A Man For Such a Time as This, Part 1 of 2 :: By Randy Nettles

The kingdom of Judah had both good and bad kings, unlike the kingdom of Israel, which only had evil kings.

Manasseh was Judah’s 13th king (and 14th ruler, as Athaliah was the queen of Judah for six years). Manasseh was the son of King Hezekiah, one of Judah’s greatest and most righteous kings. Manasseh began his 10-year co-reign with his father when he was only twelve. After Hezekiah died, Manasseh became king and ruled Judah for 45 years. Even after witnessing his father do many righteous deeds and obeying the word of the LORD, Manasseh did evil in the sight of the LORD, after the abominations of the heathen, whom the Lord cast out before the children of Israel. Manasseh wasn’t born when his evil grandfather, Ahaz, was king of Judah. However, his evil reign resembled his grandfather’s more than his father’s.

“For he built up again the high places which Hezekiah his father had destroyed; and he reared up altars for Baal, and made a grove, as did Ahab king of Israel; and worshipped all the host of heaven, and served them. And he built altars in the house of the Lord, of which the Lord said, In Jerusalem will I put my name. And he built altars for all the host of heaven in the two courts of the house of the Lord. And he made his son pass through the fire, and observed times, and used enchantments, and dealt with familiar spirits and wizards: he wrought much wickedness in the sight of the Lord, to provoke him to anger. And he set a graven image of the grove that he had made in the house…

“Moreover, Manasseh shed innocent blood very much, till he had filled Jerusalem from one end to another; beside his sin wherewith he made Judah to sin, in doing that which was evil in the sight of the Lord” (2 Kings 21:3-7, 16).

Manasseh committed more abominations and did more wickedly than the Amorites did before him and made Judah to sin with their idols. The LORD sent prophets to Manasseh, but he ignored their messages. One such message/prophecy is mentioned in 2 Kings 21:

“Behold, I am bringing such evil upon Jerusalem and Judah, that whosoever heareth of it, both his ears shall tingle. And I will stretch over Jerusalem the line of Samaria, and the plummet of the house of Ahab: and I will wipe Jerusalem as a man wipeth a dish, wiping it, and turning it upside down. And I will forsake the remnant of mine inheritance, and deliver them into the hand of their enemies; and they shall become a prey and a spoil to all their enemies” (2 Kings 21:12-15).

The LORD told Manasseh that he would do to Judah and Jerusalem what he had done to Israel and Samaria by forsaking them and delivering them into the hands of their enemies. When Manasseh died, his son, Amon, became king of Judah.

“And he walked in all the way that his father walked in, and served the idols that his father served, and worshipped them: And he forsook the Lord God of his fathers, and walked not in the way of the Lord” (2 Kings 21:20-22).

Amon ruled Judah for only two years before his servants conspired against him and slew the king in his own house. After 47 years of evil leadership under the two evil kings, the Jews had had enough.

Amon’s son, Josiah, became king of Judah after his father’s death. He was only eight years old at the time. “And he did that which was right in the sight of the Lord, and walked in all the way of David his father, and turned not aside to the right hand or to the left” (2 Kings 22:2).

Josiah was the last righteous king of Judah. When Josiah was 16, he began to seek the God of his ‘father’ (ancestor) David. At 20, he began to purge Judah and Jerusalem from the high places, and the groves, and the carved images, and the molten images. There were many ‘good’ kings of Judah, but only two destroyed the prohibited high places of worship (as commanded in Deuteronomy 12:2-7) in the land. These two kings were Hezekiah and his great-grandson, Josiah.

Josiah righted the wrongs of many kings who went before him (including Solomon).

“And he defiled Topheth, which is in the valley of the children of Hinnom, that no man might make his son or his daughter to pass through the fire to Molech. And he took away the horses that the kings of Judah had given to the sun, at the entering in of the house of the Lord, by the chamber of Nathanmelech the chamberlain, which was in the suburbs, and burned the chariots of the sun with fire. And the altars that were on the top of the upper chamber of Ahaz, which the kings of Judah had made, and the altars which Manasseh had made in the two courts of the house of the Lord, did the king beat down, and brake them down from thence, and cast the dust of them into the brook Kidron.

