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Source: https://www.sermonindex.net/speakers/william-skates/gods-last-man-standing/
Let me start with a riddle, if you will, and this will test your Bible knowledge. I was named 300 years before I was born. Before a golden calf, I offered men's bones upon an altar. I would bring revival in my day.
I am a young man. Who am I? Well, let's read in 2 Chronicles, chapter 34, 2 Chronicles, chapter 34, 2 Chronicles 34. We read verse one, Josiah was eight years old when he began to reign and he reigned in Jerusalem one and 30 years and 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.
For in the eighth year of his reign, age 16, while he was yet young, he began to seek after the God of David, his father, and in the 12th year, that's now age 20, he began to purge Judah and Jerusalem from the high places and the groves and the carved images and the molten images.
Verse eight. Now in the 18th year of his reign, age 26, when he had purged the land and the house, he sent Shaphan, the son of Azaliah and Masaiah, the governor of the city, and Joah, the son of Jehoaz, the recorder, to repair the house of the Lord, his God.
Verse 14. And when they brought out the money that was brought into the house of the Lord, Hilkiah the priest found a book of the law of the Lord given by Moses. And Hilkiah answered and said to Shaphan the scribe, I have found a book of the law in the house of the Lord.
And Hilkiah delivered the book to Shaphan. He brings it to the king. Verse 18. Then Shaphan the scribe told the king, saying, Hilkiah the priest hath given me a book. And Shaphan read it before the king.
And it came to pass, when the king had heard the words of the law, that he rent his clothes. Verse 29. Then the king sent and gathered together all the elders of Judah and Jerusalem. And the king went up into the house of the Lord and all the men of Judah and the inhabitants of Jerusalem and the priests and the Levites and all the people, great and small.
And he read in their ears all the words of the book of the covenant that was 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 with all his soul to perform the words of the covenant which are written in this book.
And he caused all that were present in Jerusalem and Benjamin to stand to it. And the inhabitants of Jerusalem did according to the covenant of God and the God of their fathers. And Josiah took away all the abominations out of the countries that pertain to the children of Israel and made all that were present in Israel to serve, even to serve the Lord their God.
And all his days they departed not from following the Lord, the God of their fathers. Now chapter 35, verse 17. And the children of Israel that were present kept the Passover at that time and the feast of unleavened bread seven days.
This is when Josiah is 26. And there was no Passover like to that which was kept in Israel from the days of Samuel the prophet, neither did all the kings of Israel keep such a Passover as Josiah kept.
And the priests and the Levites and all Judah and Israel that were present and the inhabitants of Jerusalem in the 18th year of the reign of Josiah was this Passover kept. Now it would be good if the narrative ended there.
We jump forward 13 years to the end of his life when he was 39, verse 20. After all this, when Josiah had prepared the temple, Necho king of Egypt came up to fight against Charchemus by Euphrates and Josiah went out against him.
Now that was a fatal mistake. He was shot by an arrow, taken back to Jerusalem and he died. Now come over to Jeremiah chapter 7. Jeremiah chapter 7, these chapters in Jeremiah from chapter 7 through chapter 10 are sometimes called Jeremiah's temple discourse.
It's one message that he gave in the temple precincts in Jerusalem. And it was given according to chapter 26 at the beginning of the reign of Josiah's son. So right on the heels of Josiah's death, this message is given.
Chapter 7 verse 1, the word that came to Jeremiah from the Lord saying stand in the gate of the Lord's house and proclaim there this word and say, hear the word of the Lord, all ye of Judah that enter in by these gates to worship the Lord.
Thus saith the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel, amend your ways and your doings and I will cause you to dwell in this place. Trust not in lying words, saying the temple of the Lord, the temple of the Lord, the temple of the Lord are these.
They were, they were finding some solace in the fact that they had the temple. Now chapter 8 verse 7, yea, the stork in heaven knoweth her appointed times and the turtle dove and the crane and the swallow observe the time of their coming.
But my people know not the judgment of the Lord. How do ye say we are wise and the law of the Lord is with us? Lo certainly in vain made he it, the pen of the scribes is in vain. They had the law, they prided themselves in that, but they didn't keep it.
Now chapter 10, at the end of the discourse down to verse 24, this is Jeremiah's response to his own ministry and in view of the message that he has brought to the people. Verse 24, O Lord, correct me, but with judgment, that is with equitable justice.
