Latest / Admonition Podcast / Lessons on Obedience -... | Dec 02, 2025 011
Transcript
- 0:02Good morning.
- 0:03It's good to see all of you here.
- 0:05It's good especially to have our visitors with us.
- 0:09We're grateful for your presence and we hope that you'll stick around for a little while afterwards and allow us to have time to get to know you better.
- 0:19This morning, wanted to take some time to examine some lessons on obedience.
- 0:28As a child, this was not my favorite topic, but I don't think it is anybody's favorite topic when they're a child.
- 0:37uh They have lessons to learn still.
- 0:43But there was a child in the days of Judah who became king.
- 0:51Turn your Bibles to 2 Chronicles.
- 0:55In 2 Chronicles chapter 34 we are introduced to Josiah.
- 1:01Josiah will become king when he is but eight years old.
- 1:08If you're wondering if it would be a good idea if we all put Micah in charge as of today, no.
- 1:18But Josiah will come to the throne of Judah at age eight after his father Amnon is assassinated, or Ammon, sorry, is assassinated by his own servants because of the evil
- 1:35that he was participating in.
- 1:38His father Manasseh had been evil, had participated in the destruction of the prophets, of killing the righteous, so much so that
- 1:48that it was said that the blood of the righteous ran in the streets of Jerusalem, and his son would follow in his steps.
- 1:59At age eight, Josiah will come to the throne.
- 2:03And in the life of Josiah, though he only lives and reigns for 31 years, he dies at age 39, we find some lessons on obedience.
- 2:16In 2 Chronicles chapter 34, one of the very first lessons that we learn from Josiah is it is possible to determine to serve the Lord from a young age.
- 2:32At age eight, Josiah will become king, but from day one, Josiah will be a stark contrast from his father and his grandfather.
- 2:46In chapter 34 and in verse 1 we read, Josiah was eight years old when he became king, and he reigned 31 years in Jerusalem, and he did what was right in the sight of the Lord, and
- 2:59walked in the ways of his father David,
- 3:02he did not turn aside to the right hand or to the left.
- 3:07For in the eighth year of his reign, while he was still young, he began to seek the God of his father David, and in the twelfth year he began to purge Judah and Jerusalem of the
- 3:19high places, the wooden images, the carved images, and the molded images.
- 3:26Josiah will come to the throne, and yes, there will be a period of time in which
- 3:31not much occurs, but by the time he's at the eighth year of his reign, which is when he is sixteen years old, he will begin to follow the Lord.
- 3:42He will begin to seek to understand what the Lord would have him to do as king.
- 3:50You might not be surprised, but most likely during much of the time, from the time he was eight until the time he was sixteen,
- 3:58He wasn't really making a whole lot of the decisions.
- 4:01He was more in a guardianship, as you might surmise from that.
- 4:07But as he truly begins to come to power, at age 16, he begins to seek the Lord's will for his life as king.
- 4:16And the 12th year of his reign, when he is but 20 years old, he will begin to destroy that which his father and his grandfather
- 4:27had erected.
- 4:29His great-grandfather had been a good king in Israel.
- 4:34Not a perfect king in Israel, but a good king in Israel.
- 4:39And as a result of that, as a result of the lineage of David and Hezekiah before him, Josiah will begin to correct the things that were wrong in his nation.
- 4:53He will begin to tear down the high places, something that even some of the good kings had not done in restoring that which was right in Judah.
- 5:04He will begin to tear down the altars and the images and the things that they had erected to the idols and in their idolatrous worship.
- 5:16Because at a young age, Josiah determined to serve the Lord.
- 5:24I've had it said to me before.
- 5:28usually by parents who struggle to understand the decisions their children are making.
- 5:37Well, I guess children just have to go off for a while and then you gotta hope that they come back.
- 5:47That is not the biblical example of what a child should do.
- 5:56That is not a consolation or a solace to parents who are watching their children depart from what they have been taught, depart from righteousness, and go off into sin and
- 6:09wickedness, and it is certainly not necessary.
- 6:15It is not a natural progression unless, of course, children have not been raised to do
- 6:25what the Lord has said and determined their path in righteousness from a young age.
