A Return to the Word

Intro

Antibiotics are a great thing. Prior to their creation people died from all sorts of infections that we just don’t see today.

But what is really interesting about antibiotics was how they were discovered in the first place.

It is considered today to be one of the greatest accidental discoveries ever made.

Maybe you have heard about it before, but essentially, back in 1928 a scientist by the name of Sir Alexander Flemming was about halfway through an experiment with bacteria when he left for a 2 week vacation.

Sir Flemming was not known for being a clean and tidy person and left the dirty petri dish he had been working with in the sink .

When he returned two weeks later he found that the bacteria in the petri dish had grown all over the plate, except in one area where mold had formed.

This led to the discovery of what would later be called penicillin. It was this accidental discovery that changed the world or medicine in ways few if any other discovery ever has before or since.

Can you imagine that. Can you imagine something so profound, something so world changing being discovered by accident?

New Series

Well this morning we are going to look at something that happened in God’s word, more specifically the Old Testament that did just that.

But before I get to it. I want to explain why I am preaching from this account.

Over the last couple of weeks I have been speaking on some of the current events happening in our country and the dangerous slope we are sliding down as a society.

And it would be really easy to dwell on the negative and get upset, depressed, angry, or otherwise discouraged about the world we are living in as followers of Jesus.

But how many here today know that this isn’t the first time a society turned their back on God? How many know that God has been dealing with this sort of thing from the very beginning with the Adam and Eve’s first act of disobedience to the constant backsliding of Israel.

Even outside of scripture we see a pattern of history of the Church backsliding and abandoning the truth.

But yet consistently, when we see those moments play out, we also see God move in very powerful ways. In ways that cause many people to return to him. To return in a way that brings about spiritual renewal and awakening.

We often refer to these movements of God as revivals.

Now when I say revival, many thoughts come to mind for different people based on there spiritual upbringing and experiences.

For some, the word revival evokes images of fiery preaching and miracle healings in large tents or Churches.

For some they see nothing but con artists trying to manipulate people into making a quick buck.

For others, it has little meaning.

So my hope is to spend a few weeks preaching on the topic of revival by exploring some events in scripture that led to genuine revival. The kind of revival that I believe we need in this country if things have any hope of getting better.

I believe that by exploring these events we might be able to discover how we too might experience this same revival in our individual lives and churches today.

Power in the Text

Because many of us associate such different images and experiences with revival, it’s important to define what we mean in this series.

Most broadly, a Christian revival has been defined as “the work of the Holy Spirit in restoring the people of God to a more vital spiritual life, witness, and work by prayer and the Word after repentance in crisis for their spiritual decline” (Dictionary Definition)

So what we are talking about has more to do with a supernatural move of God than it does a pre-planned meeting or event.

Historically revivals took place at particular times for particular people, but they all share a pattern of an initial state of spiritual apathy or decline, followed by spiritual renewal, prayer, reliance on the Word, and transformed commitment to the life of faith by a whole community.

Revivals understood in the fullest sense involved spiritual, structural, and social transformation

So, it is important to understand that genuine revival can’t be scheduled or planned. It is an act of God. However I do believe that are things we can do to put us on a path toward revival.

There was a famous revival the took place in the Old Testament during the reign of King Josiah.

The revival that took place during the reign of King Josiah followed a period of deep sin and corruption.

Josiah’s grandfather Manasseh had reigned for fifty-five years, but he’d done evil in God’s sight by sacrificing one of his own sons and practicing the occult. Manasseh’s son Amon did no better when he followed in his father’s ways until his own men murdered him.

The nation of Israel (referred to as the nation of Judah at this time in history) was at yet another low point, until Amon’s son Josiah came into power at the age of 8.

Unlike his father and grandfather before him the Bible says...

2 Kings 22:2 NLT 2 He[Josiah] did what was pleasing in the Lord’s sight and followed the example of his ancestor David. He did not turn away from doing what was right.

Josiah had a genuine desire to serve God. The problem for Josiah was that somewhere along the way something had gone missing among God’s people.

That something was the book of the law. Here you have the nation of Israel, God’s chosen people and they no longer had in their possession the Law of Moses to guide them.

In fact, Josiah’s Israel look very different from that of his ancestor David. The people as a whole had completely broken God’s law, specifically as it related serving other gods and worshiping idols.

The temple built by King Solomon had been filled with pagan symbols and articles used to worship false gods like Baal and Asherah and Molech.

There were pagan shrines built throughout Jerusalem where sacrifices, even child sacrifices were made and worship was conducted to these false gods.

There were living quarters built within the temple of God where male and female shrine prostitutes lived.

It was a mess. Yet Josiah wanted to serve God, even though he didn’t truly know how because they did not have the law to show them.