“And the high places that were before Jerusalem, which were on the right hand of the mount of corruption, which Solomon the king of Israel had builded for Ashtoreth the abomination of the Zidonians, and for Chemosh the abomination of the Moabites, and for Milcom the abomination of the children of Ammon, did the king defile. And he brake in pieces the images, and cut down the groves, and filled their places with the bones of men” (2 Kings 23:10-14).

While Josiah was at Bethel (north Israel), he fulfilled an amazing 300-year-old prophecy that was recorded in 1 Kings 13:1-3, where the LORD had sent a prophet to Bethel to give Jeroboam, the first wicked king of the northern kingdom of Israel, a message.

“And, behold, there came a man of God out of Judah by the word of the Lord unto Bethel: and Jeroboam stood by the altar to burn incense. And he cried against the altar in the word of the Lord, and said, O altar, altar, thus saith the Lord; Behold, a child shall be born unto the house of David, Josiah by name; and upon thee shall he offer the priests of the high places that burn incense upon thee, and men’s bones shall be burnt upon thee. And he gave a sign the same day, saying, This is the sign which the Lord hath spoken; Behold, the altar shall be rent, and the ashes that are upon it shall be poured out.”

The fulfillment of the prophecy of 1 Kings 13:1-3 by Josiah is found in 2 Kings 23:15-20. “Moreover the altar that was at Bethel, and the high place which Jeroboam the son of Nebat, who made Israel to sin, had made, both that altar and the high place he brake down, and burned the high place, and stamped it small to powder, and burned the grove. And as Josiah turned himself, he spied the sepulchres that were there in the mount, and sent, and took the bones out of the sepulchres, and burned them upon the altar, and polluted it, according to the word of the Lord which the man of God proclaimed, who proclaimed these words.

“Then he said, What title is that that I see? And the men of the city told him, It is the sepulchre of the man of God, which came from Judah, and proclaimed these things that thou hast done against the altar of Bethel. And he said, Let him alone; let no man move his bones. So they let his bones alone, with the bones of the prophet that came out of Samaria. And all the houses also of the high places that were in the cities of Samaria, which the kings of Israel had made to provoke the Lord to anger, Josiah took away, and did to them according to all the acts that he had done in Bethel. And he slew all the priests of the high places that were there upon the altars, and burned men’s bones upon them, and returned to Jerusalem.”

Josiah fulfilled the 300-year-old prophecy by killing the priests of the high places and digging up the graves of the priests who had performed sacrifices on the altar at Bethel and burning their bones. Jeroboam, who was both a king and a priest (which was prohibited in the law of Moses), was probably one whose bones were burned on the altar at Betel. The bones of the prophet who spoke with Jeroboam three centuries previously were left undisturbed.

Jeremiah became a prophet in the 13th year of King Josiah (Jeremiah 1:2). Five years later (when Josiah was 26), in 622 BC, Josiah ordered the cleansing and repair of the Temple. At this time, the book of the law of Moses (the Torah) was found in the Temple by Hilkiah, the high priest (who was also the father of Jeremiah). The book evidently had been collecting cobwebs for about 47 years during the evil reigns of Manasseh and Amon, Josiah’s grandfather and father.

When the book was read to the king, he took it and read it to the people. He was moved and captivated by the sacred words. You could say it was a Holy Spirit moment. “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” (2 Chronicles 34:31).

Josiah sent five men to Huldah, the prophetess, to enquire of the LORD for Josiah and the people concerning the words of the book that was found, “for great is the wrath of the Lord that is kindled against us, because our fathers have not hearkened unto the words of this book, to do according unto all that which is written concerning us” (2 Kings 22:13).

