Bible in a Year - 2 Kings 22-23

King Josiah and reflecting God

Even though I grew up in the mountains, I (as anyone who has seen my photos can attest) have a thing for water and reflections.  Now, put me somewhere with a mountain lake and I’m just about in heaven.  But given that we don’t have mountains around here in SW Ohio, I’ll settle for the lakes and ponds that we do have.  Anyway...yesterday morning this was the sunrise that began my day.  It was just stunning but made even more so (for me at least) by the still waters that reflected the glorious sky.  It isn’t a perfect reflection but it is pretty close.

It got me reflecting on the rest of my walk about how it is that I (and we) reflect God to others?  If God is shining into our lives and working in our lives, how is that reality evident to the world?  This probably stirred a bit for me because of the reading yesterday morning from 2 Kings.  It was the story of King Josiah of Judah who was one of the kings who tried to get the nation back to the covenant that God  had made with them.  Chapters 22 and 23 go into incredible detail about all the reforms and actions that Josiah took to restore what the people were supposed to have been but had been lost along the way.

Maybe what spoke the most to me was how, in 33:21-23, it speaks of Josiah re-instituting the celebration of the Passover - a practice that had seemingly fallen away.  “No such passover had been kept since the days of the judges who judged Israel, even during all the days of the kings of Israel and of the kings of Judah.”  The people had forgotten who they were and so how could they possibly reflect God to the world if they had forgotten the very story that connected them to God in the first  place?

So, how am I reflecting God to the world today?  How are you?  How are we?