Full Transcript

I trust that many of those phrases in that video have become part of your prayer life over the last few weeks as we’ve been in this series entitled “Awakenings.” It doesn’t take a whole lot of spider sense to look around the culture and know that this culture needs an awakening. But even closer to home, in your family, in my heart, in your heart, I trust that you have been crying out to God for an awakening.

We’ve been using a Scripture verse as part of our script, as we’ve been asking God to do that. It’s Habakkuk 3:2. I have challenged us as a church to memorize that verse. How many of you have worked on that verse? Either individually or as a family, you’ve put a little time, a little effort into that verse? How many of you feel like that if I didn’t make you do it in front of the whole church, you might be able to get through most of it?

Do you feel like you’ve about got it? So Jeff, you got your hand up there, so I’m going to make you do it in front of the whole church. So, stand up and turn around and you’re going to quote now, Habakkuk 3:2. I’m stalling for you so you can get that memory going. You think you can get it done? (Jeff says, “I think I can get it done.”) All right man, it starts with the word, “O…” That’s your only hint. (Jeff quotes the verse perfectly.) He got it. Way to go, Jeff. (Congregation applauds.)

All right, so he just set the example. Let’s all say it together. “O Lord, I have heard the report of you and your work, O Lord, do I fear. In the midst of the years, revive it; in the midst of the years make it known; in wrath remember mercy.” And we’ve learned that there is a special place in the Bible that kind of gives us the history of the great awakenings among the people of God in 2 Chronicles.

Let me ask you get your Bibles open to 2 Chronicles 34 this week. We see a pattern in that book that really is the pattern throughout all of the great awakenings. We’re supposed to be up and to the right on mission in worship with God. That is our mandate from God and that is where we’re supposed to be.

But sometimes we get lazy and apathetic and we get other things on our mind, and give our love and even our worship to other things. We go into seasons of decline, and that invites the discipline and the judgment of God. And that ought to get our attention so that we cry out, “O Lord, in wrath remember mercy.”

And God hears the cry of an individual, a family, a church, even a nation that will call out and cry up to him. And he has historically sent revival to the church that spills over into the community in a great awakening where people are now sensitive to the gospel of Jesus Christ that puts us back in worship and back on mission with God. And we want to stay up and to the right.

So that’s what we’re believing God for in this series entitled, “Awakenings.” And in the book of 2 Chronicles is the most famous revival verse in the bible. Most of us even might know that. 2 Chronicles 7:14. Why don’t we say this together? Say it with me. “If my people who are called by my name humble themselves, and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven and will forgive their sin and heal their land.”

In this verse, we have four conditions of revival. We have three results of revival. And so we’ve been walking through these four different conditions. A few weeks ago, we looked at a king who humbled himself in 2 Chronicles 12. Do you remember the name of that king? Anybody remember? Who was it? Rehoboam. And he humbled himself, and the Lord saw his humility and sent an awakening.

And we learned that King Rehoboam actually stopped a little short on those conditions. And so we looked at a king, in 2 Chronicles 20 last week, who prayed. Do you remember his name? What was his name? Jehoshaphat. And do you remember his prayer? “Lord, we do not know what to do but…” (Congregation responds.) “…our eyes are on you.” And God averted the disaster that he had planned for that nation.

So today, that brings us to the third condition of revival. It is to “Seek my face.” And we’re going to look at a different king here in 2 Chronicles 34 that did exactly that. Before we look there in Chapter 34, let’s just consider this phrase, “Seek my face.” God has given us an invitation to seek his face.

Let’s talk about what that means. First of all, let’s understand that seeking God’s face is more about an attitude than it is anything else. It’s about an attitude. Not so much an action. It’s not something you check off on your to do list. It is more of a direction that it is a destination. You’re never going to wake up one day and say, “Boy, after ten years, after twenty years of seeking God’s face, I finally found it. I guess I don’t have to do that tomorrow. I’ll move on to other things.” It is a direction of your entire life that says, “I’m going to keep pressing, I’m going to keep pursuing, I’m going to keep seeking the face of God.”

