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Hey, hey, hey, don't skip. We're a couple days away from the end of our reading plan, which means you're about to be a part of the 6% of Christians that have actually read the entire Bible cover to cover. So stay tuned until the very end of this episode to hear about something special that we have planned just for you Bible nerds. Let's dive in to today's episode. Family. Can you believe it? We're at day 365 today. We've got two chronicles, chapters 34, 35 and 36. Day 365. I can't believe it. We did it. Joe, we need some confetti. Somebody hand me some confetti. Hey, I got some confetti. Woo. Day 365. Eight. We did it. I'm proud of you already. And we're not even at the end of the episode. Oh, gosh. I can't do the episode with all this confetti. Somebody needs to clean this up. Ah, that's better. All right, let's dive into Today's episode, Day 365. What a special day it is to, like, come to the end of a journey, although we've come to the end of the road. Okay, okay, okay, okay. I gotta stop. I gotta stop. I gotta calm down. Like, every day. Like, all 364 days prior to today. I've got context clues for you. I've got nerdy nuggets for you. And you already know I'm gonna leave off the episode with a timeless truth. So let's get into it for context. All right, if there was ever a day where I need to remind everybody, like, who's writing this, content is today. It's Ezra. Ezra, Ezra, Ezra, Ezra. Like, today's content is what Gen Z would call Ezra coded. All right? We're going to dive into the story of Josiah, and I want you to realize, like, Ezra is using the story of Josiah to talk to his generation. Yes, Josiah. And what Josiah is able to accomplish in his generation and in his historical time period is really, really important. But Ezra is utilizing the history or the story of Josiah's life to really talk to his audience. And we cannot lose sight of that. So our big, big, big piece of context today is that all of this is Ezra coded. All right? And I'm going to dive into a little bit more of what I mean by that. Okay, so let's get specific. Josiah is going to emphasize the temple. Why? Because Ezra emphasizes the temple. Josiah is going to make sure that there's money that there's tithe money dedicated to the rebuilding of the temple. Why? Because Ezra cares about the rebuilding of the temple in his, his time period. Josiah is going to reinstitute festivals like Passover. Well, guess what? In Ezra chapter six, we see a massive Passover being celebrated. Also, once we get to like Nehemiah chapter nine, we're going to see festivals, like a big emphasis on festivals. Okay, next, Josiah is going to purge Israel of idolatry. Well, Ezra and Nehemiah are both purging Israel of idolatry. Okay, so, and most importantly, Josiah is going to lead the people that in his historical time period into covenant renewal. Well, guess what? If you read Nehemiah chapter 9, verse, verse 38, Ezra along with Nehemiah are leading the people into covenant renewal. And so they are. Ezra is 100% using Josiah as a character from history to inspire the people, to inspire the people to follow Ezra and Nehemiah. Because Ezra and Nehemiah are leading. Just like Josiah that remember Josiah, man, he was like the last bastion, the last hope that Israel had, the last king that really followed in the statutes or in the ways or in the example of David. And so Ezra and Nehemiah aren't just saying we're following after David, we're saying we're following after the guys that follow David. It's no different than modern day pastors and preachers tracing their spiritual lineage back to John Wesley or back to William Seymour or back to Charles Spurgeon and saying this person from history is someone that everyone is inspired by. Guess what? I'm trying to be like that person. So Ezra and Nehemiah are talking about Josiah, but we can't just get lost in all the details about Josiah's life that we forget that really this is for an audience and the audience that's going to read 2 Chronicles 34, 36 is Ezra, Ezra's generation, not Josiah's generation. Okay, so this is Ezra coded. All right, let's dive in. Second Chronicles, chapter 34. Let's get into our nerdy nuggets for the day. Second Chronicles, chapter 34, honestly, is one of the shining bright lights of hope in the entire book of Chronicles. But in all the Scriptures, like, Josiah is the man, like, what a leader. It says this. Second Chronicles, chapter 34 starts out in verse one. Josiah was eight years old when he became king. So maybe like me, you read that and you're like, I'm nervous, man. I don't know if. I don't know, I don't know about you, but I