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The Evil Reign of Manasseh in 2 Kings 21

God will forgive even the worst of sinners if we repent and ask Him for forgiveness. I guarantee you've not done anything near as bad as King Manasseh did, and yet God forgave him when we understand the text.

This is When We Understand The Text, a daily Bible commentary to help encourage your time in the Word. Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday we feature New Testament Study, an Old Testament book on Thursday, and our Q &A on Friday.

Now here's your teacher, Pastor Gabe.

Thank you, Becky. We continue with our study of the book of 2 Kings. Today we'll be reading about King Manasseh, who had the longest reign in the southern kingdom of Judah. He was also one of the most evil kings between both Israel and Judah, that is, until he repented.

But we don't read about his repentance in 2 Kings, we read about that in 2 Chronicles. So we're going to go there as well, but let's start with our text in 2 Kings 21, starting in verse 1. Manasseh was 12 years old when he began to reign, and he reigned 55 years in Jerusalem.

His mother's name was Hephzibah, and he did what was evil in the sight of the Lord, according to the despicable practices of the nations whom the Lord drove out before the people of Israel. For he built the high places that Hezekiah his father had destroyed, and he erected altars for Baal and made an Asherah, as Ahab king of Israel had done.

Ahab would have been his grandfather, and worshipped all the hosts of heaven and served them. So he worshipped the created things rather than the Creator. And we read in Romans 1, starting in verse 21,.

For although they knew God, they did not honor Him as God or give thanks to Him, but they became futile in their thinking, and their foolish hearts were darkened. Claiming to be wise, they became fools and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images resembling mortal man and birds and animals and creeping things.

Therefore God gave them up in the lusts of their hearts to impurity, to the dishonoring of their bodies among themselves, because they exchanged the truth about God for a lie and worshipped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever.

Amen. For this reason, God gave them up to dishonorable passions. And this is the very same thing that happened with Manasseh as well. He worshipped the created things rather than the Creator. Even though he knew God.

Remember, Hezekiah was probably one of the most righteous kings that Judah ever had. He instituted reform in Judah, bringing back proper temple worship. He tore down all the high places. And then Manasseh brought back all the things that Hezekiah had driven out, correcting all the mistakes that Ahaz had made.

And Hezekiah brought in these reforms that then his son undid. And recognize that Manasseh became king when he was 12 years old. If you'll remember back to when Hezekiah was king, Isaiah said to Hezekiah that Babylon was eventually going to be the nation that would overthrow Judah.

But this would happen sometime after Hezekiah had died. And Hezekiah's response was, The word of the Lord that you have spoken is good, for he thought, this is chapter 20, verse 19, why not if there will be peace and security in my days?

So Hezekiah really didn't care that Judah was going to be destroyed, that his posterity was going to suffer somewhere down the line. Hey, as long as it's not happening to me, we're good. So clearly Hezekiah did not have a consideration for future generations and may not have done well in leading his own son.

So when Manasseh assumes the throne, he has not received proper training and instruction from the Lord, as was instructed the people of Israel in the book of Deuteronomy. This is a passage that we quote very often, even when it comes to how we are to disciple our children.

Deuteronomy 6, verse 4, Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is one. And of course Manasseh worshiped multiple false gods. You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might.

And these words that I command you today shall be on your heart. You shall teach them diligently to your children and shall talk of them when you sit in your house and when you walk by the way and when you lie down and when you rise.

You shall bind them as a sign on your hand and they shall be as frontlets between your eyes. You shall write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates. And when the Lord your God brings you into the land that he swore to your fathers, to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, to give you with great and good cities that you did not build and houses full of all good things that you did not fill and cisterns that you did not dig and vineyards and olive trees that you did not plant.

And when you eat and are full, then take care lest you forget the Lord who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery. It is the Lord your God you shall fear and you shall serve and by his name you shall swear.

You shall not go after other gods, the gods of the peoples who are around you. For the Lord your God in your midst is a jealous God. Lest the anger of the Lord your God be kindled against you and he destroy you from the face of the earth.

And the reminder is given over and over, not just in the book of Deuteronomy, but all of the Pentateuch and even in Joshua, that the people of Israel would be reminded of the goodness and faithfulness of our great God who had rescued them out of slavery in Egypt.

Remind your children. Tell your children of the things that you saw when you were there, of what God did for you when he brought you out of the wilderness so that your children may remember to worship the Lord your God.

And though these instructions were given to Israel, we get an indication here that Hezekiah did not do that with his own son. So he did not follow this very basic biblical precedent that was laid down by God through Moses in Deuteronomy chapter 6.

