12.28.25 - Family Worship Sunday - 2 Kings

Amen. Amen. Uh, as we get going, I just

like to tell you that I definitely enjoy

uh Christmas cards. I enjoy getting

them. Uh, we didn't make one this year.

Uh, that's my wife's job. And, uh, we

didn't make it. We didn't make it. So,

hopefully we'll knock that out this

year. But what I love is uh seeing uh,

you know, particularly people that you

don't see all the time. It's like, oh

yeah, look at them. Look how big their

kids have gotten. And uh you know, you

just don't Gosh, man. They were friends

back in the Marine Corps days or

whatever. Where do they live now? They

live in Utah. Holy cow. Um the other

thing I love doing with my wife is I'll

look at a card of of like someone that

like we were in school with or like

we're peers. And I'm like, "Hey babe,

these are old people. We don't look like

this, do we? These look like old people.

We're not old people, are we?" And then

I have her not answer me. Uh that's

that's what I do. And then so I I was

just looking around online for some fun

Christmas card ideas. And uh I found

some. And uh here's one. Love this

family. They look like a lot of fun. The

kids are really taking over. Good job,

kids. Uh and then this one. I don't know

what to do with this one. Um

kids kids don't seem that enthused.

Parents are hitting the bottle, I guess.

Yeah, that scares me a little bit. Uh,

this one, I didn't know you could do

this, but you can make your family into

ornaments.

Good way to go. The baby at the top

doesn't know what to think about it. Uh,

and then this one. I This one unnerves

me a little bit.

Hopefully, that's their personality. You

know what I'm saying? And you're like,

"Oh my gosh, that's my Christmas card."

Sorry. No.

But what I also love about this one is

it it proves a bit of a point I want to

make, which is uh families are funny,

aren't they?

Families are funny. I was uh having a

chat with a a family who I'm not going

to look at right now before this service

and they were sharing with me some of

the idiosyncrasies, the uniquenesses,

the straightup weirdness that they said,

not my word, their word, um that they

have in their family that you know makes

them them. And and as they kind of

shared with me a little bit of the

background of that, they're like, "Yeah,

but I wouldn't change it."

Right? Because here's the thing about

your family, my family, all families,

they are a mix. They are a mix of the

unique and the blessing. They're a mix

of God's grace and some challenges. And

guess what? Your family is no different

than God's family.

That God's family is the same. And if

you know Jesus, congratulations. You've

been adopted into that family. So,

welcome to God's big, weird, unique,

gracefilled

family. And what I want to do is I want

to look at God's family this morning

with a passage that we tend to skip over

during Christmas. We tend not to read.

We didn't read it this year, but we're

going to read it today. Just a portion

of it to just get a picture of what

God's family looks like. Why? Because

you're in it.

And when you look at the people that God

chose before you, you're going to get a

picture of your place in that family.

And that's where I want to start, that

you actually have a place because of

Jesus. So, if you have your Bibles,

Matthew chapter 1, we're going to look

Matthew 1 · chapter mention

at the genealogy. I know you love

genealogies. You read them every time

you come to them in your Bible.

But we're going to look at at least the

first two paragraphs or so of this

genealogy to look at the kind of people

that had a place in God's family.

And so Matthew 1,

we're going to start in verse one.

The heading in my Bible says the

genealogy of Jesus Christ. Verse one,

the book of the genealogy of Jesus

Christ, the son of David, the son of

Abraham. Now, Matthew starts his gospel.

It's a bit of a header. He's telling

you, "Hey, here's what I'm going to do

in these next several verses, and I'm

going to tell you how Jesus uh got

here." Why? Because Matthew writes his

gospel to a Jewish audience. And so, if

you're a Jew, you want to make sure that

this Jesus um actually can fulfill the

role of Messiah, which means he has to

be a Jew. So, I want you to trace his

lineage for me. And as Matthew gets

going in order to build up all the

evidences that he is going to unpack

throughout his gospel so that by the end

of the gospel, you know what he says

right here. Jesus is the Christ. Okay,

here's all the evidence. And he starts

with his um birth. He notice he notice

he names two people, David and Abraham.

We did talk about those guys in our

series in December with reference to the

promises made to those men about the

Messiah who was to come. He said to

David, "There's going to be one who's

going to come. He's going to sit on your

throne. He's going to be a king. He's

going to sit on that throne forever.

That's Jesus." But previous to that, he

made a promise to Abraham. And he

said,"Abraham, you're going to have

offspring. You're going to have a seed.