don't necessarily want an eight year old to be the president of the United States of America. Okay, that makes me a little nervous. Okay. Josiah was 8 years old when it began. When he became king and he reigned in Jerusalem 31 years, he did what was right in the eyes of the Lord. Okay. Whew. Okay. I was nervous. Not nervous anymore. Okay. And followed the ways of his father David. Not turning aside to the right or to the left. Man, if there was something that I want people to say about my life, it's that I didn't get distracted. I didn't turn to the right or to the left, but I kept my eyes on Jesus. I kept my focus. Okay. In the eighth year of his reign. Okay. While he was still young. All right, so let's actually interpret that this is our first nerdy nugget. When the Bible says in the eighth year of his reign, if he was eight years old when it began to reign, this isn't difficult math. That means he's 16 years old. Okay, so what does he do at 16? He began to purge Judah in Jerusalem of high places. Asherah, poles and idols. Okay, high places, Asherah, poles and idols. These are interconnected ideas, but they are three separate ideas. So high places, Asheropoles and idols. Under his direction, the altars of the Baals were torn down. He cut to pieces the incense altars that were above them and smashed the as poles and idols. I want you to, like, get a sense of how thorough this purging of Israel is. And guess who else is purging their generation of Israel. That's right, Ezra and Nehemiah. So essentially, I need you to get this. Ezra and Nehemiah are essentially, by writing two chronicles, they're actually saying to their audience, we're not weirdos. Like, we're not nuts. Like, there's been a long line of people who have done this same thing. We are operating in the tradition of Josiah, of Hezekiah, of David. Like, Ezra and Nehemiah are placing themselves in a historical tradition of reformers, of purgers of Israel. Okay. That's what's happening. Like, under the surface, this is really important. It says this. These he broke to pieces and scattered over the graves of those who had sacrificed to them. He burned the bones of the priests on their altars, and he so purged Judah and Jerusalem. Okay, so why does he do that? He does that to desecrate these pagan altars so they can't even be used anymore. What he doesn't want is for him for Josiah to die and Then a generation rises up that doesn't know Josiah or God and tries to use these pagan sites again. He's trying to make idolatry as difficult as humanly possible. Like, he's not trying to just make knowing God difficult. He's trying to make idolatry difficult. And that's. Honestly, that could be a timeless truth in and of itself. Pharisees or a Pharisaical spirit makes loving God hard. It makes, like, Christianity difficult or religion difficult. Josiah is actually trying to make sin difficult. Like, and. And what. What I. And I know this is getting into my opinion, but I would say that legalism is when sin's too easy, but repentance is really hard. Coming back to God is hard. I would actually say true revival is when sin is made difficult. You try to create barriers for people so that the sin is not so easy. You make sinning hard, and you make coming back to God easy. You make repentance easy. Pharisees always make repentance hard, and then they make sin too easy. And if. If that's all you get out of today's episode, I promise you that'll change everything. For your spiritual journey, for your walk with God, you should be doing things to make sin harder. You should be putting as much distance between you and compromise, or you and idolatry or you and sin. If sin's too easy, then you'll access it. Part of the reason why there's such a rampant rise in pornography is because it's free, it's accessible, and it's anonymous. Like, it's kind of like the perfect storm of this becoming something that's going to take over somebody's life because it's just simply too easy. Okay, so good leaders, good pastors remove barriers between people and God, but they put barriers in place between people in sin. Legalists don't care about the barriers between people in sin, but definitely put barriers in place between people and God. And I always want to make it harder for people to sin and easy for people to come to God, not hard for people to come to God and easy to access sin. All right, he's 16 years old. He begins to purge Israel. Then when he's 20 years old, he actually takes it a step further. Okay, 20 years old. And if there's anybody watching Today's episode who's 16 or who's 20, like, Josiah should be one of your heroes, because this is a young leader who's serious about the