Key Verses: 2 Chronicles 35:1, 22b
Now Josiah kept a Passover to the Lord in Jerusalem, and they slaughtered the Passover lambs on the fourteenth day of the first month….[Josiah] did not heed the words of Necho from the mouth of God. So he came to fight in the Valley of Megiddo.

At 26 years old, King Josiah served God faithfully, following in detail God’s instructions for the celebration of the Passover. This was to be the annual observance for remembering the time when God delivered the Children of Israel from slavery in Egypt (Exodus 12:1-14). No doubt Josiah learned how to do this from the Bible Scrolls which were discovered in the Temple. Josiah, as recorded in 2 Chronicles 34:31, had read aloud the entire book in the hearing of all the leaders of the people. Josiah was obedient to the words he had read.

But when it came to another encounter of the Children of Israel with Egypt, there is no record of Josiah praying for guidance in his decision to engage Pharaoh Necho in war. We can learn from this tragic end to Josiah’s life that we need to add prayer and waiting on God before we make our decisions…waiting on God for His directions. Poor and destructive decisions will result from failure to hear clearly from God. Amazingly, God warned Josiah through the mouth of Necho, but still Josiah stubbornly went into battle.

PRAYER FOR TODAY:
O Lord Jesus, teach me to pray as You taught Your disciples (at this point let’s pray “The Lord’s Prayer,” slowly and carefully, found in Luke 11:1-4). Amen!!!

100 PERSONAL WORDS:
In thinking about what Josiah did when he was 26, I was reminded of one decision I made at the same age, about which I prayed a great deal. When I felt the “go-ahead” from God, I called Wes Millar, formerly the accountant at Healey Motors in Pembroke (where I had worked when I was 16). Now, 10 years later, Wes was a co-owner of a car dealership in Cornwall, Ontario. Someone had told me that they saw a used school bus on his car lot. After our chat, Wes and his partners decided to donate the bus for our Deep River Sunday School. I was so excited as I went to buy a bus ticket to travel to Cornwall to pick up the bus. As I drove it back, I could see it in my mind’s eye…the bus filled with Sunday School students. That’s what happened! On one side of the bus I painted the words, “TEACH ME THY WAYS, O LORD. PSALM 86:11.” On the other side I put the words, “STUDY TO SHOW THYSELF APPROVED UNTO GOD. 2 TIMOTHY 2:15.” For at least the next three years, that bus ran steadily every Sunday morning from Deep River to Deux Rivieres and back, and in the afternoon to Chalk River and back. Our new little Sunday School in Deep River grew to almost 150 students, and in Chalk River we reached another 50 children. God was in that decision to ask for the bus. He taught us His ways, and we studied His Word. His ways are discovered only through much prayer and complete obedience.

Yours for reading and studying God’s Word, obeying God’s Word, and praying until we are convinced we’ve heard from God concerning decisions which will have far-reaching effects,

David