And so because Hezekiah did not teach his son these things, so he did not fear the Lord God. He did not know Him as a jealous God, but instead provoked the Lord to anger by worshiping false gods. And so we come back again to see the continued depravity of Manasseh and what it was he did while he was king there in Israel, or at least the first portion of his reign.

Verse 4, he built altars in the house of the Lord, of which the Lord had said, In Jerusalem I will put my name. And he built altars for all the host of heaven in the two courts of the house of the Lord.

So in other words, he's building altars to the sun and the moon and the stars. He's worshiping the created things rather than the creator. And he burned his son as an offering, same thing that Ahaz did, and used fortune-telling and omens and dealt with mediums and with necromancers.

He did much evil in the sight of the Lord, provoking him to anger. And the carved image of Asherah that he had made, he set in the house of which the Lord said to David and to Solomon his son, In this house and in Jerusalem, which I have chosen out of all the tribes of Israel, I will put my name forever.

And I will not cause the feet of Israel to wander any more out of the land that I gave to their fathers, if only they will be careful to do according to all that I have commanded them and according to all the law that my servant Moses commanded them.

So that was the law we just read from, Deuteronomy chapter 6. I mentioned when we were at the start of this study in 1st and 2nd Kings that there were constant references to Deuteronomy. And there would be multiple times when a king would do evil, and the wording that the writers of Kings chose would be in direct contrast to what was stated in Deuteronomy to show how they were evil.

They disobeyed what God had laid down in his law. And so we see that very thing going on here. We have it stated in Deuteronomy chapter 16, verse 21, that you shall not worship the Asherah. And what is it that Manasseh did?

He raised an Asherah up in the very temple of God, provoking him to anger. So we see, again, those contrasts. Whenever we observe the wickedness of some of these kings that reigned over Israel and Judah.

And so going on from there, verse 9, but they did not listen and Manasseh led them astray to do more evil than the nations had done whom the Lord destroyed before the people of Israel. So this is just showing a continued prevailing wickedness that infected both Israel and Judah.

What their kings did, they influenced the rest of the people to do. They followed after the pattern of their leader. Their leader was a reflection of the hearts of the people, as well as a strong influence on their wickedness.

We see that same thing going on in America now. I mean, Donald Trump is not a sign of God's blessing. He is a sign of the judgment of God upon this nation. This man who is a casino and strip club owner, who is a pornographer and a misogynist, who is an obscene bully who cannot control his tongue to save his life, has said that he has never needed to ask God forgiveness for anything, has said no one has read the Bible more than he has not.

I mean, not only is it evident that he doesn't understand what it says, I just don't believe that's true. He has stated that he doesn't read much. He's even admitted that. So then to say no one's read the Bible more than he has, just a complete contradiction in his own confessions.

But Trump is not a blessing of God upon this nation. He's more an example of the judgment of God. And the things that Trump is doing is influencing other people to do and behave just as he has. We are becoming more and more divisive as a people, just as Trump is not a unifier.

He divides people. He insults people. And so this is a climate that continues in this country. It's not just among the people who would support Donald Trump, but it's even among those who are his opposition, those who would criticize him.

They're going to criticize him with the same fervor that he criticizes them. And so it just kind of grows this divisive behavior. This is Manasseh's influence on Judah as well. The things that he instituted, of course, is if he's going to raise up the high places again, and he's going to raise up idols in the very temple of God, the people are going to worship him.

They're not going to rebel against their king. They want prosperity in their land. And so they think that by worshiping these false gods, that's what he's going to get. Verse 10, and the Lord said by his servants, the prophets, because Manasseh, king of Judah has committed these abominations and has done these things more evil than all the Amorites did who were before him and has made Judah also to sin with his idols.

Therefore, thus the Lord, the God of Israel says, behold, I am bringing upon Jerusalem and Judah, such disaster that the ears of everyone who hears it will tingle. And I will stretch over Jerusalem, the measuring line of Samaria and the plum line of the house of Ahab.

And I will wipe Jerusalem as one wipes a dish, wiping it and turning it upside down. And I will forsake the remnant of my heritage and give them into the hand of their enemies. And they shall become a prey and a spoil to all their enemies because they have done what is evil in my sight.

And it provoked me to anger since the day their fathers came out of Egypt, even to this day, which we saw that with Israel when they were in the wilderness, even provoke the Lord to anger. And the Lord opened up the ground underneath them and swallowed them up or sent serpents and vipers into the camp to bite people.

