Worship by the Book

[0:00] Well, we're going to turn to our Bibles now, and so if you take up your Bible and turn to the Old Testament and to the second book of Chronicles. And we're going to look at this evening at 2 Chronicles chapter 34, if you've got one of the church visitors' Bibles, it's page 385.

[0:19] If not, find Kings, it's after that, and before Ezra and Nehemiah. Now, part of the history books of the Old Testament, and normally we think of those as being 1 and 2 Samuel and 1 and 2 Kings.

[0:32] And then we have the Chronicles, which comes after that and sort of seems to tell all about the same things again. And that's true to some extent, although it's not quite as simple as that.

[0:44] I'm sure Josh will explain why later on. But it is a story of all the different kings of Israel and Judah. And when we come to chapter 34, we're coming to one of the really good kings of Judah, preceded by some pretty nasty stuff with Manasseh and Ammon.

[1:06] Before him is Hezekiah, who is one of the good ones. But unfortunately, the bad ones seem to rather outweigh the good ones. But here's a bright spot in the book of Chronicles. And we're going to read about Josiah, his reforms, and all that he did to help God's people return to the Word of God.

[1:26] So 2 Chronicles chapter 34. Josiah was just 8 years old when he began to reign. And he reigned 31 years in Jerusalem.

[1:37] And he did what was right in the eyes of the Lord and walked in the ways of David, his father. And he did not turn aside to the right hand or to the left.

[1:47] For in the 8th year of his reign, you've got to do some mental arithmetic as we go through here. For in the 8th year of his reign, while he was yet a boy, he began to seek the God of David, his father.

[2:01] And in the 12th year, he began to purge Judah and Jerusalem of the high places. The Asherim, the carved and the metal images. And they chopped down the altars of the Baals in his presence.

[2:14] And he cut down the incense altars that stood above them. And he broke in pieces the Asherim and the carved and the metal images. And he made dust of them and scattered it over the graves of those who had sacrificed to them.

[2:29] He also burned the bones of the priests on their altars and cleansed Judah and Jerusalem. And in the cities of Manasseh, Ephraim and Simeon, and as far as Naphtali, in their ruins all around, he broke down the altars and beat the Asherim and the images into powder.

[2:48] Cut down all the incense altars throughout all the land of Israel. And then he returned to Jerusalem. Now in the 18th year of his reign, when he had cleansed the land and the house, he sent Shaphan, the son of Azaliah, and Masaiah, the governor of the city, and Joah, the son of Joahaz, the recorder, to repair the house of the Lord his God.

[3:13] They came to Hilkiah, the high priest, gave him the money that had been brought into the house of God, which the Levites, the keeper of the threshold, had collected from Manasseh and Ephraim and from all the remnant of Israel and from all Judah and Benjamin and from the inhabitants of Jerusalem.

[3:29] They gave it to the workmen who were working in the house of the Lord, and the workmen who were working in the house of the Lord gave it for repairing and restoring the house. They gave it to the carpenters and the builders to buy quarried stone and timber for binders and beams for the buildings that the kings of Judah had let go to ruin.

[3:50] And the men did the work faithfully. Over them were set Jahath and Obadiah, the Levites, of the sons of Merari, and Zechariah and Meshulam, of the sons of Kohathites, to have oversights.

[4:05] The Levites, all who were skillful with instruments of music, were over the burden bearers and directed all who did work in every kind of service. And some of the Levites were scribes and officials and gatekeepers.

[4:17] While they were 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.

[4:31] And Hilkiah answered and said to Shaphan the secretary, I have found the book of the law in the house of the Lord. And Hilkiah gave the book to Shaphan. Shaphan brought the book to the king and further reported to the king all that was committed to your servants their doing.

[4:48] They've emptied out the money that was found in the house of the Lord and have given it into the hands of the overseers and the workmen. Then Shaphan the secretary told the king, Hilkiah the priest has given me a book.

[5:00] And Shaphan read from it before the king. And when the king heard the words of the law, he tore his clothes. And the king commanded Hilkiah, Ahikam the son of Shaphan, Abdon the son of Micah, Shaphan the secretary, and Azariah the king's servant, saying, 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.

[5:26] For great is the wrath of the Lord that is poured out on us because our fathers have not kept the word of the Lord to do according to all that is written in this book.

[5:38] So Hilkiah and those whom the king had sent went to Huldah the prophetess, the wife of Shalem, the keeper of Tokath, son of Hazra, keeper of the wardrobe.

