(The images are Ashtoreth that King Manasseh made Jerusalem and Judah to worship.)
April 4
God’s Grace Before Conversion
“Moreover, Manasseh shed very much innocent blood, till he filled Jerusalem from one end to another, besides the sin that he made Judah to sin so that they did what was evil in the sight of the LORD”
2 Kings 21: 16.
Here lies the reason that long life is granted to the elect before conversion; and that all the sins committed and all the judgments they deserve cannot drive them out of the world before conversion. Manasseh . . . was a great sinner and for the trespass which he committed he was driven from his own land and carried to Babylon. But kill him they could not though his sins had deserved death ten thousand times. But what was the reason? Why, he was not yet called! God had chosen him in Christ and laid up in him a stock of grace which must be given to Manasseh before he died. Therefore, Manasseh must be convinced, converted, and saved.
That legion of devils that was possessed with all the sins which he had committed in the time of his unregeneracy could not take away his life before his conversion (Mark 5). How many times was that poor creature, as we may easily conjecture, assaulted for his life by the devils that were in him? Yet could they not kill him even though his dwelling was near the seaside and the devils had power to drive him too. Yet they could not drive him further than the mountains that were by the seaside. Yea, they could help him often to break his chains and fetters and could also make him as mad as a bedlam. They could also prevail with him to separate from men and cut himself with stones: But kill him they could not, drown him they could not. He was saved to be called. He was, notwithstanding all this, preserved in Christ, and called. (Mark 9: 22).
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