- 6:32We have far too many examples in Scripture.
- 6:35We have far too many individuals like Daniel, like Joseph, like Jesus, like all of the Apostles.
- 6:43The likelihood is that the Apostles would have at least been three to five to ten to twelve years younger than Jesus.
- 6:53It's possible that as Jesus begins his ministry at age 30, some of his younger apostles are but 18 or 19 years old.
- 7:03and yet they will be faithful in following Jesus in being obedient to the Lord as they had already been receptive to the teaching of John the Baptist.
- 7:15It is not necessary for a good, godly young person to go off into sin in order to come back to God.
- 7:27It is possible for them to choose to be right and to serve the Lord from a young age.
- 7:33and we learn that lesson from Josiah.
- 7:37But then consider as well we also learn that we should not participate in evil.
- 7:43We should not even allow the vestiges of evil to persist in our lives.
- 7:49When Josiah comes to the throne, Judah, his nation, is participating in evil.
- 7:57They have been involved in evil for more than
- 8:02Five decades.
- 8:07And yet, when he comes to the throne, as he comes to his power, as he comes to the realization of what God would have him to do, he begins to correct and set right the
- 8:20nation and no longer allow them to persist in doing evil.
- 8:27But Josiah also realizes that they cannot even continue to have the vestiges of the evil they had participated in
- 8:37around them.
- 8:39You know, when God told Israel to go into the land that He was going to give them, God commanded Israel, when you go into the land, you tear down the altars to the false gods.
- 8:53You burn them with fire and you don't even pick up the gold and the silver that is in the fire that's been melted when you burn them.
- 9:01You just leave it there.
- 9:04God wanted Israel to make such a separation between themselves and the idolatry of the nations that they were going to judge on behalf of God that they had no remains left of
- 9:22that nation and their idolatry.
- 9:27But unfortunately for Israel, that is not what they did.
- 9:32Israel rather allowed those things to remain.
- 9:36They did not take them all away as they had been commanded to do, and slowly but surely, and all too often, quickly.
- 9:47They went from having those things as just objects of history to objects of worship.
- 9:57In verse 3 we read, in the eighth year of his reign while he was still young, he began to seek the God of his father David.
- 10:05In the twelfth year he began to purge Judah and Jerusalem of the high places, the wooden images, the carved images, and the molded images.
- 10:14They broke down the altars of the Baals in his presence, and the incense altars which were above them he cut down.
- 10:22And the wooden images, the carved images, the molded images, he broke in pieces and made dust of them, and scattered it on the graves of those who had sacrificed to them.
- 10:33He also burned the bones of the priests on their altars and cleansed Judah and Jerusalem, and so he did in the cities of Manasseh, Ephraim, and Simeon, as far as Naphtali and all
- 10:48around with axes.
- 10:50When he had broken down the altars and the wooden images, he beat the carved images in the powder and cut down all the incense altars throughout all the land of Israel, he returned
- 11:01to Jerusalem.
- 11:04When Josiah set about correcting what had been done wrong in Israel, he did not just make the worship stop.
- 11:14He did not just put a halt to the idolatry.
- 11:20He put a halt to the idolatry and then he annihilated everything that was left having to do with the idolatry.
- 11:32You notice there in the text that he made dust of the altars and scattered them on the graves.
- 11:37Do you want to know why he scattered them on the graves?
- 11:40Because he had already put to death those who were participating in the sin.
- 11:47Their judgment, according to the law, was that they were to be put to death.
- 11:51And that is what occurred.
- 11:53And then their graves had their altars scattered on top of them.
- 11:59Josiah said, no more idolatry.
- 12:08We learn from Josiah that when we are dealing with sin in our lives, it is important that we cease from sin.
- 12:23but it is also important that we remove the vestiges of sin out of our lives.
- 12:31Jesus as He is teaching.
- 12:36will tell people if your hand causes you to sin, cut it off.
- 12:43If your eye causes you to sin, pluck it out.
- 12:47Now Jesus isn't promoting the maiming of oneself.
- 12:51Jesus is talking about your life and your spiritual actions, and Jesus is telling you if there is something in your life that is continually pulling you back into sin, get rid of
- 13:06it.
