A Lesson From The Life Of King Josiah: Seeking Truth

Introduction

Well, good evening. Sure is great to see everybody out here tonight. I want to commend Daniel for those great song selection tonight. They were such calming songs, and that was certainly what I needed there sitting over there waiting to get up here. I think I remember to turn everything on, so we should be good to go. This is the first time I’ve actually used a walking mic in a sermon. So I’ll either be standing here the whole time with my hands on the podium or perhaps pacing, which is more likely. That’s what I do when I get nervous, so that’s probably what will happen tonight. In the last couple weeks while I’ve been preparing this sermon, I was also reading a book that was by a famous actor from the 50s and 60s, and one of the things that he said from that was when he was working on a show where he had to talk for an hour straight, and it was only him, he had to come up with all the jokes, everything that was going to happen.

And he said, I never really realized how long an hour was until I’d gone through all my best material and still had 54 minutes to go. Hopefully, that won’t happen tonight. If you’ve seen my outline for tonight, this is six pages here, and fortunately it is not a complete outline, it’s more of a script than anything, though I’ll try not to read from it. But hopefully, I think we’ll have plenty of material, and I think it’ll be a very beneficial lesson for all of us. I know it’s been really good for me in studying this as I’ve as I’ve prepared for this lesson. If you want to, go ahead and start opening up your Bibles to 2 Chronicles, the 34th chapter. You’ll see when you get there that’s the story of King Josiah.

He’s one of my favorite characters from the Old Testament. And I always like to start my lessons in the Old Testament. I love the stories. I guess it’s the kid inside me. I still want to talk about David and Goliath and Elijah and the chariots of fire. But I think they’re really great stories that we can really learn a lot from. And but I promise you we’ll also go to the New Testament and we’ll find some examples there also that I think we can gain a lot of truth from. A few weeks ago, I was visiting with a friend in town, and this friend of mine, he just so happens to be Tommy Peeler’s son, Josiah, sorry, throwing another Josiah in here. I know Tony’s always talking about Tommy Peeler, so I figured I’d throw in another feeler in this lesson.

And but I was talking with him, and just recently, I guess over the last few years, he had converted a friend from the Baptist faith. And it’s not really important that it’s Baptist or what have you. What it sparked in our conversation, though, was this. I asked him, I said, how is it that somebody can lay aside all their preconceived notions, everything that they’ve been taught since they were a child, perhaps.

And focus and change their study towards the truth. Towards what Christ would have us to do.

1. Josiah Walked in the Ways of David

And I think what we really came to the conclusion of, and we’ll we’ll look at it throughout this lesson, is the idea of a fear of God. Because if that’s what’s forefront in our mind is serving God and fearing God. Then it doesn’t matter if something like that has to change. Because the key thing in our lives, that fear of God and the love of service to him, doesn’t ever change. So let’s look at the story of King Josiah. You’ve already turned there. 2 Chronicles chapter 34. Let’s go over some of the events of his life. We’re not going to read the entire thing. Josiah was eight years old when he became king. He was the son of a horrible king. Ammon was, I believe, his father’s name.

His father, we don’t really talk about Ammon much because he served only two years. He was horrible. His father was perhaps the only king that was worse, and it was Manasseh. He reigned for, I believe, 55 years in Jerusalem. His father was, of course, the great King Hezekiah. But Josiah is who we’re here talking about tonight. He was eight years old when he became king. The Bible also tells us right there that he walked in the ways of David. I don’t think that the Bible tells us this lightly. I don’t think that this is something that the Holy Spirit is saying flippantly in this passage. I think this is truly a compliment of him. Not just that he was a king and he was good, but the heart that he had, a heart of service to God, a tender heart.

We also learn from this that after he had reigned for eight years, he began seeking God. So now Josiah is about 16 years old, and he begins seeking God. We really don’t, the Bible really doesn’t mention, I don’t think, what that exactly means that he did. I don’t think it means that for the previous 16 years of his life he was living as pagan. I think it perhaps means that he came to an age more of accountability. I don’t know if that’s entirely the right term to use there. But whatever it means, the Bible says that at sixteen or eight years into his reign, he began seeking God. It also says that in the twelfth year of his reign, so now when he’s about twenty years old, he begins to purge Judah of all of its idolatry.