Huldah told them, “Thus saith the Lord, Behold, I will bring evil upon this place, and upon the inhabitants thereof, even all the words of the book which the king of Judah hath read: Because they have forsaken me, and have burned incense unto other gods, that they might provoke me to anger with all the works of their hands; therefore my wrath shall be kindled against this place, and shall not be quenched.

“But to the king of Judah which sent you to enquire of the Lord, thus shall ye say to him, Thus saith the Lord God of Israel, As touching the words which thou hast heard; Because thine heart was tender, and thou hast humbled thyself before the Lord, when thou heardest what I spake against this place, and against the inhabitants thereof, that they should become a desolation and a curse, and hast rent thy clothes, and wept before me; I also have heard thee, saith the Lord. Behold therefore, I will gather thee unto thy fathers, and thou shalt be gathered into thy grave in peace; and thine eyes shall not see all the evil which I will bring upon this place. And they brought the king word again” (2 Kings 22:15-20).

The evil that Huldah referred to were the curses for disobedience against the word and will of the LORD found in Deuteronomy 28:15-68. The ultimate curse is the same one the northern kingdom of Israel experienced.

“The Lord will bring you and the king whom you set over you to a nation which neither you nor your fathers have known, and there you shall serve other gods—wood and stone. And you shall become an astonishment, a proverb, and a byword among all nations where the Lord will drive you” (Deuteronomy 28:36-37).

One of the significant things that Josiah did in obedience to God (and His commandments/statutes) was to celebrate the Passover Feast on the 14th of Nisan. “And the children of Israel who were present kept the Passover at that time, and the Feast of Unleavened Bread for seven days. There had been no Passover kept in Israel like that since the days of Samuel the prophet; and none of the kings of Israel had kept such a Passover as Josiah kept, with the priests and the Levites all Judah and Israel who were present and the inhabitants of Jerusalem. In the 18th year of the reign of Josiah, this Passover was kept” (2 Chronicles 35:17-19).

Josiah became king of Judah in 640 BC, so he kept the Passover in the year 622 BC. The date was Nisan 14, AM 3139 on the Jewish calendar and April 3, 622 BC on the proleptic Julian calendar. This was approximately the same Julian date as Christ’s crucifixion, which occurred on Passover day in 33 AD (IMO).

1 Chronicles 35:7 says, “And Josiah gave to the people, of the flock, lambs and kids, all for the passover offerings, for all that were present, to the number of thirty thousand, and three thousand bullocks: these were of the king’s substance.” That is a total of 33,000 animals that Josiah gave. 33 is the number that represents Christ in the Bible (IMO), as I have written about many times. In Hebrew, the name Josiah (transliteration is Yo’shiyah) means “Yahweh supports” or “Yahweh heals.”

After 31 years as king of Judah, Josiah was killed in battle (in the valley of Megiddo, according to 2 Chronicles 35:22) against the king of Egypt in 609 BC. He was only 39 years old. His death is recorded in 2 Chronicles 35:20-25.

“His servants therefore took him out of that chariot, and put him in the second chariot that he had; and they brought him to Jerusalem, and he died, and was buried in one of the sepulchres of his fathers. And all Judah and Jerusalem mourned for Josiah. And Jeremiah lamented for Josiah: and all the singing men and the singing women spake of Josiah in their lamentations to this day, and made them an ordinance in Israel: and, behold, they are written in the lamentations” (2 Chronicles 35:24-25).

Josiah was a much-beloved king of Judah, and his death grieved the people greatly.

Interestingly, Zechariah prophesies about the second coming of Jesus when the Jews look upon Christ, whom they have pierced, and mourn for him as when Josiah was pierced with an arrow in the valley of Megiddo.

“And it shall come to pass in that day, that I will seek to destroy all the nations that come against Jerusalem. And I will pour upon the house of David, and upon the inhabitants of Jerusalem, the spirit of grace and of supplications: and they shall look upon me whom they have pierced, and they shall mourn for him, as one mourneth for his only son, and shall be in bitterness for him, as one that is in bitterness for his firstborn. In that day shall there be a great mourning in Jerusalem, as the mourning of Hadadrimmon in the valley of Megiddon” (Zechariah 12:9-11).