Not in thine anger lest thou bring me to nothing. Now that'll be our reading. It's been a long reading, but we trust the Lord will bless his word to our hearts. Let me give a little back story here to give the context.
When the kingdom was divided after Solomon, you remember that Jeroboam, the son of Nebat who caused Israel to sin, he made two golden calves. He put one in Bethel and the other up to the north in Dan.
And each of these golden calves had their own altar. And Jeroboam's message was these are the gods that brought thee out of Egypt. He went on to invent religious festivals in keeping with those altars and he devised them in his own heart and he made priests of the lowest of the people.
So clearly the law of the Lord had no relevance to these people. A false religion was planted, it flourished in the northern kingdom and it even infected the people of Judah to the south as well. At that time, 1 Kings chapter 13, verse 1, there was a man of God who came and spoke against the altar that Jeroboam had erected there in Bethel.
And Jeroboam, you remember on that occasion, he put out his hand and he said, take him. And as he said that, his hand withered up. And he cried to the man of God to pray to the Lord for his hand. And the man of God prayed to the Lord and his hand was recovered on that occasion.
There was a sign that was given that the altar would split and spill the ashes and that's just what happened. And then the man of God said this, that there would be a child that would be born whose name is Josiah.
This is given 300 years before Josiah is born. And Josiah would offer men's bones upon this altar to desecrate it. And 300 years later, Josiah is born. I just want to note in passing that God gives prophetic predictions of conditions that will pertain at the end of an era.
Our brother Scott has been handling Revelation up in Ontario and that book is introduced as This Prophecy. And it closes with the words of the book of This Prophecy. Chapters 2 and 3, I take it, are there for a preview of the church age.
And so, based on that, we may expect in our day, days just prior to the coming again of our Lord Jesus Christ, that Laodicean conditions will prevail and will pertain at the end of the church age. Conditions of self-sufficiency and complacency.
The danger of the hour for the people of God. Now, let's come to Josiah. Moving on from Jeroboam, we come to Josiah. We'll speak a little about Jeremiah later. He was eight years old when his father Ammon died, a young man, too, at the age of 24.
And as a boy, Josiah was made king, age eight. He didn't have to wait as long as poor old Charles over there in England. But we note this. There are time stamps in the life of Josiah as a young man. All the way through until Josiah is shot with an arrow, sore wounded at the age of 39.
He dies in Jerusalem and Jeremiah, the weeping prophet, he laments about the conditions that are left in the land at that time. So he becomes king at age eight. Did you notice that at age 16, we read how that he sought the God of his father, David?
Second Chronicles 34, verse 3. I take it that that would be the equivalent of what we would call today his conversion, his salvation. When he actively sought a right relationship with the God of his father, David.
And right away, we can relate to that, can't we, dear believer? Isn't it a marvelous thing that God has delivered us from the problem of our sins? You know, if we're going to be a testimony for God, genuine conversion is essential.
These are basic things, aren't they? What a tremendous truth it is that Christ died for the ungodly. That's exactly what I was, ungodly. That Christ died for our sins. I had mountains of them before God.
But he took my place and he died for me. It's wonderful to rejoice in those tremendous truths. You know, many have claimed saved status, seemingly without any depth of conviction of their sins before God.
I want to make an appeal to particularly our younger brethren as you engage in gospel work. Be sure that you preach a pure gospel. That the sinner's need is his awful, sinful condition and sinfulness before a thrice-holy God.
Too often I feel that we have jumped over that and lightly skipped over the sinner's problem and have presented his need rather as getting saved, while that is essential. But minimizing the reality of sin before God to give context, context to the reality of a need to be saved.
Some of us have spoken with Christian children and they want to be saved, they want to be saved. Maybe even shedding tears wanting to be saved. But a little probing and some questions seem to indicate there's a lack of conviction, a lack of conviction.
They want the experience that they've heard spoken of without getting to first base, the reality of sin before God. I'll pass on from that. It's good when the gospel is clearly preached and we want to maintain that in our day and generation.
Now at the age of 20, the twelfth year of his reign, he realizes that not everything is right in his realm. That there is idolatry that must be dealt with. There must be a purging away of all that is false and corrupt and carnal.
And so he goes about that and he sets in order a purging in the land. That would remind us of another truth so far as we are concerned and that is of sanctification. I've quoted from Romans chapter 5, Christ died for the ungodly.