It’s an orientation of my heart more than it is plugging information into my brain. It’s not learning some secret knowledge about God. It’s not getting a special revelation from God that’s unique to you. It’s not discovering something that no one else has ever found before. It’s an orientation of your heart. And it’s very important that we understand that God says, “I want you to seek my face. Not my belly button. Not my kneecap. And not my hand.”

So often we come to God seeking God’s hand. We want something that he gives us. We want his forgiveness. We want help. We want direction. “God if you could just tell me what’s coming next, I would do that.” That’s okay, but that’s not what God’s invited us to seek. He’s invited us to seek his face.

I’ve got some new software on my computer and it’s even shown up on Facebook. Have you ever tried to tag people on Facebook on different pictures and stuff? And now, you’re facial recognition software will actually try to guess who that face belongs to. Have you ever noticed that? And so, on some of my pictures, it’ll pop up and say, “Is this Andrea?” I’m like, “No, that’s Allison, my daughter who looks a lot like my wife.” But it’s up to me to say, “No, that’s a face that belongs to somebody else.”

Now, let me show you how important this is right now by a little demonstration here. This is group participation time and we’re about to break every rule of church growth ever written about, okay? Because I’m going to create an awkward moment in church. All right? Before I create the awkward moment, I want to create a very natural moment.

This is what I want you to do. I want you to look into the face of someone that you either came to church with or that you know very well, and I want you to do it for a period of at least ten seconds. Everybody do that right now. (Counts to ten.) All right. Now wasn’t that a nice exercise in church? Some of you had a really busy week and you didn’t even do that all week long. You had to come to church and have the preacher give you an assignment in order for you to do that. You ought to do that more often. Was that a hard exercise? That wasn’t hard, was it? It’s like, “Man, I like that. That was pleasurable. We should do that more often.” Right?

Now, let me create a little awkwardness. I want you to look in to the face of somebody that you have no idea who this person is. “I don’t know their name. I’ve never seen them before.” And I want you to do it for a period of ten seconds. Go! (Counts to ten.) Now, do you know what happened when I got to the number ten? I saw heads snap around so quick to look back at me. Because that was awkward, wasn’t it?

And some of you, you couldn’t even do it. You just started talking to the person, like, “I’ve got to know your name if I’m going to stare at you” Right? “Let me tell you who I am before we do this.” Because we’ve got to break down the awkwardness, right? Well, God says, “I want you to seek my face.” It’s going to be a very awkward thing for you to seek the face of God if you have no relationship, if you have no history. As a matter of fact, you’re going to want to resist it. Because God is so other than you.

As a matter of fact, we need to understand that if you’re a theologian, you’re already a step ahead of me here, because you’re already thinking back to a time, earlier in the Bible, in the book of Exodus when Moses wanted to seek the face of God. And God warned him of something in Exodus 33:20. He said, “You cannot see my face, for man [who is sinful] shall not see me and live.”

It’s a very dangerous thing to seek the face of God. Do you know what God is saying in this verse? “I am so holy. I am so other. I am unlike you in every way that if you were to actually see my face, it would actually melt your face off.” And so, be careful what you’re asking for here. So it’s like, “Well, does he want us to seek his face or not? He invited us to seek his face and he’s telling me he’s going to melt my face off.” How do you resolve that?

Great question. The answer is the story of the entire Bible. How do you begin a relationship with God who is holy and unlike you and has the ability to incinerate you in his presence? A sinner. Someone who’s ignored him, violated his will and lived your life as if you were God. You’re going to come into his presence? How are you going to do that without having your face melting off?

New Testament. The Bible tell us in 2 Corinthians 4:6, “For God who said, ‘Let light shine out of darkness,’ has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.” God has given us his son Jesus as the mediator, and Jesus had a real face. And it’s through the work and the person of Jesus Christ that we can now come as a sinner covered by the grace. And the atoning sacrifice of Jesus that gives us the ability to relate to God in a way that is not awkward and is not dangerous any more.

And he’s inviting us. If you want to experience an awakening, you have to come to my face. Because my face is the gateway to my mind, and my soul. God wants that kind of intimacy with you. He doesn’t want you just to know facts about him. He wants you to know his ways and his will and his character and his nature. He wants you to seek him for the sheer pleasure of spending time in his company.

