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Leaders are made, they are not born. They are made by hard effort, which is the price which all of us
must pay to achieve any goal that is worthwhile.
Vince Lombardi
What’s a football season without a Vince Lombardi quote? (early 60s – GB Packers)
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I’m going to agree but substitute a word –
Heroes are made, they are not born
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Keep in mind everyone including you is born with the capacity for heroism
You are a hero in waiting…but your heroism will stay dormant until something happens in you
and to you.
What is that? How do you make as hero? And…seriously? You can make heroes? Absolutely! And
today I’m going to show you how…by looking at the life of a very young powerful hero.
2 Kings 22
(the story in both 2 Kings 22-23, 2 Chronicles 34-35)
2 Kings 22:1 - Josiah was eight years old when he became king (640 BC) , and he reigned in
Jerusalem thirty-one years. His mother's name was Jedidah daughter of Adaiah; she was from
Bozkath. 2 He did what was right in the eyes of the LORD and walked in all the ways of his father
David, not turning aside to the right or to the left.
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Not turning aside/ right/left = phrase that expresses completeness or full participation. This
young man developed a ruthless trust in God.
o He was walk with God was dead on and his moral integrity was of the highest order
Josiah was a principled young man – living under the influence of a strong set of assumptions
and beliefs. He had a strong internal guidance system
In Chapt. 23 the writer gushes about him: Neither before nor after Josiah was there a king like him
who turned to the LORD as he did--with all his heart and with all his soul and with all his strength, in
accordance with all the Law of Moses. 2 Kings 23:25
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All his heart, soul and strength…all the law – WOW…a better king than David?
Where did THAT come from? That we’ll explore in a minute but I want you to also see what he DID
not just what we was like internally. His backed his beliefs with action:
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Josiah was a reformer…he purged Israel of rampant idolatry and festering moral decay
He stepped up in a time of national tragedy and imposed his principled life upon the nation.
Chapt. 23:4 - The king ordered Hilkiah the high priest, the priests next in rank and the doorkeepers to
remove from the temple of the LORD all the articles made for Baal and Asherah and all the starry
hosts. He burned them outside Jerusalem in the fields of the Kidron Valley and took the ashes to
Bethel. 5 He did away with the pagan priests appointed by the kings of Judah to burn incense on the
high places of the towns of Judah and on those around Jerusalem--those who burned incense to
Baal, to the sun and moon, to the constellations and to all the starry hosts. 6 He took the Asherah pole
from the temple of the LORD to the Kidron Valley outside Jerusalem and burned it there. He ground it
to powder and scattered the dust over the graves of the common people. 7 He also tore down the
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quarters of the male shrine prostitutes, which were in the temple of the LORD and where women did
weaving for Asherah
That’s enough to give you the picture – he cleaned house
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Removed all shrines and idolatrous sites
Purged the nation of cult leaders
He eliminated the rampant sexual perversion
He ended human sacrifice
For a few brief shining years the people of God were great once again.
Now, how on earth does a young eight year old develop into a furious 20 something hero of morality
and justice?
How do you make a hero?
1. Expose them to grave injustice
Josiah was born into a dystopian world - a society characterized by human misery, a squalor and
oppression
A world made that way by none other than his grandfather and father. Here’s a synopsis of what
Grandpa did:
Manasseh did evil in the eyes of the LORD, following the detestable practices of the nations the
LORD had driven out before the Israelites. He rebuilt the high places his father Hezekiah had
destroyed; he also erected altars to Baal and made an Asherah pole, as Ahab king of Israel had done
2 Kings 21:2-3
He sacrificed his own son in the fire, practiced sorcery and divination, and consulted mediums and
spiritists. He did much evil in the eyes of the LORD, provoking him to anger. 2 Kings 21:6
Manasseh led Israel astray, so that they did more evil than the nations the LORD had destroyed
before the Israelites. 2 Kings 21:9
Moreover, Manasseh also shed so much innocent blood that he filled Jerusalem from end to end. 2
Kings 21:16
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Josiah’s was born into the world of Baal and Asherah worship
o Baal whose shrines painted him as a man-god with horns of a bull and thunderbolts in
his hand or at times as a serpent.
o Asherah was Baal’s mother and wife (no comment on that)
o They were both gods of fertility worshipped to ensure the fertility of human beings and
the land.
o Cult prostitution, both male and female, was a major element of the worship
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Josiah’s world was also one of dark sorcery, animism and black magic
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And it was a world of sudden death and genocide in which parents would for who-knows-whatreason sacrifice their children in huge bonfires.
Tradition has it that Manasseh had many prophets of God tortured and killed – Isaiah
supposedly sawn in two.
This was Josiah’s world - think Nazi Germany…think Stalin’s Russia…think Khmer Rouge in
Cambodia… Think Somalia today
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Moral decay, Genocide, Idolatry
Grandpa was a nasty piece of business. And so was daddy.
Amon was twenty-two years old when he became king, and he reigned in Jerusalem two years. He
did evil in the eyes of the LORD, as his father Manasseh had done. 2 Kings 21:19
Josiah was born into a world of hurt … he saw it tasted it and it changed him…a young man it was
seared into his mind…
That was not the world I saw as a child.
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When I was a teenager I never experienced injustice to this degree. I lived in a fairly sanitized
suburban world where the only portal to tragedy was the CBS evening news.
Even when I moved to Chicago for education not too long after the turmoil of the late sixties
and living within walking distance of the worst high rise ghetto housing in America – I was
shielded from reality.
