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Starting with Jesus

Heather Bennett

Katie Chitwood

Reflect and Renew April 2023

Joash, the Boy King

Aunt Emma and the others were captured. She spent over five years in these camps. U.S. Airborne troopers liberated the residents of the camp. I noticed the form of my Aunt Emma talking to her best friend, Jesus. Kneeling next to her bed made an indelible impression upon my mind. Welcome to Reflect and Renew. Hey, I'm Katie. I'm so glad that you'll be joining me today. We will be learning and growing together in our walk with Jesus. You will surely be encouraged and challenged as we study week by week and hear from the experiences of others. This week we're looking at the story of Joash. If you've read the book My Bible Friends by Edith B. Degering, you know that there's a story in there called Joash the Boy King. It's quite a remarkable story because you have this baby who is or could be the crowned king, but he's rescued by his aunt because he is to be killed by his grandmother. He's raised in secret until he's seven years old and then placed on the throne by his Uncle Jehoiada, who just happens to be the high priest. As a young man he desires to repair the temple, the place where he had been hidden for so many years. At first he doesn't succeed, but then he comes up with a plan. He places a box by the entrance to the temple so that people can come and drop their money into that box and the money will be used for all the repairs needed. This time he's successful. The temple is finally repaired and the worship services are reinstated. You know, time goes by and the Bible tells us that his Uncle Jehoiada died. Can you guess how old he was? A hundred and thirty years old. And you would think that with all those years of faithful godly leadership that Joash would be okay. He would continue to walk in the training of his youth, but it doesn't happen that way. The leaders of Judah come to him, the Bible says, and they bow to him. The king listened to them. What were they saying? Well, we don't know. The Bible doesn't say exactly, but it does tell us what the actions were that followed. Second Chronicles 24 18 says, Therefore they left the house of the Lord God of their fathers and served wooden images and idols, and wrath came upon Judah and Jerusalem because of their trespasses. Even with all this wrath, even though they turned away from God, God still has mercy. He still has pity on them. So he sends them the prophets to help them see the error of their ways so that they can turn back to God. One prophet's name was Zechariah. He was the son of Jehoiada. So that makes him the cousin of Joash. Zechariah came to the king and he asked him questions that were designed to help Joash think about what he was doing, to remember the God that his uncle Jehoiada had taught him about. Why do you transgress the commandments of the Lord so that you cannot prosper? Why? This made Joash angry. And in fact, rather than turning back to God, he turned against Zechariah, his cousin, and he even had him stoned to death. Within a few months, Joash himself was wounded in battle and then his own servants plotted together and they killed the king. It's a sad ending, isn't it? What can we learn from this story about Joash? Well, in our devotional that each week, Merle Poirier writes for Starting with Jesus, she brings out in this lesson the topic of influence. And so if you want to read that devotional for yourself, you can go to our website, startingwithjesus.com slash renew, startingwithjesus.com forward slash renew, and you can read through it on your own. But I want to talk about today, influence. What is influence? Well, of course, if you want to know the definition, where do you go now? I go to Google. So I looked it up and the Oxford Dictionary says that influence is the capacity to have an effect on the character, development, or behavior of someone or something. In really simple terms or everyday English, it means that our actions will affect those around us. Not only do we impact people around us, but we are impacted by others. This can be different ways. It can be emotionally, it can be physically, and it can be spiritually. So let's think about people who have impacted our spiritual journey. Maybe it's a parent, a grandparent, a teacher, a pastor, or a youth leader. It's easy to be influenced by people and follow them or even their example, rather than following the God who they serve. The problem is, is that when we do this, when we follow the people rather than God, that person, when they're gone from our lives, we have nothing to stand on. We flounder. We lose our way, just like Joash did in our story this week. And yet, when we're influenced by those spiritual leaders in our lives, when we're pointed to Jesus, when He becomes our foundation, then you know what? We have no need to fear for the future because our feet are firmly planted on Him. Not a person, but the rock who will not suffer us to be moved. Isn't that encouraging? This week, we hear from Kevin Longo, who will share with us about a special woman in his life and how her walk with God, her devotion to God made a profound impact in his own spiritual life at a young age. In the summer of 1972, my mother and father bought a fixer up our house in the Bay Area. And my mom's aunt, Aunt Emma, came down to spend a week with us, helping to clean up the kitchen and the rooms and making the house livable. I had moved out of my bedroom to a back bedroom so that my aunt could have my room. It was there that my aunt made a deep impression upon me. A little background is in order. Aunt Emma graduated from nursing school in the late 1930s. She took a call as a missionary nurse to a hospital, an Adventist hospital, in Shanghai, China. Months after she arrived, the Japanese bombed and invaded China. She and the others were captured and taken to prisoner of war camps. She was in a number of camps, but finally ended up at Los Baños in the Philippines, south of Manila. It was a terrible place to be. She spent over five years in these camps. The commandant of her particular camp slowly starved them to death. Many, many of the people there died. But a couple of days before the prisoners were scheduled to be executed, U.S. Airborne Troopers Special Forces parachuted into the camp at 7 o'clock in the morning, eliminated the guards, and liberated the residents of the camp. There were over 2,000 missionary families there in the camp. Emma returned to the United States, where she recovered from malnutrition and the abuse and treatment that she had experienced. And she continued her career as a nurse, serving