Cast Away The Keepsakes

“But he did that which was evil in the sight of the LORD, as did Manasseh his father: for Amon sacrificed unto all the carved images which Manasseh his father had made, and served them;” (2Ch 33:22 AV)

I have a question.  Why weren’t the images destroyed?  Manasseh learned a hard lesson.  After refusing to continue in the revival his father initiated, Manasseh went completely the opposite direction.  He went so far as to establish idol worship as the national religion.  God took Manasseh by the hand of the king of Assyria and dragged him through the place of thorns.  He was tortured by the hand of a pagan king.  Manasseh repented and God heard him.  Manasseh was rescued and restored to his throne.  As a result, Manasseh cleaned out all that he has established accept for the images he had made and the high places Judah sacrificed unto the LORD.  He removed the images from public worship.  He must have stored them away because apparently, his son found them and set them up again.  The question is, why repent of a sin and not destroy it?  Even if you get victory over it, it could become a stumbling block to the next generation.

My wife and I go through a time of downsizing every spring.  We throw out a lot of stuff that we have accumulated over the last thirty years.  I even came across the corsage that I wore at our wedding.  I might just keep that.  But there are other things that have sat idle for decades and only dusting them off reveals what we once treasured.  But there are other things the saints keep.  Old pieces of a former life that one hopes never to go back to.  But the remnants still remain.  An old ticket stub to a rock concert.  A picture of a prom dance with someone who never became a spouse.  Posters of teen idols.  Maybe that old cassette tape of a song we still hang on to even though it is about inappropriate living.  We hang on to these things because the old man still feels regret over having to give them up.  We would never go back there.  The pain from it all was too real.  But there is still a small part of us that misses it even though it would never be repeated.

The problem is, there is a new generation that knows nothing of the pain or consequences of those things.  They interpret our mementos as something to be cherished.  Then pursued.  We may never attend another concert in or lives where drugs and alcohol are a part.  But the next generation sees our mementos as approval of it and will pursue it.  Having an old beer can from our past life may be ‘cool’ to us.  But it may entice a future generation to consume it.  An old Elvis album may be innocuous to us. But it just might be the bridge for a future generation to go down the road of full blown rock and roll.  If God was gracious enough to save us from it, we need to destroy what is left of it.  All of it!  Lest a future generation find it, experience it, and take it one step further.