Lord. It says this in the 18th year of Josiah's reign. That means he's 20 years old. Okay, it's our next nerdy nugget. At 20 years old, he began to purify the land and the temple. Okay, so remember, Ezra loves people who prioritize the temple. So Josiah is prioritizing the temple. He sent Shaphan, son of Azaliah, and Messiah. Messiah. Messiah, the ruler of the city with Joah, son of Joahaz, recorded to repair the temple of the Lord his God. And this is a financial decision. What does it say next? They went to Hilkiah, the high priest, and gave him the money that had been brought into the temple of God. And I just want you to. I want you to hear me say this. There is no revival without finances. Like, the number one way that we know whether or not people prioritize the presence and the power of God is show me your bank account. Okay? Show me the money, period. Where's the money? Follow the money. You want to know what people care about? Follow the money. I know. Who cares about the garden? Like, I know based on time, treasure, and talent, it's not hard to figure out who's, like, really, really, really, really invested in our church, because that's proven through the financial sacrifice of people. So I'm not shy when it comes to talking about finances, because the Bible's not shy. And so the Bible's telling us that Josiah, at 20 years old, is like, no, no, no, no, no. Take this money and invest it in the temple. Invest finances into the temple. We want God's house to be built up. We want God's house to be strong. That requires finances. Okay, now there's one more kind of wave of what's going to happen with Josiah. And so we've looked at the eighth year, the 12th year, and now we're going to look at the 18th year. I misspoke. Okay. So in the eighth year of his reign, while he was still young, he began to seek God. Okay, don't skip. Don't skip. Hey, if you are in the home stretch of reading your Bible, first of all, I'm so proud of you. Second, you probably know this, but you're my kind of people. I thoroughly enjoy hanging out with Bible nerds. So I've got exciting news for. For you, and it's called the six percent club. For anyone that has finished their entire Bible in a calendar year, we have exclusive content, newsletters, giveaways, live events. Oh, yeah, live events, baby. And more all throughout the year. You can find out about all of that if you go to thebibledepartment.comclub to officially join the 6% club. Why do we call the 6% club? Because only 6% of Christians have actually read their entire Bible cover to cover. And every year, Bible nerds like you finish our Bible reading plan and we get asked, what's next? Well, we've got an answer, and you don't want to miss out. So head over to the bibledepartment.com club or click the link in the description to get access. We'll see you in the club. Let's go. So this starts personal. He begins to see God. At 16 years old, he is personally seeking the Lord. Four years of seeking God, and what happens? Okay, in his 12th year, he began to purge Judah and Jerusalem of high places, Asherah, poles and idols. Okay, so verse three tells us that in his eighth year, he seeks God. In his 12th year, that actually becomes something public. And I could just stop and give a word to every leader right now. I would say that we did the Bible department in 2025 for the very first time. But in 2013, 2014, I decided that I was going to start reading my Bible every day. Let's back up even more. In 2010, I decided, yeah, I want to go to England and I want to study the Bible and read the Bible five times in nine months. Okay. Before I could ever inspire thousands of people to take the Bible seriously, I had to do it myself. And there's a lot of people who want to skip what Josiah did in his eighth year and immediately jump to what he did in his 12th year. And the reality is that in year eight, you need to seek God. Then, after seeking God for four years, now it's contagious. Now it's real. Now you can get other people to reject idolatry and to also seek God. And there's a lot of us who probably have a Year 12 vision. But right now, you're in Year 8, and you don't need to implement any of the year 12 vision that God gave you. What you need to do is you need to internalize it, and you need to turn it into a personal conviction. Because moral failure isn't just the result of someone not loving the Lord. No, no, no. It's a result of wanting to Skip to year 12 without years 8, 9, 10, and 11. And my challenge to a lot of leaders is you can tell other people what you know, but you will reproduce who you are. And Josiah would never be able to lead a nation in reform or repentance or revival