Under The Oakes

One of the youngest kings the Israelites ever had was a boy named Josiah. 2 Kings 22 tells us that he became king at 8 years old. Josiah came from a line of bad Kings. Josiah’s father was named Amon & he was a wicked King, who only ruled for 2 years. His father, Josiah’s grandfather, Manasseh, was one of the most wicked kings they had. Not only did he reinstate Baal worship, but he also allowed child sacrifice, which God’s Word clearly speaks against. Then we see Josiah, who comes along & becomes king at the young age of 8. I have a 9-year-old son, & while he is one of the wisest 9-year-olds I know, he is not fit to be king. 

Scripture jumps ahead to when Josiah is 26, & he is having them clear out the rubble that was the temple so they can rebuild it. While they are unburying all the remains of the temple, they found the lost book of the law. Most scholars agree that this would be the book of Deuteronomy. Deuteronomy is full of laws for God’s chosen people to live by. Not only does the book lay out how they were to live their lives, it also lays out what would happen if they disobeyed God. The high priest, Hilkiah, has the book of the law given to Josiah’s secretary, so he can tell Josiah what they’ve found & read it to him, if King Josiah desires. 

Josiah has his secretary read him the book of the law, & Josiah is so upset with what he hears. 2 Kings tells us that upon hearing the words from the book of the law, King Josiah tears his clothes in sorrow & sends his religious leaders to petition the Lord to stay His hand on their behalf. Scripture tells us that King Josiah will be spared from all the evil God was going to send upon them because of his reaction. Why was his reaction so severe? King Josiah was so upset that they had been led astray by his ancestors. He didn’t know what the book said, because they had lost it in the ruins of the temple. He then learned how publicly they were sinning against the Lord. It grieved his heart over their sin. 

Does your sin grieve your heart? Do you read God’s Word so you can make sure you are aligning yourself with God’s Word? How well do you know God’s Word? I have found that the more I read God’s Word, the clearer it gets. There are over 63,000 cross-references in scripture, where scripture speaks to itself. That is why the more we study it, the clearer it gets. While we don’t live under the laws that Josiah found in Deuteronomy, we do see that the Bible is our manual for life. The book is full of instructions on how to live a Godly life. What keeps you from scripture? Is it the daunting task of 66 individual books? Is it the fact that it’s a book, & it can’t be watched through social media? Or is it the fact that there isn’t just enough time in the day? Truthfully, that is probably where we find most of ourselves, in the “no time” category. 

I want to challenge you to ask yourself, how much time a week do you spend engaged in social media? Let’s just say you spend 2 hours a day on your cell phone. Whether it be social media, emails, news, or gaming apps, do you spend 2 hours a day on your phone? (If you don’t know, if you’re an iPhone user, you can look at your screen time through the settings app that calls out this information.) If you spend 2 hours a day, that’s 14 hours a week. That is then 728 hours a year you spend on your cell phone. That is just over 30 days straight that you spend on your cell phone. The sad reality is that our teens, on average, spend 3-4 hours a day on their smartphones. That would mean, for our young people, they are spending 2 months every year doing nothing but doomscrolling, as they call it.  That’s a scary statistic, but it definitely sheds some light on the next generation. Imagine if we spent that time reading our Bibles, praising God, in prayer, etc, instead of on our smartphones… If you took 30 minutes of that time and spent it reading your Bible, you would be able to read the Bible every year. Imagine how much different our world would be if we spent that time with God. 

The reality is, our cell phones are studying us now to keep us engaged. The algorithms that social media have are working hard to focus the content they show you strictly based on what you want, so you don’t even realize you’re spending 20 minutes every time you pick up your phone. Our phones, which were meant to show us things, are now studying us. When you react to a video with an emotion-based reaction, it tells the algorithm that detail, so it knows if you liked it or disliked it, to tailor your future videos to that one. 

There is even a whole thing where the reels we watch work like a slot machine. They will put some reels that interest you, but you don’t love, back to back, & then put in a reel they know you’ll love to hook you back in. They are studying the science to see if it releases the dopamine hit that your brain desires to keep coming back for more. Here we are thinking we’re spending 5 minutes (which is really 25 minutes) to decompress, or do something mindless for a few minutes, but in reality, we are being studied to be sucked into our phones for hours on end. 

Don’t mishear me, cell phones are not inherently evil; there are good things we can use them for. However, there are equally bad things that we can get pulled into if we don’t realize it. I have all kinds of apps on my cell phone that help me in my faith or encourage me. I have a few Bible Study apps that I use, as well as an app called “The Unreached Of The Day” that posts all about a different people group each day. I can then read about them & pray for them to know the gospel. However, the cons easily outweigh the pros, especially for the younger generation, where they don’t have any checks in place for what they are looking at. 

We need to be in the Bible for ourselves. We need to know God’s Word like the back of our hands. The reality is, there is an enemy out there who is seeking to kill, devour & destroy. If he can use people in places of leadership & trust to preach the wrong gospel, he gladly would. I have heard a few sermons in my day that are not at all biblical, but they have just enough scripture/truth to them that easily allows it to go over the head of those not pressing in. I am not saying that the pastor was a man of satan, but the gospel he preached was not the gospel of the Bible either. We HAVE to read the Word with a pen & notebook in hand, studying it to see what God has for us. 

In closing, the Bible is an algorithm in & of itself. However, the Bible doesn’t change to fit us; it changes us to align with it. Hebrews 4:12 tells us the Word of God is living & active, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing to the division of soul & spirit, discerning the thoughts & intentions of the heart. I want to challenge you to spend 20 minutes every day reading your Bible. Do that for a month & re-evaluate. I have never met anyone who wished they spent less time reading God’s Word! Pursue Him, honor Him, glorify Him, in ALL you do! Be blessed!