- 13:09Jesus will tell us it is better to enter into heaven maimed or lacking that thing which we had attachment to than to go to hell whole.
- 13:24Josiah knew his nation had been stuck on sin, had participated in idolatry to such a degree that there was no way for them to have those things around them and pull themselves
- 13:41out of it.
- 13:44And so in Judah and Jerusalem, He will tear down the altars, He will destroy the altars, He will grind them to powder, He will scatter them.
- 13:53He doesn't take the gold into the treasury.
- 13:56He doesn't take these things and set them aside just because they were valuable.
- 14:01No.
- 14:05He gets rid of them completely.
- 14:08But He doesn't stop in Judah.
- 14:09By the way, He is going to be reigning after the northern kingdom of Israel is already gone.
- 14:15They've already been taken into captivity.
- 14:18And yet as He reigns, He's going to go into the tribes that remained and the pieces that remained out of Israel, and He's going to begin to extract the idolatry out of their place
- 14:29too.
- 14:32and ultimately he will return to Jerusalem.
- 14:38But we learn in verse 8, sometimes evil will not be removed quickly, but over years of diligent effort.
- 14:50One of the challenges that we have in our own lives is the challenge that Josiah had.
- 14:57He begins to reign.
- 14:59He begins to do that which is right and to seek the will of God in his eighth year.
- 15:04He begins to tear down these vestiges of idolatry in his twelfth year.
- 15:10It's a process and it takes time.
- 15:17Josiah was benefited by never departing from the Lord, but his nation didn't have nearly that same scenario.
- 15:29Josiah knew that he needed to take the time and spend the time and the diligent effort necessary to extract the evil out of the nation.
- 15:43And sometimes when individuals become Christians, there's a lot of old habits.
- 15:52There's a lot of old conditions.
- 15:56There's a lot of things that they've participated in for their entire lives.
- 16:03that need changing.
- 16:05And it doesn't all change overnight.
- 16:08It changes through diligent effort and taking the Word of God and comparing the Word of God to our lives and going, I'm going to be more like the Word of God tomorrow and today
- 16:22than I was in the past.
- 16:25I'm going to become more like Christ and the Son of God tomorrow and the next day and the next day than I've ever been before.
- 16:37Josiah knew that it wasn't going to be an overnight change.
- 16:43Hezekiah, his great-grandfather, had restored worship in Israel, had restored many of the right things, had done away with many of the idols, and as soon as Hezekiah died, the
- 16:58nation went full force back into idolatry under his son Manasseh.
- 17:07Josiah realized the difficulty of the things he was trying to do, and he took the time to diligently execute those actions.
- 17:22Sometimes we struggle with the fact that we're not perfect.
- 17:27Sometimes we struggle with the fact that we don't always do it right.
- 17:31Sometimes we struggle with the fact that we're not much better tomorrow than we were a year ago.
- 17:40And sometimes we get discouraged at our progress.
- 17:49But the truth is this, we often overestimate what we can do in a year.
- 17:57We often overestimate what we can accomplish and how we can change in a year.
- 18:03And we often underestimate how we could change in ten.
- 18:09If we would be diligent and persistent in making those changes.
- 18:16Josiah took the time
- 18:19and put forth the effort to continue to persist in correcting the evil that had been done.
- 18:30But then consider as well that we learn from Josiah that it is possible to spend years removing evil from your life and still not be right with God.
- 18:47Sometimes we look at the world around us and we look at someone who is not a faithful Christian, but we look at where they were.
- 18:59Maybe we knew them when they were growing up and they were the epitome of a heathen.
- 19:06Everything that was wrong, they loved.
- 19:09Every action that they could participate in that was immoral, they were all for it.
- 19:15everything that they thought could bring them a moment of joy, they would participate in.
- 19:21And perhaps we have observed them over the span of their life, and at some point they changed what they were doing.
- 19:28At some point they realized the destructiveness of their path, and they started to remove the evil out of their lives, and we look at that and we applaud that, we're grateful for
- 19:37that.
- 19:37That's wonderful.
- 19:43But we learn from Josiah that just removing evil isn't the same as being right with God.
- 19:53and Josiah is going to find that out.
