Seeking Answers

KEY VERSE: osiah said “Go ye, inquire of the LORD for me, and for the people, and for all Judah, concerning the words of this Book that is found.” —II Kings 22:13

SELECTED SCRIPTURE: II Kings 22:12-20; II Chronicles 34:1-33

GOOD KING JOSIAH was about twenty years old when he undertook a religious reformation in Judah. He broke down all the altars and groves of Baalim. The carved and molten images he had reduced to dust, and sprinkled it over the graves of those who had formerly worshiped Baal. Next he set about repairing the holy Temple in Jerusalem so that the worship of Jehovah might be reinstituted there.

The funds for this purpose had been collected previously and stored in a remote place in the Temple by the Levites. When Hilkiah, the High Priest, went to bring out the money he found an old Book of the Law stored away also. This was quite a sensational find, since it had not been used for many years in Judah, and its precepts had been considerably forgotten even by those who were responsible for the Temple worship.

Even though he knew these were the commandments of the true and living God, Josiah was unsure of their meaning. At the time there was a prophetess in Jerusalem named Huldah. Apparently she was recognized for her righteousness and loyalty to the Lord and had the confidence of the people and the king. So Josiah sent messengers to Huldah to get what he believed would be an authoritative statement of what to expect.

The reply from Huldah was much as Josiah had thought: “Thus saith the Lord, Behold I will bring evil upon this place, and upon the inhabitants thereof, even all the words of the Book which the king of Judah hath read.” (II Kings 33:16) But Huldah had a word of comfort for Josiah. She reported the Lord’s words for him: “Because thine heart was tender, and thou hast humbled thyself before the Lord, when thou heardest what I spoke against this place, and against the inhabitants thereof, … and hast rent thy clothes, and wept before me; I have also heard thee, saith the Lord.”—vs. 19

A long time had passed in Judah without any detailed knowledge of God’s Law, except as it had been handed down from generation to generation by word of mouth. When Josiah learned how much there really was to the Lord’s Law, he made a covenant to “keep his commandments, and his testimonies, and his statutes, with all his heart, and with all his soul, to perform the words of the covenant which are written in this Book.”—II Chron. 34:31

Even the wording of this covenant—“with all his heart, and with all his soul”—had evidently been taken out of the Book of the Law which had been found in the Temple. Not only did the king enter into a covenant with the Lord to obey the Law, but he also enjoined “all that were present in Jerusalem and Benjamin to stand to it. And the inhabitants of Jerusalem did according to the covenant of God, the God of their fathers.”—vs. 32

What a wonderful example the life of this young king is as an illustration of seeking after God. The record is that “he did that which was right in the sight of the Lord, and walked in the ways of David his father, and declined neither to the right hand, nor to the left.”—II Chron. 34:1,2

“Ask … where is the good way, and walk therein.” (Jer. 6:16) May the Word of God inspire us to inquire of his ways and to obey his precepts in our lives.

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