And they would die by the snake bites, or there would be a plague or pestilence or something like that. So there were times when Israel had even provoked the Lord to anger when they were in the wilderness from the time they came out of Egypt, even to this day.

And so the Lord is finally going to hand them over to their enemies. Now we've seen hints of this in chapters 16 through 20, but this is the first major pronouncement that we have heard that Judah is going to be subjected to judgment.

Even though Manasseh wasn't even though Manasseh was evil, it wasn't during his reign that Judah was ultimately exiled and Jerusalem was conquered. Why is that? Well, because God probably stayed his hand on this judgment that he has just issued on Judah because Manasseh eventually repented.

And we'll get to that here in just a moment. But let's finish up this section here in second Kings and we'll jump over to second Chronicles. Moreover, verse 16, Manasseh shed very much innocent blood till he had filled Jerusalem from one end to another, besides the sin that he made Judah to sin so that what they did was evil in the sight of the Lord.

Now the rest of the acts of Manasseh and all that he did and the sin that he committed, are they not written in the book of the Chronicles of the Kings of Judah? And Manasseh slept with his fathers and was buried in the garden of his house in the garden of Uzzah and Ammon, his son reigned in his place.

So then we're going to come back to second Kings and we'll read about Ammon here in just a moment. But for now, let's flip over to second Chronicles chapter 33, and I'm going to begin reading in verse 10.

Verses one through nine is very similar to what we've read in second Kings, but things start to look a little bit different when you get to verse 10, second Chronicles 33, verse 10, the Lord spoke to Manasseh and to his people, but they paid no attention.

So you think of the, the judgment that was issued upon Judah that we just read in second Kings. That was probably what the Lord said to his people. They didn't listen. Therefore, the Lord brought upon them the commanders of the army of the king of us of Assyria, same army that had a threatened, same nation, rather that had threatened Hezekiah, not the same king because that king had died, but now a new king during Manasseh's reign and, but same nation, Assyrians threatening Judah and Jerusalem.

They captured Manasseh with hooks and bound him with chains of bronze and brought him to Babylon. And when he was in distress, he entreated the favor of the Lord is God and humbled himself greatly before the God of his fathers.

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. Now, why is it that second Kings doesn't include this?

Why is it that we only read in second Chronicles about Manasseh being captured in a very brutal sort of a way as well. It doesn't look like he was treated very well. We also don't read about how he was freed.

We just read that he was captured and, and he was repentant before God and the Lord was moved by his entreaty. In other words, the, the anger that Manasseh had stirred up in the Lord was abated and he let Manasseh go back to Jerusalem.

So why do we read this in second Chronicles and not in second Kings? Well, likely the reason is because second Kings is telling us how Judah came to be conquered and exiled. Whereas second Chronicles doesn't necessarily have that aim.

So we have a little bit more merciful end to this story to show how God will even forgive the worst of sinners. That's what Paul mentions in first Timothy one 15 that the saying is trustworthy and deserving of full acceptance that Christ Jesus died to save sinners of whom I am the foremost.

And so here we have Manasseh who is the foremost evil King that Judah ever had. And yet the Lord was even willing to forgive him and lifted his hand of judgment that was decreed upon Judah did not bring judgment upon Judah during the time of Manasseh because likely because Manasseh repented.

Nonetheless, there are still great consequences for the evil that Manasseh had done. Even though the Lord didn't bring judgment to Judah during Manasseh's day, it still was brought about Judah and the hearts of the people were still evil.

So remember what I talked about yesterday when we were going through first Timothy, I said that that you can remove all of the bad doctrine stuff from your church, but it's still going to take some time to then turn the hearts of the people in that church who had been influenced by that bad doctrine that had previously been in your church.

It's going to be a long labor to work that bad doctrine out and put good doctrine into their hearts. So what happened here in Judah is the influences of Manasseh had some positives and some negatives because of the evil that he did before the Lord in the first part of his reign.

The people of Judah were so, you know, influenced to do the same evil. But then when Manasseh repented, there was some repentance in Judah, but that evil in the hearts of the Jews was still there. And so then when the next king comes about, you have King Ammon, and he reinstitutes everything that Manasseh would have undone after his repentance.

And then you have Josiah that comes after Ammon, and then he brings about reform just like Hezekiah did. So you have this kind of ebb and flow. But why is it so easy for Judah to fall right back into that sinful pattern again?

