The Simple Life

And the king commanded Hilkiah the high priest and the priests of the second order and the keepers of the threshold to bring out of the temple of the Lord all the vessels made for Baal, for Asherah, and for all the host of heaven. He burned them outside Jerusalem in the fields of the Kidron and carried their ashes to Bethel. And he deposed the priests whom the kings of Judah had ordained to make offerings in the high places at the cities of Judah and around Jerusalem; those also who burned incense to Baal, to the sun and the moon and the constellations and all the host of the heavens. And he brought out the Asherah from the house of the Lord, outside Jerusalem, to the brook Kidron, and burned it at the brook Kidron and beat it to dust and cast the dust of it upon the graves of the common people. And he broke down the houses of the male cult prostitutes who were in the house of the Lord, where the women ...

Then the king sent, and all the elders of Judah and Jerusalem were gathered to him. And the king went up to the house of the Lord, and with him all the men of Judah and all the inhabitants of Jerusalem and the priests and the prophets, all the people, both small and great. 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.  2 Kings 23:1-3 (ESV)   Leaders need to lead when it comes to the read and heed habits. Leaders are responsible to follow in a way that leads others to follow, and they are successful when th...

Josiah was eight years old when he began to reign, and he reigned thirty-one years in Jerusalem. His mother's name was Jedidah, the daughter of Adaiah of Bozkath. And he did what was right in the eyes of the Lord and walked in all the wayof David his father, and he did not turn aside to the right or to the left. 2 Kings 22:1-2 (ESV)   Josiah was young and powerful because he listened to God. Perhaps as a young man, he had already observed the futility of not following God. Perhaps at the tender age of eight, he felt totally inadequate to lead a nation, and that drove him to know and listen to God.    Whatever the reason, there is this ray of hope amid darkness. King after king that preceded him either refused to acknowledge God or did not completely follow God, and, at last, we will see what God will do with one who chooses to follow Him.   It seems a nation repents when those in charge show h...

They set up for themselves pillars and Asherim on every high hill and under every green tree,  and there they made offerings on all the high places, as the nations did whom the Lord carried away before them. And they did wicked things, provoking the Lord to anger, and they served idols, of which the Lord had said to them, "You shall not do this." 2 Kings  17:10-12  (ESV)   Doing what we are not supposed to do never turns out well.  Why would man, the created one, defy the one who created them? What sense does it make to ignore the only one who knows what is going on?   Willful disobedience is something that cannot end well. It did not end well for the people of Israel and Judah, and it will not end well for the people of the United States of America. Saying such things does not make me prophetic. It means that I read the Bible, saw the history ,and realize that those who ignore history are doomed to repeat h...

And this occurred because the people of Israel had sinned against the Lord their God, who had brought them up out of the land of Egypt from under the hand of Pharaoh king of Egypt, and had feared other gods and walked in the customs of the nations whom the Lord drove out before the people of Israel, and in the customs that the kings of Israel had practiced. And the people of Israel did secretly against the Lord their God things that were not right. They built for themselves high places in all their towns, from watchtower to fortified city. 2 Kings 17:7-10 (ESV)   Ignoring God is not a good idea, and those who do will wish they had not. There is not a good reason to ignore God. Those who ignore God do not know God, for if they knew God, they would never ignore Him.   The easiest way to get to know Him is to spend time with Him yet we so often do not do that until we are forced to do so.  Our refusal to learn from the past has wasted ...

And he did what was evil in the sight of the Lord, as his fathers had done. He did not depart from the sins of Jeroboam the son of Nebat, which he made Israel to sin.  2 Kings 15:9 (ESV)   And he did what was evil in the sight of the Lord. He did not depart from all the sins of Jeroboam the son of Nebat, which he made Israel to sin. 2 Kings 14:24 (ESV)    Over and over again, we see the same pattern. The next king did what was evil because he chose to follow a human king who did what was evil, and their evil affected the entire nation who also did evil because they were following their leader.  Why do we think that we will be the exception? Why do we think that history will not repeat itself?  We become so self-focused that we cannot see the effects of Godlessness in others and think we are so important that the ill effect of sin will not cast its shadow on us.   We need to learn from history, not repea...

And he did what was right in the eyes of the Lord, yet not like David his father. He did in all things as Joash his father had done. But the high places were not removed; the people still sacrificed and made offerings on the high places. 2 Kings 14:3-4 (ESV)   Why do we partially obey and hope that it is good enough?  Amaziah wanted to do right and thought that mostly doing right was good enough.  It is never a good thing to almost listen. Purity in thought and deed means that we lack impurity completely.    We are continually redefining terms that have already been defined. Obedience, love, hate, anger, good, bad, greed, commitment, and more, are words we have re-engineered to make them fit our lifestyle.  So, regardless of how we live, we are obedient, loving, good, generous, and committed people who are never really challenged by the truth.   Those who know and live in the truth would be able to confront us if...