And that seed is the one through whom

I'm going to bless the entire world."

And so, he's setting right from the

get-go. You're a Jew. You're like,

"Great. David, check. Abraham, check.

Those are the two I need." And then he

starts to list the people. So starting

with Abraham verse two says he was the

father of Isaac and Isaac the father of

Jacob and Jacob the father of Judah and

his brothers and Judah the father of

Perez and Zarah by Tamar and Perez the

father of Hezron and Hezron the father

of Ram and Ram the father of Aminadab

and Aminadab the father of Nishan and

Nan the father of Sammon and Sammon the

father of Boaz by Rahab and Boaz the

father of Oed by Ruth and Oed the father

of Jesse and Jesse, the father of David

the king. Uh, a lot of those names you

don't recognize. Uh, not a lot is

written about him, but a few you do. And

so, the first one, Abraham. We're going

to, like I said, we're going to unpack

his life in detail come next year. But,

um, Abraham's mostly a good guy.

He's imperfect, turns out. He has great

moments where like in Genesis 15, he

believes God and God counts it to him as

righteousness. The theme that Romans

picks up in the Apostle Paul. This is

the archetype. You know what? How you

get right with God? Believe him and

he'll count it to you as righteousness.

The archetype of faith that how to be a

people of God has always been by faith

all the way down to Abraham.

Um, Abraham passes the biggest test that

you could ever imagine in your life.

That's what we're going to study on

Easter. Um, but he also does some things

that are like, dude, really? Like every

time he gets into a tough spot, he lies

about his wife, says that she's his

sister, and then she gets taken into a

herum. I'm not a perfect husband, but I

never did that. Um,

guess what? Abraham's a little imperfect

like the rest of us, but notice he still

had a place. His son Isaac, there's a

little bit written about him. He's kind

of like a like a NPC. Am I using that

term right? Um, thank you. I get a

thumbs up from a teenager to my right.

Um, like he's just he's just there. Not

a lot of, you know, vigor, vim, not a

lot to him. Just kind of h. But guess

what? Follows in his father's footsteps,

does the same mistake his dad did. Um,

and Isaac has two boys, Esau and, uh,

Jacob. Uh, Jacob's a real gem. Uh, but

then again, his parents named him

deceiver. Wouldn't recommend that to you

as parents. None of you did that. Uh,

but Jacob, like a lot is written about

him, and you you're like, man, he's like

a real train wreck at times. He um he

tricks his brother, actually manipulates

him out of his birthright um over a nice

bowl of stew. Uh then because of check

this out because his mom insists, right?

His mom and dad played favorites in the

family. Mom liked Jacob. Dad liked Esau.

Again, parenting 101. Don't do that. Um

but mom's like, "Hey, disguise yourself

as your older brother. Your dad's going

to die soon. Go in there and get the

blessing." And he's kind of hems in a

haw, but he does it. Tricks his old

blind father. Gets the blessing. His

older brother doesn't like that. Wants

to kill him. he has to hight tail it out

of there and um gets deceived by a

bigger deceiver. And then what Jacob

does is he really likes working for this

guy because of his really pretty

daughter. Um ends up marrying her. Well,

he ends up marrying the older daughter

because he gets tricked by the trickster

and uh then ends up marrying four

ladies.

Don't recommend that. Here's a shocker.

That didn't go great.

Um,

but he still made it in the family.

On his way back home, it's a day before

he's going to meet his brother, Esau,

who last he saw him was going to kill

him. He uh he wrestles with what he

thinks is an angel. Uh I interpret it as

a pre-incarnate Jesus whom he wrestles

with. It's a theophony, I think. Um and

God honors it. Jesus honors it.

because he uh he wouldn't let him go

unless he blessed him. And just like you

can see like a little kernel of faith in

there. He goes, "I know. I don't know

much, but I know I need your blessing.

Otherwise, I'm not going forward."

It's in that moment his name gets

changed from Jacob to Israel. One who

strives, one who wrestles with God.

Um

Jacob's a mixed bag.

His son Judah gets mentioned. Uh Judah

doesn't start out so great. Uh he is

part of a plan to kill his brother. Oh

yeah, because Jacob played favorites too

with his kids. Um and uh instead they

sell him into slavery. God's in it. So

it works out. Uh praise God. Uh but

Judah ends up being a man of character.

When the chips are down, Judas stands up

and uh he does what's right.

And then as you go through, you see a

bunch of names you don't recognize. And

there's one there towards the end, Boaz.