Romans chapter 6 follows, dealing with the sanctification of the believer. Wonderful that Christ died for me. But wonderful too to grasp in my soul that I have died with Christ. And that's brought out now in Romans chapter 6.
Knowing this, that our old man is crucified with Christ. Know that because God says so. That is all that I am in Adam before God. God has terminated that in his reckoning at the cross. The old man is crucified.
God's finished with it. There's no reformation for it. The flesh within us is still present. But the old man, all that I was in Adam before God, is crucified and terminated. Now that's a biblical truth we need to grasp in our souls.
And then we are to allow that to affect us in our hearts and in our lives. It goes on to say, Reckon ye yourselves therefore dead unto sin, so that sin may have no more dominion over us. And we are then to yield our members as instruments of righteousness.
So in this great truth of sanctification, all that pertains to a carnal life needs to be viewed as God views it and put in the place of death. Not only that Christ died for me, but that I died with Christ.
And standing in the value of the death of Christ on my behalf, that will lead to sanctification in our souls. Now, one essential element of sanctification is separation. So we've gone from salvation, sanctification, separation.
This is borne out too in the story here of Josiah. You'll notice that in relation to the house of the Lord, at age 26 now, moving forward, he's progressing in age and in his experience, he's exercised now about the house of the Lord in Jerusalem.
And the king will make arrangements for the repair of the house of the Lord. And so there's money gathered, there's money collected, and money is given to faithful workers to carry forward the work. Verse 12,.
And the man did the work faithfully, and the overseers of them. So this speaks to the intent of the king's heart to seek to honor God in seeing to it that his house is put in good repair. Now, the house of God today is the local assembly, isn't it?
Paul writes to Timothy, 1 Timothy 3, verse 15, talks about the fact that he might be delayed, but in the meantime, he's writing so that ye may know how you ought to behave or conduct yourself in the house of God, which is the church of the living God, the pillar and ground of the truth.
And so we do appreciate younger brethren and younger sisters, faithful young men in particular, with potential, who early on have a heart to see to it that the house of God is in good repair. Is in good repair.
Now, how would you go about doing that? Well, they turn up at the gatherings consistently with an exercise to be a help. They do follow the lead of godly overseers. They explore the scripture that's going to be handled in the Bible reading carefully at home, and when occasion arises in the meeting, give a helpful contribution.
They are moved to pray for family members, for loved ones, for friends who are without Christ. And so gladly they make their contribution as well in the prayer meeting. Like Daniel's three friends, they all showed up at the prayer meeting and they prayed like their life depended upon it, because it did.
And so young men that have an exercise to see to it that the house of God is in good repair. We appreciate young men like that. Separation unto the Lord and attending to the things of the Lord in the house of God.
That separation is further played out in a negative way, perhaps, in relation to Josiah, in that he went out to Bethel and he's going to deal with the false altars and the false priests. And the prophecy was fulfilled that the man of God had given 300 years previously, and he took men's bones out of sepulchres and he burned them upon that altar to desecrate the altar.
He's putting away all that is false. He's putting it away. And he's separating himself from every false association religiously. Separation unto God also involves for us in our day a severing of any association with that which does not bear the light of Scripture.
Now that will play out as well when it comes to our own private lives. There should be never an occasion in our lives, in private or with others, where we're catering to sensual desires and giving them a higher priority in our souls and in our affections than the things of God.
Allegiance to God will mean that we will remove from our lives and from the assembly all that caters to the flesh. Man's way is to add to the array of behaviors and practices in God's assembly. Sometimes regardless as to whether or not it's found in the Word of God.
Let me give an example. The Word of God nowhere endorses the assembly of God engaging in the entertainment of old or young or rich or poor or male or female or saint or sinner. It is not found in the New Testament a mandate for an assembly to entertain anyone.
In a world where the Lord is rejected, we are to stand as a testimony to the Lord in His rejection. You know, we've been thinking of the Lord's coming. Following that, there's the bema, the judgment seat of Christ.
The test will be this. How obedient have I been to His Word? Now, Josiah had an exercise about the Word of God and others were affected too. There was actually a movement among the people of God. The Word of the Lord is brought before Josiah and it's read before him.
And it's almost brought in, as you read down through those verses, it's almost brought in as a kind of an afterthought. Oh, by the way, you know, we're getting on with repairing the house. By the way, there's a book here.