And not only that, he goes outside of the borders of his kingdom into Israel, which, by my calculations, had fallen nearly a hundred years before, and he begins to purge that country of its idolatry as well. Now, sometime after that, during the oh, during the let’s see.

2. They Found the Book of the Law

When he was about twenty six years old, so about six years after that, he begins repairing the temple in Jerusalem. Now, this isn’t the same repairing of the temple that we’ve been studying about in our Wednesday night class. That comes sometime later, but he begins repairing the temple here. And that’s where we’ll pick up the story in 2 Chronicles 34, and we’ll start reading in verse 8.

And it says, Now in the eighteenth year of his reign, when he had cleansed the land and the house, he sent Shaphan, the son of Azaliah, and Messea, the governor of the city, and Joah, the son of Joaz, the recorder, to repair the house of the Lord his God. They came to Hokiah, the high priest, and gave him the money that had been brought into the house of God, which the Levites, the keepers of the threshold, had collected from Anasse and Ephraim, and from all the remnant of Israel, and from all Judah and Benjamin, and from the inhabitants of Jerusalem. And they gave it to the workmen who were working in the house of the Lord, and the workmen who were working in the house of the Lord, gave it for repairing and restoring the house.

They gave it to the carpenters and the builders to buy queried stone and timber for binders and beams for the buildings that the kings of Judah had let go to ruin. And the men did the work faithfully. Over them were set Jehath and Obadiah the Levites of the sons of Morari, and Zechariah and Meshulem, of the sons of the Kohathites to have oversight. The Levites, all of who were skillful with instruments of music, were over the burden bearers, and directed all who did work in every kind of service. And some of the Levites were scribes and officials and gatekeepers. And while they were bringing out the money that had been brought into the house of the Lord, Hilkiah the priest found the book of the law of the Lord given through Moses.

I’ve always thought this is such an interesting passage here. Because we’ve already looked at how Josiah, when he was 16 years old, began seeking God. Sometime after that, he begins to purge Judah and Israel of their idolatry. And yet, even then, they apparently had not found the book of the law yet. The Bible really doesn’t say what part of the law, perhaps it was it was only a portion of it that they had lost, perhaps it doesn’t really say what it was even that they found, but what it does say is that they found the book of the law, and to me that implies that it was lost. And so we’ll read on, and continuing in verse 15, it says, Then Hokkiah answered and said to Shaphem the secretary, I have found the book of the law of the Lord in the house of the Lord.

And Hilkiah gave the book to Shaphan. Shaphan brought the book to the king and further reported to the king, all that was committed to your servants, they are doing. They have emptied out the money that was found in the house of the Lord, and have given it into the hand of the overseers and the workmen. Then Shaphan the secretary told the king, Hilkiah the priest has given me a book. And Shaphan read from it before the king. Now we’ll stop there again. I always find this part interesting as well. For one, it’s not Hilkiah the high priest that goes before the king bringing this book. He sends the secretary there. I don’t know if that’s strange, but I find it a little peculiar that he wouldn’t bring the book to the king himself.

3. Why Is Josiah Afraid?

But he also, he doesn’t begin with that either. He says, Hey king, I just want to let you know everybody’s doing exactly as you commanded them. They’re all following your decrees. The work on the temple is going really well. And oh, by the way, we found this book. And of course, the implication is this book is going to change his life forever. Picking up in verse 19. And when the king heard the words of the law, he tore his clothes. And the king came and the king commanded Hilkiah, Ahikim, the son of Shaphan, Abdon, the son of Micah, Shaphan the secretary, and Aziah the king’s servant, saying, Go and inquire of the Lord for me and for those who are left in Israel and in Judah, concerning the words of the book that have been found.

For great is the wrath of the Lord that is poured out on us, because our fathers have not kept the word of the Lord, to do according to all that is written in this book. So why is Josiah afraid? We’ve already talked about it, but I’ll mention it yet again. He’s already been seeking God. He’s already been cleaning out Israel and Judah of their idolatry. The implication is he’s also cleaned out his own life. He’s tried very hard to make his own life pure before God. But yet he’s afraid. What is he afraid of? Perhaps that he hasn’t been doing everything that he was supposed to be doing. If we were to read later on, and we really won’t touch on it in this lesson, apparently they hadn’t been celebrating the Passover like they should have been.

