Dungeons and Dragons

I don’t even believe in this stuff—not really. I’ve said it many times: “I’m an atheist.” Loud. Certain. Decided. And yet, I found myself sitting there—beneath an ancient cross, surrounded by flickering candles and stained glass that whispered stories I’ve tried to unlearn.

I turned to my wife and said, “I know I’m an atheist.”
And still… I prayed.

Not a big prayer. Nothing rehearsed. Just silence. Stillness. A sigh that escaped from somewhere deeper than my intellect. Winning my category that year was my desire but I didn’t know what I really wanted from God, or if He was even listening.  But something in that space pressed against me—softly but unmistakably. A kind of gravity. Light found space in the dungeon of my mind.

Maybe it was memory. Or longing. Or hope I’d stopped admitting.
But for those few moments… I wasn’t who I said I was.

I imagine Manasseh would understand. Born into a house of worship and wisdom, he had every tool for spiritual greatness. His father? Hezekiah. A legend. A man of prayer. A man who saw miracles up close. You’d think some of that would rub off. But it didn’t.

Manasseh didn't drift. He detonated.

Rebuilt the high places. Erected altars to foreign gods. Dabbled in dark arts. Sacrificed his own child in the fire. He turned the very courts of God into a playground for devils, demons and dragons. 

But the spiral didn’t end there. He was captured. Dragged away with a hook in his nose. Tortured. Humiliated. Locked up in an Assyrian dungeon so dark even guilt had shadows.

And that should’ve been the end. Justice delivered. Case closed.

But there, in the bowels of defeat, something cracked open. Manasseh prayed. No priests. No choirs. Just chains. He didn’t deserve a second chance. He didn’t earn it. But grace doesn’t need permission.

God listened.

And not only listened, He restored. The brat came home. The reason this “messes with my meds” is that both Guillermo’s story and Manasseh’s, is that  it chips away at the boxes I’ve built. The categories. The mental scorecards. The quiet list of people I think are too far gone.

But the truth is, people don’t always announce their turning point.
Sometimes they just walk into a chapel.
Sometimes they just collapse in a cell.
Sometimes they just…pray.

And when they do, heaven doesn’t cross its arms.
It leans in.

Because in God’s kingdom, a broken whisper counts more than a thousand well-practiced declarations. And the brat? The one we wrote off? He just might become the builder. The preacher. The proof.

So maybe the real question is this:
Am I humble enough to believe God can save the very people I’ve stopped believing in?