Tag Archives: 2 Chronicles 34-36

Daily Bible Study

May 28, 2024 Bible Study — Setting an Example for Others to Follow

Today, I am reading and commenting on  2 Chronicles 34-36.

Josiah became king when he was eight years old.  His father was a wicked king who was assassinated by some of his court officials.  The people rose up and killed those who plotted against King Amon and made Josiah king (which suggests that those who killed Amon were attempting to usurp the throne in much the same way that Queen Athaliah had done some years earlier).  When Josiah was sixteen he began to seek God.  As part of his efforts to serve God, Josiah destroyed the altars to Baal and the Asherah poles erected throughout the land.  He went so far as to desecrate the places where offerings had been made to these idols.  He did not limit himself to the areas which we consider part of the Kingdom of Judah, but extended his cleansing to all of the land of Israel.  When he was twenty-six, he gave orders to repair the temple.  He used money which had been collected from all of Israel (the passage specifically mentions Ephraim and Manasseh in addition to Judah), which suggests that his religious reforms enjoyed support from people throughout the entire land of Israel.  So, while Josiah used his power as king of Judah to destroy idolatry throughout all of Israel, he enjoyed the support of the people outside of his domain in doing so.  By taking a strong stand for God, Josiah inspired many to also seek God.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

Daily Bible Study

May 28, 2023 Bible Study — Perhaps If We Serve God With All That Is Within Us He Will Delay The Judgement Which Is Coming

Today, I am reading and commenting on  2 Chronicles 34-36.

Josiah took the throne at eight years of age.  At sixteen he began to seek God.  As I read that, he didn’t really know what he should do, but he sought to understand what God wanted him to do, and did it.  At twenty he began to destroy the places of worship for idols in Judah.  At twenty-six he began to have the temple cleaned, repaired, and purified.  While the priests and Levites were cleaning the temple they found a copy of the book of the Law, which was then read to Josiah.  In a way, we see Josiah gaining a progressively better understanding of what it meant to serve God, until, finally, God revealed Himself to him.

But what I want to really focus on is that when the book of the Law was read to Josiah, he realized just how badly the people of Israel had angered God, and the terrible judgement which they were due.  In response to that understanding Josiah tore his clothes and mourned.  Then he sent messengers to inquire of God of what they should do.  The prophetess told Josiah’s messengers that he was correct that it was too late to avoid God’s judgement upon the people of Judah, but that because Josiah had humbled himself and wept before God, he, Josiah, would not see God’s judgement fall.  Josiah sought with all that was within him to serve God, and led the people to do likewise.  As a result, God chose to delay the judgement which their sin had brought upon them.  This should serve as a message of hope for those of us who serve God today.  Let us serve God with all that is in us and perhaps God will likewise delay the judgement which the sins of humanity are bringing upon the Earth.  Let us strive, as Josiah did, to serve God to the best of our understanding, and seek to improve that understanding.  Hopefully by doing so we will lead others to serve God.  Perhaps if we do so with all that we have, God will delay His judgement until we have gone.  And, here is my true hope, perhaps if we serve God with all that we have, we will inspire the next generation to do likewise, and God will decide to delay His judgement until they have gone from this Earth, and then perhaps the generation after that will follow their example.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

Daily Bible Study

May 28, 2022 Bible Study

Today, I am reading and commenting on  2 Chronicles 34-36.

Why did King Josiah march out to intercept Pharaoh Necho? (as an aside, whenever I read about Pharaoh Necho, I cannot help but think of the candy, Necco Wafers).  I mean, we know that King Josiah had joined the alliance against the Assyrians led by the Babylonians and that Pharaoh Necho was going to the assistance of the Assyrians, but why did King Josiah march out without God’s blessing?  In all other ways, Josiah acted according to God’s will, and even in this case he was acting in God’s will because God was bringing judgement against Judah for the sins of the people generation after generation.  Yet we also know that God had promised not to bring that judgement until after Josiah’s death.   This question has bothered me for many years.  I have chosen not to write about it because there are so many other things of value in this passage we can talk about.  Nevertheless we need to look at this decision made by Josiah.  We do not know that Josiah made a mistake in going against Pharaoh Necho.  We can think about the “what-ifs” if he had not, but we do know that God had had determined that Judah needed to face judgement for the sins of its people.  We do not know what would have happened had Josiah not chosen to join that war.  Perhaps he would have turned power over to his son peacefully and his son would have followed in his footsteps.  Or perhaps, his son would have done evil in the eyes of the Lord and things would have gone as they did anyway.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

Daily Bible Study

May 28, 2021 Bible Study Doing God’s Will Leads Us To Better Understanding Of God’s Will

Today, I am reading and commenting on  2 Chronicles 34-36.

