Jim Gallagher

2 Kings 22:2

“And he did what was right in the sight of the Lord, and walked in all the ways of his father David; he did not turn aside to the right hand or to the left.”

Josiah was the youngest king to reign over the nation of Israel. At eight years old, his father died and he ascended the throne. We read very little of the early years of his reign, but at eighteen, he began a campaign to reform the nation, and turn the people back to the Lord. Josiah would go on to become one of the greatest kings in the nation’s long history. His success is summed up in three simple statements: he did what was right, he walked in the ways of the Lord, and he did not allow himself to become sidetracked by other things. As his story unfolds, we see the application…

Psalm 95:6

“Oh come, let us worship and bow down; let us kneel before the Lord our Maker.”

Paul declared, all Scripture is inspired by God and is profitable. Every page of God’s Word has a purpose in the life of the believer. However, there are certain passages that have greater meaning to each of us, because of the impact they have had upon our lives. This is a particularly important text to me.

Years ago, when I was a relatively new Christian, I was invited to a weekend retreat with about 200 other teenagers. We all congregated at a retreat center in the San Bernardino Mountains, for times of worship, and the Word. I had been a Christian for about two years, but had never been to anything like that before. In fact, I had only been to church a handful of times. The first night, after a…

2 Kings 21:1-2

“​Manasseh was twelve years old when he became king, and he reigned fifty-five years in Jerusalem. His mother’s name was Hephzibah. And he did evil in the sight of the Lord, according to the abominations of the nations whom the Lord had cast out before the children of Israel.”

Manasseh, king of Judah, will go down in history as the king who caused the fall of there nation. It was not his foreign policy, his economic plan, or his tax code, that killed the nation. Instead, it was his view of God and his stance regarding sin that would weaken the nation, and lead to its collapse. Later we read,

2 Kings 23:26 “Nevertheless the Lord did not turn from the fierceness of His great wrath, with which His anger was aroused against Judah, because of all the provocations with which Manasseh had provoked Him.”

The…

2 Kings 20:6

“And I will add to your days fifteen years”

Imagine what this promise meant for Hezekiah. First, he was ill, so it meant he would be healed. Second, it meant he would have more time. Third, it meant a clock started that night, giving him an expiration date. Fifteen years from this promise, Hezekiah would breath his last. This promise has often made me wonder, “What I would do with fifteen more years?” How would you react, if suddenly you were given an expiration date? Let’s take a look at what Hezekiah did.

First, Hezekiah entertained delegates from Babylon. These men were impressed with him because he accomplished what no other nation had; he was victorious in battle against Assyria. We previously read how God sent angelic beings to do battle on behalf of Judah, defeating Assyria. Hezekiah, however, seemed to take credit for what the Lord…

Psalm 93:1

“The Lord reigns, He is clothed with majesty; the Lord is clothed, He has girded Himself with strength. Surely the world is established, so that it cannot be moved.”

It seems to me, if one thing is certain in life, it is that things are constantly moving. We live on a moving planet. At the equator, the Earth is spinning at 1000 miles per hour, moving at 67,000 miles per hour around the Sun, and our entire Galaxy is moving at about 185 miles per second. Since this motion is constant, we cannot feel its effects. However, there is other movement that we do notice. The United States Geological Survey website lists dozens of earthquakes that have happened around the world in the past seven days. Earthquakes happen because the earth’s surface is like a thin crust. This crust is made up of many pieces, like a puzzle…

2 Kings 18:33

“Has any of the gods of the nations at all delivered its land from the hand of the king of Assyria?”

Assyria was on a campaign to conquer the world. Their armies were sent out to defeat any nation that showed the least resistance. Judah had watched as their neighbors Israel and Syria were defeated, and the people taken away as slaves. Now, with the Assyrian army at their doorstep, it seemed as though Judah would be the next to fall. Delegates, representing the king of Assyria, came to Jerusalem and openly threatened the people, in order to destroy what little confidence they might have had in the Lord. These delegates reminded the people that no other nation had been able to resist the Assyrian conquest, and Judah would be no different. It was here, they made their biggest mistake. They thought Israel’s God was no…

Psalm 91:7

“A thousand may fall at your side, and ten thousand at your right hand; but it shall not come near you.”

The Psalmist is speaking of the benefits derived from living in an intimate, abiding, relationship with God. Jesus also spoke on the same subject when He refered to Himself as the vine and us as the branches. He made it clear, the only way to bear fruit in our life was by remaining in a close and personal relationship with Him. This verse expresses one of the most important benefits of abiding.

“A thousand may fall at your side, and ten thousand at your right hand; but it shall not come near you.”

Sadly, we have all seen Christians fall by the wayside. People who, at one time, were walking with the Lord, but have fallen back into the life from which they were delivered. We…

2 Kings 17:9

“Also the children of Israel secretly did against the Lord their God things that were not right, and they built for themselves high places in all their cities, from watchtower to fortified city.”

Webster’s dictionary defines secret as, “kept from view or hidden”. It goes on to speak of something as “being covert or stealth”, implying that great pains are taken to avoid detection.

During the time that led to the fall of Israel, the people were involved in secret sins. They knew the things they were doing were wrong, hence they were hidden, but they continued in them none the less. Sadly, the more they practiced these sins, the harder their hearts became, until they eventually built places of worship, and brought their secret transgressions into public view. Soon, what had once been recognized as sinful behavior, and practiced only in secret, was now being done…