That’s what we’re going for in seeking the face of God. That is so much more than asking God to give you a better car. Or to bail you out of jail. Seek the face of God. So we’re going to see a person that did that, and we’re going to see it here in 2 Chronicles 34:1.

Here’s the first point of the message:

 

• God awakens an available (v. 1-2)

 

Let’s introduce you to our hero. His name is Josiah. 2 Chronicles 34:1, “And Josiah was eight years old when he began to reign.” Wait a minute. An eight-year-old king? We’ve got a problem here. How do you resolve that?

Now you should already be asking why an eight year old? Anybody here the parent of an eight year old? What are eight year olds seeking? The next Lego set? A later bedtime? A doughnut? I mean, there’s a lot of things that eight year olds seek. God is usually not real high on the priority list, right? And so here we have an eight year old king. And you’re like, “Man, the only thing worse than an eight year old king is a king that’s acting like an eight year old.” Anybody agree with that? Okay?

So, how are we going to have an awakening with an eight year old king? That’s the first question. So the question is like, “God, why an eight year old?” I think I know the answer. The reason that God uses an eight year old to spark an awakening is because God couldn’t find a nine year old with a blameless heart. Or a thirty-nine year old. Or a fifty-nine year old.

Do you know the condition that was going on in the country when this eight year old began to reign? Here’s what we find again in the book of 2 Chronicles. God was looking for someone with a blameless heart. 2 Chronicles 16:9 says, “For the eyes of the Lord run to and fro throughout the whole earth to give strong support to those whose heart is blameless toward him.” The person that God uses is someone who is available with a blameless heart. And God will use anyone who is available with a blameless heart.

This was an unlikely candidate for God to use to spark the next great awakening. Let me tell you a little bit about Josiah’s family background. How many of you have a Christian heritage in your family? I mean, by the time you were eight, you had been introduced to the gospel, you had a children’s bible in your name, and you had a drug problem. You were drug to church every week for eight years, right? And you were addicted because you had a godly father, a godly mama, a godly granddaddy. How many of you had a godly granddaddy?

Thank God for godly granddaddies, right? How many of you had a godly daddy? That’s great. You had an advantage Josiah didn’t have. Let me tell you about Josiah’s granddaddy. Josiah’s granddaddy, you read about him in the previous chapter, chapter 33. His name was Manasseh. And Manasseh, let’s just read it. Just flip back. You can look over one page earlier.

And look in verse 6. Manasseh in verse 6, “he burned his sons.” Now, there have been times as a dad that I considered that option, but the restraining power of the Holy Spirit convinces you to use another form of discipline. Okay? So, Manasseh actually burned his sons. But he wasn’t disciplining his son.

Listen, he was so messed up, he thought he was actually worshiping God by burning his sons. Look at what it says. “He burned his sons as an offering in the Valley of the Son of Hinnom, and used fortune-telling and omens and sorcery…” this is sounding like a Harry Potter movie here. “…with mediums and necromancers.” Do you know what a necromancer is? It’s a person that talks to dead people. And “He did much evil in the sight of the Lord, provoking him to anger.” You think? I mean, how much more ungodly could you be? This guy is so far from God he thinks he’s obeying God by sacrificing his son.

This was not a good king. Anybody want to serve under that king? That king, Manasseh, reigned for fifty-five years. They had not yet figured out term limits apparently. And so the wicked king just continued to generate more wickedness and more evil and push the nation further and further away from God. Finally, he died, and his son became king.

He son was named Amon. The name Amon is not even a Hebrew, Jewish name. it’s the name connected to a pagan god. So he named his son after a pagan god. And Amon, we don’t have a lot of history on Amon, but the last few verses there in chapter 33 tell us that Amon reigned for two years, and what cut his reign short is that he was assassinated.

So here’s Josiah, an eight-year-old orphan with a pagan granddaddy and an absent father. Now, I don’t know what kind of family you came out of. That was not someone that was likely to follow after God. Do you know what that tells us? God can use anybody who makes themselves available with a blameless heart. And God shows up and puts his favor on Josiah.