[5:50] And she lived in Jerusalem in the second quarter. And he spoke to her to that effect. And she said to him, Thus says the Lord, the God of Israel, Tell the man who sent you to me, Thus says the Lord, Behold, I will bring disaster upon this place and upon its inhabitants, all the curses that are written in the book that was read before the king of Judah, because they have forsaken me and have made offerings to other gods that they might provoke me to anger with all the works of their hands.

[6:22] Therefore, my wrath will be poured out on this place and it will not be quenched. But to the king of Judah who sent you to inquire of the Lord, Thus shall you say to him, Thus says the Lord, the God of Israel, regarding the words that you've heard, because your heart was tender and you humbled yourself before God when you heard his words against this place and its inhabitants.

[6:48] And you've humbled yourself before me and have torn your clothes and wept before me. I also have heard you. declares the Lord. Behold, I will gather you to your fathers and you shall be gathered to your grave in peace and your eyes shall not see all the disaster that I will bring upon this place and its inhabitants.

[7:10] And they brought back word to the king. Then the king sent and gathered together all the elders of Judah and Jerusalem. And the king went up to the house of the Lord with all the men of Judah and all the inhabitants of Jerusalem and the priests and the Levites, all the people, both great and small.

[7:30] 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 in his place 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 the covenant that were written in this book.

[7:55] Then he made all who were present in Jerusalem and in Benjamin stand to it. And all the inhabitants of Jerusalem did according to the covenant of God, the God of their fathers.

[8:10] And Josiah took away all the abominations from all the territory that belonged to the people of Israel and made all who were present in Israel serve the Lord their God.

[8:20] All his days, they did not turn away from following the Lord, the God of their fathers. Amen.

[8:32] And may God bless to us his word. Good evening. Please do open your Bibles again to 2 Chronicles chapter 34.

[8:50] It is a common experience for God's people to look around at their situation and for it to look bleak. It's a common experience for God's people that in trying to live lives of true worship of God, that there'll be many obstacles.

[9:07] God's people are always battling the world, the flesh, and the devil. Fulfilling our purpose will be met with opposition to discourage us and temptation to not do what we must do.

[9:23] And that was very much the experience of the recipients of Chronicles. Chronicles was written to the remnant of God's people who'd returned to the land after exile.

[9:35] It's one of the latest books in the Old Testament. And it was written to direct the restoration efforts of God's people. A lot of the historical figures that feature in Chronicles are familiar to people.

[9:49] But as Willie hinted at, generally the familiarity comes from what we know about in Kings. I know of a few people who've said that they have a tendency to skip over Chronicles because it seems that it's so very similar to Kings.

[10:03] And it's true. They cover lots of the same material. But they were written about 150 years apart. And so whilst they cover the same history, the same people even, they have very different purposes.

[10:21] So say, for example, there was a history of World War II that was written in the immediate aftermath of the war. It might have been seeking to bring some understanding to people in the 40s and 50s as to why it was so imperative that Hitler was stopped.

[10:38] Why the immense cost of the war, the cost of the economy, the cost of lives was necessary. So there's a very clear purpose in drawing together the history that it uses.

[10:51] And it might draw particular attention to the rise of Hitler and his atrocities or something like that. But say another history was written now. As Europe is on the cusp of another significant event, perhaps a history written in 2019 about World War II might focus on how to prevent another war.

[11:11] So it might focus particularly on diplomatic relationships and their feelings in the build-up to World War II. Well, that subtle difference is similar to the difference between Kings and Chronicles.

[11:25] Kings was concerned with helping a people living in exile under judgment to help them understand why that had happened. What brought them to exile?

[11:37] It was showing the pathway that led to God's judgment on them. But now in Chronicles, the focus of the history is on how to prevent another one. They've returned to the land, but what now?

[11:50] The focus is on how to learn lessons to direct the life of God's people who have returned, to show them what to prioritize, to model for them what it is to play their part in building the kingdom of God.

[12:05] And in our particular passage this evening, the focus is particularly on God's people returning to true worship of God. We're going to look very briefly at what the story around Josiah is before then looking at three themes that come out of the story and what is particularly unique to Chronicles about these things.

[12:28] So first, what is the story of Josiah? Well, Josiah was a good king who longed to reshape the life of God's people into line with what the ideal was. Look at verse 2.

[12:41] The summary of his life, he did what was right in the eyes of the Lord. Verse 3, from a young age, he began to seek God. And when he was no longer just a boy, when he took to the throne as an adult, he began to introduce vital reforms to the life of Judah and even to some parts of Israel.