If you know the book of Ruth, that's

where you meet Boaz and get his story.

And uh you know, he's not perfect

because he's human. But man, when you

read the book of Ruth, he's a solid

standup dude.

He's the kind of guy it's like, be like

Boaz. He ends up being the

great-grandfather of uh David for his

obedience and his faith as God works in

him.

and uh he does what really when you look

at it you're like man that guy went

above and beyond.

And what I love about this list is um

it's a mixture.

Good stuff, not so good stuff. Stuff

that like when you meet this these guys

in heaven, they're going to be like,

"Yeah, God worked through that. Let me

tell you what you didn't hear."

Um,

and they all had a place.

God didn't kick them out of the family

because they had their struggles.

The same way for you and your family.

When you you mess up, you don't get

kicked out

because of Jesus. You have a place.

And that place is secure.

And that place is for you.

And you're supposed to bring all your

uniquenesses of your personality and how

God wired you to the family.

And that's what I want us to be as late

for you.

Messed up, odd, gracefilled,

kicking butt and taking names for Jesus.

Why? Because all y'all have a place.

One of the things we did over Christmas

uh a few nights ago, I think I think we

played it on Christmas night is uh we

played this game. I don't know if you're

familiar with this. Uh my wife got it

and uh I opened it and I was like,

"Really, babe? This is what we're going

to play." And uh it was it turned out to

be a lot of fun. I I recommend it to

you. Basically, what the gist is super

simple. It's not like Settlers of Katan

or something like this is super simple.

Um, it's filled with uh a bunch of cards

and little like white boards that you

can hold in your hand because you read a

card and you and it describes like a

personality trait and you decide who in

the family that trait describes most

directly and you write the name on and

you're like I think it's this person.

Whoever gets the most votes gets the

card and when you get seven cards you

win. That's how you play. So here's what

we're gonna do. We're gonna play right

now. This is what we're gonna do. Okay.

So, if you're with your family, please,

this is fun. This is like a laid-back

Sunday. Point, yell, laugh, right?

Ridicule, whatever you need to do. Okay,

so this is who in your family

would struggle the most without their

phone. Who is this? Oh, we're pointing.

Yep. This young lady. Oh, okay. Yep.

Lots of pointing. This young man over

here, Jesse. Nice. Self-identifying.

I'm proud of you. I'm proud of you. Very

good. All right, you guys got the gist.

You guys got the gist. All here's the

next one. Who in your family is never on

time? Oh,

Joe Bland. I knew it. I knew it. Yep.

Oh. So, so sometimes we think it's mom,

but it's actually mom because trying to

get the kids ready.

>> Yes. Yes, I hear you. And all the on

time people are like, "That's why you

stress me out."

All right. Who in your family always

gets the best spot on the couch? Yes.

Self-identifying.

Yes. Good. I see that. Very good. Randy

sees. Good. Love it. Love it. Love it.

All right. All right. We got three more.

All right. Keep keep whoever's winning,

keep track of your points. Uh, who can't

keep a secret in your family? Same guy.

Like this guy's always a guy.

Uhhuh. Oh, mom over there. The youngest

brother, the youngest courts, man.

All right. Good to know. Look, look

around for who's getting pointed at.

Don't tell them your secrets.

Okay, next one. Who in your family talks

during the movie? H

Rusty, Adam, come on.

That drives me nuts,

man.

Every family has one and you're like,

just wait. They'll explain it. Stop

talking. I just missed something. Rewind

that. Rewind that.

All right, last one. Last one. Keeping

score at home. Who in your family eats

the last cookie? Yeah. Unashamed.

I know who it is in that family over

there. Oh, okay.

Self-identified. Nice. It's okay. I love

you just the same.

Nice, Adam. Good.

All right. Raise your hand if you won.

Raise your hand. There we go. Nice, bro.

Right out of the gate. Well done. Well

played, sir. Well played. Nice. I see

you over there. I see that hand. I see

that hand. All right. Very good. Very

good. Um, yeah, it was a lot of fun. I

wonder if they're going to have more

sales this afternoon.

Uh

here I we I I do all that and and we

play that game for for this statement.

Just like you have a place in your

family

and the things that you got pointed out

for are actually fun at the end of the

day.

You have a place in your father's

family.

And he loves the way he made you.

He loves how he wired you.

He loves that you said yes to his son.

And what I want to do as Lakeview Bible

Church is have a place, have a family

where people find their place.