And later on, that is corrected during his reign, and it says that a Passover like that was not celebrated since the days of Samuel the prophet. You know, it doesn’t say what passage was being read before the king when he tore his clothes. But I imagine that it was somewhere around Deuteronomy 28 and verse 15, if I had my guess. In that passage it says, But if you will not obey the voice of the Lord your God, or be careful to do all his commandments and his statutes that I command you today, all these curses shall come upon you and overtake you. For the first 14 verses of that chapter in Deuteronomy 28. Blessings are pronounced on those who faithfully keep the law. For the remaining 54 verses, curses are pronounced on those who fail to keep the law.

4. The Fear of God Is the Answer

As you have time in your own time, I encourage you to read that chapter. And I can certainly see, and I think you’ll see why Josiah was so afraid when he finally heard this and the changes that he needed to make in his life. They failed to keep every part. So now let’s go back again and look at our question that we asked at the very start. How does someone lay aside everything that they thought was right and follow the truth? As I told you before, it’s a fear of God. The entire Old Testament and the New Testament as well. It’s full of passages about the fear of God.

Proverbs 1 7. The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge. Fools despise wisdom and uninstruction. Proverbs 9 in verse 10, the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom, and the knowledge of the Holy One is insight. Psalm 111 in verse 10. The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom. All those who practice it have a good understanding.

Or my favorite, Ecclesiastes 12 and verse 13. The end of the matter. All has been heard. Fear God and keep his commandments. For this is the whole duty of man.

You see, brothers and sisters, I don’t think someone changes their way of thinking simply because we prove everything wrong in their argument. How many times have you given the most compelling, logically sound, scripturally based argument that you could have ever thought of? If you were like me, you were probably patting yourself on the back at the time, because you thought, you know what? Even if I wasn’t convinced of this before, I’d sure be convinced of it now. But the person isn’t convinced. They don’t change their way of thinking. Why is that? Well, I think if we’re really honest with ourselves, we’ll remember all the times that we’ve been in that situation. I know I’ve been in that situation probably more times than I’ve been right. I’ve been wrong.

And unwilling to change what I was thinking. So, like someone stuck in quickstand, the more we struggle in that situation, just the deeper in our own argument we get.

5. The Example of Apollos

So I think what we have to remember is again what we talked about, this fear of God is the answer. And a desire to do everything as he is commanded, and not our own preconceived notions, our own ideas. It’s what God wants. But lest you should think that all these examples of great character are constrained to the Old Testament, let’s take a look in the last few minutes of our time at two examples from the New Testament. Now we could probably look at a dozen examples from the New Testament. We could look at the example of Paul and the great change that he made in his life. We could look at Simon the sorcerer, who even after being showed his error, said, please pray for me.

But the two examples that I want to look at tonight are the examples of Apollos and Peter. So, first, if you’ll open to Acts, the 18th chapter, and we’ll start reading in verse 24, this is the example of Apollos and the changes that he made when he was confronted by Priscilla and Aquila. Starting in verse 24, it says, Now a Jew named Apollos, a native of Alexandria, came to Ephesus. He was an eloquent man, competent in the scriptures. He had been instructed in the way of the Lord, and being fervent in spirit, he spoke and taught accurately the things concerning Jesus. Though he only knew the baptism of John. He began to speak boldly in the synagogue. But when Priscilla and Aquila heard him, they took him aside and explained to him the way of God more accurately.

And when he wished to cross to Achaia, the brothers encouraged him and wrote to the disciples to welcome him. When he arrived, he greatly helped those who through grace had believed. And this is the important verse 28, for he powerfully refuted the Jews in public, showing by the scriptures that the Christ was Jesus. It doesn’t say explicitly right here that he suddenly changed his thinking when confronted by Priscilla and Aquila. But I think when it talks about in verse 28, maybe he was showing by the scriptures that the Christ was Jesus, and this conversation that he had previously had with Priscilla and Aquila, and the support that he received from the brothers and sisters when he wanted to teach the Bible further, I think it shows that he changed the course that he was on.