if he had not first sought the lord in year eight. So what happens? First, in the eighth year of his reign, at 16 years old, he seeks the Lord. It's not until he's 20 that he purges the land of idolatry. And then at 26. At 26, he's like, Wait, wait. In the 18th year of Josiah's reign, he's 26 years old. Now, this is verse eight. He's like, let's repair the temple. Let's get some money together. Whoa, whoa, whoa. Let's put the finances in place so that God's house can be prioritized. So I wanna. And then something really, really amazing happens in verse 14. Okay? While they were bringing out the money that had been taken into the temple of the Lord, and Hilkiah found the book of the law. I love that man. I don't just think that's serendipity. I think that's God. That once they actually prioritize the finances and put the money where it belonged, God goes, now let me unlock the Scriptures for you. I tell people all the time, the number one reason that we should be tithing is so that God could unlock truth. Revelation to the church. I've never been in a church with a revelatory preacher that was not directly attached to a generous congregation. Because Revelation, a preacher, a pastor's ability to receive revelation from the Lord is connected to whether or not people are generous. It is the generosity and the sacrificial giving of people that unlocks a revelatory gift for the pastor or for the preacher who leads that church. And so what happens? They get their finances in order, and the. The Bible, the book of the law that was lost is now found. Okay, so they find the Bible. It says this in verse 15. I have found the book of the law in the temple of the Lord. He gave it to Chiffon. Okay? Josiah now had been leading without God's word. He had just been doing things based on instinct because he was a man after God's heart, just like David. But now he receives instruction. And what happens? He responds. He responds. And he says, this great is the Lord's anger that is poured out on us because those who have gone before us did not keep the word of the Lord, not acted in accordance with all that is written in this book. That's verse 21. Now, I want to show you one last thing, one last dirty nugget. They have found the Logos, the written word. And what does that cause Josiah to do? Go find a prophet. So who do they find? They find a woman. Come on. Women in ministry. I'm pro women in ministry. They find a woman named Huldah. And Huldah now adds the rhema, okay? The spoken, the living, the uttered, the prophesied word. Now the rhema, the living spoken word of God, is added to the Logos. And if you want to know, my dream for what the Bible department should be doing is I hope that the year that you've spent with God's Logos has created a hunger, a desire for you to actually find a holder, somebody who can prophesy, someone who can preach, and someone who can help add rhema to the foundation of Logos that you have. And so kind of want to give you a three step outline for what happens in Josiah's life. First, there's repentance. Repentance. He turns to God. Repentance is not just what you turn from, it's what you turn to. Josiah seeks God in the eighth year of his reign while He's 16. And after seeking God for four years, then what's the second wave of repentance? He then purges Israel. So he turns to God. And then he caught. That turn to God causes a domino effect. It inspires an entire nation to turn away from Asherah poles and idolatry and, and high places. So step one is repentance. Then step two, reform. Let's get the temple in place. Let's get our finances in place. Let's. Let's find the Bible, let's reform. So often Christians want to change the world, but we're not changed. God starts at his house. He cleans his house first. He doesn't demand that America change. No, he demands that the church of America changes. And then lastly, we get revival. Repentance. Reform. Revival. Revival is when prophecy starts where the Spirit of God is poured out in such a way that the church isn't just right or cleaned up or purged, but on fire. Oh man. And my prayer is that this year that you've just spent with God and with His Word would cause you to repent, would cause you to maybe lead your sphere of influence to reform, to not be mad at non Christians, but to make sure that God's people actually act godly and then ultimately that revival would pour out. So Josiah's life looks like repentance, reform and revival. I should have told you this back in the context clues, but it's okay. Josiah's born in 648 B.C. once we get into 2nd Chronicles 35, Josiah is going to die. And then once we get into 2nd Chronicles 36, we are going to