The thing I notice when I scroll my news

feed and spend way too much on YouTube

is there's a lot of places where for the

most part you'll find out where you

don't fit.

You'll find out where you don't have a

place. You'll find out a lot of places

you're like, I don't want to ever be a

part of that place.

And what would it look like if Lake View

was a place?

I'm gonna date myself a little bit,

but like the Cheers

theme song said, where everyone knows

your

>> name.

What's the next line

and they're always glad you came?

>> Apparently, I'm old, too.

That's what I want us to be.

Why? Because this is why I love this

list. A not a perfect person in the

bunch.

And they still made the list.

And God has a list with your name on it

if you know his son.

And one day he's going to say, "Welcome

home for eternity."

And Jesus is going to be there. He's got

I got a place for you.

And what Lake View is going to be by his

grace is a little taste of that. I hope

so. Here's what I want us to do in 2026.

Look for the person on Sunday morning

who looks like

and help them find a place.

When you're walking your neighborhood

and you're walking your fancy dog,

those who know just chuckled.

Help people find their place.

The person in the cubicle next to you,

help them find their place.

One of the things you'll notice when you

walk walk through the scriptures is God

wants a big family.

And there's always room at the table.

And if a weird one like me can get in

of all the things that people need

today, it's a place

and they can have it.

We also have an important part to play.

So look back at verse six. We also have

an important part to play.

And David was the father of Solomon by

the wife of Uriah. And Solomon the

father of Rahaboam. And Rayoboam the

father of Abijah. and Abijah the father

of Asaf. And Asaf the father of

Jehoshaphat. And Jehoshaphat the father

of Jorham. Jorham the father of Isaiah.

Ziah the father of Jotham. And Jotham

the father of Ahaz. And Ahaz the father

of Hezekiah. And Hezekiah the father of

Manasseh. And Manasseh the father of

Amos. And Amos the father of Josiah. And

Josiah the father of Jeconiah and his

brothers at the time of the deportation

to Babylon.

Uh this list uh you know a couple names.

you know, David, Solomon, likely

Rayaboam, maybe a little bit. There's

some in Kings about him. Uh Hezekiah is

in there in verse 9. You may recognize

him uh in Second Kings. But the name

that I want us to look at with a little

detail is uh Josiah.

Little Bible quiz. How old was Josiah

when he became king? Kids,

he was eight. Now, for sure he had some

advisers and some help early on, but uh

he grows up to do a pretty good job. In

fact, in the summary, when you read

through the kings, every king is given

uh one verse summary of their reign. And

here's what Josiah gets. And he did what

was right in the eyes of the Lord and

walked in all the way of his of David,

his father. And he did not turn aside to

the right or to the left. You actually

can't get a better summary. And so what

did Josiah do to have this description

of him? Well, um, in his reign at some

point, he's probably in his 20s, maybe

his 30s, he, uh, he gets it in his head,

he's going to rebuild, he's going to

remodel, if you will, the temple. Temple

had fallen into disrepair, among other

things. And as they're doing the

remodeling project and they're doing

demo, uh, they find something.

They find something that on the surface

of it, you're like, "Are you kidding me?

They found the Bible.

They found the first five books, the law

of Moses, Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus,

Numbers, and Deuteronomy

hidden under some rubble." Okay?

They hadn't had the Bible in the temple

for hundreds of years. Could you imagine

coming to church and for a hundred years

there was no Bible?

That's what happened.

Josiah, so the the high priest at the

time is a guy named Hilkaya. He finds

it, lets Josiah know, hey, we found the

book of Moses. We found the law of

Moses. And Josiah has Hilkaya read it to

him. And so he reads those first five

books. And how Josiah responds is he is

broken.

He tears his clothes in anguish. Why?

Well, what Josiah says is he goes,

"We've basically disobeyed every way you

can disobey God. We are in trouble."

And he calls the rest of the country to

repent.

Not only does he do that, but the other

thing that you read when you're reading

2 Kings 20 starts in 22 and uh 23 is

they actually had turned the temple of

God into a pagan worship house. There

were male cult prostitutes there. There

were um ashropoles. There were burning

incense to Baal. uh they were doing all

manner of and I'll just use God's term

from Jeremiah spiritual whoredom.

Josiah gets rid of all of it. It says in

the text that he takes some of their um

totem poles um they have tapestries and

burns it all outside the city. Josiah

does one better. Um what had happened in

the intervening years is on every hill

basically in modern day Israel. Um

because at that time the way you thought

how you got closer to God as you climbed

a hill and that's obviously topography

you're higher up and you built an altar

to all manner of God.