- 19:57In 2 Chronicles chapter 34, we read in verse 8 in the 18th year of his reign, when he had purged the land and the temple, he sent Shefan the son of Azaliah, Maceiah, and governor
- 20:16of the city, and Joah the son of Jehoahaz the recorder, to repair the house of the Lord his God.
- 20:23When they came to Hilkiah the high priest, they delivered the money that was brought into the house of God, which the Levites, who kept the doors, had gathered from the hand of
- 20:32Manasseh and Ephraim, from all the remnant of Israel, from all Judah and Benjamin, and which they had brought back to Jerusalem.
- 20:41And they put it in the hand of the foreman, who had the oversight over the house of the Lord, and they gave it to the workmen, who worked in the house of the Lord, to repair and
- 20:50restore the house."
- 20:52They gave it to the craftsmen and builders to buy hewn stone and timber for beams and to floor the houses of the kings of Judah and to the floor the houses which the kings of
- 21:03Judah had destroyed.
- 21:05And the men did the work faithfully.
- 21:08Their overseers were Jehath and Obadiah the Levites of the sons of Merari and Zechariah and Meshallim of the sons of the Kohathites to supervise.
- 21:19Others of the Levites, all of whom were skillful with instruments of music, were over the burden bearers and were overseers of all who did work of any kind of service.
- 21:30And some of the Levites were scribes, officers, and gatekeepers.
- 21:34Now when they brought out the money that was brought into the house of the Lord, Hilkiah the priest found the book of the law of the Lord given by Moses.
- 21:46Here they are, they're repairing the temple.
- 21:50They're hiring the workers.
- 21:52The Levites, whose role it was to care for the temple, are overseeing the workers.
- 21:58And as they're doing this, Hilkiah has gone into the treasury, I believe the idea is, and he has gathered the money that had been collected, and he brings it out, in the midst of
- 22:10the treasury,
- 22:13They find the book of Deuteronomy.
- 22:19They find the book of the law.
- 22:23And they begin to read.
- 22:29Hilkiah is going to take the book of the law to Shefan, the scribe.
- 22:34Verse 15, he says, have found the book of the law in the house of the Lord, and Hilkiah gave the book to Shefan.
- 22:41So Shefan carried the book to the king, bringing the king word and saying, all that was committed to your servants they are doing.
- 22:48And they have gathered the money that was found in the house of the Lord and have delivered it to the hand of the overseers and the workmen.
- 22:55Then Shefan the scribe told the king, saying, Hilkiah the priest has given me a book, and Shefan read it before the king.
- 23:04Thus it happened when the king heard the words of the law that he tore his clothes.
- 23:12Thus it happened when the king heard the words of the law that he tore his clothes.
- 23:16Then the king commanded Hilkiah, uh Haikam the son of Shefan, Abdon the son of Micah,
- 23:23Shefam the scribe and Asiah the servant of the king saying, inquire of the Lord for me and for those who are left in Israel and Judah concerning the words of the book that is found.
- 23:35For great is the wrath of the Lord that is poured on us because our fathers have not kept the word of the Lord to do according to all that is written in this book.
- 23:47Josiah has set right many of the things that were wrong.
- 23:51Josiah has torn out many of the things that were evil.
- 23:54Josiah has decimated the practices of the idolaters, but now and only now Josiah realizes they haven't been keeping the law.
- 24:07And it's not just that his father hadn't kept the law.
- 24:11It's not just that his grandfather hadn't kept the law, but that for generations they hadn't kept the law.
- 24:24And Josiah admits what we should all realize, that it is because of their failure to keep the law that the wrath of the Lord was poured out on them.
- 24:46Josiah knows that there is a difference between removing evil and doing what God commands.
- 25:00And Josiah knows and Josiah realizes having been faced with the word of the Lord that it is not enough to pat oneself on the back and say, look how far we've come.
- 25:14if we're still not doing what God commands.
- 25:23Hilkiah, and those who are at the appointment of the king will go to the prophetess and she will tell them, "'Thus says the Lord,' verse 24, "'behold, I will bring calamity on
- 25:37this place and on its inhabitants all the curses that are written in the book which they have read before the king of Judah.