When we look at King Josiah, we tend to focus on the discovery of the Book of the Law and his reaction to it.  We tend to over look that most of his reforms happened BEFORE the Book of the Law was discovered in the Temple.  At age 16, Josiah began to seek God.  This probably corresponded to the time when his regents began to let him begin to exercise some authority as king.  At age 20, he began to purge the kingdom of idols and places of idol worship, not just breaking down the places of idol worship, but desecrating them.  This probably corresponded to the time when he came into his full authority as king.  When he finished in Judah, he continued cleansing the land of idols and places of idol worship into the territory of the Northern Kingdom.  It was only after he had cleansed the land of idol worship that he ordered the repair of the Temple, during which the Book of the Law was found.  Until today I had never really thought about how when Josiah sought God, one thing just followed after another for good.  The same thing will happen for us.  If we seek God with all of our hearts, souls, and minds, God will reveal the next step we should take in order to further His will for us. Don’t worry about what you do not know of God’s will, just do what you know.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

Daily Bible Study

May 28, 2020 Bible Study Let Us Serve God for the Joy of Serving God

I am using the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

Today, I am reading and commenting on 2 Chronicles 34-36.

I love the story of Josiah.  He became king at a young age, clearly under the oversight of regents.  As he started to be allowed to make his own decisions he chose to seek God.  As soon as he was of age to rule in his own right he began to fight against idolatry in the land under his control.  Once he had cleansed the land of idolatry he turned his attention to restoring the Temple.  In the process of cleaning the Temple, the priests found a copy of the Book of the Law and brought it to Josiah.  Which raises the question of what Josiah and the others worshiping God were basing their actions on?  Perhaps they had traditions passed down to them from previous generations, or perhaps they had partial records of God’s Law.  The important thing is that when Josiah heard what was in the Book of the Law, he immediately responded to it and began implementing it.

King Josiah’s first act upon hearing what God actually required was to tear his clothes in grief over how badly the people of Israel had failed to keep God’s covenant with them.  His second act was to seek God’s guidance on what he, and the people, should do.  Then, when he was told that God’s wrath could not be averted, Josiah chose to enthusiastically worship God and follow His Law to the best of his ability.  Josiah did not serve God because he saw it as the path to wealth and power.  He served God because it gave him joy to do so.

Daily Bible Study

May 28, 2019 Bible Study — Do What You Know Is God’s Will And He Will Give You Clear Direction

I am using the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

Today, I am reading and commenting on 2 Chronicles 34-36.

Josiah took the throne at 8 years old.  When he was 16 he began to seek God.  At 20, which was probably when he started to have full authority and no longer answered to a regent, he ordered the destruction of all of the pagan altars and idols in the land.  He also ordered the purification of the Temple.  Once all of this was completed, Josiah ordered the Temple repaired.  What happened next never ceases to cause me wonder.  During the repairs they found the Book of the Law of Moses.   Which makes me wonder what Josiah was going by up until this point.  Did they have some partial accounts of what the Law of Moses said?  Or, was Josiah merely relying on oral tradition?  I want to note that because King Josiah did his best to follow God’s will based on his limited understanding of what that was, God provided him with a more complete understanding.  If you are unsure of all of God’s will for your actions, do what you know to be His will and He will give you clearer guidance.

In any case, Josiah was horrified to learn how badly they had been falling short of obeying God’s commands and went into mourning for their shortcomings.  He also instructed his top advisers to petition the Lord about what they should do going forward since they had failed so badly to do God’s will up to this point.  Here we see something interesting.  Only one of these advisers was a priest.  Yet all of them seem to be intimately involved in Josiah’s religious reforms.  A fact which tells us something about King Josiah.  He had surrounded himself with men who sought the Lord just as much as he did.  Despite getting an answer from God that the disasters described in the Law of Moses would fall on the people of Israel because of their unfaithfulness, although not in his lifetime, King Josiah instituted further religious reforms that implemented the entire Law of Moses.  He appears to have enforced his religious reforms over the entire land of Israel, even though his political control only extended to the area of Judah and Benjamin.

