So, Well, good morning to you today. I'd like to encourage you, if I may, from 2 Kings chapter 22. Let me preface it with this question. Have you ever known somebody who was living kind of a messed up life, and their excuse was, it's in the gene pool? I can't help but live this way because this is how my father lived, and this is how my grandfather lived, and I'm just condemned to this. I'm doomed to this way of behavior, this way of life. Well, is that really true? Is that really true? In 2 Kings 22, we're told about a new king that's come on the throne of Judah, and his name is Josiah. And if you look at his past, realize he had some pretty wretched examples who served as kings before him. His father was Ammon, and Ammon, it says in chapter 21, verse 19, was 22 years old when he became the king, and he only reigned two years, and then he was killed. He was assassinated. But the summary of those two years of Ammon's reign, we read in verse 20, it says, and he did evil in the sight of the Lord, as his father Manasseh had done. Okay, so Ammon followed in the footsteps of his father Manasseh. And what do we know about Manasseh? You go back a few verses in chapter 21, and we read that Manasseh was all of 12 years old when he began to reign. and he reigned for 55 years in Jerusalem. So he had a long reign. And how was it characterized? Verse 2, 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. He rebuilt all these high places and all of this kind of stuff. He built altars to the host of heaven. engaged in child sacrifice, verse 6 says, he practiced soothsaying and witchcraft and consulted spirits and mediums, and the end of verse 6 it says that Manasseh, Josiah's grandfather, did much evil in the sight of the Lord to provoke him to anger. He even carved a set, even set a carved image of a Shira that he had made in the house of which the Lord had said to David and Solomon, in this house I've chosen to put my name, and so forth. And Manasseh the king was a wretched, evil man. And so was his son, Ammon. Well, along comes Josiah. And we read in chapter 22, verse 8, that Josiah was eight years old when he became the king. Stop and think about that for a minute. He was eight years old when he became the king. His dad, was 22 years old when he became the king and reigned for two years. So his dad died when he was, when Ammon, Ammon died when he was 24 years old and his son was eight years old already. So Ammon became a dad when he was 16. Wonder how old his mom was. Well, we don't have that piece of information. But Ammon didn't have a whole lot of time to influence his son Josiah, eight years, but that's long enough. And those are the formative years. And the summary of Ammon's life? He did evil. How much did he know about his grandfather? Well, he grew up in an environment that was enveloped in idolatry and evil and wickedness. And the culture was so wicked, in fact, that his father was assassinated. And now as an eight-year-old, he comes on the throne. And of course, because his father was so evil and his grandfather was evil, then it was just destiny. He was going to have to be evil too. He couldn't get around it, right? Well, I don't know. Don't think so. This chapter 22 verse 2 says that Josiah did what was right in the sight of the Lord and walked in all the ways of his father David, that is his ancestor David. He did not turn his side to the right hand or to the left. In other words, even at a young age, somehow Josiah knew about the ways of David. Did he have the influence of someone reading the Psalms to him? We don't have that information. We don't have that information. But what we do know is that he was not going to allow himself to be controlled by the behaviors, the practices of his father and his grandfather. He chose a different model. He chose a different path. One of the keys to being able to break that cycle of sin and so forth is evident several years later in Josiah's life, in the 18th year of his reign, so he would have been 26 years old, that he heard about, he found the Book of the Law, he found God's Word, and we read in verses 11 and following that when the king heard the words of the Book of the Law that he tore his clothes, in repentance, because he realized how far removed from God's law his people, those whom he is serving in Judah, had gone. And it broke his heart, and it caused him to repent and turn to the Lord even more fully, and determined by God's grace to live by God's law. There's the key. There's the key. Josiah had a sensitivity to God's Word and a determination to live for God, to follow what God has to say, and not to follow in the pattern of his evil father and grandfather. So the cycle can be broken. There isn't a generational curse that you can't escape. Isn't that great? Our Father and our God, we thank you for your grace that can deliver and break the power of sin and evident even in Josiah's life. Bless these thoughts to us today we ask in Jesus' name. Amen. All right. Well, listen, I hope you have a good rest of your day and that the Lord will bless you in it. Good day. you