But he knew the Temple was in disarray so he starting a remodeling project if you will and then like the Penicillin I mentioned earlier, an accidental discovery changed everything.

You see while the Hilkiah the high priest was going through things, probably clean things out for the restoration project he found something.

2 Kings 22:8-11 NLT 8 Hilkiah the high priest said to Shaphan the court secretary, “I have found the Book of the Law in the Lord’s Temple!” Then Hilkiah gave the scroll to Shaphan, and he read it.

9 Shaphan went to the king and reported, “Your officials have turned over the money collected at the Temple of the Lord to the workers and supervisors at the Temple.” 10 Shaphan also told the king, “Hilkiah the priest has given me a scroll.” So Shaphan read it to the king.

11 When the king heard what was written in the Book of the Law, he tore his clothes in despair.

This is the power of God’s word. Even when it seemed like it had been lost forever to history, God made sure that it hadn’t and the Book of the Law was discovered and it changed everything.

Immediately Josiah recognizes how far his people had fallen away from God. He knew it was bad, but he didn’t have the law to show him just how bad.

This sparked one of the greatest recorded revivals in Israel’s history.

The bible says...

2 Kings 23: 1-3 NLT Then the king summoned all the elders of Judah and Jerusalem. 2 And the king went up to the Temple of the Lord with all the people of Judah and Jerusalem, along with the priests and the prophets—all the people from the least to the greatest. There the king read to them the entire Book of the Covenant that had been found in the Lord’s Temple.

3 The king took his place of authority beside the pillar and renewed the covenant in the Lord’s presence. He pledged to obey the Lord by keeping all his commands, laws, and decrees with all his heart and soul. In this way, he confirmed all the terms of the covenant that were written in the scroll, and all the people pledged themselves to the covenant.

The Bible says that from there Josiah began to clean house and removed everything from the temple that did not belong. All the pagan worship articles.

He destroyed all the pagan shrines and alters, many of which had been built by his grandfather. Even Solomon himself didn’t do this.

Josiah was committed to God’s word once he discovered what it said, and it was the word that guided him to make the reforms that he made.

Then he had done something that we learn hadn’t been done since before Israel’s first King.

2 Kings 23:21-25 NLT 21 King Josiah then issued this order to all the people: “You must celebrate the Passover to the Lord your God, as required in this Book of the Covenant.” 22 There had not been a Passover celebration like that since the time when the judges ruled in Israel, nor throughout all the years of the kings of Israel and Judah. 23 But in the eighteenth year of King Josiah’s reign, this Passover was celebrated to the Lord in Jerusalem.

24 Josiah also got rid of the mediums and psychics, the household gods, the idols, and every other kind of detestable practice, both in Jerusalem and throughout the land of Judah. He did this in obedience to the laws written in the scroll that Hilkiah the priest had found in the Lord’s Temple. 25 Never before had there been a king like Josiah, who turned to the Lord with all his heart and soul and strength, obeying all the laws of Moses. And there has never been a king like him since.

This revival staved off the judgment that God was going to bring to Israel because of their sin. And for as long as Josiah lived God brought them blessing and peace.

Big Idea/Why it Matters

The renewal experienced by Israel during the reign of King Josiah began with a return to the Word of God.

The principal we need to recognize here is that to the extent that we devote ourselves to Scripture, we will experience a revival of faith in our lives together.

You have heard it said that revival starts in the house of God.

For many revival is inaccurately understood to be an event where lots of unsaved people accept Jesus.

Don’t get me wrong, that happens when genuine revival happens, but before that can occur, those of us who already know Jesus have to experience revival. We have to have our spiritual eyes opened and be drawn back to the things of God.

But this doesn’t happen apart from God’s word. We must be devoted to the scriptures if we want to see revival in our Churches and communities.

Unfortunately, as has been widely reported, Bible reading plummeted during the COVID-19 pandemic in the United States.

A 2022 survey by the American Bible Society sought to determine the number of active “Bible users,” defined as people who “use the Bible at least 3–4 times each year on their own, outside of a church setting”.

From 2021 to 2022, the number of Bible users dropped from 50 percent to 39 percent. That equals 25 million Americans who no longer consult the Bible even three to four times a year.

Whatever the reason, this loosening of our engagement with Scripture points to the real need for revival.

Application/Closing

This is in large part why we started the Bible Engagement Project here at church. And if you aren’t taking part in it, you are missing out. If you aren’t reading the devotions each week you are missing out.

I cannot stress enough how important this book is. If is the only defense we have agains the lies that this world wants us to believe.

Revival is possible, but it starts with us. Not with those outside the Church, you and me. And it starts with us returning to Gods word.

And not only reading it, but doing what Josiah did, and allowing it to change who we are and what we do so that our lives come under its authority and reflect its teaching.

We need to show the world what that looks like.