Because that's the condition of their hearts. Because it takes so much work to try to work that out of a person's heart with good and sound doctrine. They are ensnared by the devil to do his will. As Paul talks about in 2 Timothy 2, it is God who grants repentance.

And that takes some work. Sometimes it takes longer than in other generations. It's all according to God's sovereign decree. Just be obedient to him. Hold fast to sound doctrine and lead others in the truth of God's word.

As long as you can commit yourself to that and be able to say that there is no fault against you for the way that you presented the word of God. Just as Paul talks about in Acts 20, I presented the full counsel of God and I am innocent of any man's blood.

And so may that be the case with the way that we present the gospel of Jesus Christ. Be obedient to what he has called you to. Be obedient to his word and let the Lord do the rest. So let's finish up with Manasseh's repentance here.

Verse 14, afterward he built an outer wall for the city of David west of Gihon in the valley and for the entrance into the fish gate and carried it around Ophelia. And raised it to a very great height.

He also put commanders of the army in all the fortified cities in Judah 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. Doesn't say he destroyed those idols. It just says that he removed them from Jerusalem. And that's kind of what we see here with the reform that Manasseh attempts to implement here in Judah.

It only goes as far as Jerusalem. He doesn't do this in the rest of Judah. So again, the hearts of the people were still clinging to the evil that Manasseh had first introduced. And he didn't do a good enough job of instituting the right kind of reforms that would have flushed all the bad stuff out.

So then you have a man, it very easily is able to raise those idols back up again. All Manasseh did was he removed them from Jerusalem. Amman found them and, and put them back in their places. So then verse 16, 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. Nevertheless, the people still sacrificed at the high places, but only to the Lord, their God. That's significant, which we'll get to when we, when we arrive at Josiah's reign.

Now the rest of the acts of Manasseh and his prayer to his God and the words of the seers who spoke to him in the name of the Lord, the God of Israel, behold, are they in the chronicles of the kings of Israel and his prayer and how God was moved by his entreaty and all of his sin and his faithlessness and the sites on which he built high places and set up the Asherim and the images before he humbled himself.

Behold, they are written in the chronicles of the seers, which we don't have. So Manasseh slept with his fathers and they buried him in his house. And Amman, his son reigned in his place. Let's read about Amman by going back to second Kings.

The Repentance of Manasseh in 2 Chronicles 33

So this is a second Kings chapter 21, beginning in verse 19. Amman was 22 years old when he began to reign and he reigned two years in Jerusalem. His mother's name was Meshulameth, the daughter of Heruz of Jatba.

And he did what was evil in the sight of the Lord as Manasseh, his father had done. He walked in all the way in which his father walked and serve the idols that his father served and worshiped them. Kind of have to figure that when your father has sacrificed your brother to God as a sacrifice, it's going to have an impact on a guy.

So regardless of the fact that Manasseh had repented, all of those things that he did early on in his reign, obviously affected Amman and his heart more so than the reforms that Manasseh tried to implement.

Verse 22, he abandoned the Lord, the God of his fathers and did not walk in the way of the Lord. He served, I'm sorry. And the servants of Amman conspired against him and put the king to death in his house.

But the people of the land struck down all those who had conspired against King Amman and the people of the land made Josiah, his son king in his place. Now the rest of the acts of Amman and all that he did, are they not written in the book of the chronicles of the kings of Judah?

And he was buried in his tomb in the garden of Uzzah and Josiah, his son reigned in his place. And that's the king that we'll be reading about next week on Thanksgiving day. We'll hear about Josiah. Let us pray.

Lord, you have said in your word that we are to pray for all people, for kings and all who are in high position. So we lift up the president of the United States, Donald Trump, that he would turn from his sin and know Christ the Lord.

We pray for the prime minister of Canada, Justin Trudeau, that he would know Christ. The prime minister of the United Kingdom, Teresa May, that she would know the fear of the Lord. We pray for Australia, that just voted to accept gay marriage in their nation, just this week.

And their prime minister, Malcolm Turnbull, that this nation and their leaders would know that what they have done is in rebellion against the Lord. And they would turn from this sin and seek Christ the Lord for he alone gives forgiveness of sins and salvation from death and the wrath of God.

May many come to know Christ before that great day of judgment arrives. And may we recognize our leaders, whether it's on a local level or on a national level and pray for them, that they too would repent and influence others to come to know Christ as well.

Thank you for the salvation that we've been given in Christ, our Lord. Thank you for demonstrating your love to us in that while we were sinners, Christ died for us. It's in his name that we pray.

Amen. For more about our ministry, visit us online at www .utt .com.