Are you often moved? Moved to change your mind? Moved by the humility of others? Are you easily moved to forgive? When you’ve been greatly wronged, what does it take to move you?

Manasseh, unlike his father Hezekiah, did evil in the sight of God. His father reigned over Judah and the land knew prosperity and economic growth. 2 Chronicles 32:30 says that Hezekiah prospered in all his works. One would think that, if the father prospered, the son would wish to emulate those actions.But Manasseh wanted things his own way.

He rebuilt the high places and altars to Baal and Asherah. He built altars in the temple. He sacrificed his sons as burnt offerings. If you’re God, are you going to forgive this guy?

Down the road, Manasseh gets captured by the very people that God turned away during Hezekiah’s reign. This must have been the bottom for him.

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.

2 Chronicles 33:12 (ESV)

What strikes me here is that, even though Manasseh had been worshipping the foreign gods, he still recognised the Lord has his God. God was still a personal God to him.

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.

2 Chronicles 33:13 (ESV)

There is nothing, nothing that God won’t forgive when you humble yourself and recognise him as God. Here is a man who spurned him father’s faithfulness, worshipped foreign gods, defaced the temple, burned his own sons and God still had mercy on him.

God is moved when we humble ourselves and know that He is God.

Daily Bible reading: 2 Chronicles 32-33; John 18:24-40