Kings of Judah, Pt. 12: "Give of the Strength of Your Youth" (2 Chron 34)

GIVE OF THE STRENGTH OF YOUR YOUTH (2 CHRONICLES 34)
The greatest chess player of all time is arguably Gary Kasparov. He was the world’s youngest-ever champion at the age of 22 and was the undisputed king for more than two decades. The enigmatic and charismatic Russian Jew was known for holding his own against IBM supercomputers that could process up to 3 million chess moves per second.

Kasparov, however, shocked the world in 2005 when he announced his retirement at the young age of 41. Why retire at the prime of his life? He said part of the reason was because he saw no real goals left to accomplish in his professional chess career. Bushinsky, one of the IBM supercomputer programmers who met with Kasparov for a month, explained, “Kasparov’s resignation ‘was in the cards.’ Like Michael Jordan, he achieved all his goals.”

How does one improve when there are no mountains to conquer and giants to battle? How about when you have been there and done that at a very young age, like Josiah?

Two of the eight good southern kings – Joash and Amaziah were so disgraced before God and in the Scriptures that they never made it to Jesus’ genealogy even while bad kings were listed there. Joash killed the prophet Zechariah, his own cousin and the son of his uncle, good prophet and high priest Jehoiada (2 Chron 24:20-22). Amaziah (2 Chron 25:14-15) gave credit to idols after God gave him an unexpected victory over Edom. Three were above average but short of excellence, including Asa – due his bitterness, Uzziah – his pride and Hezekiah – his naiveté, all ended badly. The three godliest kings out of the eight good kings of Judah all begin with a J – Jehoshaphat, Jotham and Josiah. Out of these three, Josiah’s story is the brightest.

Josiah, the last good king of Judah, was one of the most righteous and most helpful kings who ever lived. God spared him from seeing the exile that would begin in the immediate generation (2 Chron 36:4).

What make a person truly great in God’s eyes? Is it turning to Him when you get into trouble? Is it helping people when they ask? The answer might surprise you, as it surprised me!

Your Attitude, Not Age, Counts in God’ Eyes
34:1 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 walked in 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, carved idols and cast images. 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, the idols and the images. These he broke to pieces and scattered over the graves of those who had sacrificed to them. 5 He burned the bones of the priests on their altars, and so he purged Judah and Jerusalem. 6 In the towns of Manasseh, Ephraim and Simeon, as far as Naphtali, and in the ruins around them, 7 he tore down the altars and the Asherah poles and crushed the idols to powder and cut to pieces all the incense altars throughout Israel. Then he went back to Jerusalem. (2 Chron 34:1-7)

A father who was frustrated and upset with his son’s grades at school attempted to get his 14-year old son to study for a test to pull up his grades. So he told his son in no uncertain terms the story of Abraham Lincoln, saying: “Son, when Abraham Lincoln was your age, he had a job and he walked 14 miles in the snow to get to school and every night, he came home and studied and did his homework, reading books by the light of the fire, for the next day.”

To this his son replied, “Dad, when Abraham Lincoln was your age, he was President of the United States of America.”

As Mark Twain said, “When I was a boy of fourteen, my father was so ignorant I could hardly stand to have the old man around. But when I got to be twenty-one, I was astonished at how much the old man had learned in seven years!”

When kids his age were attending school and having fun, Josiah was required to act like an adult. If anyone had reasons to moan about his or her childhood, Josiah had more. The last verse of the previous chapter notes that his father, King Amon, was assassinated and, therefore, Josiah was put on the throne at a tender age of eight (2 Chron 33:25). One can safely say that the boy did not have much of a childhood. He did not get to know his father and was mindful he could be the next target and victim. However, he showed teenagers and adults a thing or two about responsibility. At 16, in the eighth year of his reign (v 3), he had a spiritual conversion and had a personal relationship with God. At about the midpoint of his teenage years and the time to cause problems, challenge authorities and create havoc, he turned to God, got serious with Him and explored ways to serve Him. He was not the only good king to “walk in the ways” of King David (v 2) - so did Jehoshaphat (2 Chron 17:4), but Josiah was the only one who did not turn right or left, which means he walked the straight and narrow way all the days of his life and not straddle the fence, like Jehoshaphat, who incurred the wrath of God (2 Chron 19:2-3) for his alliance with Ahab’s house in marriage (2 Chron 18:1) and in war (2 Kings 3:7).

Josiah’s great-grandfather featured in the only other cleansing episode in Judah’s history; Hezekiah purged or cleansed the entire temple (2 Chron 29:18), but Josiah went one better: he cleansed the entire land (v 3). A dilemma: if great-grandpa Hezekiah had removed the high places, why did Josiah have to bother again? The answer was that his grandfather Manasseh rebuilt the high places Manasseh’s own father, Hezekiah, had demolished (2 Chron 33:3). Great-grandpa Hezekiah and young adult Josiah were the only two kings known to have removed all the high places and other pagan idols of wood or metal, almost all they could find or handle.