- 25:47The law gave both blessings and curses.'"
- 25:51And when Josiah sends word to find out and inquire of the Lord about the thing which he has now been, had read to him, he finds a message delivered back to him from the Lord that
- 26:03says, I'm going to carry out every single curse that I put in that book.
- 26:11on your nation.
- 26:17because they have forsaken me, verse 25, have burned incense to other gods, that they may provoke me to anger with all the works of their hands.
- 26:26Therefore my wrath will be poured out on this place and not be quenched.
- 26:31But as for the king of Judah, who sent you to inquire of the Lord, in this manner you shall speak to him thus says the Lord God of Israel.
- 26:40concerning the words which you have heard, because your heart was tender, and you humbled yourself before God.
- 26:46When you heard His words against this place and against its inhabitants, and you humbled yourself before Me, and you tore your clothes and wept before Me, I also have heard you,"
- 26:58says the Lord.
- 27:00Surely I will gather you to your fathers, and you shall be gathered to your grave in peace.
- 27:06And your eyes shall not see all the calamity which I will bring on this place and on its inhabitants.
- 27:12So they brought back word to the king.
- 27:17Josiah inquires of the Lord, and the Lord's answer is, yes, I will keep my word.
- 27:25Everything I promised your forefathers would happen to them because they would not keep my word, I'm going to carry out.
- 27:35but because of your humility, because of your humbleness, because of your contrite heart, because of your righteousness, you won't live to see it.
- 27:49Josiah doesn't receive that word, throw up his hands and say, well, so much for all the good that I've done.
- 27:58No, as a matter of fact, we read verse 29, then the king sent and gathered all the elders of Judah and Jerusalem.
- 28:06The king went up to the house of the Lord with all the men of Judah and the inhabitants of Jerusalem, the priests and the Levites and all the people, great and small.
- 28:14And he read in their hearing all the words of the book of the covenant which had been found in the house of the Lord.
- 28:21Josiah knows it's not enough for Josiah to read the book of the law.
- 28:25Josiah knows it's not enough for Josiah to know what God has commanded.
- 28:29Josiah knows it's important that all the people know what God has commanded.
- 28:36And so he gathers all the nation together.
- 28:38He gathers all the people great and small, brings them to the temple, and they read the book in their hearing.
- 28:49Then the king stood in his place, verse 31, and made a covenant before the Lord to follow the Lord and to keep his commandments and his testimonies and his statutes with all his
- 28:58heart and all his soul to perform the words of the covenant that were written in this book.
- 29:08There's a reason why I said it was the book of Deuteronomy.
- 29:11It is in Deuteronomy where you find the command, thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart and with all thy soul and with all thy strength and with all thy might.
- 29:24And when Josiah read the command, Josiah made a covenant with the Lord to do exactly what the book said.
- 29:39and all who were present in Jerusalem and Benjamin take a stand.
- 29:45Or he made all who were present in Jerusalem and Benjamin take a stand so the inhabitants of Jerusalem did according to the covenant of God the God of their fathers.
- 29:55Thus Josiah removed all the abominations from all the country that belonged to the children of Israel and made all who were present in Israel diligently serve the Lord their
- 30:04God.
- 30:04All his days they did not depart from following the Lord God of their fathers.
- 30:10For the thirty-one years of Josiah's reign, from this point forward till the end of his reign, Israel followed God.
- 30:20And as a matter of fact, chapter thirty-one, verse one, we find
- 30:24that they participated in the Passover feast, something that they had neglected to keep since the earliest days of Israel.
- 30:33Chapter 35 verse 1, now Josiah kept a Passover to the Lord in Jerusalem and they slaughtered the Passover lambs on the fourteenth day of the first month.
- 30:41That's what they were commanded to do.
- 30:43And he set the priests in their duties and encouraged them for the service of the house of the Lord.
- 30:48And he said to the Levites who taught all Israel who were holy to the Lord,
- 30:53Put the holy ark in the house which Solomon the son of David king of Israel built.
- 30:57It shall no longer be a burden on your shoulders.
- 31:00Now serve the Lord your God and his people Israel.
