2 Chronicles 34

July 7, 2022

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Reading along with us in 2 Chronicles? Here’s today’s reading:

2 Chronicles 34 (NIV)

Josiah’s Reforms
1 Josiah was eight years old when he became king, and he reigned in Jerusalem thirty-one years. 2 He did what was right in the eyes of the Lord and followed the ways of his father David, not turning aside to the right or to the left.
3 In the eighth year of his reign, while he was still young, he began to seek the God of his father David. In his twelfth year he began to purge Judah and Jerusalem of high places, Asherah poles and idols. 4 Under his direction the altars of the Baals were torn down; he cut to pieces the incense altars that were above them, and smashed the Asherah poles and the idols. These he broke to pieces and scattered over the graves of those who had sacrificed to them.........Continue Reading

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This Post Has 6 Comments

  1. Josiah begins to clean up the mess from the last couple of kings and set things right. In the midst of the housecleaning the Book of the Law is found and immediately Josiah recognizes what needs to be done. He gathers the people to remind them that they have known all along what they should have been doing and yet were ignoring God’s words and instructions! Similar to our own lives when we separate ourselves from God’s word, when we hold it in our hands but do not hold it in our hearts! We have the instructions but we ignore them and we all know how well that goes when building something!

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  3. I have always loved the account of Josiah and his heartfelt conviction about the Word and his desire to conduct himself and the nation based in what it says. There is an upward progression in the chapter that starts with Josiah being drawn to the things of God at an early age. That leads him to repair the temple and provide the workers and materials to get the house of God in order. Now it does no good to build up the house of God if all the tools of false worship are around so he destroys them completely, even going beyond Judah to do so. Then the law is found and Josiah hears it with humility and repentance. This requires two things: he’s got to find the inside track from someone who has God’s ear to find out where he and the nation stand in relation to what he has heard. Second he has got to read the book of the law (probably the book of Deuteronomy btw) to the people. It was not enough for him to hear and just direct them, they needed to hear it too. It is most impressive about Josiah that even after hearing about the disaster coming, he doesn’t throw up his hands in failure, he doesn’t say it’s going to be on others, so let me rest on my laurels. He keeps moving forward and seeks to promote further faithfulness to God.

    I have been so impressed with the growth and influence of this man Josiah that I did the only thing I could to honor his legacy: and that is to name my son after him. May he follow God with the same intentionality and conviction that his namesake did!!!

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