Bible Reading for August 1 – II Kings 20-21

So, why would Manasseh want to undo everything his father Hezekiah had done? Why would Manasseh embrace the worship of false gods that his father had so firmly rejected? Today, when young people are quite literally tearing down their ancestors’ heroes, it’s not just an academic question. What’s wrong with them?

Now, to explain is not to excuse. Manasseh was indeed a wicked man by anyone’s standards. In II Kings 21:7, we learn that he set up a carved image of Asherah, a false fertility goddess in the Temple of the Lord, in a very real sense making the worship of sex equal to the worship of God. Worse yet, in the previous verse we read that “he made his son pass through the fire.” This means he offered up his own son as a sacrifice to a false god, burning him up while he was still alive.

How could he have fallen so far so fast? Why did he so completely reject his father Hezekiah’s faith? Maybe it’s because at the end of his own life, Hezekiah had begun to do the same thing. Yes, during his reign God had miraculously saved Jerusalem from the Assyrian army (II Kings 19:35). Yes, God had saved Hezekiah’s life, protecting him on at least one occasion from a terrible disease (II Kings 20:7). Moreover, God had given him an impossible, miraculous sign that he would in fact recover from his sickness, making shadows move backward, as if time itself had shifted into reverse (II Kings 20:11).

And yet, even while he was receiving all of these amazing blessings from God, he lavishly entertained emissaries from Babylon, trying to curry favor with that rising power in the Ancient Near East. He displayed all his wealth and power, probably in an attempt to get them to form an alliance with him (II Kings 20:13). In other words, even while God was giving him every reason to trust in Him alone, Hezekiah was hedging his bets.

Worse yet, when God called his bluff, when God said that the Babylonians would end up conquering his kingdom instead of making him an ally, his only reaction was a selfish relief that he would not himself live to see the disaster that would come upon his family because of the mess he had made (II Kings 20:19).

No, we cannot excuse those who use violence to tear down social institutions and to destroy public and private property. But do we really have room to criticize them if we ourselves have been busily undermining such fundamental supports of society as marriage and the Church through our selfish neglect?

And what about Jesus Himself? We say we want to serve Him by giving ourselves completely for the glory of God and the good of others. But if instead we set Him on the sidelines of our lives, living for our own pleasure and profit, why shouldn’t our children do the same thing? And why should they give any respect to the artifacts and heroes of a Christian culture we largely abandoned long ago?

No, in their own angry, violent way, aren’t these young people really just doing the same sort of thing we’ve been doing for years? Aren’t they just taking the next logical step down the godless road we’ve already been travelling? Something to think about.

II Kings 21:1-9 (NASB)

Manasseh was twelve years old when he became king, and he reigned fifty-five years in Jerusalem; and his mother’s name was Hephzibah.
2 And he did evil in the sight of the LORD, according to the abominations of the nations whom the LORD dispossessed before the sons of Israel.
3 For he rebuilt the high places which Hezekiah his father had destroyed; and he erected altars for Baal and made an Asherah, as Ahab king of Israel had done, and worshiped all the host of heaven and served them.
4 And he built altars in the house of the LORD, of which the LORD had said, “In Jerusalem I will put My name.”
5 For he built altars for all the host of heaven in the two courts of the house of the LORD.
6 And he made his son pass through the fire, practiced witchcraft and used divination, and dealt with mediums and spiritists. He did much evil in the sight of the LORD provoking Him to anger.
7 Then he set the carved image of Asherah that he had made, in the house of which the LORD said to David and to his son Solomon, “In this house and in Jerusalem, which I have chosen from all the tribes of Israel, I will put My name forever.
8 “And I will not make the feet of Israel wander anymore from the land which I gave their fathers, if only they will observe to do according to all that I have commanded them, and according to all the law that My servant Moses commanded them.”
9 But they did not listen, and Manasseh seduced them to do evil more than the nations whom the LORD destroyed before the sons of Israel.