And when these things begin to come to pass,
then look up, and lift up your heads;
for your redemption draweth nigh.
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March 20, 2008:Traditions | Just a few more weary days and then... I'll fly away... And when these things begin to come to pass, then look up, and lift up your heads; for your redemption draweth nigh. |
| December 29, 2007:New Year's 2008 | ||
| November 3, 2007:How To Be Successful in Christian Ministry | ||
| October 23, 2007:Salmon |
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| Leaders Must Lead William H. Haller |
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In some respects, I feel like we covered some of what the quarterly writer covered this week, last week in dealing with church reform. Before I go on today, does anyone have any other thoughts about that?
Today, we deal with one of the better kings of Judah. His reign starts toward the end of the list rulers of this people. There had just been two wicked kings following Hezekiah - Manasseh and Amon. Manasseh had set up carved images in the temple and 2 Chr. records that he made the people to err and do worse than the heathen. The Lord spoke to Manasseh, but he wouldn't listen. For this, he was taken into captivity to Babylon. In his affliction, he calls out to the Lord and humbles himself. He takes away the strange gods and idols and altars and there is a brief revival. Then he dies and Amon takes over. He did everything his father did, didn't humble himself, and trespassed more and more. 2 Chr. 33:23. His servants slew him at home and made Josiah to be the king.
He started his reign when he was eight years old. He did what was right, in spite of what his father had done. This started in the eighth year of his reign (16 years old) when he began to purge Judah and Jerusalem from the high places and groves, carved images, and molten images that were abundant. He broke the altars to Baalim, burnt the bones of the priests on the altars, throughout the land.
In the eighteenth year of his reign (26 years old), he sent Shaphan out to start repairing the temple of the Lord. Hilkiah the high priest had found the book of the Law, and gave it to Shaphan to study. He reads it, and after giving a report to the king, asks if the king would like to hear the law that had been found. The king agrees and hears the law, and as he listens he rends his clothes and calls for Hilkiah the priest and others to go and inquire of the Lord what should be done since it was clear they weren't keeping the law.
Huldah, the prophetess, declares that because of the evil that was done in the land, God was going to bring evil on the land according to the words of the law that they had read. This was due to forsaking the Lord, burning incense to other Gods, and doing works with their hands (making graven images and metal idols to worship.) He declared that His anger was not going to be quenched, but would in fact be carried out. His only concession was that due to the life of the King and the status of his heart, He would refrain from pouring out His wrath until the King had died.
Josiah brings the people together at the temple, and reads them the law. He then finishes the purge of the groves, idols, and priests that had not been taken out in the first 10 years of his reign. The people have a revival and God's hand is temporarily stayed. He eventually is killed by Pharaohnechoh of Egypt and God carries out His plans against the people of Judah.
There are a few things to draw from this history that can be of use to us today.
The first thing is the relationship between the people and the leader. The people were continually allowing the foreign gods to influence their lives. The leaders of the people generally didn't have enough backbone to put a stop to it, and would end up taking up the same sins as the people. It was rare for a leader to come along and try to put the people on the right path.
The people's fight with sin was a long term problem for Israel. The duration of the kings of Israel and Judah stretched over around 500 years. The patterns that were ingrained into the people oscillated back and forth, over and over, during this period. Once sin gets hold of people, it is very hard to wipe it out completely. It keeps rearing its ugly head again and again. It takes a power from above and not mere legislation.
Josiah took the throne at a very young age (8). He did right in the sight of the Lord and it says he didn't turn to the left or to the right. But it is clear from reading the accounts, that he didn't make a very full effort at eliminating the evil from the people. He did start out and make several reforms and to read 2nd Chronicles, it is clear that he had little mercy for the false priests of the land. But he didn't try to completely wipe out the false religions of the land. I think that he had seen what God did to his father and grandfather, and wanted to do what was right, but was either too young or had too much of a wavering heart about it to really get serious. He said the right words and made a stab at bringing the people to task, but until he read the law, he didn't take the problem's of the people seriously. His was closer to a live and let live philosophy.
It is also pretty clear that he is more concerned about the outward forms than the inward. He was moving to tear down the places of the foreign gods, and eventually began to try to get the temple put back in order. Like many leaders today, he was more concerned about building things for God rather than the condition of his or his people's hearts toward God. God has always been much more interested in the condition of the heart than in the surroundings where worship is done. He started out with the people of Israel in a burning bush to get Moses' attention. That moved on to the tabernacle that he set up as a mobile soft building that the people could move about as they moved. A large part of this was to make the people comfortable from their fear of God. It was mostly the kings that wanted huge palaces for themselves and felt they needed to do something equally huge for God so He wouldn't be offended that pushed the huge temple building and restoration efforts.