Here’s what we learn about Josiah. Before an eight year old seeks God, God seeks an eight year old. And whether you realize it or not, God is the seeker, and you, this morning, are being sought. I don’t know what you went through this week. You may not have thought about God a single second. In the time that you were not thinking about God, God was thinking about you. And God brought you to this service. And God is seeking you and drawing you and saying, “Are you available? Seek my face. Seek my face.” He’s giving you an open invitation to seek his face.

And Josiah was an eight year old with a bad heritage. But here’s what he understood. You do not get to choose your heritage, but you can choose your legacy. If you’ve been given a godly heritage, don’t waste it. If you’ve been given a heritage of pagan worship, change your legacy. And you can be the first one in your link in the chain to send your family in a better direction than the one that you got by your daddy or your granddaddy. God is seeking those that will make themselves available to him.

Here’s another lesson we learn about Josiah. It is never too early or too late to begin seeking the Lord. Look at verse 2. In verse 2 it says, “He did what was right in the eyes of the Lord…” So there’s the eyes of the Lord. They found Josiah doing right. And he “…walked in the ways of David his father…” Now I want you to underline in verse 2 where it says, “he walked in the ways…” You see that? Just underline that. We’re going to come back to it in a minute.

He “…walked in the ways of David his father; and he did not turn aside to the right hand or to the left.” It is never too early to begin to seek the Lord. Where are the young people here? Raise your hand if you’re young. Some of you fifty-five year olds, your time okay, put your hand down, all right? See the young people? I’m talking to you right now. Okay? Listen to me. Eye contact. Eyeballs. Especially if your last name is Griffith.

Okay, so, here’s what you have to understand. It is never too early to begin to seek the Lord. It is never to early to get serious, sold out, passionate, like a heat-seeking missile. On it everyday, going after the face of God. But listen to me, the longer you wait, the harder it will become.

Is there anybody here? Now I’m talking to the old people now. Okay? If you were not in the first category, you are now the people I’m talking to. Okay? How many of you regret seeking God so soon? Anybody here like, “Man, I wasted a lot of fun. Could have gotten drunk and had a hangover and thrown up. Could have gone through two or three marriages by then. And have a bunch of dysfunctional children.”

Anybody here regret seeking God so soon? All right, young people, I’m now talking to you a second. I want you to watch something. Watch this. How many of you here regret waiting so long before you began to seek the Lord? Keep your hand in the air. They’re watching you.

You have regrets like, “Man, why didn’t I do this sooner? Eight years old. That would have been a great time to start seeking the Lord or at least walking in the ways of our father David.” Listen, it’s never too early to begin to seek the Lord, and it’s never too late. But the longer you wait, the harder it becomes. And here’s the lesson for all of us. No matter what age you currently are, now is the time to seek the Lord.

Josiah was eight years old. He didn’t have a whole lot of advantage, but somehow he knew about this guy named David. Now what’s interesting about this verse; it says that David was his father. But we already saw, who was his father? What was his name? Amon. Who was his granddaddy? Manasseh. So who’s this guy named David? David was actually his great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-granddaddy. I don’t know if I counted sixteen, but it was sixteen generations earlier that David was king.

And there’s something that Josiah must have known about this guy, this king who left him a legacy of seeking after the heart of God. Because David was a man after God’s own heart. And so this is what Josiah must have done. He knew about his daddy and he knew about his granddaddy. Not real impressed. He’s like, “I think I’m going to go around those guys, way back 360 years earlier, to find a guy who had a heart after God. That’s the guy that I want to imitate in my life.” And that’s who he walked in his ways.

Here’s the second point:

 

• God awakens a seeking (v. 3a)

 

Look at verse 3. “For in the eighth year of his reign…” Let’s do a little math in church. In the eighth year of his reign, how old would he have been? Sixteen. Excellent. So the question is: is a sixteen year old a boy, or a man? Let’s let the Bible settle it. “For in the eighth year in his reign, while he was still yet a boy…” So, biblically speaking if you’re sixteen, you’ve got to wait at least one more year, okay? Before you can actually start calling yourself a man. You’re still a boy.

