Ten Minute Bible Talks Devotional Bible Study - Spiritual But Not Religious? | Historical Books | 2 Kings 21:1-9

Starting point is 00:00:00 Welcome to 10-minute Bible Talks, where we connect the Bible to your life. In the time it takes to get to work. I'm Patrick Miller. Do you know what the fastest growing religion in America is right now? It's not Christianity. It's not Islam. It's not atheism. It's not Hinduism or Buddhism or any religion that has a title. It's a group of people that sociologists have dubbed spiritual but not religious. Or sometimes they're called the nuns. That's N-O-O-W-E. N-E-S. These are people who believe in spirituality and God in some ways, but they don't identify with a particular historic religious tradition. And you see the influence of spiritual but not

Starting point is 00:00:47 religious in the increased interest in crystals, in astrology, and the occult. A lot of people in this camp, they kind of piecemeal together things from different religious traditions without taking on the religion itself. You know, they might practice Zen meditation, they might pray to their ancestors. They might believe in guardian angels. They might talk about demons or powers of darkness. They might practice fasting and they often pray to a higher power. Now, one thing that I love about 10-minute Bible talks is that a lot of people who find this show probably find themselves in that spiritual but not religious category. And for many people, listening to this podcast has been transformational because listening to the Bible every day has drawn them into a relationship with God. And they've

Starting point is 00:01:31 started following Jesus, not just any God or any spiritual idea out there. We started going to church. Their lives have been changed. So if that's you and you're on a journey towards God thinking about Jesus, I'm so glad that you're here and that you're listening. We welcome everyone who's curious, everyone who's asking questions. But on today's episode, we are studying a passage that issues a challenge to people who are spiritual but not religious. Spiritual but not walking with Jesus. In 2 Kings 21, we meet Judah's most notorious king. His name was Manasa, and he was the son of Hezekiah. Now, you might remember, Hezekiah was a really good guy. He taught the people to worship Yahweh, and he worshipped Yahweh alone. And Manassah is a lot like his father in the sense that he is a very spiritual person. There's just one problem. Manasse wasn't very religious. He didn't commit himself exclusively to the path of Yahweh. Instead, he mixed and matched pieces of different religions and practices into his own way of doing spirituality. And the consequences of this mixing and matching, well, they were dire.

Starting point is 00:02:41 Let's read this together, 2nd Kings 21. Manasseh was 12 years old when he became king, and he reigned in Jerusalem 55 years. His mother's name was Hefsuba. He did evil in the eyes of the Lord, following the detestable practices of the nations the Lord had driven out from before. the Israelites. He rebuilt the high places his father Hezekiah had destroyed. He also erected altars to bail and made Asherap, as Ahab, King of Israel had done. He bowed down to all the starry hosts and worshipped them. He built altars in the temple of the Lord, of which the Lord had said, In Jerusalem, I will put my name. In the two courts of the temple of the Lord, he built

Starting point is 00:03:24 altars to the starry hosts. He sacrificed his own son in the fire. He practiced divination, sought omens, and consulted mediums and spiritists. He did much evil in the eyes of the Lord, arousing his anger. He took the carved Asherapole he had made, and he put it in the temple. Now, the story concludes a few verses later, explaining how Manassas' leadership eventually impacted the people of Judah. Manasseh led them astray so that they did more evil than the nations the Lord had destroyed before the Israelites. Now, I want to start by making a few observations. The first is that Manasseh didn't get rid of worshipping the Lord. I don't know if you caught that. Instead, he was just adding to God.

