"Lost and Found" (August 23, 2026 Sermon)
/Lost and Found
2 Kings 22:1–13; 23:1–4, 24–27
Josiah was eight years old when he began to reign; he reigned thirty-one years in Jerusalem. His mother’s name was Jedidah daughter of Adaiah of Bozkath. He did what was right in the sight of the Lord and walked in all the way of his father David; he did not turn aside to the right or to the left.
In the eighteenth year of King Josiah, the king sent Shaphan son of Azaliah son of Meshullam, the secretary, to the house of the Lord, saying, “Go up to the high priest Hilkiah and have him add up the entire sum of the silver that has been brought into the house of the Lord that the keepers of the threshold have collected from the people; let it be given into the hand of the workers who have the oversight of the house of the Lord; let them give it to the workers who are at the house of the Lord repairing the house, that is, to the carpenters, to the builders, to the masons; and let them use it to buy timber and quarried stone to repair the house. But no accounting shall be asked from them for the silver that is delivered into their hand, for they deal honestly.”
The high priest Hilkiah said to Shaphan the secretary, “I have found the book of the law in the house of the Lord.” When Hilkiah gave the book to Shaphan, he read it. Then Shaphan the secretary came to the king and reported to the king, “Your servants have melted down the silver that was found in the house and have delivered it into the hand of the workers who have oversight of the house of the Lord.” Shaphan the secretary informed the king, “The priest Hilkiah has given me a book.” Shaphan then read it aloud to the king.
When the king heard the words of the book of the law, he tore his clothes. Then the king commanded the priest Hilkiah, Ahikam son of Shaphan, Achbor son of Micaiah, Shaphan the secretary, and the king’s servant Asaiah, saying, “Go, inquire of the Lord for me, 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 ancestors did not obey the words of this book to do according to all that is written concerning us.”
Then the king directed that all the elders of Judah and Jerusalem should be gathered to him. The king went up to the house of the Lord, and with him went all the people of Judah, all the inhabitants of Jerusalem, the priests, the prophets, and all the people, both small and great; he read in their hearing all the words of the book of the covenant that had been found in the house of the Lord. The king stood by the pillar and made a covenant before the Lord, to follow the Lord, keeping his commandments, his decrees, and his statutes, with all his heart and all his soul, to perform the words of this covenant that were written in this book. All the people joined in the covenant.
The king commanded the high priest Hilkiah, the priests of the second order, and the guardians of the threshold to bring out of the temple of the Lord all the vessels made for Baal, for Asherah, and for all the host of heaven; he burned them outside Jerusalem in the fields of the Kidron and carried their ashes to Bethel.
Moreover, Josiah put away the mediums, wizards, teraphim, idols, and all the abominations that were seen in the land of Judah and in Jerusalem, so that he established the words of the law that were written in the book that the priest Hilkiah had found in the house of the Lord. Before him there was no king like him who turned to the Lord with all his heart, with all his soul, and with all his might, according to all the law of Moses, nor did any like him arise after him.
Still the Lord did not turn from the fierceness of his great wrath by which his anger was kindled against Judah because of all the provocations with which Manasseh had provoked him. The Lord said, “I will remove Judah also out of my sight, as I have removed Israel, and I will reject this city that I have chosen, Jerusalem, and the house of which I said, ‘My name shall be there.’”
All right, friends, we come to our second-to-last stop on our journey through 1 and 2 Kings. It’s been a bit different from a typical sermon series, and I hope you, like me, have learned more about these two books of the Bible. Last week we journeyed through the collapse of the northern kingdom of Israel and were reminded that there wasn’t one big, dramatic mistake that led to the downfall of the nation of Israel, but rather a long series of missed opportunities to be faithful. We found the good news in that passage: that what you and I do each and every week is a kind of counterbalance to that. It is a long, lifelong process of faith formation in which we gather to be reminded of who we are and whose we are. That’s what we journeyed through last week, and this week we turn our attention to the southern kingdom of Judah. So here are these words from 2 Kings 23, verses 1 through 4 and 24 through 27.
So, friends, as we mentioned last week, the end of 2 Kings begins in a much darker place than the beginning of 1 Kings. Last week we saw the destruction of Israel and the northern kingdom’s exile to the Assyrians, and now we see the beginning of the end of the southern kingdom of Judah, which will fall next week to the Babylonians. Last week’s events occurred around 725 to 722 BCE, and the southern kingdom hung on for another hundred years or so — it didn’t fall until about 587. But before that, we’re introduced to a king named Josiah.
A King Unlike the Others
He was one of the kings of the southern kingdom of Judah. Did anybody pay attention to how old he was when he began his reign? Eight years old. Last time I remember a king that young was King Joffrey in Game of Thrones, and that did not end very well — King Joffrey was not a very nice human being. But Josiah was. Of all the kings we hear about in 1 and 2 Kings — remember, we started off with Saul and David in the books of 1 and 2 Samuel, and then we got to Solomon and Kings — all the kings had their ups, but they most certainly also had their downs. They had a lot of them. Except for Josiah. Josiah is the only king in all of 1 and 2 Kings who gets a glowing five-star review.