The wise Josiah went further than any king in reforming and reviving Judah. The Chinese say, “You have to remove its root when cutting grass斬草除根.” 2 Kings 23 tells us that Josiah not only removed the high places, he did away with the pagan priests appointed by previous kings and supported by tax money (2 Kings 23:5). He was the only king to follow in the tradition of Moses (Ex 32:20) who “ground to powder” (v 6) the idols of the people in the land.

Your Advancement, Not Advantage, Counts in God’ Eyes
19 When the king heard the words of the Law, he tore his robes. 20 He gave these orders to Hilkiah, Ahikam son of Shaphan, Abdon son of Micah, Shaphan the secretary and Asaiah the king’s attendant: 21 “Go and inquire of the LORD for me and for the remnant in Israel and Judah about what is written in this book that has been found. Great is the LORD’s anger that is poured out on us because our fathers have not kept the word of the LORD; they have not acted in accordance with all that is written in this book.” (2 Chron 34:19-21)

Tiger Woods shocked the world when he decided to make a drastic change, some would say a complete overhaul. Before turning 30 Tiger had won 10 major championships. Most players agree that they were merely playing for second when Woods had a good start.

Tiger won nearly half of the tournaments he entered in 2000 and overran the competition, but he decided to opt for a new swing teacher and a new swing method designed not only to make him a better player but also to take stress off his joints and muscles, especially after he had undergone arthroscopic surgery on his left knee in December 2002, but a 16-month slump ensued - 10 majors without a victory and only one PGA Tour victory to show. The critics thought Woods was nuts to make the change in the first place.

In 2005, however, Tiger came back with a roar and a vengeance. The golfer with the out-of-the-world swing had four victories that year and won two Masters, adding some 20 yards to his tee shots and displaying better than ever iron play. Woods explained to reporters and critics, “I remember having the same conversations back in ‘98 and ‘99 -- ‘Why would you make a change when you won the Masters by 12? Well, so I could win by 13, and I could win more of them. That’s the whole idea. That’s why I made the changes. “I don’t want to go back to 2000. I want to become better than that.’’
http://www.pga.com/pgachampionship/2005/news/woods080905.html

10 years after removing the high places (v 8), the 26-year old Josiah advanced another reformation in Judah when the Book of the Law was found. When the law was read, the king tore his robes (vv19). By this time, Assyria had long exiled the northern Israel and Babylon had previously imprisoned his grandfather Manasseh. The adult king did not tear his clothes (v 19) because his great-grandfather Hezekiah did (2 Ki 19:1); he tore his clothes due his comprehensive and mature reading and understanding of God’s word. He heard the prophecy, made the interpretation and read the signs. Josiah knew what others did not: the Lord’s “great wrath” (v 21) was about to fall upon Judah, as surely as the north was not spared. Later the prophetess Huldah would label it as unquenchable (v 25). 2 Chronicles 36:16 says there was no remedy. In fact, Josiah was the only one in the Bible, apart from the prophets later (Jer 21:5), who described and verbalized it as God’s “great wrath” (v 21) long before the exile occurred– not just wrath, but great wrath. Jeremiah would repeat those words again at the fall of Judah (Jer 21:5). This word “anger” is not the regular anger, but the Hebrew word “chemah” for wrath, as translated by KJV, NASB and RSV. It is furious, intense, blazing, scorching, searing and spreading heat, the word for Esau’s fury, outrage and indignation with Jacob (Gen 27:44).

Josiah was right; the prophetess of her generation concurred, announcing the theological reason: Israel and Judah had abandoned all the commands of the Lord and allied themselves with idols their hands had made – unsurprisingly, the same announced reason when the north was exiled (2 Kings 17:16). Their twofold sin was forsaking the commandments and forging the idols. The word provoke (v 25) was not used lightly by God; still the Israelites succeeded in doing so. Theologically speaking, only two things are real provocations to God. Summed up in 2 Kings, 17:11, the foremost was idolatry (Deut 4:25, 32:16-21, Judg 2:12, 1 Kings 14:9, 14:15, 15:30, 16:33, 2 Kings 17:11, 22:17, 23:19, 2 Chron 28:25), as led infamously by Jeroboam (1 Kings 15:30), Ahab (1 Kings 16:33) and Manasseh (2 Kings 23:26), and the second was evil (Deut 9:18, 31:29, 2 Kings 17:11, 21:15). Huldah agreed with Josiah that God will pour out His unquenchable (v 25) anger or wrath - “chemah.”

Josiah was a great king because he had a “responsive” (“tender” in KJV) heart, the only king so far, and he humbled himself, the only king to do so when not in trouble! Since it worked for bad kings like Ahab (1 Kings 21:29), Rehoboam (2 Chron 12:7-8) and Manasseh (2 Chron 33:11-12), too, wept in the Bible, but Josiah’s weeping (v 27) was outstanding, altruistic and humane. Unlike other kings’ tears, Josiah’s tears were for others and not self-caused.