Um it says at one point uh that he uh

defiles it'll say he defiles this thing

which means he basically desecrates it.

Um, which is a good thing uh because

they had been doing child sacrifice uh

in different places to the different

gods uh Canaanite gods that were there

like he cleans house

in some righteous anger.

And the king stood by the pillar and

made a covenant before the Lord to walk

after the Lord and to keep his

commandments and his testimonies and his

statutes with all his heart and all his

soul to perform to actually do the words

of this covenant that were in written in

this book and all the people joined in

the covenant.

Josiah had a conviction. Josiah had an

important part to play

and he did it.

And this is the summary at the end of

his life.

Before him was no king like him who

turned to the Lord with all his heart

and with all his soul and with all his

might.

Notice this. According to all the law of

Moses

and nor did any like him arise after

him.

It is so amazingly simple. If you're to

ask and answer the question, how is it

that Josiah does what he does? This is

how simple it is. He read this

and did it.

You're like, Eric, what else? That's

all.

He read this

and he just did it.

Guess what I would love for every one of

us this year.

Just read it

and best as you can with God's help,

with the Holy Spirit, with the grace of

Jesus, do it. Okay, Eric, what do you do

on day two? Okay, read this

and with God's grace and help,

do it now.

You are smart people.

It is easy to say and hard to do.

Yes,

man. So hard. Why?

Oh, hold on. I didn't kill my joke.

I meant to go back. There's only two

buttons and I messed it up. I'm

imperfect, too.

Notice what it says.

He did what was right in the eyes of the

Lord. How did he know what was right in

the eyes of the Lord? The book

and then he walked in all the way of

David his father. And notice this, he

did not turn aside to the right or to

the left.

How do you and I play the part that we

have to play in God's kingdom in our

time in every every place where you

live, work, learn, and play all the

places.

Do what's right in the eyes of the Lord

and don't turn aside to the right or to

the left. Why? Because every day it's

like, "Oh, that looks shiny. I think

I'll try that." Everyone else is doing

it. It seems like it's working out for

them.

Nope. When you read this, you'll be

like, "Ah, don't do that." You walk

along the next day, "Man, that looks

really shiny. Seems to be working out

for them. I think I'll try that." Don't

do it.

It's hard work.

Now I want you to see how

>> Yeah.

>> You got a lot of work to do.

>> Yeah.

>> I got water grass, pick stuff up, pick

chairs, all kinds of stuff up.

>> What about the chickens? You got to feed

them.

>> Yeah,

>> you do. What about the eggs?

>> Yeah, I'll check I'm going to check

them. I'm going to check the mail.

Check the

>> Yeah, we did get a few things. Bills.

>> Okay. Another one over there. Water

glass over there.

We'll be in the time

one.

>> What time?

>> What? It looks like uh it's 5:40 right

now.

>> Anyways, I got to hurry and pick some

stuff up.

All right.

>> Love you.

>> My guy is eight going on 45,

man. And like you know you're middle age

when you sigh over the mail.

Last thing I want to tell you,

you have an important part to play.

You have an important part to play.

Do you know what that is?

And are you doing it?

God wants to work in you and through you

for his good purposes.

today, this afternoon into 2026.

Do you know what it is?

One of the things we do as a church, as

a family, is we get together and help

each other play the part that we're

meant to play.

Why?

Because you all have one.

You know how Lake View is going to be

awesome in the years and decades ahead

when we get the maximum number of people

doing exactly what God's wired them to

do.

And all of us encouraging each other and

cheering each other on, go get them.

Why,

man? And if if Josiah can do it

and he just read the book

and tried by grace to do exactly what it

said,

man, what's possible for you?

What's possible for us?

That's what I want to find out.

And that's what we're going to do in

2026.

Okay,

let's pray. Father, we thank you for

your grace. We thank you for your love.

We thank you for your kindness. We thank

you that you're a good dad who loves his

kids. And I pray your blessing over each

of us individually and each of us

collectively that exactly what you have

for us is exactly what would happen.

And we would have great joy amidst the

labor.

Help us by your spirit and in your grace

to be a people of the book who do the

book.

And we trust you to take us where you

have us.

And would your blessing rest on every

family, every individual

that calls Lake View home.

And may you the best be yet to come.

And everyone said,

"Amen." Amen. Merry Christmas. Happy New

Year. If you need prayer, we're going to

be down front with that. We'll see you

next year. All right. Lord bless.