and caring for patients in the Napa Valley. And it was then, that time, that she came down and spent a week with us. Now, I hadn't met Aunt Emma very many times before she came to our home. In fact, I don't really remember meeting her more than maybe once or twice. But it was there in our home that week that I got to get personally acquainted with her and find out what kind of a person she really was. And she was amazing. She was the most loving Christian and the most happy Christian that I had ever met in my entire life. She had memorized scripture extensively. She always had a smile. And she was so tender and compassionate. I had never met anybody like that in my life. One morning, while I was walking down the hallway, I noticed her door was just slightly ajar. I noticed a form down next to the bed. I stopped and I peeked in and noticed that she was kneeling next to her bed with her Bible open, talking to her best friend, Jesus. That made a very deep impression upon me. I had never seen anything like that before. While my mother was a Christian and was committed to raise my sister and I to know Jesus, I had never seen somebody kneeling next to their bed in prayer. My father was a backslidden Christian. I don't really remember having worship in our home, at least certainly not consistently as I grew up. But there that morning, I noticed the power of my Aunt Emma. She had a personal relationship with Jesus. And she spent time with him every morning, talking with him in prayer. Now, I had given my heart to Jesus when I was eight years old, and I still remember the day, standing out on a playground in Burlingame, California, following a week of prayer and thinking and talking to Jesus, saying, Jesus, I don't know how to tell people about you, but I ask that you will come in and live in my life, that people will see you in my life and want to be like you too. But from that point until the summer of 1972, when I was 15, I had not made a public stand for Jesus through baptism yet. But at that moment, seeing my aunt, this loving, compassionate, cheerful Christian, kneeling next to her bed, made an indelible impression upon my mind. And again, I thought, Jesus, help me to do that too. Over my life, I have had times when I have not been consistent and times when I have spent time with Jesus every morning. But it's still a goal and desire in my heart. Because of that one morning in the summer of 1972, when I noticed the form of my Aunt Emma, kneeling next to her bed, talking to her best friend, Jesus, and wanting to experience that too. When you think about the story that Kevin shared with us, what is your spiritual impact on those around you, your spouse, your kids, and your grandkids? I love the quote from Adventist Home on page 426 and it says, Above all things, parents should surround their children with an atmosphere of cheerfulness, courtesy, and love. A home where love dwells and where it finds expression in looks, in words, in acts, is a place where angels delight to dwell. Let the sunshine of love, cheer, and happy content enter your own hearts and let its sweet influence pervade the home. This is a challenge, isn't it? That we allow ourselves to be love and cheer and happiness to our kids. And I'm not saying that you never show your kids that you're sad. No. Because there is a time to be sad. And we need our kids to see that we get sad sometimes too. But let's encourage, let's promote cheerfulness, courtesy, and love in our actions, in our words, to each one in our family. Each week we have a challenge from our devotional. And this week, it's a little different because there isn't just one challenge, but there's a challenge for each day of the week. So let's look at these together. And I'll also include them in the description box down below. You can always find them in our free devotional by going to startingwithjesus.com slash renew so you can read along or see it for yourself. But here's some of the challenges. So this is for Monday. Are you ready? If you're married, list the characteristics of your spouse that not only attracted you to them, but also made them a wise and godly choice. Now if you're single, make a list of traits that you would like in a life partner, those godly traits that you're looking for. On Tuesday, the question is asked, how has God used you in doing simple things to accomplish his work? What are the little things? Sometimes we get so caught up in the big things or wanting to do the big things that the little things kind of slide by. So what are some ways that God has used you to doing those simple little things to accomplish his work? On Wednesday, it says consider the temple, either as your local church or as your body because our body is the temple of the Holy Spirit, right? Choose one and think about how you might help to improve your temple just like Joash did. What are some things? I know I need to exercise more. I've been so busy that oftentimes exercise just kind of gets pushed to the back burner, but I feel so much better when I exercise. Or maybe in our church, is there something that you can do? Maybe weeding the flower bed or helping with some painting or something that you can do to help spruce up or improve the temple just like Joash did. On Thursday, consider how God has preserved your life. Do you know of a time when God has preserved your life? Maybe in a big way or in a little way, but think about that and ponder that. On Friday, does God seem hidden to you? In what ways has he revealed himself to you in the past? How does he reveal himself to us today? And lastly, on Sabbath, how can you bring about revival in your life? You might even tweak this question a little bit. How can God bring about revival in your life? Are you going to surrender to God and let him take you just as you are and help you bring that revival to your life? I hope so. Let's pray. Dear Lord, the story of Joash has so many lessons that we can learn. We ask and pray that you will help us today to surrender ourselves to you, to be grounded in you, not in other people, not in other ideas or philosophies, but in the pure word of God that can give us strength, that can lead us and guide us to make the right choices every single day. Lord, you know the struggles each one of us are going through. There's hard times and there's good times. I ask and pray that you will help us to stay connected to you, committed to you. In Jesus' name, amen. This podcast is sponsored by Starting With Jesus. To find out more about other programs or to find out the links that were shared in this podcast, just check out the description box below.

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