[13:02] That's what we see in verses 4 to 7. He starts smashing down the various altars to Baal and to Asherah because under his predecessor, King Ammon, Judah had been drawn to worship these false gods and their abominable practices.

[13:19] Worship of Baal was characterized by things like temple prostitution, orgies, and these were believed to magically get the gods to indulge in similar activity in order to bring rain, to get a good harvest.

[13:34] And worse than this, their religious practices included sacrificing children to bring favor from the gods. Society sometimes likes to think that it's moved on to be a bit more sophisticated.

[13:50] But don't we just see the same thing today in the name of freedom? Josiah sets out to cleanse the land from these religions that have had a poisonous effect upon God's people.

[14:02] temple. After six years of cleansing the land, verse 8, Josiah then set about repairing the temple. It wasn't enough to just rid Judah of false worship.

[14:15] True worship needed to be restored. And so Josiah commanded that the money that had been given to the temple be used to pay for the workmen and all the materials that were needed to restore the temple that had been long neglected.

[14:29] That's what's happening in verses 8 through to 13. And then a turning point comes. As a necessary work was beginning to happen, a book was found, verse 14, and it makes its way to Josiah through his secretary.

[14:49] So verse 16, there's a report back that the work is commencing on the temple. Things are going well. Josiah's commands are being listened to. And when the report is over, Shaphan sort of adds, oh, and by the way, we found this book.

[15:05] Now you'll notice in verse 14 that it's called the book of the law. Verse 30 calls it the book of the covenant. And the likelihood is that this book was a form of Deuteronomy.

[15:20] And whilst it didn't seem like much of a discovery to Shaphan, who simply calls it a book, Josiah takes it very seriously. Once it's read to him, he realizes that this has important implications for Judah.

[15:36] And he knew it wasn't good news. So he sends for a prophetic word about it. What exactly are the implications of what the book says for Judah now?

[15:49] That's his question as he sends off his servants. And so off his servants go, and they get the prophetic word. That's what happens from verse 22.

[16:01] And as he seeks the prophetic word, two words come to him. The first one, verses 24 and 25, Judah has broken the covenant.

[16:13] They've been ignoring God's word. They've been buying into sensual pleasures of other religions, forsaking God. So all the curses of Deuteronomy are to fall on Judah.

[16:28] That's the first prophetic word. God's wrath has to be poured out upon them. And by saying that all the curses would fall on Judah, what that prophetic word means is that exile is coming.

[16:40] For that was the ultimate curse. Cut off from the land. Removed from God's kingdom. But the second word was to Josiah.

[16:51] You see, he was a good king. And so verse 27, God says that because he humbled himself, because he sought God, because he wept at hearing the book read, this exile was going to be delayed.

[17:07] Verse 28, Josiah wasn't going to see it happen. Your eyes shall not see the disaster that will be brought on this place. And when Josiah hears these words, he brought the people together and he read the whole of the book of the covenant to them.

[17:25] And he, verse 31, made a covenant before the Lord to keep the commandments, to walk in them, to be faithful to the Lord. And it wasn't just Josiah that was going to do this.

[17:38] It was for all who were there. It was for all of Judah and the remnant of Israel. And so verse 33, the last sentence of this chapter, all their days, they did not turn away from following God.

[17:55] Josiah turned around the worship of Judah under the threat of exile. His commitment to the Lord meant that he and his people didn't experience it in his lifetime.

[18:07] And so this chapter is all about worship and directing God's people to see what that means and why they can and must do it.

[18:21] And so now that we're a bit familiar with the story, we're going to look at three ways that that comes out in this passage. First, we worship because we have a perfect king.

[18:34] We worship because we have a perfect king. Josiah is set up as one of the greatest kings ever. He's the only one who the chronicler gives the note in verse 2 about.

[18:47] He did not turn to the right or the left. Josiah was up there with the best of them. The summary of his life is that he did what was right in the eyes of the Lord.

[18:59] He was one just like the great king David. That's what he tells us just as his father David had done. And this assessment of Josiah's reign is so positive because he puts his efforts into directing God's people to worship as they should.

[19:19] That's what makes a good king. So having taken the throne as an 8 year old in the 8th year of his reign as a boy of just 16 he began to seek the Lord.

[19:31] And as a boy he would have ruled with a regent in place. So until he reached an appropriate age which would have been about 20 he had a regent.