After the law is read, we see that Josiah has a change of heart and finishes his task of wiping the evil out of the land. He does his job of making sure the people know the law. He begins the worship and remembrance services like the Passover that perhaps had not been done for a long time in Judah. He really tries to get the people back to worshiping God rather than just making a nice place for God to have as a temple.
Unfortunately it is too late. The best that he gets is an extension of the good times due to his heart until after he is dead. But that is all.
Today, with our political situation, it is almost impossible for a leader to try to bring the people to repentance. If a leader in the U.S. tried to do what Josiah did, the ACLU would be all over them in a heartbeat. We must have separation of church and state at all costs. There can't be the slightest hint of trying to influence the people to live holy lives for God or you'll be tied up in the courts for the rest of your life. Such is life in the U.S. today, and that is a sad thing.
Regardless of what the ACLU and others would like to believe and promote, the First Amendment of the Bill of Rights says:
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.
The Congress can't make a law that says the only religion that can be practiced in the United States is religion X. The Congress can't make a law that prohibits the free exercise of religion Y. That is absolutely all it says. Nothing more and nothing less. The founding fathers didn't want to have a situation like where they came from where the Church of England was the only officially approved religion and where your advancement was tied to what religion you practiced (or didn't practice).
It doesn't mean that you can't be a Christian and be in the federal government. It doesn't mean that someone in the federal government can't talk about Christianity if they want to (on or off the job). It doesn't mean that the president or a member of the Congress or the judiciary are prohibited from speaking their mind about subjects and using the religious background as part of the comments and argument, on government time. Indeed, any law that says otherwise is "prohibiting the free exercise" of their religion and is against the U.S. Constitution.
Believe it or not, they could even lead out in prayer in schools if they wanted - to pick a popular touchpoint for the ACLU. They are freely practicing their religion, and that is all right. If they are Christian, that is all right. If they are Muslim, that is all right. If they are Hindu, that is all right. The sad thing is that in this warped culture, if they were Muslim or Hindu they would probably get away without the ACLU taking notice on some cultural mind widening basis, but if it is a Christian prayer everyone gets all uptight. This isn't right or equitable by any standards.
Due to the constitutional protections, they can't go out and wipe out all the false religions in the land and destroy all the temples where the false religions are practiced. They can't have all the adherents killed. They can't order the people to all come and listen to the law of God. That is just how the founding fathers wanted it and that is OK. But by the same token, they shouldn't be penalized if they try to speak the truth that they know in their hearts and lift the people who want to listen to them up.
For today, I would truly be happy, if the leaders in the government and the leaders of the churches could all just start setting good examples for how they live their own lives. They have done a lot of damage to that Bill of Rights in the last century, and particularly in the last couple of decades. They want to legislate all the things that we can and cannot do in our own lives, monitor our telephone and electronic communications at will, control the borders more securely and even go so far as possibly requiring us to get permission to leave the country (soon to need passports for even travel to our neighbors Canada and Mexico), all in the name of fighting terrorism since the people wouldn't stand for those things in any other context. They are above all those petty details. Way too many scandals in their own ranks to be calling us kettles black.
I'm not sure that reading the Bible to them would be enough because many of their hearts are just as hard as some of the most evil kings of Israel and Judah. But it might be a start. Hear the truth and it will set you free.
If you go back over the last lessons, I've dwelt on the problems in the church today many times, so I won't spend a lot of time on it again. Of course this week did bring the downfall of another Mega Church whose leader battled sin as we all do. The thing is, God expects more of the leaders. Every time a leader is brought down, regardless of denomination or non-denomination, the cause of Christianity suffers. We need to pray for all of our leaders - in church, work, or politics every day that God will direct them in the ways they should go. Perhaps when they grow up, they won't depart from it.
In Josiah's time, the Law was what was read to the people. If Paul were to be around today, what do you suppose he would read to us of the New Testament to bring to remembrance how Christians are supposed to be acting and what Christians are supposed to be doing today?
Verses that spring to mind include:
And then, like Josiah, he would suggest that we read the whole thing from cover to cover and not have it be just as lost to us as the Law was in the temple. Too many times, the Bible is never opened among us so we never hear or read what God wants to tell us. After all, if we read the Bible He might point out something we should be doing and who has time for that? We all have favorite scriptures that we can recall, but there is so much more there that He wants us to know. We need to get back to being people of the Word, ready to give a word in season to anyone. We'll all be better for it.