But when he was still a boy, at sixteen.  Now I love Josiah, because I was about sixteen years old when the same thing happened to me. “While he was yet a boy, he began to seek the God of David his father.” Now, notice the difference. He began to seek the God of David his father. Verse 2 tells us that he walked in the ways of his father. What’s the difference? What’s the difference in seeking the God of your father and walking in the ways of your father?

Let me tell you the difference. If you walk in the ways of your father, if you had a godly father, you’ll be a good boy. You won’t be a troublemaker. You’ll be likeable. You’ll know all the rules. You’ll be well respected. And you’ll have all the answers in youth group. And you will fake your way through the Christian life and not seek the God of your father.

When you stop being content to walk in the ways and just kind of tolerate God so you won’t get in trouble, not just admire God from a distance, but when you make the choice, “I am no longer content in walking in the ways of my father, but now I’m going to seek the God of my father,” all of a sudden God becomes real to you. You own him in such a way that you have a personal relationship that is not dependent upon your father anymore. It’s just dependent on your available heart and God’s grace to you, inviting you to seek his face. All of a sudden, God becomes personal. You can’t stay away from encounters with him, because you realize that encounters with God are the only thing that satisfy the deepest longings of your heart.

And everything else your heart could ever seek will leave you spectacularly unsatisfied, other than the face and the heart of God. Have you just walked in the ways of your father? Of have you begun to seek the God of your father? That’s the difference. As a sixteen year old, that’s what he chose to do.

And it made all the difference in the world. God invites you to seek him and his face. Jeremiah 29:13, “You will seek me and find me, when you seek me with all your heart.” You say, “I’ve tried to seek God, but he just seems so distant. It’s just kind of theoretical. He’s so invisible. I don’t hear his voice. It’s like I pray, but my prayers bounce off the ceiling. And to be honest, I’m just asking for stuff out of his hand.”

What’s your problem? You’re trying to seek him with a half heart. You will seek him and find him when you search with him with all of your heart. Get your eyes off of every other thing that competes for your heart, and seek him and him alone. In Amos 5:4, God says this, “Seek me and live.”

There’s two implications. If you don’t seek me, you’re going to die. Your life is going to feel like a slow death. The other implication is this: you haven’t even lived until you seek me. You wonder why life is so boring and unsatisfying and you just keep bouncing from whatever the next stimulant is? It never satisfies? You haven’t even lived until you’ve sought the face of God.

Matthew 6:33, a familiar verse that Jesus told us in the New Testament. “But seek first…” Number one priority on your calendar, on your task list, every day, the rest of my life, the first thing I’m going to do, I’m going to seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness. And all those other things, they can be yours without guilt. If you will put God first and seek him from a heart orientation that says, “I’m going after him. No holds barred. All the way.”

I thought about this week how to illustrate this and I was reading again in Tim Keller’s book on prayer that I’ve mentioned to you a couple of times. And he has a little illustration there about sailing. How many of you have ever gone sailing? Where the movement of the boat was entirely dependent upon the wind. Right? Seeking God is like sailing because it is completely dependent upon the wind of the Spirit.

However, what you do in sailing is, you’ve got to make sure that you unfurl the sails. You throw the sails high. You are at church. You are with godly people. You are crying out to God in prayer with a Bible open. All of those are different things that raise the sails of your life and the wind of the Spirit catches those sails and shoots you to the face of God.

And it is not a passive process. You grab hold. It’s so exciting and so joy-filled and there’s such wonder. All you got to do is keep the boat straight. And the accelerant and the movement will thrill your heart. Seeking is like sailing. And pretty soon you’re in a completely different place than you were when you started.

But some of us are not sailing. Some of us are like, “Eh, it feels more like this.” (Shows a picture of a man rowing a boat.) It feels like rowing. It’s like so monotonous. And I’m so sore. And it’s a chore and it’s a task. And that’s okay as long as you’ve got your boat headed in the right direction, you’re making some progress. There are seasons that you have to row. It takes some effort. Sometimes it’s against the wind and against the current, but you’ve still got to make progress and you’ve still got to point your boat in the right direction. And you’ll make progress. And then pretty soon you need to find a sail. Get that thing up there and let the wind take you.

