Sunday School Lesson: Seeking Renewal

Purpose: To recommit ourselves to reading and hearing the Scriptures as the key to the renewal or our covenantal relationship with God.

Scripture: 2 Kings 22-23

Tell me if you agree or disagree with this statement:

What you study determines what you become.

Give me some real-life illustrations that support that statement.

How about this:

If you study Christ and the Word of God you become more like Christ. If you study the world and the ways of the world you become more like the world.

Can the study of God’s Word change a life?

Can the study of God’s Word lead to change in our world?

Paul in Romans 12:2 says:

Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect.
(Rom 12:2 ESV)

Can the study of the Word transform our minds and teach us to discern the will of God?

What about ignorance of the Word? How does ignorance affect our walk with God?

Many people stumble in their walk because of ignorance.

How can ignorance of the Word be overcome?

Ignorance can only be overcome by the renewal of your mind, by conforming your mind to Christ.

And what is the best way to conform our mind to Christ?

Are all Christian’s minds conformed to Christ?

Is conforming our minds to Christ as simple as becoming a believer?

Becoming a new person in Christ is much the same as a newborn infant. We do not enter the world with full knowledge of all we need to know to survive in the world around us. As new Christians we are just as ignorant and unknowing as a newborn baby. We must be in a constant state of study and learning about the world around us. What type of adult would a person be if they stopped learning early in their life. We cannot be mature Christians if our Christian Study ended with our confirmation class or when we graduated from the senior high Sunday School Class.

So Jesus said ......, "If you abide in my word, you are truly my disciples, and you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free."
(Joh 8:31-32 ESV)

The writer of Adult Bible Studies wrote:

A seminary professor once told me that as a pastor I occasionally would have to try to get my church “to be Christian”...

Churches are “Christian”. Why would a church need to be reminded “to be Christian”?

What are some examples of church activities that may not be “Christian”?

How does a church (or an individual) lose its way?

The writer goes on:

Religious institutions can lose their way just as individuals can. What ought to be the primary focus of their attention can be lost. After all, churches are social institutions as well as religious ones. Weddings, funerals, bazaars, parties, meetings, and other events of a social nature occur at our churches that sometimes have little to do with the gospel. There are lots of churches that are well attended and popular and prospering where the preached and taught word bears only the foggiest resemblance to the gospel itself.

When religious institutions or individuals lose their way, when what was meant to be the heart of the faith is peripheral or ignored entirely, reformation is required. Churches sometimes have to learn how to be “Christian” again.


The most likely culprit when a church or person loses the way is when they lose their commitment to study and know the Word.

Today’s scripture lesson gives us the story of one of the first reformations of faith caused by rediscovery of the Word and what it means to abide in the Word.

Josiah became king of Judah at the age of eight when his father, Amon, was assassinated by some of the servants of the palace. The assassins were captured and killed by the people of Judah and the people made Josiah king. Amon “did evil in the sight of the Lord, as his father Manesseh had done.” Manasseh, Josiah’s grandfather may have been the most evil of all the Judahite kings. 2 Kings 21 tells us that Manasseh “misled (the people) to do more evil than the nations had done that the Lord had destroyed before the people of Israel.”

Because of Manasseh’s extreme wickedness, God pronounced destruction on Judah.

But Josiah was different. Only King David was more highly favored by the Deuteronomic historian than Josiah and that mainly because of accomplishments. As a man of God, Josiah gets the highest honors:

2Ki 23:25 ESV
(25) Before him there was no king like him, who 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, nor did any like him arise after him.

Josiah’s reformation did not begin immediately. 2 Kings does not offer a single word to describe the first eighteen years of Josiah’s reign. 2 Chronicles 34, however, says that Josiah began to seek God in the eighth year of his reign and during his twelfth year he began to purge all the high places of Asherah and Baal worship and cleansed Judah of all the priests of the false gods.

The story of Josiah’s eighteenth year as told in 2 Kings begins with Josiah funding repairs and renovations to the Temple. The Temple had obviously fallen into serous disrepair during the reigns of Amon and Manasseh, which happens to all aging buildings, but doesn’t it seem that buildings go down faster when they are not being used?

Have you noticed some of the old country churches around that have very small or non-existent congregations?

