Christian teaching

We are continuing on in our series from 2 Chronicles today, picking up with Manasseh, the son of Hezekiah.

The basics

• He began to reign at 12 years old – v. 1. Probably alongside his father for the first several years, as was common.
• He reigned for 55 years – v. 1, the longest of any Judean king.
• But, he did what was evil in the sight of the Lord – v. 2. In fact, he was so bad, we have to have a whole section to describe all of . . .

Manasseh’s sins

• “He rebuilt the high places” – v. 3. These were local shrines throughout Judah, that his father had broken down in his reforms. These were most often for Canaanite worship.
• “He erected altars to the Baals, and made Asherahs” – v. 3. These were Canaanite gods. Ba’al’s name means “lord.” He was the god of storms (and thus rain) as well as fertility. Asherah or Astarte was his companion, the goddess of many things, including fertility.
• He “worshiped all the host of heaven and served them.” – v. 3; that is, the worship of stars and planets as gods. Vs. 4-5 tell us that he built altars in the Temple for this pagan worship, “in the two courts of the house of the Lord” it says, thus defiling the temple with his idolatry.
• He practiced child sacrifice offering up some of his own sons – v. 6.
• He “used fortune-telling and omens and sorcery, and dealt with mediums and with wizards.” – v. 6.
• But his crowning act of unfaith-fulness is that he “put an idol in God’s temple of which God had said . . . ‘I will put my Name forever’” – v. 7. The contrast between God’s action of putting his name in the temple, and Manasseh action of putting an idol in the temple, is stark.

Also in v. 8, commenting on this action, the contrast between the faithful Davidic king who is “careful to do all that I have commanded . . . all the law, the statutes, and the rules given through Moses,” the contrast between this and Manasseh, is clear. He blatantly went against God’s commands given through Moses and defiled the Temple.

This passage has a building crescendo of outrage to it. As v. 2 says, “he did what was evil in the sight of the Lord, according to the abominations of the nations whom the Lord drove out before the people of Israel.” As v. 6 says, “He did much evil in the sight of the Lord, provoking him to anger.” And as v. 9 says, he did “more evil than the nations whom the Lord destroyed before the people of Israel.”

The bottom line is that he was the worst king in all of Judah’s history. His “sin and unfaithfulness” (v. 19) was complete. He was the antithesis of his father, the righteous Hezekiah and he undid all of his reforms until things were worse than they were before Hezekiah.

Yet, despite all this, through the many years . . .

God tried to get through to Manasseh

God sent prophets to speak to him and the people:

• v. 10 says, “The Lord spoke to Manasseh and to his people, but they paid no attention.”
• v. 18 also refers to “the words of the seers who spoke to him in the name of the Lord, the God of Israel.”

Finally, since he didn’t listen, God put him in “distress.” v. 11 says, “Therefore the Lord brought upon them the commanders of the army of the king of Assyria, who captured Manasseh with hooks and bound him with chains of bronze and brought him to Babylon.”

Its possible he took part in a rebellion against the Assyrian overlords, so they came after him and caught him. Whatever the case may be, it was the Lord who was behind this.

The Assyrians were brutal. They would put hooks through the nose or lips of a person, tie a rope onto them and lead them away as prisoners. Something like this happened to Manasseh. He was taken away in humiliation.

Now, sometimes when God puts us in distress, or disciplines us for our sin, it works. But sometimes it makes people even more hardened in their rebellion against God. In this case, the distress worked. It led to . . .

Manasseh’s repentance

v. 12 says, “And when he was in distress, he entreated the favor of the Lord his God and humbled himself greatly before the God of his fathers.” He was already humiliated before the Assyrian king, but now he humbles himself greatly before the king of all creation. Humiliation is what others do to you. You have to choose to humble yourself. And he chooses to do this before God.

v. 13 says, “He prayed to him, and God was moved by his entreaty and heard his plea and brought him again to Jerusalem into his kingdom. Then Manasseh knew that the Lord was God.” This is a remarkable verse. God was moved by his prayer. Isn’t it an amazing thing that our prayers can move God?

