Today’s Scripture Reading (July 4,
2013): 2 Kings 22
As an avid
amateur political observer, it seems that the most revealing question
indicating the success of a political campaign is found in the answer to one
question – do I trust you to keep me safe. A potential candidate may have the
economic know how to run a nation, they may have the inside track on some of
the social issues our country’s face, they may even seem to have taken the
moral high ground – but even with all of that in their favor if we do not
believe that they are capable of keeping us safe it is unlikely that the
candidate will succeed and be elected to political office. It may be that the
responsibility to keep the nation safe is the most important task for any
politician occupying a position of rule and authority.
Josiah comes
to rule the nation of Judah. And there was an expectation that every king would
sit down and write out a copy of the law of God. He was expected not to only
read the law, but to make a copy for himself, not by having a scribe do the
work and hand the finished copy to the king, but the king was expected to sit
down and take a writing instrument and a blank scroll and copy it himself – so
that he would know what was in the law. Ignorance of the law was not going to
be accepted as an excuse for violating the law. Deuteronomy 17 makes this very clear – “When he [the
king] takes the throne of his kingdom, he is to write for himself on a scroll a
copy of this law, taken from that of the Levitical priests” (Deuteronomy
17:18.)
It was the
Book of Deuteronomy that was likely the book that was found during the reign of
Josiah. And it might have been this passage that Josiah had just heard and he
realized how he had failed at the task of being king – and ignorance was not
going to be accepted as an excuse. And in failing in knowing the law he had
failed at his most basic responsibility as king – he had failed to keep the
nation safe, as his father before him had failed to keep the nation safe in the
twenty-two years of his reign – and as his grandfather had failed to keep the
nation safe during the fifty-five years of his reign. And Josiah tore his robes
as he repented, not from the sins that he had committed in rebellion, but
because of the sins he had committed because he simply did not know.
At the end
of the American civil war, the United States placed the phrase “In God We
Trust” on their money. It was simply an indication that a nation that had been
hurt so badly by a war could only be put back together by God who loved them.
And they were right. So we wish our American friends a Happy Independence Day.
May your leaders and your God simply keep you safe.
Tomorrow’s Scripture Reading: 2 Kings
23
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