Unfortunately, after Josiah died in battle his sons and grandson did not follow his example.  When we get to the Book of Jeremiah, it will be worth remembering that King Zedekiah was King Josiah’s son.

 

Daily Bible Study

May 28, 2018 Bible Study — The Importance of Learning to Read God’s Word

I am using the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

Today, I am reading and commenting on 2 Chronicles 34-36.

    Josiah was Hezekiah’s great gandson. Unlike Hezekiah, Josiah’s father and grandfather were not godly men. They encouraged the people to worship idols. Josiah was placed on the throne when he was eight years old. Something led him to begin seeking the Lord when he was a young man of sixteen. The passage does not spell it out, but, if you read closely and do the math, you realize that Josiah began to act to turn his people to God as soon as he reached his majority and was no longer subject to regents. He did not limit himself to the traditional lands of Judah. Josiah extended his efforts to stamp out idolatry into lands which had been controlled by all of the tribes.

As an aside, if we combine what we read here with the account of King Hezekiah’s Passover celebration we discover that the Kings of Judah extended their control, to at least some degree, to all of the lands of Israel after the Assyrians destroyed the Northern Kingdom.

    I find it the differences between King Hezekiah’s religious reforms and those of King Josiah interesting. King Hezekiah restored the Temple and called people to worship God, then, in response to their worship experience, the people turned from idolatry and destroyed the idols in the land. On the other hand, Josiah acted to eradicate idolatry, then he restored the Temple and called the people to worship God. As we read today’s passage we discover that by King Josiah’s time the people of Israel had lost their knowledge of what God required of them. They clearly still had an understanding that God required that they worship only Him, but had lost direct knowledge of God’s Law. It seems to me that King Josiah thought he was doing pretty well at acting according to God’s will when he sent the priests to clean out and restore the Temple. However, when the priests found a copy of the Book of the Law and read it to him, Josiah realized how far he, and the entire people of Israel, were falling short of keeping their end of their covenant with God. Josiah acted at once to do his best to put things right with God, even after being told that such would only delay the coming disaster, not forestall it.

    We see in the timeline of Chronicles the importance of thoroughly spreading knowledge and understanding of God’s Word. When Jehoshaphat was king, he sent teachers throughout the land to teach the people God’s word. I am convinced that as part of that effort they taught many of the people to read and write, so that they could make copies of God’s word. But over time, those copies would have been lost or destroyed and no one provided the leadership to replace them. In Hezekiah’s time, the people, at least the most educated members of society, still know the contents of God’s Law. However, by Josiah’s time that detailed knowledge had been lost, apparently even among the priests and Levites. This passage also shows us that God provides, because when Josiah sought the Lord a copy of God’s Law was found.

Daily Bible Study

May 28, 2017 Bible Study — Doing The Lord’s Will In The Face of Coming Disaster

I am using the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

Today, I am reading and commenting on 2 Chronicles 34-36.

    Josiah’s father was assassinated when Josiah was eight years old and Josiah became king. When he was 16 he began to seek God. When he turned 20 he began systematically destroying and desecrating all of the idols, symbols of idolatry, and places “holy” to other gods. He did this not just in the territory of Judah, but in all the land that had been part of Israel. He then ordered the repair of the Temple. During that repair the priests found a copy of the Book of the Law. Josiah was horrified when he learned how badly he and the rest of the people of Israel had failed to keep God’s commands and immediately sought God’s guidance for what they should do. The response Josiah received was that it was too late to prevent the disaster which God was going to pour out on the people of Israel, but because Josiah had repented in sorrow for the sins God would delay it. Josiah chose to continue in faithfulness despite that being insufficient to prevent the coming disaster. I am always inspired by Josiah and his leadership. Under his leadership the people enthusiastically worshiped and served God in the face of impending tragedy.

Daily Bible Study

May 28, 2016 Bible Study — Doing What Is Right, Even When It Won’t Make a Difference

I am using the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading. I had been using One Year Bible Online, but it was time for a change.

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Today, I am reading and commenting on 2 Chronicles 34-36.

    Josiah was the last good king of Judah. He recognized that the people of Judah had ignored God’s commands too often and for too long. He understood that it was too late to avoid the coming judgment. Nevertheless, he chose to faithfully follow God’s instructions to the best of his ability. He did not follow God’s instructions in order to avoid suffering. He followed God’s instructions because it was the right thing to do. We should strive to follow his example.