Some of you say, “I’m not really rowing. I’m like drifting. It’s like, “Man, I caught a bad current about a decade ago, and it’s just kind of been sending me out further and further away. God seems so distant. And it’s like I couldn’t even get back if I wanted to. I even kind of forgot what he looks like. There’s no hope.”

Listen. Find an oar! Get your Bible open. Grab some friends. Tell them, “I’ve drifted so far off course. Would you please pray for me? What do I do to get back?” Get the sails up and point your boat in the right direction. You can make progress again. Some of you say, “I’m not even doing that. I’m just sinking. I mean, Trent, this storm! My boat took on water. Someone that I loved betrayed me or disappointed me or they died. And somebody sinned against me. All this marital difficulty and kids are a wreck and my daddy would make Manasseh look like a priest. I’ve got so many things. I am sinking.”

Listen, bail water. Find an oar. Raise a sail, and you can get started again. God is inviting you in whatever situation you are, “seek my face.”

Here’s the third thing:

 

• God awakens a purged (v. 3b-7)

 

Look at the middle part of verse 3. “In the twelfth year…” Uh, little math in church. How old would he have been? Twenty years old. I know some of you are struggling to carry the one. Twenty. He’s twenty years old. So what does a twenty year old king do? A twenty year old king does this. “He began to purge Judah…” Underline the word “purge”. “He began to purge Judah and Jerusalem of the high places, the Asherim and the carved and the metal images.”

And so they had all these paraphernalia of false worship. There were so many ungodly influences competing for their heart. And when Josiah set his heart to seek the Lord, he said, “I’m going to remove every competing obstacle for our heart so we can all seek the Lord together.” Let’s find out how serious he was about that little project.

Verse 4, “And they chopped down…” Just underline those two words. So what would have been in his hand? If he was chopping down the altars of the Baals in his presence? An ax. Okay, so imagine a twenty year old king with an ax, marching through town. Don’t you think the people would have thought, “What is going on?” And maybe the rumors behind his back were, “There’s a new king in town and he’s going to make some changes. It’s a new day. And there’s going to be new influences in town.”

So, he’s marching around with this ax and he’s chopping down these altars of Baal. And then it says, “…he cut down the incense altars that stood above them. And he broke in pieces the Asherim and the carved and the metals images, and he made dust of them…” He wasn’t content to chop them down. He began to obliterate every influence. It goes on and it says he made dust of them and he scattered them over the graves of those who had sacrificed to them. It’s like, “You want your idol? You’re dead and now so are they. You should be in the same place.”

Verse 5. And, “He also burned the bones of the priests on their altars and cleansed Judah and Jerusalem.” Verse 6, “And in the cities of Manasseh, Ephraim and Simeon, and as far as Naphtali, in their ruins all around…” Verse 7, “…he broke down the altars and beat the Asherim and the images into powder and cut down the incense altars throughout all the land of Israel. Then he returned to Jerusalem.”

How many think this guy was serious? My question is: how serious are you? You say, “Oh that’s Old Testament. They did crazy things back in the Old Testament.” Can I show you a New Testament verse? There was an awakening in the church right after Jesus ascended into heaven. And in Acts 19:19, we find out that there was a magician who began to seek the Lord. “And a number of those who had practiced magic arts brought their books together and burned them in the sight of all. And they counted the value of them and found it came to fifty thousand pieces of silver.”

How many of you would like to have that investment portfolio? That would build a really nice church. But they didn’t sell it. They burned it because they wanted to remove every competing influence for their heart. Why was he so serious? Because he realized, you couldn’t just manage false worship, you have to obliterate false worship.

You know what some of us do with our false worship? Some of our sinful habits? Some of the things that we run to that we know are contrary to God’s will in our lives? We got a bad habit. We got a bad friend. We got a bad relationship. Instead of cutting that off, instead of removing that out of our way, we try to tame it. We try to manage it. We kind of keep our distance but close enough to where if we wanted to, we could go back to it. Instead of cutting it down, breaking it in pieces, burning it and grinding it to powder.

You ever watch that show on the Discovery Channel, “When Animals Attack?” You ever watch that and gather your eight year olds around and say, “Let’s watch this.” You ever watch that? How many of you are actually secretly cheering for the animals? How many of you have never seen the show? Okay, so I brought an episode. We’re going to watch a little episode here. Just watch this.

