Is America is too far gone to be redeemed? That’s really what the “woke” protesters in our biggest cities have been saying: that racism is woven too deeply into the fabric of our national culture to be removed, and that it’s too big a problem to be ignored. And so, they want to erase all of our history before the middle 1960’s, condemning everything that happened before that as too horrible to remember.

So, is America is too far gone to be redeemed? Many Christians have at least entertained the same question, albeit for very different reasons. We look at the violence and hatred in our streets. We look at the rise of drug use and the decline of the family. We mourn the death of 60 million Americans who never had the chance to be born and wonder how long God will let the ungodliness go on.

For sometimes God does bring cultures crashing down. Sometimes countries collapse under the weight of their own wickedness. As King Josiah read the Law of Moses for the first time (II Kings 22:8-10), as he understood the curses God announced on the godless in passages such as Leviticus 26:14-45 and Deuteronomy 28:15-68, and as he listened to the words of the prophetess Huldah (II Kings 22:14-17) he knew he and his people were in big trouble. Their own history of oppression and idolatry meant they would soon be swept away in God’s judgment.

So what did he do? He could have fallen deeper into idolatry, into the worship of food and drink and sex that has become so popular in modern America: “Let us eat and drink, for tomorrow we may die” (Isaiah 22:13). On the other hand, he could have allowed his despair to drive him into depression, into the belief that there is really nothing good or true or beautiful left in the world, the sort of nihilism that motivates all too many of the destructive, hate-filled mobs we see today.

But instead, as Josiah tore his clothes in grief over the coming judgment of God (II Kings 22:11), he resolved to lead his people into greater faithfulness to God (II Kings 23:3). He did his best to root out all the worship of false idols from his land (II Kings 23:4-14). He even went up into what had been the northern kingdom of Israel and destroyed all the places where people had worshipped God in the wrong way (II Kings 23:15-20). And he encouraged his people to worship the One True God, setting a personal example of serving God with all his heart and soul and might (II Kings 23:25). Even knowing that God’s judgment was coming, he chose to love the Lord for His holiness and righteousness.

Now, we don’t know if America is too far gone. But given Josiah’s example, it really doesn’t matter, does it? No matter what happens, we are called to love and serve the Lord, to do whatever we can to tear down the idols in our lives and in our culture. So, let’s live only for the glory of Christ, and trust Him to temper His justice with the same sort of mercy that He displayed so clearly on His cross. For that’s really what we should have been doing all along.

II Kings 22:14-23:3 (NASB)

14 So Hilkiah the priest, Ahikam, Achbor, Shaphan, and Asaiah went to Huldah the prophetess, the wife of Shallum the son of Tikvah, the son of Harhas, keeper of the wardrobe (now she lived in Jerusalem in the Second Quarter); and they spoke to her.
15 And she said to them, “Thus says the LORD God of Israel, ‘Tell the man who sent you to me,
16 thus says the LORD, “Behold, I bring evil on this place and on its inhabitants, even all the words of the book which the king of Judah has read.
17 “Because they have forsaken Me and have burned incense to other gods that they might provoke Me to anger with all the work of their hands, therefore My wrath burns against this place, and it shall not be quenched.”‘
18 “But to the king of Judah who sent you to inquire of the LORD thus shall you say to him, ‘Thus says the LORD God of Israel, “Regarding the words which you have heard,
19 because your heart was tender and you humbled yourself before the LORD when you heard what I spoke against this place and against its inhabitants that they should become a desolation and a curse, and you have torn your clothes and wept before Me, I truly have heard you,” declares the LORD.
20 “Therefore, behold, I will gather you to your fathers, and you shall be gathered to your grave in peace, neither shall your eyes see all the evil which I will bring on this place.”‘” So they brought back word to the king.

Then the king sent, and they gathered to him all the elders of Judah and of Jerusalem.
2 And the king went up to the house of the LORD and all the men of Judah and all the inhabitants of Jerusalem with him, and the priests and the prophets and all the people, both small and great; and he read in their hearing all the words of the book of the covenant, which was found in the house of the LORD.
3 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 carry out the words of this covenant that were written in this book. And all the people entered into the covenant.