- 31:03Prepare yourselves according to your father's houses, according to your divisions, following the written instructions of David king of Israel and the written instruction of
- 31:13Solomon his son.
- 31:14And stand in the holy place according to the divisions of the father's houses of your brethren.
- 31:20the lay people according to the division of the fathers houses of the Levites and he's going to set in order all the pieces all the ordinances all the instructions all the
- 31:31sacrifices
- 31:34We go down to the end of the chapter and we read verse 16, And so all the service of the Lord was prepared the same day, to keep the Passover and to offer burnt offerings on the
- 31:44altar of the Lord according to the command of King Josiah.
- 31:47And the children of Israel who were present kept the Passover at that time and the feast of the unleavened bread for seven days.
- 31:53There had been no Passover kept in Israel like that since the days of Samuel the prophet.
- 31:59And none of the kings of Israel had kept such a Passover as Josiah kept.
- 32:04with the priests and the Levites, all Judah and Israel who were present and the inhabitants of Jerusalem in the eighteenth year of the reign of Josiah this Passover was
- 32:13kept.
- 32:1618 years into Josiah's reign.
- 32:20At age 26, Josiah, under his command, sets in order the carrying out of the exact commands of the Lord.
- 32:35And we are reminded.
- 32:39that number one, removing evil isn't the same thing as being obedient to God.
- 32:46But we are also reminded that if we are going to be obedient to God, we are going to obey God completely.
- 32:55And we are going to obey God fully.
- 33:00And we are going to do it exactly as He said to do it.
- 33:11It is important and it is paramount for us to not think, well, you know what?
- 33:18Just because the New Testament says that's how they did it in the first century doesn't mean we have to do it the same way.
- 33:26Just because that's how they worshiped in the days of the apostles doesn't mean we have to do it the same way.
- 33:33I know that's what it says, but times have changed.
- 33:39I imagine times had changed quite a bit from the days of Moses to the days of Josiah.
- 33:48And yet, in spite of the fact that nearly a thousand years had transpired from the days of Moses to the days of Josiah, Josiah did not argue that they didn't need to keep the
- 33:57command simply because that was the way they used to do it.
- 34:03No, Josiah was considered right in the eyes of the Lord because he did it exactly as they used to do it,
- 34:13because that was what the Lord commanded.
- 34:18We ought to be those who always obey God.
- 34:24We ought to be those who persist in repentance.
- 34:29We ought to be those who are ready to hear.
- 34:35Josiah didn't have the high priest come to him with that book, the scribe come to him with that book and say, no, I'm not interested.
- 34:45No, Josiah desired to hear what the book had to say.
- 34:52We need to be those who obey immediately.
- 34:57Josiah didn't say, well, let's hold off a few months.
- 34:59Let's see if things change.
- 35:01You know what, let's just give it some time.
- 35:03We've made a lot of changes recently.
- 35:04We need to just wait a little while.
- 35:08No, Josiah sent his servants immediately to inquire of the Lord.
- 35:14And then when he found the word of the Lord and heard what the Lord said to him, he immediately acted.
- 35:23And when we obey, we are to obey completely.
- 35:29We do not choose which commands of the Lord to keep.
- 35:34We choose whether or not we will obey because obedience is keeping all of the commands of the Lord.
- 35:44If you're here this morning and you're outside the body of Christ,
- 35:48Christ has established how a person is saved.
- 35:52And it's not by men's traditions.
- 35:55It's not by the things taught by some church or some doctor of the law.
- 36:02It's in accordance with the commandments of Jesus Christ.
- 36:06Jesus said, he that believeth and is baptized shall be saved.
- 36:11You want to do what the Lord says?
- 36:12There it is.
- 36:15But then he also said that they had to be faithful for the rest of their lives.
- 36:22Because being right with God means continuing and persisting in repentance and continuing and persisting in obedience.
- 36:33If you're here this morning and you're outside the body of Christ, why not change that?
- 36:37If you're a member of the body of Christ and you realize that you have not persisted in obedience,
- 36:44Perhaps Josiah's example is the example you need to immediately obey, to persist in diligently removing evil, and to persist in obeying every day.
- 37:01If you have need of the imitation, why not come now as we stand?