20241021

normal can be deadly

2 Kings 21:1-26 (JDV).

2 Kings 21:1 Manasseh was twelve years old when he became king, and he reigned fifty-five years in Jerusalem. His mother’s name was Hephzibah.
2 Kings 21:2 He did what was evil in Yahveh’s sight, imitating the detestable practices of the nations that Yahveh had dispossessed before the Israelites.
2 Kings 21:3 He rebuilt the high places that his father Hezekiah had destroyed and reestablished the altars for Baal. He made an Asherah, as King Ahab of Israel had done; he also bowed in worship to all the stars in the sky and served them.
2 Kings 21:4 He built altars in Yahveh’s temple, where Yahveh had said, “Jerusalem is where I will put my name.”
2 Kings 21:5 He built altars to all the stars in the sky in both courtyards of Yahveh’s temple.
2 Kings 21:6 He sacrificed his son in the fire, practiced witchcraft and divination and consulted mediums and spiritists. He did much evil in Yahveh’s sight, angering him.
2 Kings 21:7 Manasseh set up the carved image of Asherah, which he made, in the temple that Yahveh had spoken about to David and his son Solomon: “I will establish my name forever in this temple and in Jerusalem, which I have chosen out of all the tribes of Israel.
2 Kings 21:8 I will never again cause the feet of the Israelites to wander from the land I gave to their ancestors if only they will be careful to do all I have commanded them — the whole law that my servant Moses commanded them.”
2 Kings 21:9 But they did not listen; Manasseh caused them to stray so that they did worse evil than the nations Yahveh had destroyed before the Israelites.
2 Kings 21:10 Yahveh said through his servants the prophets,
2 Kings 21:11 “Since King Manasseh of Judah has committed all these detestable acts — worse evil than the Amorites who preceded him had done — and by means of his idols has also caused Judah to sin,
2 Kings 21:12 this is what Yahveh God of Israel says: ‘I am about to bring such disaster on Jerusalem and Judah that everyone who hears about it will shudder.
2 Kings 21:13 I will stretch over Jerusalem the measuring line used on Samaria and the mason’s level used on the house of Ahab, and I will wipe Jerusalem clean as one wipes a bowl — wiping it and turning it upside down.
2 Kings 21:14 I will abandon the remnant of my inheritance and hand them over to their enemies. They will become plunder and spoil to all their enemies,
2 Kings 21:15 because they have done what is evil in my sight and have angered me from the day their ancestors came out of Egypt until today.'”
2 Kings 21:16 Manasseh also shed so much innocent blood that he filled Jerusalem with it from one end to another. This was in addition to his sin that he caused Judah to commit, so that they did what was evil in Yahveh’s sight.
2 Kings 21:17 The rest of the events of Manasseh’s reign, along with all his accomplishments and the sin that he committed, are written in the Historical Record of Judah’s Kings.
2 Kings 21:18 Manasseh rested with his fathers and was buried in the garden of his own house, the garden of Uzza. His son Amon became king in his place.
2 Kings 21:19 Amon was twenty-two years old when he became king, and he reigned two years in Jerusalem. His mother’s name was Meshullemeth, daughter of Haruz; she was from Jotbah.
2 Kings 21:20 He did what was evil in Yahveh’s sight, just as his father Manasseh had done.
2 Kings 21:21 He walked in all the ways his father had walked; he served the idols his father had served, and he bowed in worship to them.
2 Kings 21:22 He abandoned Yahveh God of his ancestors and did not walk in the ways of Yahveh.
2 Kings 21:23 Amon’s servants conspired against him and put the king to death in his own house.
2 Kings 21:24 The common people killed all who had conspired against King Amon, and they made his son Josiah king in his place.
2 Kings 21:25 The rest of the events of Amon’s reign, along with his accomplishments, are written in the Historical Record of Judah’s Kings.
2 Kings 21:26 He was buried in his tomb in the garden of Uzza, and his son Josiah became king in his place.

normal can be deadly

Two evil kings came after Hezekiah and proceeded to undo all his good work and send Judah closer to judgment. The pressure to conform to the idolatry of the nations around them must have been great. There is no other way to explain how these kings could have ignored the fact that the northern kingdom (Israel) had already been taken into exile by Assyria. Time was running out for the southern kingdom as well. If only these kings would have realized that business as usual was killing them.

LORD, revive us. Keep us from business as usual, because that is keeping us from you.