It seems almost as if severe deterioration begins immediately when the buildings are abandoned .

Imagine, if you will, what a community would be like if the only church left was rundown and decayed to the point of being condemned.

Stretch your imaginations even further and think what a community would be like if the Bible had been out of use for so long that noone even would know what you meant if you said the word “bible”. Can you imagine the Word of God becoming lost to memory in a lifetime?

Do you even think that such a thing is possible?

Could we Christians become so associated with popular culture that the way of the world replaced the Way of the gospel?

Could we study the way of the world until we conformed to the world and were no longer conformed to Christ?

It happened in Josiah’s time.

2Ki 22:8 ESV
(8) And Hilkiah the high priest 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, and he read it.

What was this book that was discovered?

Probably the Book of Deuteronomy.

Where was it found?

In the Temple.

How could the book that contained the Laws of Moses become lost in the House of the Lord, in the nation of the people of God?

It was lost because it was not being used. It was not being used because the people were occupied with conforming to the world around them.

From Adult Bible Studies:

When one associates with a culture that thinks a particular way, it is difficult to remain separate and to maintain another view of reality.

What happened when the secretary read the book?

He immediately recognized the significance of the book and took it to the king.

2Ki 22:11 ESV
(11) When the king heard the words of the Book of the Law, he tore his clothes.


What happened when the king read the book?

What was the significance of the king tearing his clothes?

This was an accepted act of genuine repentance.


2Ki 22:12-13 ESV
(12) And the king commanded Hilkiah the priest, and Ahikam the son of Shaphan, and Achbor the son of Micaiah, and Shaphan the secretary, and Asaiah the king's servant, saying,
(13) "Go, inquire of the LORD for me, and for the people, and for all Judah, concerning the words of this book that has been found. For great is the wrath of the LORD that is kindled against us, because our fathers have not obeyed the words of this book, to do according to all that is written concerning us."

Josiah instructed his advisors to seek further advice from someone familiar with the Word of God.

He had read the book. Deuteronomy clearly states God’s opinion of folks who fail to follow the law and the possible results. Do you think he may have been seeking a second opinion to find any possible loopholes or means to escape the wrath described in the book?

2Ki 22:14-20 ESV
(14) So Hilkiah the priest, and Ahikam, and Achbor, and Shaphan, and Asaiah went to Huldah the prophetess, the wife of Shallum the son of Tikvah, son of Harhas, keeper of the wardrobe (now she lived in Jerusalem in the Second Quarter), and they talked with her.
(15) And she said to them, "Thus says the LORD, the God of Israel: 'Tell the man who sent you to me,
(16) Thus says the LORD, behold, I will bring disaster upon this place and upon its inhabitants, all the words of the book that the king of Judah has read.
(17) Because they have forsaken me and have made offerings to other gods, that they might provoke me to anger with all the work of their hands, therefore my wrath will be kindled against this place, and it will not be quenched.
(18) 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 have heard,
(19) because your heart was penitent, and you humbled yourself before the LORD, when you heard how I spoke against this place and against its inhabitants, that they should become a desolation and a curse, and you have torn your clothes and wept before me, I also have heard you, declares the LORD.
(20) Therefore, 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 they brought back word to the king.

What do you think Josiah did next?

Huldah offered no hint that God may possibly hear their plea and forgive the sins of the former generations. God had already decreed the destruction of Judah as a result of Manasseh’s actions.

Josiah pushed ahead with the reforms that he had already started. Josiah brought the people together at the Temple to hear these lost words of God and to renew the covenant that had been forgotten.


2Ki 23:1-3 ESV
(1) Then the king sent, and all the elders of Judah and Jerusalem were gathered to him.
(2) And the king went up to the house of the LORD, and with him all the men of Judah and all the inhabitants of Jerusalem and the priests and the prophets, all the people, both small and great. 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.
(3) And the king stood by the pillar 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 this covenant that were written in this book. And all the people joined in the covenant.

Josiah led the people in a ceremony commanded in the Law:

Deu 31:11-13 ESV
(11) when all Israel comes to appear before the LORD your God at the place that he will choose, you shall read this law before all Israel in their hearing.
(12) Assemble the people, men, women, and little ones, and the sojourner within your towns, that they may hear and learn to fear the LORD your God, and be careful to do all the words of this law,
(13) and that their children, who have not known it, may hear and learn to fear the LORD your God, as long as you live in the land that you are going over the Jordan to possess."