And despite all that he had done, his idolatry and child sacrifice, God heard his plea, forgave him and saved him! He was sent back to Jerusalem.

Then Manasseh knew that Yahweh was the true God. After pursing every other god available, every other religious option, he comes back to the God of his fathers.

This is one of the most powerful stories of repentance, of turning one’s life around, of a true change of heart, in all of the Old Testament and indeed in all of the Scriptures.

When he got back to Jerusalem, he started doing what a Davidic king is supposed to do.

He took care of God’s people

• He built a great outer wall around the whole eastern part of Jerusalem – v. 14
• He also “put commanders of the army in all the fortified cities in Judah.” – v. 14

He got rid of the idols. v. 15 says,  “And he took away the foreign gods and the idol from the house of the Lord, and all the altars that he had built on the mountain of the house of the Lord and in Jerusalem, and he threw them outside of the city.”

He had done great wrong with his idolatry and now he makes it right. His repentance finds expression in concrete actions. He stopped doing what he was doing wrong. And then also he started doing what was right . . .

He practiced true worship in the temple. v. 16 says, “He also restored the altar of the Lord and offered on it sacrifices of peace offerings and of thanksgiving, and he commanded Judah to serve the Lord, the God of Israel.”

But we also have to say that his reform was limited in impact. V. 17 says, “Nevertheless, the people still sacrificed at the high places, but only to the Lord their God.”

It was focused on Jerusalem. The people outside of the city still used the high places, even though they worshipped God at them or were supposed to now.

It also didn’t take hold in people’s lives. It’s most likely that his repentance came nearer to the end of his reign, so that most of his life, most of his 55 years as king, he did evil and encouraged others to do evil – (which is why, even with his repentance, he is still later referred to in v. 22 as one who did what was evil in the sight of the Lord).

A whole generation would have been brought up in his idolatry, which would be hard to break. And this is why his son, who followed in his footsteps, found it easy to go back to Manasseh’s idolatrous practices.

Some lessons

1. We learn that sin has consequences. As Paul says in Galatians 6, ‘you reap what you sow.’

Now, not all trials come directly from our wrongdoing, but in this case it was because of his sin that he experienced distress in his life. He was taken away as a prisoner in humiliation. And God also disciplines us when we sin. God tries to get our attention; to wake us up.

With regard to his legacy, he is remembered as one who repented, but he is also remembered as one who lived most of his life in sin (33:22).

We learn from this that it’s always better to not sin in the first place, than to sin and then repent. There is always damage and pain and consequences that you can’t control, even with the grace of repentance. Manasseh repented, but his sins continued on in the generation to come. Sin has consequences. We must remember this.

2. How to repent. Manasseh “humbled himself greatly” before God – v. 12. That is, he lowered himself. He put aside arrogance and defensiveness and recognized his wrong. Then he “prayed to God” – v. 13. He confessed his sins. And then, he changed his behavior – v. 14–16. And this last part is necessary.

His repentance was not just a matter of the heart. Although it has to start there. He  didn’t just feel bad. It was not just a verbal thing. He didn’t just say, “I’m sorry.” Although this is necessary too. His repentance involved changed behavior. What he did wrong before he stopped doing. And he began to do what is right.

Repentance requires all three: the heart, the mouth and our actions.

3. Finally, we learn about the depth of God’s mercy. God was patient with Manasseh, seeking him out for so many years; speaking through prophets; putting him in distress; trying to get his attention.

And God does the same with us. We sin, we run, and we try to ignore. But God pursues us.

And we see God’s mercy in that God forgave Manasseh. When the worst king of Judah, whose sins and unfaithfulness were astounding; when this sinful man cried out in repentance, God heard, God forgave and God saved.

And if God can have mercy in such an extreme case, it shows us that God can have mercy on us too.

What a good and wonderful God we have! A God we don’t deserve, but a God who loves us nevertheless.

William Higgins