6. The Example of the Apostle Peter

It changed his path to more align himself with Christ. Or what about the example of Apostle Peter? Even after Peter’s vision in Acts 10 of the sheep being let down from heaven. Even after that, and when he stated in verse 34 of Acts 10, he says, Peter opened his mouth and said, Truly I understand that God shows no partiality. But in every nation, anyone who fears him and does what is right is acceptable to him. Sometime later, we read in Paul’s writing in Galatians chapter 2 and verse 11 and following. It says, But when Cephas came to Antioch, I opposed him to his face, because he stood condemned. For before certain men came from James, he was eating with the Gentiles. But when they came, he drew back and separated himself, fearing the circumcision party.

And the rest of the Jews acted hypocritically along with him, so that even Barnabas was led astray by their hypocrisy. Verse 14 is key. Let’s listen to this verse. But when I saw their conduct was not in step with the truth of the gospel, I said to Cephas before them all, if you, though a Jew, live like a Gentile and not like a Jew, how can you force the Gentiles to live like Jews? Now, so that we don’t have to get into an entire discussion of what Galatians is talking about here. It’s fairly simple from the wording that Paul uses that he says, Peter was acting like a hypocrite. And he says their conduct was not in step with the truth. And that’s the important thing.

Their conduct was not in step, so it needed to change to become in step with the truth. I think that’s a pretty simple point. I know I’m not telling you anything that you haven’t ever heard before. But that’s the change that needed to be made. So what if he had decided that despite being shown being wrong in his understanding, he wouldn’t change his ways? He wouldn’t follow the scriptures. He wouldn’t, as Apollos had done, go back to the scriptures and show that the Christ was Jesus. What if he hadn’t done that? But now you might say, well, Jared, we have the entire scripture before us. And you’re right. Most of you are probably holding a Bible in your hand right now. So you have the entire revelation from God.

I’m not saying that there’s anything else that we’re waiting on, because we’re not. But what I am saying is this even if we studied the Bible for a hundred years, I don’t think we would know everything perfectly. Otherwise, why would we come here and pray that we could find something in our lives that we could apply from the lesson that we learned? There are changes that we need to make. But as long as we keep the fear of God as our focus in mind, those changes, even though they seem huge, are really very small. Because we’re not changing the key thing in our lives. We’re not changing the fear of God.

Conclusion

So our story won’t be quite like King Josiah’s, will it? It won’t be like Apollos. It won’t be like Peter. I’m sure Peter would have really wished that Galatians was written before he did that. I’m sure he would have liked to have known the error so that he could have avoided it. But I guess sometimes things don’t work out that way. But let’s look now one last time at 2 Chronicles 34. And we’ll end here. We’ll start reading in verse 26. 2 Chronicles 34, starting in verse 26.

But to the king of Judah, who sent you to inquire of the Lord, thus shall you say to him. So now this is the prophet going to be coming back to the king and telling him what happened, what transpired when the prophet went before God to determine what must be done. And it says, thus says the Lord, the God of Israel, regarding the words that you have heard. Because your heart was tender, and you humbled yourself before God when you heard his words against this place and its inhabitants, and you humbled yourself before me and have torn your clothes and wept before me, I also have heard you, declares the Lord. 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 its inhabitants.

Verse 27 is key. God saw Josiah’s tender and humble heart. And he spared him the destruction that would bring that he would bring on the people for their actions. Let us work in our lives to emulate the character of King Josiah, the character of Apollos and Peter, and others like that throughout the New Testament, who changed their lives so that they would be in accord with Christ. So now I bring us back to the question that we ask at the very start. One last time. How does someone lay aside everything that they thought to be true and take on the truth? The truth of Christ?

The answer, as we’ve already said, is a fear of God, a tender and a humble heart before Him. So I ask you this question. Have you hardened your heart before God? Do you have a tender heart and a humble heart and the fear of God that you should have? If you would like to make a change in your life tonight, if you would like to make your heart tender, to humble yourself before God and accept his sacrifice, or if you would like the prayers of the congregation tonight, then I ask you to do so and come forward as we stand and sing.