Now we’ve got three people in the story here. (Shows two men and an alligator.) Two of them are idiots. And one of them is a predator. I don’t know what the guy is doing on the back end, but he’s smarter than the guy on the front end. I’m not quite sure what this guy thinks but I think he thinks, oh he’s going to pray, which is a good idea, but I think he’s praying to the alligator. If he was praying to God, God would tell him to run.

And so, I think he thinks that he’s tamed the alligator. That it’s his friend. Maybe he feels like…don’t do that! (Man puts head in alligator’s mouth. Video freezes.). No, no. You can kind of guess what happens next right? And as much as we think that guy’s an idiot, some of us are doing the same thing with our idols. You are playing around with it. You are trying to tame it. You think you can control it rather than obliterating it.

And some of us have this kind of stuff in our hearts, some of us have it in our homes. Josiah was so serious, he wanted to remove it from the nation. So here’s your project for this week. I want you to purge, not only your heart, but your home. In order to do that, you’re going to need a tool. (Rolls out a garbage can.) Now, I don’t know if you need an ax or a chainsaw or a fire pit, but one thing you’re really going to need is one of these.  (Holds up garbage bag.)

Grab each one of your children. Don’t throw them in the trash. But grab them and give them one of these. And systematically go through your home, looking for every influence that is preventing you from seeking God. That means music, books, movies, artwork, songs digitally on your iTunes, movies on Netflix, and every thing that you know is contrary to a heart that needs to be awakened to seeking God.  And once you have gathered those things together (opens can and throws bag in), purge it. Destroy it. Burn it if necessary. But get it out of the way. Because God awakens a seeking heart.

Here’s’ the fourth thing:

 

• God awakens a tender (v. 8-31)

 

Look at verse 8. “Now in the eighteenth year of his reign…” How old would he have been? Twenty-six. What does a twenty-six year old who seeks God look like? What does he do? “In the eighteenth year of his reign, when he had cleansed the land and the house, he sent Shaphan the son of Azaliah, and…” the next guy who’s the governor and the next guy, the recorder and here’s what he did. He “…repair[ed] the house of the Lord his God.”

It had been 250 years since the place of worship had been functional. And in order to create corporate worship, in order to seek the Lord together, in order to be an influence, he knew there had to be a repair of the place of worship.

Here’s what a tender heart does. Here’s five actions of a tender heart. You want to know if you have a tender heart? A tender heart says this:

 

Five Actions of a Tender Heart

 

1. I will repair the place of worship.

 

If I ask you, “What is your place of worship?,” you’d probably identify this room. This is the place where we come and gather together and sing our songs and we respond to the word of God and we pray our prayers. Of course, this is a place of worship. But if this is your only place of worship, you need to repair the place of worship.

When was the last time, you fathers, Pastor Dad, gathered your family together and said, “We’re going to seek the Lord together. We’re going to open his word. We’re going to get our eyes on God because his eyes are looking for someone whose heart is blameless.” And prayed together? And sought the Lord together? And obeyed God together? Served God together?

And when was the last time that you privately, personally, without any external pressure, said, “I have got to get to the place of worship. Because I am going to seek the Lord. I’m not content with walking in ways. I must seek the God who is worthy to be sought.” Repair the place of worship.

Look down in verse 14. “While they were bringing out the money…” as they began to repair the house of the Lord, they had a money campaign and there was a lot of money, and they brought it out. When they began “bringing out the money that had been brought into the house of the Lord, Hilkiah the priest found the Book of the Law of the Lord given through Moses.”

The book that he found was probably a scroll, either of what we call the book of Deuteronomy that we all have nicely tucked away in our Bibles, or it might have been the first five books of the Bible. Either way, that book had been so neglected, so ignored, so rejected as authoritative and so forgotten, it had been lost. Somebody set it on a shelf in a storage room somewhere and forgot where they put it. And the priest finally finds the book.

That’s the second thing that a tender heart does.