[19:42] And so 4 years later when he was 20 when he would have taken to the throne independently what's the first thing that he does? His seeking becomes serving God.

[19:55] Verse 8. Josiah's great concern for Judah to be restored to true worship of God set him apart as one of the great kings.

[20:07] The chronicler's focus on Josiah as a son of David and his subsequent positive steps for the kingdom was to show the people of God to keep putting their trust in the line of David.

[20:22] The promise that out of David's line a forever king would come. Throughout the book of Chronicles David and Solomon are the absolute ideals of what a king and his kingdom should look like.

[20:37] And now the chronicler's audience the returnees who've come back from exile when they received this they didn't have a king on the throne but they did still have someone in David's line.

[20:50] They had Zerubbabel. They had someone in the line of David who God promised to carry his promises on through. And so just like all the good kings in the Bible Josiah is only a shadow of the great king.

[21:09] Those who are born into David's line are all pointing forward to the king that would finally reign forever. And so we in 21st century Glasgow we can rest assured that God's people always have a king who can be trusted and followed and looked to.

[21:32] So whilst the chronicler's readers were to look to the continuance of David's line through Zerubbabel we can look back to the arrival of this king. And so just as Josiah verse 4 chopped down and cut down the incense altars just as he broke the pieces broken pieces the ashram in King Jesus we have one who hasn't just crushed idols we have one who's crushed the head of our real and dangerous enemy.

[22:02] Jesus has crushed the head of the one who longs to lure us into following him who longs to lure us into false worship. Josiah poured resources into rebuilding the temple he made it a priority ensuring the workmen who were skilled had the right resource to repair and restore the house verse 10 but in King Jesus we have one that rebuilt the temple in three days as he became the true temple himself so that through Jesus we can truly worship God forever.

[22:36] The temple never needs to be rebuilt again. Josiah's fidelity to God his exemplary leadership meant that when Judah were confronted with curses for their disobedience as we see in verse 24 the disaster promised upon the people and verse 25 anger because they've forsaken God well in the face of this Josiah's fidelity meant that verse 28 the disaster would be delayed but in Jesus we have a king who doesn't delay what is inevitable but who faces it on our behalf.

[23:16] we aren't just told that we won't see the forsakenness that is to come like Josiah we have a king who cried out my God my God why have you forsaken me as he stood in our place redeeming us from the curse and where Josiah renewed the covenant with God as he read the words of the book verse 30 and as Josiah made a covenant between himself and his people to walk after the Lord we have a king who guarantees our covenant relationship with God so as much as verse 33 Josiah took away all the abominations and made it all Israel serve God we have a king who removes all sin and enables us to obey God and to worship God truly Josiah was a king in David's line and he directed

[24:18] Judah to worship God but we have the greatest David as our king and so no matter what this world throws at us no matter how bleak things can look for the church we have a king we can always look to and always trust we have the perfect king who in no way ever drifted to the right or the left and so because of him and through him we can worship in spirit and truth we creatures created by God can worship the living God so no matter what the nation that we belong to is doing we can continue to worship God that's what Jesus himself said listen to his words from John 4 he said the hour is coming and is now here when the true worshippers will worship the father in spirit and truth that's what we have through King Jesus and so that's the first thing we worship and we can worship because we have a perfect king but secondly our worship must always be by the book our worship must always be by the book a church must always seek to conform what it is doing and what it's seeking to do with God's word and God's purposes what does it mean for us to worship God that is always a question to ask well with the similarities between Kings and Chronicles one of the keys to understanding

[26:09] Chronicles message is in noticing the differences in the accounts of Kings and Chronicles so in Chronicles the account of Josiah follows events in chronological order so notice the various years of Josiah's reign that are mentioned verse 3 we're told about the 8th year and the 12th year and then verse 8 the 18th year well in the same account in Kings Kings is less concerned with the chronology and so Josiah's reign has all of his reforms flowing from the rediscovery of the book but Chronicles has the reforms starting before that so it was six years into cleansing the land that the book is discovered so Josiah has been working hard to place God at the center of all that his kingdom is doing but there's a shock in this passage verse 8 the land has been cleansed verses 16 and 17 the commands of Josiah to get the work done in the temple have been carried out the reforms seem to be going well but then notice the shock in verse 19 after the reports of what was being restored after the progress that had already been made

