use it for buying timber and quarried stone to repair the house.
7 But no accounting shall be asked from them for the money that is delivered into their hand, for they deal honestly.”
8 And Hilkiah the high priest said to Shaphan the secretary, “I have found the Book of the Law in the house of the Lord.” And Hilkiah gave the book to Shaphan, and he read it.
9 And Shaphan the secretary came to the king, and reported to the king, “Your servants have emptied out the money that was found in the house and have delivered it into the hand of the workmen who have the oversight of the house of the Lord.”
10 Then Shaphan the secretary told the king, “Hilkiah the priest has given me a book.” And Shaphan read it before the king.
11 When the king heard the words of the Book of the Law, he tore his clothes.
12 And the king commanded Hilkiah the priest, and Ahikam the son of Shaphan, and Achbor the son of Micaiah, and Shaphan the secretary, and Asaiah the king’s servant, saying,
13 “Go, inquire of the Lord for me, and for the people, and for all Judah, concerning the words of this book that has been found. For great is the wrath of the Lord that is kindled against us, because our fathers have not obeyed the words of this book, to do according to all that is written concerning us.”
6 Ingredients of Revival
Scriptural Authority (22:8- 11)
Scriptural Authority (22:8- 11)
8 And Hilkiah the high priest said to Shaphan the secretary, “I have found the Book of the Law in the house of the Lord.” And Hilkiah gave the book to Shaphan, and he read it.
9 And Shaphan the secretary came to the king, and reported to the king, “Your servants have emptied out the money that was found in the house and have delivered it into the hand of the workmen who have the oversight of the house of the Lord.”
10 Then Shaphan the secretary told the king, “Hilkiah the priest has given me a book.” And Shaphan read it before the king.
11 When the king heard the words of the Book of the Law, he tore his clothes.
The lost Law was proof of how far they had fallen.
Drifting from God always begins with failure to be in His Word.
Failure of using God's word bring the need for revival but learning God's Word brought revival.
11 Let us therefore strive to enter that rest, so that no one may fall by the same sort of disobedience.
12 For the word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing to the division of soul and of spirit, of joints and of marrow, and discerning the thoughts and intentions of the heart.
13 And no creature is hidden from his sight, but all are naked and exposed to the eyes of him to whom we must give account.
17 So faith comes from hearing, and hearing through the word of Christ.
Group Accountability (22: 12- 14)
Group Accountability (22: 12- 14)
12 And the king commanded Hilkiah the priest, and Ahikam the son of Shaphan, and Achbor the son of Micaiah, and Shaphan the secretary, and Asaiah the king’s servant, saying,
13 “Go, inquire of the Lord for me, and for the people, and for all Judah, concerning the words of this book that has been found. For great is the wrath of the Lord that is kindled against us, because our fathers have not obeyed the words of this book, to do according to all that is written concerning us.”
14 So Hilkiah the priest, and Ahikam, and Achbor, and Shaphan, and Asaiah went to Huldah the prophetess, the wife of Shallum the son of Tikvah, son of Harhas, keeper of the wardrobe (now she lived in Jerusalem in the Second Quarter), and they talked with her.
Team Effort-
Godly counsel.
ILL-- Haystack Prayer Meeting
5 men in August of 1806 were meeting for Bible Study about missions, in a grove a trees when a sudden thunderstorm drove them to take shelter in a haystack. They continued in prayer and talking about missions. Beginning of the Missions Movement that influenced among baptists the creation of the Cooperative Program and the Foreign Mission Board- today International Mission Board.
Not their opinions but they each sought God's interpretation.
Josiah was not alone. other reformers of his day include
Huldah- who interprets the covenant for Josiah and his counsel
Jeremiah- a young reformer like Josiah at this time.
Nahum, Habakkuk, and Zephaniah.
ILL- Daniel, Shadrach, Meshach, Abednego
Those in leadership sought God's will together.
Individual Responsibility (22:18-20) (23:25)
Individual Responsibility (22:18-20) (23:25)
18 But to the king of Judah, who sent you to inquire of the Lord, thus shall you say to him, Thus says the Lord, the God of Israel: Regarding the words that you have heard,
19 because your heart was penitent, and you humbled yourself before the Lord, when you heard how I spoke against this place and against its inhabitants, that they should become a desolation and a curse, and you have torn your clothes and wept before me, I also have heard you, declares the Lord.
20 Therefore, behold, I will gather you to your fathers, and you shall be gathered to your grave in peace, and your eyes shall not see all the disaster that I will bring upon this place.’ ” And they brought back word to the king.
25 Before him there was no king like him, who turned to the Lord with all his heart and with all his soul and with all his might, according to all the Law of Moses, nor did any like him arise after him.
Each person has to respond individually.
Your not going to heaven because of the faith of your parents or grandparents.
ILL-- Secretary of State Daniel Webster, was asked at a dinner party, “Mr. Webster, will you tell me what was the most important thought you ever had?” Following a brief silence, he confidently replied, “The most serious thought that ever occupied my mind was that of my individual responsibility to God.”Jones, G. C. (1986). 1000 illustrations for preaching and teaching (p. 145). Nashville, TN: Broadman & Holman Publishers.
Great White Throne Judgment - Everyone judged according to 1. What they have done 2. Whether they are in the Lamb's Book of Life -- Whether they have accepted the gift of Jesus as the perfect sacrifice for the sins.
Corporate Participation (23:1-3)
Corporate Participation (23:1-3)
1 Then the king sent, and all the elders of Judah and Jerusalem were gathered to him.
2 And the king went up to the house of the Lord, and with him all the men of Judah and all the inhabitants of Jerusalem and the priests and the prophets, all the people, both small and great. And he read in their hearing all the words of the Book of the Covenant that had been found in the house of the Lord.
