ARME 10: Angwin, CA - July 2012

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ARME Bible Camp

Doug Batchelor

Finding the Book of the Law

Well, these Bible Army programs are wonderful.

It's just that, you know, having all these people come together just because of the simplicity of the power of the Word.

And I might add It's good to be back here at Angwin at PUC and to stand here again and to be able to open the Word of God.

If you'll permit me, I'll tell you something exciting that's happening.

You know, Amazing Facts has been trying to do something to reach every generation.

A few years ago, we did a program for the kids called Amazing Adventure.

And I think more adults got baptized from that, but a lot of kids did too.

You know, you keep it simple and the adults go, ah, I get it now.

But even here, all the kids come up, It's such a thrill for us.

And then a couple of years ago, we broadcast a series from the Cedar Lakes Academy in Michigan.

What's the name of the academy where I was?

Yeah, well we were getting it in Michigan.

And we've been praying for the opportunity to do something especially for the college age group.

Because you know, statistically, and they've just finished a study, Barna Research on this, that as many as 70% of the young people in that age group from 17 to 22 drift from their faith, at least temporarily, some return.

And so we are going to Southern University and we're going to be uplinking from October 10 to 13 a program called The Ultimate Purpose.

And we're going to really be talking about what is the ultimate purpose of life.

It'll be broadcast to all the universities online.

But we hope you'll just pray for that because I'm above my skill set when I talk to college students.

And so we're just praying the Holy Spirit will reach out to them.

You know, I was talking earlier about how I love the word, and Christ is really in all of the teachings of the Bible.

But you know, it's possible for us to grow up in the church and to be surrounded with Bibles, and to be surrounded with Christian clichés, and religious ceremony, and all the fanfare, and still really know nothing about the Bible.

Sometimes we can confuse owning a Bible for really knowing the Bible and for knowing Jesus.

The Bible tells us in the book of Amos chapter 8, the days are coming, the Lord says when there'll be a famine.

Not a famine for bread or thirst for water, but of hearing the words of the Lord.

And people will wander from north to south and east to west, searching for the Word of God and not be able to find it.

And I've often wondered if the reason that prophecy is so amazing is because he's not talking about a famine for the Word of God in some pagan country.

There's always a famine for the Word of God in the pagan lands.

It's talking about a famine for the word of God in the pagan lands.

It's talking about a famine for the word of God among God's people.

And that's a frightening thought that you could actually have a people...

I mean, even now that we've got the Bible on computers, I've got, oh, half a dozen Bible programs on my computer.

I've got it on my iPad and all the other contraptions and Bibles and Bibles on the shelf.

A Bible on the internet will read to you for free.

I mean we're just surrounded with the opportunity for biblical truth.

Sometimes absent makes the heart grow fonder and sometimes familiarity breeds contempt.

There was a day where people would die for little sections of the Bible.

They were handwritten and they risked their lives to obtain a portion of the Gospel of John, a few words from God.

And now we're actually drowning in the possibility of hearing the Word of God and there's an indifference.

I want to direct you to a place in the Bible.

Please go to the book of Chronicles, sorry, 2 Chronicles, chapter 34.

2 Chronicles 34, I'll start with the first verse.

Loving Father, we just pray right now that your Spirit will come into this place.

You've promised that if we seek, we'll find, and if we search for you with all of our hearts, that we'll realize you, that you'll come into our presence.

And Lord, right now we're gathered in this place, especially because we're seeking after you.

We want to know you, your word better, and we ask you would remove any distraction.

Please be with me, forgive my sins, and I pray ultimately it'll be your voice that we hear.

The last good king in the Old Testament was King Josiah.

What's really strange is he had a really bad father, Manasseh.

1 of the worst kings, which tells you that you can even have good kids come from a bad family.

And some very good kings like Hezekiah had bad kids like Manasseh.

Josiah was 8 years old when he became king, and he reigned 31 years in Jerusalem.

And he did what was right in the sight of the Lord, and he walked in the ways of his father David.

He did not Turn aside to the right hand or to the left.

For in the eighth year of his reign, while he was still young, now if he begins to reign when he's 8 years old, in the eighth year of his reign, how old is he?

I don't believe this idea that, you know, you should just anticipate the kids need to rebel while they're teenagers, and I think that they can be the greatest workers for God during that age.

And in the 12th year, he began to purge Judah and Jerusalem.

Now you notice things aren't happening quickly.

It's going 8 years, and then in the eighth year of his reign, and then the twelfth year he begins to purge.

He's saying, you know, I was young before and I had a lot of advisors, but now I'm developing a little more of my own authority, and I want to do something.

I don't want to just be knowing what the truth is.

I want to do something to have an influence for good.

And he actually exerted his authority, began to purge Judah and Jerusalem of the high places, these false places of religion, and the wooden images and the carved images and the molded images.

He began to eliminate idolatry because at least he knew the 10 Commandments and they broke down the altars of the Baals in his presence and the incense altars which were above them he cut down and the wooden images and the carved images and the molded images you notice that he begins to effect a revival.

And even fulfilled a prophecy, burning the bones of the false priests on their altars to basically pollute those altars so they wouldn't use them anymore.

In the 18th year of his reign, when he had purged land in the temple, he got rid of all the idols.

Remember his father Manasseh had set up idols in the temple of the Lord.

When he purged the land in the temple, he sent Shaphan, the son of Azaliah, Maseah, the governor of the city, and Joah, the son of Jehoahaz, the recorder, to repair the house of the Lord.

The house of the Lord during the 55 years of the reign of Manasseh had just fallen apart.

And he said, look, we need to restore the house of God.

So here you're seeing the makings of a great revival.

They're missing something, but he's acting on what he knows.

And they came to Hilkiah the high priest, and they delivered the money that was brought into the house of the Lord that the Levites who kept the doors had gathered from the hand of Manasseh and from Ephraim and from the remnant of Israel.

10 of the tribes in the north had been carried away but some of the remainders now were worshipping in Jerusalem.

From all of Judah and Benjamin which they had brought back to Jerusalem and they put it in the hand of the workmen and they began to work and to rebuild and repair the house of the Lord because it had broken down and it says in verse 12 and the men did the work faithfully.

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Finding the Book of the Law

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