We routinely entrust important work to experts. We hire accountants to handle our taxes, mechanics to repair our cars, and doctors to interpret medical tests. That is usually wise. But it can also lead us to approach God's Word the same way: "The Bible is complicated. That is what pastors are for." The pastor studies it, explains it, and talks about it while everyone else listens for an hour and then returns to ordinary life.

The Reformation challenged that assumption. Luther did not believe pastors and teachers were unnecessary; he believed God's Word was too important to be confined to them. The Reformation was not about replacing the authority of the pope with the authority of each individual Christian. It was about placing pastors and people together under the authority of Christ's Word.

In 2 Kings 23, the Book of the Law had been sitting inside the temple. God's people possessed the Word, but they were no longer being shaped by it. It is possible to possess God's Word without permitting God's Word to possess us. When the Book is opened, Josiah listens, repents, gathers the people, removes their idols, and reforms the nation's practices.

Yet Josiah's reformation remains incomplete. He can remove idols from the land, but he cannot remove sin from the human heart. He can renew the covenant, but he cannot fulfill it. Scripture ultimately leads us beyond Josiah to Jesus—the King who fulfills the Word, bears our judgment, rises from death, and announces forgiveness to sinners. Because his Word still speaks and his promises still hold, here we still stand.