[27:40] Josiah hears the book read and this causes him to weep to tear his clothes to mourn over the state of Judah after the reforms have started and so even before the prophetic word comes to him to explain just what the implications are for him and for Judah Josiah already knows that he was not good verse 21 he could tell that the legacy of their fathers was a shadow hanging over them great is the wrath poured out on us because our fathers have not kept the word of the Lord to do according to all that was written in this book the fact that this book was lost the fact that Shaphan didn't even really know what he was holding the fact that the temple was in need of such work was evidence that Judah had broken

[28:45] God's covenant God's word had been hushed silence hidden away and look at the end of verse 11 Judah's kings had let the buildings of the temple go to ruin utter neglect they'd failed for generations to do what God's people were to do instead reveling in sensual sinful and shocking worship of other gods and the chronicler's audience those who'd returned from exile well they too must take seriously all the words of the covenant having seen the great cost of not doing it they of all people should know how important it was to worship God as they ought for they knew what it was to be exiled from the land and so as they were getting to work rebuilding the temple and the walls and seeking to live life in a land again with all that meant and living as God's people they needed to take seriously all that their forefathers had ignored all that led to exile and so likewise for the church now we have much work to do around us in this city there are so many people who do not know the

[30:12] Lord Jesus God has given us a grand purpose of participating in his work of drawing people from death to life of bringing people from every tribe and nation into his kingdom and just as Josiah was a reformer of worship and the returnees needed to have their lives shaped around the true worship of God that doesn't change that is always what God's covenant people are to do that's what we are to do to live lives that glorify God to take seriously the worship of God to take seriously his purpose in this world and so a church that is truly worshiping by the book is a church that takes seriously their corporate gatherings we must continue to prioritize meeting together hearing God's word if that disappears from our church that disappears from our own lives then it leads to the rest of life not being what it should be this world bombards us with its corrupting priorities it doesn't take long for us to drift off course when we read all the newspapers and listen to all the news when we watch the latest

[31:34] Netflix series we're bombarded with this world's ideas and so we need to be realigned week after week to what it means to belong to God we need to come to God's word each week just like Josiah leads the people to at the end of the chapter verse 31 after hearing God's words they committed to the covenant again they renewed their commitment to obey all that God has commanded and so worship is not just singing songs true worship centers on what we do as we gather together corporately as we open up God's word as God himself speaks in our gatherings and then this drives worship in the rest of life and so what does it look like in the rest of life what does it mean for us to be a worshiping church well a church that's truly worshiping by the book is a church that works hard at loving one another being warm and hospitable bearing with one another even if it's costly to do so even if someone really gets on our nerves it's continuing to love and support and invest in our small group that we belong to to keep doing it even if we find it hard work a church that's truly worshiping is a church that looks outward to do what can be done to see more people rescued through Jesus blood it's a church full of people who pray for their non-Christian friends regularly and then seeks to give them opportunities to hear the gospel or as someone put it recently it's doing the admin for evangelism putting time in the diary to pray for our non-Christian friends and family time in the diary to spend with them to invite them maybe to read the word one-to-one that is worshiping and a church that's truly worshiping is a church that strives together to grow to maturity so that God's word is being pressed more and more into each other's lives so that together we're learning more of what it means to obey

[33:53] God to love God or in the language of chronicles to grow in keeping all that God has commanded so when we've been studying something together on a Sunday or in small groups or in release the word it might be that we need to help each other see the implications of God's word but a worshiping church is a church that does have hard and loving conversations in order to help our brothers and sisters grow it's a church that knows that faithful are the wounds of a friend and an enemy multiplies kisses a church that truly worships is a church that are committed together to serve to give up time talents money to regularly invest in the ministry of the church or as Willie pointed out to truly worship is to take seriously these values which cover all of these kinds of things and we can do all of these things because we have a perfect king who enables us to worship who's ransomed us and who gives us his grace to help us but a truly worshiping church is also a church that looks to the future and that's the final theme we see in this passage our worship must be shaped by the future our worship must be shaped by the future

[35:26] Christians have an ultimate future that they look forward to and it must be that future which shapes what they do now the chronicler adds a phrase in a couple of places in this passage that is different from what kings records of these events so when the chronicler talks about the money being gathered in for the works and the temple he expands on who's involved in that kings just has a phrase the people but look at verse 9 the chronicler mentions those from the north from Israel who are involved along with Judah and look at what he calls them he calls them the remnant turn over to verse 21 as Josiah sends his messenger to the prophet look at what he's inquiring about he says what does the Lord say regarding me and those who are left in Israel and Judah or if you're using an NIV then the word there will not be those who are left but again the word the remnant and that phrase the remnant is a hugely significant word in the Bible the chronicler could use it here because

