I Have Found the Book of the Law

2012-03-19

“And Hilkiah the high priest said unto Shaphan the scribe, I have found the book of the law in the house of the LORD. And Hilkiah gave the book to Shaphan, and he read it. And Shaphan the scribe came to the king, and brought the king word again, and said, Thy servants have gathered the money that was found in the house, and have delivered it into the hand of them that do the work, that have the oversight of the house of the LORD. And Shaphan the scribe shewed the king, saying, Hilkiah the priest hath delivered me a book. And Shaphan read it before the king. And it came to pass, when the king had heard the words of the book of the law, that he rent his clothes.” (2 Kings 22:8-11)

After more than fifty years of utter neglect of the things of God, Hilkiah finds the book of the law in the Temple. Shaphan the scribe goes to king Josiah and reads it to him. I cannot imagine the feelings of fear and regret that this would have evoked. Manasseh and Amon were busy creating new idols for the Temple for more than half of a century, and this sacred book was somewhere buried underneath all of the demonic rubbish of these two kings. This spurred Josiah into action. He cleaned out all of the rubbish of paganism from one end of the kingdom to the other. He did everything right, including the restoration of the passover.

Here is an observation we can learn from Joshua through 2 Kings. When the leaders did what was right in the sight of the Lord, the rest of the kingdom did well. This was because the King would execute judgment on those who did evil with false religion. This would effectively remove all of the wicked people from the kingdom, and it would cause others to fear and worship God alone. This was the case when the judges ruled; the people did well when a judge ruled over them, but as soon as he died, they would revert to their old ways until the next wave of invaders would come. It was the same with the kings; the atrocities that king Manasseh did opened the floodgates for the people to worship the host of heaven.

Now Josiah purged the whole kingdom of wickedness. But afterward, we still read the following: “Notwithstanding the LORD turned not from the fierceness of his great wrath, wherewith his anger was kindled against Judah, because of all the provocations that Manasseh had provoked him withal” (2 Kings 23:26). The Bible says that Manasseh had shed a lot of innocent blood; this could not be undone.

This should scare us. This country, and any other country that legally sanctions infanticide, also known as abortion, will cross a line with God. Here in the United States, we have “legally” murdered the unborn (read: “innocent blood”) since 1973, with over a million abortions per year. It is too late for us. How could there be anything else to do? God will judge our country someday. I do not know when, but he will. Even if the whole country got saved tomorrow and walked with God, just like Josiah’s purging of Judah, all the good in the world CANNOT undo the wickedness of our country. We may be able to delay the inevitable if there were a huge revival, but it is coming.

When we throw the Bible on the ground and build pagan altars on top of it, just like Manasseh, we are still responsible for everything in the book. Mark my words, the demise of this country is coming. Our country was a gospel light for hundreds of years, but we have thrown it all away for comfort, luxury, and religious syncretism. Who is responsible? Yes, our political leaders are responsible. They are the ones that sanction evil with abortion, war, legalizing gay marriages, and not executing murderers, rapists, and kidnappers, which are all things that the Bible talks about. The people of this country are also responsible, because they vote these wicked people in there. But over all of that, we the American churches are most responsible, because we are the ones that are supposed to be salt and light in this dark world. But we have turned from the true Gospel of grace, and have preached other gospels: salvation by works in its many forms, universalism, the prosperity gospel, the social gospel, and the gospel of hedonistic humanism. We are responsible for our country more than the others, because if we served God the way we were supposed to, the rest would fall into place.

We need to reform our ways like Josiah, throwing down altars, ridding our churches with the filth that is plaguing us. Look at your life and start with you, and I will look at my life as well. What needs to change in our lives? How can we serve God? You may say, “But you say it is too late for America, why bother?” It was too late for Josiah as well, but he still did what was right. Maybe we will prolong judgment? Maybe many more can be saved? Who knows, but we must serve God despite the wicked world we live in.