There is somewhat particularly interesting in the history to which these verses refer, and I would beg the Reader to mark it with me. If he will turn to the thirteenth chapter of the first book of the kings, he will read the history of those events, which the Lord, by the prophet there spoken of, predicted that Josiah himself should fulfil. And although it was at a distance of no less than 350 years from the time of the prediction to the accomplishment, yet so exact, and so particular was the correspondence of one to the other, as if it had been recorded in one and the same day. Reader! doth it not warm your heart, the very thought of it? Oh! how delightful is this doctrine, considered as to the great object of all doctrine, the salvation by our Lord Jesus. He was set up from everlasting. And Paul tells us that the church also was chosen in him before the foundation of the world. See those precious scriptures to this effect: Proverbs 8:22-31; Micah 5:2; Ephesians 1:4; 2 Timothy 1:9. In addition to the observations made in the Commentary, on this history of the prophet, 1 Kings 13:1, I would only here add, that though the Lord was pleased, by way of example to the church, to punish that prophet's disobedience with temporary death; yet you observe here the Lord watched over his dust; and amidst the burning of the bones of others, his lay secure. It is a part of the covenant to inflict the rod, by way of chastisement, for sin, but the everlasting salvation of the Lord's heritage is secured, from the Lord's righteousness. Psalms 89:30. What the old lying prophet proposed to himself, in being laid in the same sepulchre, I know not, but like another lying prophet, he thought, perhaps, the very dust of God's Israel a gracious preservative. Numbers 23:10. Reader! think of this! And be assured no goldsmith ever prized the precious dust of the golden ore, equal to what Jesus doth the very ashes of his people. However, to your view, or my view, this may seem lost, and scattered, and mingled amidst the rubbish of the earth, or the bodies of the carnal, Jesus beholds every particle of his whole mystical body; and when he cometh to make up his jewels, will as easily gather them altogether, and reanimate, and cause them to rise up a glorified body, as he first called them out of the dust of the earth, when he breathed in their nostrils the breath of life. Sweet thought. Oh! my soul, cherish it. Precious in the sight of the Lord is the death of his saints. Psalms 116:15.
Related Commentaries of 2 Kings 23:16
2 Kings 23:16-18
16 And as Josiah turned himself, he spied the sepulchres that were there in the mount, and sent, and took the bones out of the sepulchres, and burned them upon the altar, and polluted it, according to the word of the LORD which the man of God proclaimed, who proclaimed these words.
17 Then he said, What title is that that I see? And the men of the city told him, It is the sepulchre of the man of God, which came from Judah, and proclaimed these things that thou hast done against the altar of Bethel.
18 And he said, Let him alone; let no man move his bones. So they let his bones alone,f with the bones of the prophet that came out of Samaria.