Starting point is 00:04:10 He added the worship of the stars. He added the worship of Asherah, who he thought was the divine consort of Yahweh. He added the worship of Baio and divination and omens and spiritous and mediums. I think sometimes Christians today, we fall into the same trap. We think that as long as we keep Jesus, as long as we worship Jesus, it's not a big deal to add things to him. So maybe we'll dabble in astrology. Maybe we'll use crystals. Sometimes we just add theological ideas from other traditions. You know, we like the idea in Buddhism that the goal of spiritual life is to rid ourselves of all our desires. So we try to do that through Zen meditation. But that's not what the Bible says, of course. Or maybe we like the idea of a mother God. And so we pray to a heavenly mother rather than a heavenly

Starting point is 00:04:57 father, even though that's not what the Bible says. And now, the question, of course, does do these things even really matter? I mean, do these things really cause problems in our lives? Do they cause problems in our relationship with God? Well, this passage helps us answer that question in three ways. First, it shows us that these spiritual forces that Manasseh is dabbling with, they're real. The Bible never argues that the gods of other nations and religions, practices, it never says that they don't exist. Instead, it says time and again that they are spiritual forces of darkness, bent on harming us and misleading us. When the Christians in Corinth were mixing and matching Jesus with pagan feasts, Paul wrote this in 1 Corinthians 1020. The sacrifices

Starting point is 00:05:43 of pagans are offered to demons, not to God, and I don't want you to be participants with demons. So astrology and crystals and a little Buddhism, it might sound really harmless, but it's not because there are real dark demonic powers behind it and playing with demons can destroy your soul. The second thing this passage shows us is that these spiritual forces, they lead us into injustice and evil. Smack in the middle of the passage, we learned that Manassas sacrificed his own son to these gods, to these demonic forces. Now that sounds egregious to us today. But in his time, that was actually an incredibly pious thing to do. It looked like a self-sacrificial act. But God looked at what Manassah did. He calls it unjust. He calls it evil.

Starting point is 00:06:33 So while you might not be tempted to sacrifice a child, you need to know that dabbling with other spiritualities always leads you on a path towards evil. It leads you towards denying the truth, towards embracing sin, and sometimes even towards harming others. So while a little Buddhist meditation might look pious and harmless, it's really not. You're opening yourself up to powers that will influence you to deny and to disobey God. The third thing this passage shows us is that mixing and matching our spirituality, it actually ruptures our relationship with God. At the end of the passage, the author tells us that Manasseh aroused God's anger. If life is best when God is near to us, then why would we dabble with things that grieve him, that anger him? Especially when we know that

Starting point is 00:07:22 his anger is driven by love. He's a good father. He's a good father. and he doesn't want his child, you, me, to hurt ourselves, and that's why he gets angry when we dabble with these spiritual things. Now, I realize that some of you hearing this might be offended. So let me say this in love. Dabbling with demonic powers will destroy your life and jeopardize your relationship with God. If that's true, me not saying these things would be an act of hate. Love drives us to speak truth even when it's painful. Think about it this way. You don't want your doctor to avoid telling you that you have cancer because he's afraid it will hurt your feelings. In the same way, you don't want your Bible teachers to avoid telling you the

Starting point is 00:08:05 truth so that it doesn't hurt your feelings. But I know that there are other people listening to this and you're just surprised. Maybe you didn't know this or maybe you did, but you didn't really see the problem and now you're feeling guilt and shame. Can I give you some good news? At the end of Manasse's life, he was attacked by Assyria, and then he called out to God for help and God answered him. The author of Chronicles tells us that it was then that he saw the folly of his ways and he repented and he tore his clothes and he tore down all the altars to foreign gods to all the idols to the starry hosts. He stopped messing with the mediums and the spiritists and the omens. He put it all away and God forgave Manasseh because God is good and God is forgiving and God

Starting point is 00:08:52 overflows with love. So if you've mixed to match Jesus with other spiritualities, don't wallow in shame. Confess and know that you are forgiven. And then follow Manassas' example. Get rid of the books, the crystals, the astrology, get rid of the objects that led you astray and commit your path to the Lord and he will carry you on.

Ten Minute Bible Talks Devotional Bible Study - Spiritual But Not Religious? | Historical Books | 2 Kings 21:1-9

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