[36:44] Judah had been decimated by war Hezekiah and Manasseh and the recent rains faced many attacks lots of wars and the population was decimated but the chronicler uses that word remnant here particularly for his readers those who have returned from exile he was writing to the remnant who were back in the land those who had been spared out of exile to return to the promised land and to seek to rebuild it listen to the words from Deuteronomy 30 about the remnant words that would have been at the very end of the book that Josiah just discovered they say this even if you've been banished to the most distant land under the heavens from there the Lord your God will gather you and bring you back he will bring you to the land that belonged to your fathers and you'll take possession of it that's what had already happened to the chronicler's audience and then he says he will make you more prosperous and numerous than your fathers even when things look bleak for

[38:03] Israel throughout their history God made promises that in the midst of even exile God would preserve a faithful remnant of his people and through this remnant he would bring their ultimate restoration and he would bless them more than ever Josiah was faced with the reality of exile looming over his kingdom he could see from the reading of the book what was coming wrath was coming for generations of unfaithfulness but he asks what does this mean for the remnant he was looking beyond the certainty of exile to the future hope that Israel had and for the remnant in the chronicler's day for the people he was writing to they too needed to be reminded that sharing Josiah's concerns first that worship was restored and the temple were functioning that these things were vital but ultimately they were vital because it was in restoring the kingdom that they'd be putting their hope in all that God promised to do through the remnant that's why the chronicler uses these words here it's to put hope into his readers about what's ahead to think about the future the chronicler is reminding his readers that even though they are only a remnant that even though things looked less than what was before even though everything about the restoration was insignificant looking they were still a remnant only a remnant but still a remnant and that meant that

[39:49] God's promises still stood so whilst they didn't have a king they could still look forward to a future that would see the true king reign forever and a church that has its vision fixed in the future fixed on all that God has promised to do at the last day that's a church that will be able to keep worshipping truly so if we want to be able to worship and to keep on worshipping if we want to be able to keep on loving our church to grow in maturity to reach out to the lost to come under God's word again and again then we must have the future in view we must have in view what God is doing in the world and what his ultimate purposes are when we let this world shape everything when eternity passes from view so that our cares center around how I want things to be at church was good for me or our cares center around making money for this life for maximizing this life then that leads only to where Judah had slipped to worshipping idols worshipping things that were right in front of them putting hope and trust in what was tangible in this life or like their forefathers putting trust in foreign armies for strength instead of looking to the eternal promises of

[41:18] God and that slippery path of being consumed with the here and now instead of God's grand purposes for the church and the world that leads to the predicament Judah was in we have a glorious future despite what this world tells us despite what it looks like true prosperity true glory does not belong in this life a time is coming when we will stand with Jesus victorious gathered together with all those who likewise have trusted in him and been rescued by him and will share in all that is his and knowing that having that fixed within us fuels true worship for when it is costly when it is hard we keep doing it because we know that it matters into eternity it matters into the time when the car that we drive or the trinkets that we own will have turned to dust and so it is a gloriously worshipful thing to do to give time in the week to serve the church to work in some way for the benefit of our church family or to find ways and time to do evangelism whether that time comes from using early retirement to do so or cutting down our hours to do so or foregoing a hobby to do so that is a gloriously worshipful thing for as we do it we're holding out the

[43:00] Lord and our future with him as what is ultimately valuable even though we're so constantly bombarded with the world's concerns money career success politics family even all that we hear and see is pushing us to focus on this life here and now but it was in having the remnant in view in seeing the future hope for God's people that Josiah found fever before God fever to delay the exile but it was also this that drove him to renew the covenant to ensure that even though things were bleak for now that there still would be a remnant who would be faithful and through whom God would keep his promises ultimately and so as a church we can worship we can worship truly because we now know that the king has come he has arrived but we also know that the king is coming and so we can pour this life now out in true worship in true faithfulness to

[44:17] God's covenant word because of the one in whom we'll spend eternity with because even better than the great king Josiah we have the Lord Jesus as king the one who's come and the one who's coming back amen let's pray father we thank you that we have the Lord Jesus so that we can know you and worship you and we thank you that through him we have a glorious future to look forward to you and we can do so with even greater confidence than those who return from exile because we live in between

[45:20] Jesus two comings and so we do pray that you would help us to give our whole lives as a church to worship in you for we ask it in Jesus name amen