Couple this with the fact that the brand of Christianity I was taught rarely dealt with injustice in
the world.
But for a child growing up today at Grace Community Church at this time in history things are so very
different:
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Today’s child is exposed instantly to the world in all its unjust horror
Fortunately our kids are taught a different the gospel of the Kingdom which includes being
concerned about injustice
And, our kids have the opportunity to go anywhere to taste and see their world.
Generations past have had their share of heroes but perhaps this new generation will give birth to as
many heroes as any time in history of the church.
How do you make a hero?
1. Expose them to grave injustice
2. Surround them with strong mentors
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his mother had impact – Jedidah
trusted advisers
o Shaphan
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prophets – Jeremiah, Zephaniah
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Back to Chapt 22: 1 - Josiah was eight years old when he became king, and he reigned in Jerusalem
thirty-one years. His mother's name was Jedidah daughter of Adaiah; she was from Bozkath.
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I think she’s mentioned because she may have been the one who helped unlocked his
heroism.
Add to her influence that of Jeremiah and Zepheniah – prophets of the day
Josiah was, no doubt, mentored well.
This week the Martin Luther King Memorial opened in Washington D.C. I am anxious to see it up
close but it looks quite stunning. What should be included right behind that 30 ft. stone of hope
carving of Dr. King is the statue of Rev. Howard Thurman.
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Dr. Thurman – pastor, missionary, and Dean of Theology of Boston University was the man
behind the man. He was MLK’s mentor.
"I don't believe you'd get a Martin Luther King, Jr. without a Howard Thurman". Walter Fluker, Boston
University
You don’t get a Josiah without a Jedidah or Jeremiah.
You don’t get a hero without a mentor.
Children are likely to live up to what you believe of them. ~ Lady Bird Johnson
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Somebody believed in Josiah
Somebody gave him the context of the injustice he was seeing
Somebody led him to God
How do you make a hero?
1. Expose them to grave injustice
2. Surround them with strong mentors
3. Help them seek God
In the eighth year of his reign, while he was still young, Josiah began to seek the God of his father
David. 2 Chronicles 34:3
At 16 began to seek God. Despite the polytheistic, animistic, destructive theology all around him - he
practiced communion with God – 3 very clear ways 
He practiced corporate worship (actually rebuilt the Temple himself)
Chapt 22: 3 - In the eighteenth year of his reign, King Josiah sent the secretary, Shaphan son of
Azaliah, the son of Meshullam, to the temple of the LORD. He said: 4 "Go up to Hilkiah the high priest
and have him get ready the money that has been brought into the temple of the LORD, which the
doorkeepers have collected from the people. 5 Have them entrust it to the men appointed to supervise
the work on the temple. And have these men pay the workers who repair the temple of the LORD-- 6
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the carpenters, the builders and the masons. Also have them purchase timber and dressed stone to
repair the temple.
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He practiced studying the Word of God
(in the course of repairing the Temple they found the book of the law)
Chapt. 22: 13 "Go and inquire of the LORD for me and for the people and for all Judah about what is
written in this book that has been found. Great is the LORD's anger that burns against us because
our fathers have not obeyed the words of this book; they have not acted in accordance with all that is
written there concerning us."
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He practiced communion with God – prayer
Chapt. 22: 19 Because your heart was responsive and you humbled yourself before the LORD when
you heard what I have spoken against this place and its people, that they would become accursed
and laid waste, and because you tore your robes and wept in my presence, I have heard you,
declares the LORD.
That’s right – read the Bible and pray, go to church… they are still the basic building blocks of faith
and they are the foundation from which heroes are born!
How do you make a hero?
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Expose them to grave injustice
Surround them with strong mentors
Help them seek God
Show them their place in history
2 Kings 23:21-22 The king gave this order to all the people: "Celebrate the Passover to the LORD
your God, as it is written in this Book of the Covenant." Not since the days of the judges who led
Israel, nor throughout the days of the kings of Israel and the kings of Judah, had any such Passover
been observed.
The Celebration of the Passover was huge – it centered Josiah and the nation of Israel in their place
in history and the purposes of God.
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You were brought out of Egypt.
You were given this land
You have a grand purpose to bless the world.
You are a people of destiny.
That’s why Josiah pulled out all the stops in this celebration – he knew he was raised up for
“such a time as this”
Heroes see themselves as crucial pieces in God’s plan to redeem and reclaim the world.
Heroes have this sense of destiny
My point today is simple - Heroes are made not born
For you to become a hero that is exactly what must happen to you:
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Exposed to injustice – see the need
Strong mentors – get guidance
Seek God – understand his heart and purposes
Understand your place in history
The young have an advantage – we have a responsibility to nurture them – this church must
give birth to heroes.
But it is not too late for you. You can still be made into a hero who will find their destiny and change
this world.
------We’ve looked at a number of heroes this month both biblical and right here at Grace. Today we honor
are two more heroes among us…
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Ordinary folks who for the past 20 years of our existence as a church have served with
humility and skill.
Ordinary Grace church servants who have been there faithfully and consistently living out
their Ephesians 2:10 destiny…doing the good works which God prepared in advance for
them to do.
And they will stand here today as a source of motivation to you to find your place in God’s Kingdom
Revolution.
Every week we will emphasize a different ministry are - today - Adult Ministries
So…let’s meet them…two folks who have given their lives for years serving the people of Grace
Church.