2 CHRONICLES xxix. 1-11, 15-19.
Worship has vital connections with work. There are nerve-relationships between the heart and the hand. The condition of the sanctuary is reflected in the state of the empire. If there is uncleanness in "the holy place," there will be blight and degeneracy among the people. The fatal seeds of national instability and decay are not found in economics; they are found in the sanctuary. "Until I went into the sanctuary ... then understood I!"
Hezekiah cleansed "the house of the Lord." He cast forth the filthiness out of the holy place. He ushered in his golden age with the reformation of worship. He recalled exiled and white-robed Piety to her appointed throne. He began the re-establishment of right by recognizing the rights of God. He gave the Lord His due! All our rights are born out of our "being right" with God! We begin to be rich when we cease to rob God!
"_And when the burnt offering began, the song of the Lord began also._" That is ever so. Our real songs begin with our sacrifices. We enter the realm of music when we enter the realm of self-surrender. A willing offering, on a clean altar, introduces the soul into "the joy of the Lord."
JULY The Twenty-second
2 CHRONICLES xxxiv. 1-11.
Josiah "_began to seek after God_." The other day I saw a young art student copying one of Turner's pictures in the National Gallery. His eyes were being continually lifted from his canvas to his "master." He put nothing down which he had not first seen. He was "seeking after" Turner!
And thus it was with Josiah. His eyes were "ever toward the Lord!" He studied the "ways" of the Lord, in order that he might incarnate them in national life and practice. Wise doings always begin in clear seeing. We should be far more efficient in practice if we were more diligently assiduous in vision. It is never a waste of time to "look unto Him." Looking is a most needful part of our daily discipline. "What I say unto you, I say unto all, _Watch_!"
And because Josiah saw the holiness of the Lord he saw the uncleanness of the people. He had a vision of God's holy place, and he therefore saw the defilement of the material worship.
"_In the twelfth year he began to purge Judah._" Yes, that is the sequence. The reformer follows the seer. We shall begin to sweep the streets of our own city when we have gazed upon the glories of the holy city, the New Jerusalem.
JULY The Twenty-third