How God’s Word Changes Hearts

By Zach Chronley

In this series, we will explore Jesus’ family tree, looking at some key figures and their lives as told in Scripture. We believe the church is in part a family, and so we look to Christ’s family to help us see our own sin better, but also to know and worship Jesus even more.

Josiah

Imagine God’s Word being so lost to God’s people that a copy literally had to be unearthed in the rubble of the temple. This was the reality in the age of kings for the lands of Judah and Israel. Aptly recorded for us in the books of 1 and 2 Kings in the Bible, this was the period of time in which the descendants of King David had shattered the kingdom into two different countries. Israel to the north and Judah to the south. Reading through 1 and 2 Kings, we see God’s people descend further and further into sinful patterns and idol worship. Over the generations, we see many cruel men become kings and do evil in the eyes of the Lord.

Josiah was the grandson of the evil king Manasseh, the son of the equally evil king Amon. The Bible in 2 Kings 21:21-22 describes Amon this way, “he did what was evil in the Lord’s sight, just as his father Manasseh had done. He walked in all the ways his father had walked; he served the idols his father had served, and he bowed in worship to them. He abandoned the Lord God of his ancestors and did not walk in the ways of the Lord.” A group of his servants conspired then and took the king's life but were then executed by the people of Judah for their crimes. Then Josiah became king at Eight-years-old because his father was assassinated.

This kind of betrayal and murder was not uncommon in that day, but Josiah’s story was far from ordinary. We do not know much of Josiah’s early life, how the loss of his father at a young age or the abruptness of his coronation affected him, but we do see that 2 Kings 22:2 introduces Josiah by saying, “He did what was right in the Lord’s sight and walked in all the ways of his ancestor David; he did not turn to the right or the left.”

Abandoned Scriptures

The important turning point in Josiah’s life happened during the 18th year of his reign. Josiah had raised money to repair the temple, and during the repairs, we are told that the high priest at the time, Hilkiah, found “the Book of the Law” (The Scriptures).

In one sense, it seems a bit hard to imagine that God’s own nation would have so completely lost its connection to God’s word that it literally had to be unearthed and rediscovered. And yet, at the same time, when we look around at our culture, while some may claim to believe and follow God’s word, they too might be shocked to find out what it truly has to say about the way we live our lives. The nation of Judah still had priests and still had a cultural form of following God, but they had completely lost connections to the Words of God and chose to co-worship other gods. Because of this, God continued to send invading armies against them in order to cause God’s people to return to him.

Hilkiah, the high priest, after finding the book of the Law, sends it to king Josiah. We are told that when it was read to him, he tore his clothes as a sign of mourning and repentance. All the cultural religion in the world cannot do what a simple reading of God’s Word was able to do: change Josiah’s heart. We see that the rest of his life was spent enacting a series of reforms and cleansing Judah of its many places of idol worship. Sadly, it was not enough to turn away God’s wrath against the nation. 2 Kings 3:25-27 records this:

“Before him there was no king like him who turned to the Lord with all his heart and with all his soul and with all his strength according to all the law of Moses, and no one like him arose after him. In spite of all that, the Lord did not turn from the fury of his intense burning anger, which burned against Judah because of all the affronts with which Manasseh had angered him. For the Lord had said, “I will also remove Judah from my presence just as I have removed Israel. I will reject this city Jerusalem, that I have chosen, and the temple about which I said, ‘My name will be there.’””

While it may not have been enough to save Judah from destruction, it was enough to save Josiah. And Josiah led a great many people to enter back into a covenant with the Lord. 2 Kings 23:2-3 tells us, “And he read in their hearing all the words of the Book of the Covenant that had been found in the house of the Lord. And the king stood by the pillar and made a covenant before the Lord, to walk after the Lord and to keep his commandments and his testimonies and his statutes with all his heart and all his soul, to perform the words of this covenant that were written in this book. And all the people joined in the covenant.”

Return To Him (And His Word)

Have you ever felt so far from God's Word that it literally feels lost to you? Turn to it, weep, mourn, and repent where you fall short of it. God has the power to change our hearts, and one of the main ways he does this is by a constant renewal of our minds through reading his Word. It does not matter how long it has been since you last read his Word; Zechariah 1:3 says: Therefore say to them, Thus declares the Lord of hosts: Return to me, says the Lord of hosts, and I will return to you, says the Lord of hosts.” And again, James 4:8-10 tells us, “Draw near to God, and he will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you double-minded. Be wretched and mourn and weep. Let your laughter be turned to mourning and your joy to gloom. Humble yourselves before the Lord, and he will exalt you.”

So return to him and his Word, even now!