Move into every single descendant that Josiah has. I actually love saying these names. We get Jehoiahaz, Jehoahaz, Jehoiakim, Jehoiachin, and then Zedekiah. And then we're going to get exile for 70 years. And then we're going to end Second Chronicles 36 with Cyrus's decree. So the end of Second Chronicles and the beginning of Ezra is going to line up that history. What gets covered in these last three chapters of our Bible reading plan, 2 Chronicles 34, 35 and 36 is 109 years of history condensed into three chapters. So if you got dizzy today, just like, did we just cover like 70 years just in the last paragraph of chapter 36? Yes, we did. Okay. And it's left on a cliffhanger for a reason. So I want to give you two words as we move into our timeless truth. Death and descendants. Death in descendants. Josiah's gonna die. It doesn't matter how good a leader is, they always die. Moses was awesome, and then he died. Joshua was great, and then he died. Like, everyone's gonna die. And that is what the entire culmination of the Hebrew Scriptures are telling us. A story of death and descendants. Hey, Abraham was great, but then he died. And here are his descendants. Hey, Noah was great, but he died. And here are his descendants. Hey, Ezra, Nehemiah, whoever, name a person in the Hebrew Scriptures of the Old Testament. It doesn't matter how awesome they are. They're gonna die and they're gonna leave behind some descendants. And the story of Josiah is, oh, my God, look, this incredible leader. And the entire Old Testament is to make you to go, maybe this is our guy. But then they die and they leave descendants. And Josiah's descendants are wicked. So ultimately he dies and he leaves the sentence that can't follow, cannot follow in his footsteps. But then we get to the Book of Matthew and we're going to get a leader like Josiah, a leader who prioritizes the temple, a leader who purges Israel, a leader who, like Ezra and like Josiah, is going to be found in the temple seeking God at an early age. Is gonna be someone who renews the covenant, is gonna be somebody who is passionate about the Passover and even fulfills the Passover. Yeah, that person's name is Jesus. And what happens at the end of Jesus life? He dies. But his death is not the end. He dies, and in his death wins a victory that no Old Testament character could ever win in their death. And then what do Jesus descendants do? Yeah, his disciples, his followers, they actually take this thing that he started called the kingdom, and they take it further than he could have ever taken it. He actually says to them, you're gonna do greater things than I've ever done. And so every single Old Testament character that we've looked at in the entire Old Testament doesn't matter how awesome they are, they die and they leave descendants that pale in comparison to how awesome they were. Except when we get to the New Testament, when we get to Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, we're going to finally encounter a God, a man, a God man named Jesus, who is not just going to die, but he's going to resurrect from the dead. And he's not just going to leave behind ill equipped followers. No, no, no, no. He's going to leave behind 12 men that he lived life with and he's going to say to them, you're going to do greater things than me. And they do. They go and they preach the gospel around the world and it changes everything. And since the death of Jesus, the gospel has overtaken the world. And with that, I want to introduce you or I want to invite you to day one. That's right, Luke chapters one, two and three. Tomorrow is day one, day one of the Bible department. And maybe you did day one like 365 days ago, but I promise you, you're gonna see new things in day one this time that you didn't see last time. So buckle up and let's do it again. Let's go meet Jesus in Luke chapter one, two and three. Love you. I'm so proud of you. If you're on a streak, no point in breaking it now. I want this year to be the last year that you ever go a year without reading your Bible every single day. I'll see you right here tomorrow for Luke chapter 1, 2 and 3. Peace. Thanks so much for joining us on the Bible department podcast. Hey, we're almost there. I bet you can see the light at the end of the tunnel. We're towards the end of the year and I'm so proud of you. If this episode and this year of reading through the Bible was helpful, how about you invite a friend to join you on the journey next year? To learn more about the show, head to thebibledepartment.com and to learn more about the 6% club, make sure you go to thebibledepartment dot com club. We'll see you right back here tomorrow.