Introduction
Some of us feel far from God.
Far from the person we wanted to be.
Far from family.
Far from our own true selves.
And though we long to come home, we know that we cannot pave that road with our own effort.
The Bible has a single word for the road back.
That word is grace.
Victor Hugo’s Les Misérables paints that word in unforgettable color.
It is the story of a man named Jean Valjean and of the great conflict between Law and Grace.
Jean Valjean did not begin as a hardened criminal.
He was a poor peasant who once stole a loaf of bread to feed his sister’s starving children.
For that theft—and for several attempts to escape—he spent nineteen years chained to the oars of a galley ship.
Year after year the cruelty of prison life beat into him bitterness and rage until his heart turned to stone.
When he was finally released, society branded him forever a dangerous man.
Every door slammed shut.
Every innkeeper turned him away.
Law had done its work: it punished, but it could not heal.
One winter night, homeless and shivering, Valjean knocked at the door of Bishop Myriel.
The old bishop welcomed him, spread a warm table, and offered him a bed.
But in the small hours, Valjean—still a creature of fear and scarcity—crept from the house and stole the household silver.
Caught by the police and dragged back at sunrise, he braced for condemnation and a return to chains.
Instead, the bishop did something astonishing.
Placing the silver candlesticks into Valjean’s hands, he said quietly,
> “My friend, you left the best behind. I gave you the candlesticks too.
Use this silver to become an honest man. With this I have bought your soul for God.”
That one sentence of grace undid nineteen years of shame.
Jean Valjean staggered away a free man in more than the legal sense.
Grace had struck the deepest chord of his heart.
From that night on, Valjean lived under a new name and a new mission.
He became a factory owner, a mayor, a rescuer of orphans—each act a ripple from the bishop’s grace.
Even when relentlessly pursued by Inspector Javert, the embodiment of Law, he kept choosing mercy: paying the legal defense of the poor, sparing the very man who hunted him.
Grace was not a single act of pardon; it became the lifelong power of transformation.
Years later Paris erupted in revolution.
Valjean’s beloved Cosette loved a young revolutionary named Marius, certain to die on the barricades.
Valjean went to that smoky, gun-blasted street not to kill but to save.
When Marius was struck down, Valjean hoisted the unconscious young man on his shoulders and disappeared into the foul sewers of Paris.
For three days he wandered through pitch-dark tunnels, knee-deep in filth, every step an echo of Christ carrying His cross.
At one point he whispered a prayer:
> “Lord, let this young man live; if need be, take my life.”
In that prayer the bread thief became a Christ-figure, offering himself so another could live.
By the end of his life, Jean Valjean died quietly, the silver candlesticks glowing near his bed—everlasting reminders of the night grace claimed him.
Law had once chained him; grace had set him free and taught his heart to love.
The same grace that found Jean Valjean is the grace that found King Manasseh, and it is the grace that seeks each of us today.
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Our Scripture reading tells Manasseh’s story:
> “In his distress he sought the favor of the Lord his God and humbled himself greatly… And when he prayed, the Lord was moved by his entreaty and listened to his plea; so He brought him back to Jerusalem and to his kingdom. Then Manasseh knew that the Lord is God.” (2 Chronicles 33:12-13)
Manasseh became king when he was only twelve.
Imagine that—absolute power before his voice had even settled.
He could not handle it.
He tore down his father Hezekiah’s reforms and rebuilt pagan shrines.
He set up Asherah poles—sexual idols—inside the very temple of God.
He practiced sorcery and witchcraft.
In horrifying devotion to foreign gods he even sacrificed his own sons in fire.
Finally he rebelled against Assyria and was dragged away to Babylon with a hook through his nose.
This is what sin does.
It promises freedom and delivers bondage.
It promises sight and leaves us blind.
It promises glory and leaves us with a hook in the nose.
But in exile something broke open.
The Scripture says, “In his distress he humbled himself greatly before the God of his ancestors and prayed.”
And God—who never despises a contrite heart—was moved.
He listened.
He brought Manasseh back to Jerusalem, back to his throne, back to Himself.
That is grace: unearned favor that meets us at our worst and brings us all the way home.
Grace is not leniency that winks at sin.
Grace is God’s decisive action in Jesus Christ to rescue and remake the sinner.
Paul says, “Sin shall not have dominion over you, for you are not under law but under grace.”
Law can diagnose; only grace can deliver.
Rules can restrain; only grace can renew.
An old Zulu tale speaks of a village starving beneath a towering fruit tree. The fruit would fall only when someone spoke the right word. The lion forgot the word. The kudu forgot the word. At last, the slow tortoise remembered it and spoke—and the fruit cascaded down and the people were saved.
What is the gospel word that brings heaven’s fruit within reach? “By grace through faith.” Not grace plus merit; not grace plus your perfect week. Grace alone, received by faith alone in Christ alone. That is how the fruit of forgiveness, freedom, and new life drops into empty hands.
That same grace transformed another life centuries later: John Newton.
You know the story.
A boy who memorized Scripture, lost his mother young, mocked his father, and became the cruelest of slave traders.
Shipwrecked in a storm and later stricken by a stroke at the helm, he finally opened Thomas à Kempis’ Imitation of Christ and surrendered.
He sold his business, entered the ministry, and every Sunday read the brass plaque on his pulpit:
> “Remember that you were slaves in Egypt and that the Lord your God redeemed you.”
One evening, remembering his past, Newton wrote:
> Amazing grace! how sweet the sound
that saved a wretch like me.
I once was lost, but now am found—
was blind, but now I see.
Grace took the hook from Manasseh’s nose.
Grace set Jean Valjean free.
Grace broke the chains of John Newton.
Grace can break ours.
And when grace claims you, obedience becomes delight, not debt.
You don’t serve to earn God’s love—you serve because, in Christ, you already have it.
There is nothing you can do to make God love you more.
There is nothing you can do to make Him love you less.
Love is the atmosphere of grace; holiness is the fragrance it leaves behind.
So if you feel too far gone, remember Manasseh.
If you are tired of trying harder, remember Valjean and Newton.
If you are seasoned in the faith, keep the candlesticks polished—be ready to hand grace to someone else.
Picture Valjean carrying Marius through the sewers.
Picture Manasseh in chains with a hook in his nose.
Picture Newton steering a slave ship through a storm.
The difference in every story is one small word spoken by faith: grace.
Friend, if you are hungry beneath that tree today, speak the word.
If you are shackled by shame, speak the word.
By grace, through faith, let the fruit fall.
Let the chains break.
Let the road appear.
And follow it home.
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Closing Prayer
“Father, in our distress we seek Your favor. We humble ourselves and call on Jesus.
Be moved by our prayers as You were by Manasseh’s.
Bring us back—back to worship, back to calling, back to Yourself.
Let grace reign where sin once ruled. Through Christ our Lord.
Amen.”