The book of the law of the Lord. A kind of a by the way. One fears that sometimes decisions are made and the Word of the Lord is a kind of a by the way. But it affected Josiah to the point where the king rent his clothes and he made a covenant.
I made a covenant. And the people entered into this covenant too. Number one, to walk after the Lord. His person became precious to them. To walk after the Lord. And to keep His commandments. The precepts of the Lord would direct their steps.
And to perform the covenant in the book. Their practice would be adjusted by the Word. And He caused the people to stand to it. And there was a movement of recovery. So God used a young man like Josiah to bring that revival among the people of God.
To restore the Passover like that time. And there was never before a Passover kept like it. And appreciation again was renewed of the redemption from Egypt. And it's wonderful when we have that renewed appreciation in our souls for the redemption that we have in Christ Jesus.
And I'm appealing to young men today who have a potential to live for God. And live a life that is yielded to Him. Such a one is a saint that God can take up and use. Even to affect others positively.
And to encourage them in a pathway of obedience. Now sadly, all that potential of Josiah it seems to stagnate in the 13 years that are silent. From age 26 through to age 39. We don't read anything about the life of Josiah.
Or about any work that he did for God. And I wonder, why is the scripture silent in relation to that? All the way up until there's a battle that he goes to. To fight against the king of Egypt who has come up to move against Babylon.
And Josiah engages himself against the king of Egypt in a pro-Babylon way. And I just wonder if in those 13 years he has become turned aside, distracted, involved in the geopolitical environment around the nation.
Something that God never, never gave to His people to be involved in the affairs of other nations. And so when this happens, he goes up to fight against Egypt. And it has fatal results for him. You know, the sad fact is this.
That as the people of God, we too can be distracted in context, by political things. And all the wrongs that go on in government and so on and so forth. And I could absorb our attention and our energies and social media.
We're putting out these posts and so on and so forth. And being distracted from the focus that God would have us to be focused upon the things of God. Now the word of God, through the prophet, and even through the instrumentality of Pharaoh, God told Josiah not to go to that battle.
But Josiah disobeyed. He disobeyed. You know, sadly, a life may start well with glowing potential. But it is possible to be distracted. And not only distracted, but that distraction to lead to disobedience.
Inviting the discipline of God in our hearts, in our lives. Josiah was shot with an arrow, sore wounded, brought back to Jerusalem, where he died. And Jeremiah could recognize, not only was that a personal disaster, but it was a national disaster.
So far as the kings were concerned, Josiah was God's last man standing. He had such potential, but he died in disobedience. That's a very sad thing. It moves Jeremiah to tears, and it brings him to the sanctuary where he proclaims these words against the people.
I'm not going to have time to deal with it, but you read over those chapters, Jeremiah 7 through chapter 10, and those people were priding themselves in the fact they had the temple. And they had the law.
They had the scriptures. They had the sacrifices. And they had the sign of circumcision. But the prophet will speak against that and say that God would punish not only the uncircumcised nations, but all the house of Israel are uncircumcised in their hearts.
So they had all the external things going for them, things that were according to the word of God, but their hearts were far from Him. Now I want us to grasp the seriousness of that in our souls. So far as the assembly is concerned, we could have everything outwardly just in order.
We could even pride ourselves in the order that pertains. But if our hearts are not right before God, we're open to the discipline of God, and we're not bringing honor to His name in spite of all the externals.
The sad result was there would be no further revival in the nation. By the time Josiah's grandson is there, the Babylonians have come in, and Judah is taken away into exile under the government of God for their disobedience.
Now let me close with this. Did you notice the effect that all of that had upon Jeremiah at the end of his sermon in chapter 10? It had a tremendous effect upon him. He says, O Lord, correct me. He's internalizing the sad state of affairs in the testimony of God.
He's internalizing it, and he's saying, Correct me! And each one of us personally need to be exercising our own souls about our own condition before God. Correct me, he says, but with judgment, with equitable justice, not in thine anger, lest thou bring me to nothing.
So I trust, brethren and sisters, the effect of the conference will be this, that our hearts might be open before the Lord like Jeremiah. O Lord, correct me. Are there areas in my life that need to be put right?
Are there areas of disobedience and departure? O Lord, correct me that our lives may bring glory to Him and honor to His name. Lessons from the life of Josiah, God's last man standing.