And that’s because when he was reigning — I don’t think this happened when he was eight, but sometime later on — they were doing some housekeeping in the temple, and a priest found this thing as he was going around. See if we’ve got one here. What was found? The Bible. The Torah. The Book of the Covenant. The law. That was the whole reason God called God’s people together. It was the whole reason the temple was built by Solomon in the first place: to protect the law of God, to honor the law of God, and to follow the heart of the law — to do justice, to love kindness, to walk humbly, to love God with all of our body, our mind, and our strength. And this all-important document was found where? In a closet somewhere. Dust — covered in dust. And it was found, and the priest went to Josiah and said, “Hey, look what we found. We found the holy scriptures. This is what God has been calling us to do all along.”
I think this is a really ironic and beautiful picture, even as heartbreaking as it is — that sometimes institutions like the church forget why we were founded in the first place. Right? We’re all guilty of that from time to time. We forget that we are not called to go out and maintain buildings. That’s not in the Great Commission. That’s not what Jesus calls us to do. It’s not to go out and form committees — although committees can be really important, and we’re going to get to that in a second. But God calls us to do justice, to love kindness, and to walk humbly. That’s the core of what we’re called to do.
So Josiah finds himself reigning at a time when this really important part of the — the bylaws, you might say — is discovered, reminding the Israelites who they’re called to be. Rather than acting defensively, Josiah says, “Everybody needs to hear about this. We’ve forgotten about this. Let’s make this an opportunity to get together and remind ourselves why we exist.” So he calls everyone together and says, “Y’all, let us read this together. Let us recommit ourselves to what God has been calling us to do all along.” He brings everybody together, and they read the scroll. The people weep, recommit themselves to God, and Josiah has all the idols of Baal thrown out, burned, and destroyed. That is what Josiah is remembered for.
Doing Right, Even When It Doesn’t Change the Outcome
So there are a couple of things I was thinking about this week. One, I thought — as I already mentioned — that sometimes we all need to be reminded of why God has called us together as Guilford Park Presbyterian Church, founded in 1948, to serve our neighbors. It’s something we do really well here at Guilford Park, and we must never, ever, ever allow ourselves to forget that’s why we exist.
The other thing this text reminds me of is that sometimes it’s really important to do the right thing, even when it doesn’t change the outcome. What we’ll find next week is that the kingdom of Judah still falls after Josiah and the people find the scroll and recommit themselves — because Josiah has already heard an oracle from a prophet that Judah will fall. And yet Josiah still does the right thing and says, “You know what? Nevertheless, this is who we are, so we’re going to recommit ourselves to God’s law.” So to me, that’s a really important lesson about leadership: doing the right thing even when it doesn’t change the outcome.
Beyond the Hero Narrative
But what I really want to focus on in this brief sermon today is a reminder of what David LaMotte calls the hero narrative. I’m plugging this a bit because you all know David LaMotte is going to be joining us in about a month, and I know some of y’all have started working your way through his book, You Are Changing the World Whether You Like It or Not. One of the core premises of this book is that David pushes back on the hero narrative — this lie that you and I have been taught to believe, that social change happens when a hero shows up. Right? Think about most of the big superhero or adventure movies you go see — the plot is pretty similar. There’s some great cataclysmic threat, and a hero just sort of appears out of nowhere. Everybody claps along as the hero magically fixes everything, and then the curtain falls, and that’s that.
Well, that may make a good movie in Hollywood, but David LaMotte argues that nowhere in the history of social movements has that been how things actually happened. Heroes do not promote positive social change. Do you know what does promote positive social change? Committees. I know — Presbyterians, this is the moment we’ve been waiting for.
David LaMotte says it’s not heroes that make change, but movements that make change, and committees that keep those movements going. He talks about Rosa Parks and how we’ve been taught the story of how she bravely refused to give up her seat on the bus in Montgomery. For most of us growing up, that was about the extent of the story we were told. Now, to be sure, that was an absolutely courageous act, and nonviolent movements like the civil rights movement need those big moments that galvanize the public. But those moments are not what sustain change. What a lot of us weren’t told is that before Rosa Parks ever refused to give up her seat, she had already been organizing nonviolently for over a dozen years. She had her big moment in the spotlight, but as soon as it happened, she got right back to organizing the Montgomery bus boycott, which lasted over a year. She helped bring a lot of people together, and they essentially created Uber in the 1950s, right? They all had to work together to get people from point A to point B to keep the movement going.
Because we have figures like Josiah who are lifted up as heroes — and yes, leadership is important. I will never suggest that leadership isn’t important. But I think Josiah’s story is a reminder that sometimes we are all guilty — me too — of waiting for the next president to come and save us. The next pastor to come and save us. The right CEO, teacher, or whoever to come and save us. And David LaMotte reminds us that while individual piety like Josiah’s is important, what’s more important is that you and I realize we are all responsible for one another, that we are all part of this movement — and dare I say, we are all part of this committee called Guilford Park Presbyterian Church that has been called to love our neighbors.
So thanks be to God for the Josiahs among us — that is important. But more importantly, thanks be to God for the people who organize us to achieve long-term, positive social change. If you want to learn more about that, read this book and join us next month for our Ruth Lamb weekend.
In the name of God the Creator, Redeemer, and Sustainer, may all of us, God’s beloved children, say: Amen.