 

2. I will find the book of God’s law.

 

I will get my eyes on it. Look down at verse 19. “And when the king heard the words of the law, he tore his clothes.” Do you understand that the word of God had not been read or spoken for centuries? Josiah had never heard it. And when he heard it, it made such an impact on his heart that the Bible says he did something really strange. He tore his clothes. I will not give you that assignment. Like, “That’s a weird thing. Why would he do that?”

God was tearing up his heart. And the external evidence was, he tore his clothes. Those were royal clothes. Those were expensive clothes. Those were clothes that declared, “I’m in control. I am put together.” And Josiah knew that not only the nation was not put together and he was not in control, he said, “I’m not going to hide behind external garments that make me appear more godly than I really am.” So he tore his clothes. It was a sign of repentance and humility in his heart that he would tremble at the counsel of the word of God.

Here’s the third thing that a tender heart does.

 

3. I will inquire of the Lord.

 

Look at verse 21. He gathers a group of people around him that he believes could have gotten him in touch with God and he says, “Go, inquire of the Lord for me and for those who are left in Israel and in Judah, concerning the words of the book that has been found. For great is the wrath of the lord that is poured out upon us, because our fathers have not kept the word of the Lord, to do according to all that is written in this book.”

And so he said, “I’m going to pray and I’m going to gather people around me that know how to pray, and we’re going to inquire of the Lord about what we should do in regard to what we’re reading.” That’s a sign of a tender heart.

Look down at verse 27. God says to him through a prophetess, “Because your heart was tender….” There it is. “Because your heart was tender and you humbled yourself before God when you heard his words against this place and its inhabitants, and you have humbled yourself before me and have torn your clothes and wept before me, I also have heard you, declares the Lord.” Not only were God’s eyes on Josiah, his ears were attentive to his prayers.

What’s the evidence that you have a tender heart? When was the last time there was any external evidence of humility that the unfinished business in your life, the condition of your heart, the condition of your family or this nation, the weight of that brought you to your knees? Physically? That there were tears that welled up in your eyes and you cried and wept over how far from God you had drifted?

When was the last time you humbled yourself and actually told somebody, “I’m not where I need to be. I have idols in my heart. I have no passion in my soul for God.” That’s a humble admission of a tender heart. He inquired of the Lord.

Here’s the fourth thing:

 

4. I will keep my covenant with God.

 

Look down at verse 31. “And the king stood in his place and made a covenant before the Lord…” What was that covenant? It was the covenant that he read in the book of Deuteronomy and Exodus that Moses had with God. It was the old covenant, the Old Testament. He made a covenant before the Lord to do these things: “…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 the covenant that were written in this book.”

Again, Josiah had no idea what those testimonies and those commandments were until he opened it up. And now that he saw what God wanted them to do, he said, “I’m leading the whole nation to do those very things.”

 

And then finally:

 

5. I will remember the Passover Lamb of God.

 

Look at chapter 35, verse 1. Just one verse there and we’ll be done. “Josiah kept a Passover to the Lord in Jerusalem.” The Passover was the celebration and the remembrance of how God brought Israel out of slavery into the Promised Land.

And what they did was very violent and it was very bloody and it was very visual. Look at what they did. “And they slaughtered the Passover Lamb…” You say, “Why an innocent lamb?” I mean, that seems so brutal. The lamb didn’t do anything wrong. Why would seeking God have anything to do with a violent, bloody sacrifice of an innocent lamb?

One day, God sent Jesus, his Son, who was innocent and pure and beloved. And God hung that sacrificial Lamb on a cross, and Jesus bled out to pay the price for the sin of people who weren’t seeking God. And in doing that, God made a way for us to seek his face without our face melting off. It’s only through the blood of the Passover Lamb, Jesus Christ. This was a foreshadowing. It’s the story of the Gospel. It’s the entire Gospel summed up in one verse. That there was a Passover Lamb that was slaughtered to make a way for you to seek God. And yet how often do we remember the price that was paid for our sin?

I’m going to ask the ushers to come forward right now. We’re going to end the service by taking the elements of communion. Do you understand what a visual picture communion is? To take a piece of bread that Jesus says represents his broken body. To take a cup filled with juice that Jesus said represents his blood. And those visual elements to remind us of the price that was paid so that you and I could come and seek his face.