3 And the king stood by the pillar and made a covenant before the Lord, to walk after the Lord and to keep his commandments and his testimonies and his statutes with all his heart and all his soul, to perform the words of this covenant that were written in this book. And all the people joined in the covenant.
Justification is personal.
Sanctification is corporate.
We are not suppose to do it alone.
Accountability!
12 For just as the body is one and has many members, and all the members of the body, though many, are one body, so it is with Christ.
13 For in one Spirit we were all baptized into one body—Jews or Greeks, slaves or free—and all were made to drink of one Spirit.
14 For the body does not consist of one member but of many.
15 If the foot should say, “Because I am not a hand, I do not belong to the body,” that would not make it any less a part of the body.
1 Corinthians 12:24–26 (ESV)
24 ...But God has so composed the body, giving greater honor to the part that lacked it,
25 that there may be no division in the body, but that the members may have the same care for one another.
26 If one member suffers, all suffer together; if one member is honored, all rejoice together.
Complete Surrender (23:4-20)
Complete Surrender (23:4-20)
4 And the king commanded Hilkiah the high priest and the priests of the second order and the keepers of the threshold to bring out of the temple of the Lord all the vessels made for Baal, for Asherah, and for all the host of heaven. He burned them outside Jerusalem in the fields of the Kidron and carried their ashes to Bethel.
5 And he deposed the priests whom the kings of Judah had ordained to make offerings in the high places at the cities of Judah and around Jerusalem; those also who burned incense to Baal, to the sun and the moon and the constellations and all the host of the heavens.
6 And he brought out the Asherah from the house of the Lord, outside Jerusalem, to the brook Kidron, and burned it at the brook Kidron and beat it to dust and cast the dust of it upon the graves of the common people.
7 And he broke down the houses of the male cult prostitutes who were in the house of the Lord, where the women wove hangings for the Asherah.
8 And he brought all the priests out of the cities of Judah, and defiled the high places where the priests had made offerings, from Geba to Beersheba. And he broke down the high places of the gates that were at the entrance of the gate of Joshua the governor of the city, which were on one’s left at the gate of the city.
9 However, the priests of the high places did not come up to the altar of the Lord in Jerusalem, but they ate unleavened bread among their brothers.
10 And he defiled Topheth, which is in the Valley of the Son of Hinnom, that no one might burn his son or his daughter as an offering to Molech.
11 And he removed the horses that the kings of Judah had dedicated to the sun, at the entrance to the house of the Lord, by the chamber of Nathan-melech the chamberlain, which was in the precincts. And he burned the chariots of the sun with fire.
12 And the altars on the roof of the upper chamber of Ahaz, which the kings of Judah had made, and the altars that Manasseh had made in the two courts of the house of the Lord, he pulled down and broke in pieces and cast the dust of them into the brook Kidron.
13 And the king defiled the high places that were east of Jerusalem, to the south of the mount of corruption, which Solomon the king of Israel had built for Ashtoreth the abomination of the Sidonians, and for Chemosh the abomination of Moab, and for Milcom the abomination of the Ammonites.
14 And he broke in pieces the pillars and cut down the Asherim and filled their places with the bones of men.
Violent because he realized how costly sin was.
No area was left unchanged.
Repentance has to be complete. Surrender every area of your life.
Repentance is surrender.
Undefiled Worship-- cannot mix God with every other area of your life. He wants 100%.
God doesn’t want to be one of the gods you worship. He wants to be the only God you worship.
Undeserved Mercy (23:26-27)
Undeserved Mercy (23:26-27)
26 Still the Lord did not turn from the burning of his great wrath, by which his anger was kindled against Judah, because of all the provocations with which Manasseh had provoked him.
27 And the Lord said, “I will remove Judah also out of my sight, as I have removed Israel, and I will cast off this city that I have chosen, Jerusalem, and the house of which I said, My name shall be there.”
This is what the nation deserved. God warned them at the dedication of the Temple.
19 “But if you turn aside and forsake my statutes and my commandments that I have set before you, and go and serve other gods and worship them,
20 then I will pluck you up from my land that I have given you, and this house that I have consecrated for my name, I will cast out of my sight, and I will make it a proverb and a byword among all peoples.
21 And at this house, which was exalted, everyone passing by will be astonished and say, ‘Why has the Lord done thus to this land and to this house?’
22 Then they will say, ‘Because they abandoned the Lord, the God of their fathers who brought them out of the land of Egypt, and laid hold on other gods and worshiped them and served them. Therefore he has brought all this disaster on them.’ ”
Was it fair? Sin has consequences. It affects everyone around you. Murder, adultery or addiction will effect more than just the person responsible.
70 years in captivity- it wasn’t everyone’s fault. But all paid.
We all live in the affects of Adam and Eve’s sin.
We deserve just as bad or worse for our sin. -Wages of sin is death.
But we live on this side of the cross-
23 For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.
But the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus our Lord.
For those who are saved and find yourself slowly getting lost- God wants us to turn back to him.
1 I was ready to be sought by those who did not ask for me; I was ready to be found by those who did not seek me. I said, “Here I am, here I am,” to a nation that was not called by my name.
2 I spread out my hands all the day to a rebellious people, who walk in a way that is not good, following their own devices;
13 When I shut up the heavens so that there is no rain, or command the locust to devour the land, or send pestilence among my people,
14 if my people who are called by my name humble themselves, and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven and will forgive their sin and heal their land.
CONCLUSION
God wants revival to begin in your heart today.
God is calling us to repentance.
Are you ready for revival?