“And like unto him was there no king before him, that turned to the Lord with all his heart, and with all his soul, and with all his might, according to all the law of Moses; neither after him arose there any like him. Notwithstanding the Lord turned not from the fierceness of his great wrath, wherewith his anger was kindled against Judah, because of all the provocations that Manasseh had provoked him withal. And the Lord said, I will remove Judah also out of my sight, as I have removed Israel, and will cast off this city Jerusalem which I have chosen, and the house of which I said, My name shall be there” (2 Kings 23:25-27).

Even Josiah’s covenant with the people regarding a return to obeying God’s word could not stop the curses that were to come upon Judah and Jerusalem.

According to Huldah and the prophecy from the Lord, Josiah, because of his righteousness, never saw the evil that would befall the Jews in Judah and Jerusalem. “I will gather thee unto thy fathers, and thou shalt be gathered into thy grave in peace; and thine eyes shall not see all the evil which I will bring upon this place.”

However, it didn’t take long after his death before the curses from the LORD began. Josiah died in the year 609 BC. Josiah’s fourth son, Jehoahaz (also called Shallum), became king of Judah in the same year, and he only reigned for three months when Pharaoh Neco deposed and deported him to Egypt, where he died in captivity.

Jehoiakim (also called Eliakim) was Josiah’s second son, and he replaced Jehoahaz as king of Judah in 609 BC. In 605 BC, Jeremiah prophesied that because of Judah’s sins, God would send Nebuchadnezzar, the king of Babylon, to destroy Jerusalem and take the Jews captive to Babylon for 70 years. The same year, the Babylonians conquered Jerusalem, pillaged Judah, and carried away many of their inhabitants to serve him in Babylon. Daniel and his three friends were among those taken into exile. This was the start of the desolations of Judah.

Jehoiakim’s reign lasted for 11 years. His son (Josiah’s grandson), Jehoiachin (also known as Jeconiah or Coniah), then became king. His evil reign only lasted for three months and 10 days. Jehoiachin’s uncle (Jehoiakim’s brother), Zedekiah (also known as Mattaniah), then became king of Judah. His reign lasted for 11 years. He was the last king of Judah.

There were three assaults on Judah and Jerusalem by the Babylonians (in 605 BC, 597 BC, and 586 BC), which culminated in the destruction of Jerusalem and the burning down of the Jew’s temple in 586 BC. This tragedy occurred within one generation of Josiah’s death, approximately 23 years. Unfortunately, Josiah’s descendants did not inherit his righteous ways, as they served other gods and didn’t obey the word of the LORD. The last vestige of greatness in the form of spiritual revival for Judah died with Josiah.

“Josiah’s impact on the Israelite nation cannot be overstated. During his reign as king, he played a pivotal role in leading the people back to the worship of Yahweh and away from the idolatrous practices that had infiltrated the land. Josiah implemented sweeping religious reforms and made significant efforts to restore the true worship of God. His commitment to purging the nation of its idols and false gods brought about a spiritual revival among the people. The Book of 2 Kings reports that Josiah even went to the extent of destroying all the idols and shrines located throughout the land, affirming his determination to eradicate idolatry from the nation.

Furthermore, Josiah’s impact on the Israelite nation extended beyond matters of faith. He was known for his justice and fairness in ruling, ensuring that the rights of the citizens were protected. Josiah enacted numerous social reforms aimed at improving the lives of the people. He promoted righteousness, compassion, and the rule of law, establishing a society where injustice was not tolerated. Under his leadership, the Israelite nation experienced a period of stability and prosperity, as Josiah’s commitment to good governance and moral uprightness created an environment conducive to societal flourishing.” {1}

This ends part 1 and Josiah’s impact on the Israelite nation. Part 2 will concern U.S. President Trump and Modern-Day Israel.

Endnotes:

{1} Names and Their Meanings: The Importance of Josiah in the Bible

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