Your Actions, Not Acquittal, Counts in God’ Eyes
33 Josiah removed all the detestable idols from all the territory belonging to the Israelites, and he had all who were present in Israel serve the LORD their God. As long as he lived, they did not fail to follow the LORD, the God of their fathers. (2 Chron 34:33-33)

A messenger who was sent by his king to deliver vital information to a distant city rehearsed the message over and over before he started on his journey. At the end of the first day, the messenger rehearsed it with satisfaction, but on the second day the messenger met a lost child and conscientiously took the child to find her home. That night he was concerned that he might have lost small parts of the message. The third night he arrived at a village whose well had gone dry and its inhabitants too weak to send for help. The messenger reluctantly agreed to take word to the next town to save the town from thirst and disease. That night the message was in parts unclear and his worry increased.

Each day thereafter the messenger was more distracted and more interrupted but he responded as best as he could. But each evening, when he rehearsed the king’s message, it became less accurate, less clear. When he finally reached his destination, he was in agony, for he knew that he could not repeat the message. To the governor of the distant town he presented himself, telling of his distractions and beating his breast in repentance for getting himself so misled from his sworn duty.

The governor bade him rise. “My son, Our king had dispatched another servant with the same message in written form. You may read what it says:
‘My Dear Governor: There is great suffering in the land, but our people’s hearts are hardened. I must find someone with eyes to see, a will to respond, and the courage to share the pain that lies about us to act as minister to my people. If you have such a person, and send him to me at all speed, for the time is short and the responsibility heavy.”

The governor explained, “Until you came, I had no such person to send, but now it is clear that you are he, for you have brought the message ten times more clearly than you could ever rehearse it.” (Adapted)

The altruistic Josiah was the last king to make a covenant with God (v 31), a practice long lost on previous kings other than the first good king, Asa (2 Chron 15:12). David (1 Kings 14:8) and Hezekiah (2 Chron 31:21) may have loved God with all their heart, BUT Josiah made a commitment to follow the Lord and obey Him with all his heart and soul (v 31) – his everything to God. “Read” (v 30) diminishes the actions of the king. Traditionally, KJV translates the word as “call” 528 times and “cry” 98 times, but merely 38 times as “read.” It suggests intensity, volume, commission. He is not merely the only king to “call together” (v 29), he does the reading himself.

The greatness of Josiah was not only that he did not want the problems in his backyard – nobody does, but he also rejected the thought of letting his neighbors’ backyard rot. So he reached out to the remnant or survivors in the north or Israel (v 33) after the latter’s dramatic exile to Assyria in 722 B.C. True, Hezekiah called the northern kingdom to celebrate the Passover in Jerusalem (2 Chron 20:1), but Josiah went one better; he went north himself. 2 Kings 23 tracks Josiah’s follow-up work in Israel. He did a demolition job at Bethel (2 Ki 23:15), to the source of all sources and the sin of all sins and the mother of all evils, to the first high place made by the first idolatrous king of the northern kingdom, Jeroboam, who set up idols in the north to discourage northerners to go to Jerusalem in the south for temple sacrifices. The Bible condemns the phrase “the sins of Jeroboam” and his house as many as 15 times (1 Kings 14:16, 15:30, 16:31, 2 Kings 3:3, 10:29, 10:31, 13:2, 13:6, 13:11, 14:24, 15:9, 15:18, 15:24, 15:28, 17:22) in the Bible. On top of that, five times the Bible deplores “the way of Jeroboam” (1 Kings 15:34, 16:2, 16:19, 16:26, 22:52). So Josiah made a concentrated effort to wipe out the ways and sins of Jeroboam and would not rest till then, which he succeeded.

Josiah was the first Good Samaritan in the Bible. After Bethel, the zealous and fiery southern Josiah went to the northern capital, Samaria (2 Kings 23:19), where he removed and defiled all the shrines at the high places that the kings of Israel had built in the towns of Samaria that had provoked the LORD to anger. He even slaughtered all the priests of those high places on the altars and burned human bones on them. Can you imagine the country was gone but the priests remained? It was such a deep-rooted problem, but Josiah was determined to get to the root of the problem. He was not going to rest or return to Jerusalem until he fixed the problem (2 Kings 23: 19-20). As readers know by now, Josiah did not subscribe to the “you die, your problem” mentality or “every man sweeps the snow in front of his house” philosophy.

To the end, Josiah not only kept his word to God, he carried other people on his back. The Israelites did not fail to follow the LORD as long as Josiah reigned and lived. The funny and ironic thing was the use of the word “fail,” or “depart” in Hebrew in the last words on Josiah’s story. The Israelites (2 Kings 13:6, 17: 22) and the northern kings (2 Kings 3:3, 10:29, 13:11, 14:24, 15:9, 15:18, 15:24, 15:28) did not depart from idols before, but now with Josiah in charge, they did not depart or fail to follow the Lord (v 33).

Conclusion: Give God your best when you are young. One is never too young to be in God’s service. You advance when you use the gifts and talents God has given you but you have no advantage when you do not use them. Do you despise your youth or age? Do you see the potential God sees in you? Are you thankful that you have escaped judgment while others did not? Have you reached out to others to tell them about God’s love, forgiveness and offer?