The nation of Judah had lost the Word of God and had forgotten the Word of God, yet when a few men of the leadership of the nation read and studied the Word , their minds conformed to the Word and resulted in a renewal of the covenant with God.

It’s never too late.

After my daddy became so disabled by emphysema that he could no longer work, he had to take an early retirement. He did not have a lot to do and there was very little that he could do because of his physical condition. It’s a good thing that he liked to read. Daddy had always been a reader. His favorite books were paperback westerns written by Zane Grey, Louis L’amour, and Max Brand. Daddy had hundreds of those paperback westerns and he would read them over and over.

Sometime during that time Daddy started reading the Bible. I don’t remember my daddy ever going to church for any reason, even weddings or funerals. We have a New Testament that my daddy received at Vacation Bible School when he was 10 years old in 1951, so I do know that he had attended church as a child. When Daddy started reading that Bible, he read it all. He rediscovered the gospel that he had not heard since childhood. The message had been lost to him, but he found it again.

The preacher from the little country church down the road from Daddy’s house, Andy, had been visiting him regularly. According to Andy, when Daddy started reading that Bible, he also started asking such questions that even a preacher had to dig for the answers.

Because of what Daddy read, he decided that he wanted to be baptized. Andy was elated. There were problems, though. At this stage in Daddy’s illness, he could not walk from the living room to the kitchen without a bottle of oxygen. And even with the oxygen it was an ordeal. How could we possibly get someone in this condition to a church, into a baptistry, and back home again? (This denomination only practices full-immersion baptism.) Andy came up with the solution. He asked permission of his church to baptize Daddy at his home.

One of the high point in my life was the night that a few members of Hebrew Free-Will Baptist Church gathered along with the family at Daddy’s house and Andy sprinkled Daddy and everyone there sprinkled tears of joy. I cried more that night than I did at Daddy’s funeral six weeks later.

The point of this story is that Daddy started late, but it’s never too late. Once he began studying the Word, his mind became conformed to the Word and it changed his life, even though he had very little life left.

God’s Word is not something that we want to lose. How many of us have lost the Word, even with Bibles in our homes. The Bible is the most published book since the invention of the printing press, but it’s one of the least read. Let’s don’t wait until we have to re-learn the Gospel story.

In our world there is no shortage of Bibles. Yet widespread biblical illiteracy means that effectively, the Bible is "lost". What can we do to address that problem?

If we give our minds to God, God will transform our minds. We give God our minds through studying His Word. Our minds conform to whatever we fill them with. For most of my life I filled my mind with the garbage of the world. My mind was garbage. I now fill my mind with Truth and my life has been transformed by that Truth.

All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, that the man of God may be competent, equipped for every good work.
(2Ti 3:16-17 ESV)

Think about that for a moment. Scripture is breathed out by God. What happens when God breathes out something? In Genesis 2 we read that God breathed into a body of dust and what happened? That dust became alive. Scripture is the same. Our Bible is not just a book full of words that tell us some history and offer some suggestions as to how to live. The Scripture is alive and lives in us when we live our lives under the authority of that Scripture.

Heb 4:12 For the word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing to the division of soul and of spirit, of joints and of marrow, and discerning the thoughts and intentions of the heart.


There are some cautions to be aware of when studying the scripture:

We should never use the study of Scripture in order to reinforce our current lifestyle or opinions. An honest study of Scripture always challenges us to acknowledge our weaknesses and to move deeper into the faith. An honest study of Scripture always leads to a changed heart.


Our purpose for study of Scripture is not simply to gain knowledge. Our purpose for study is to conform our minds to Christ and thus to become more like Christ because we are the Body of Christ in this world. We must be prepared for our task which is to do God’s will in the world.

Knowledge is a great thing as long as you use it. We can read the Bible through four times a year, but if we aren’t challenged by it and changed by it, we may as well spend our time reading the funny papers.

Let’s recommit ourselves to reading and hearing and being challenged and changed by the Scriptures, which is the key to our relationship with God.

Could a modern reformation begin as simply as a renewed emphasis on the reading and study of Scripture?