WWUTT 549 Hezekiah's Emancipation?

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The king of Judah was being intimidated by one of the most powerful kings on the planet.

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But instead of giving in to his demands, he consulted a prophet of God, who spoke for the king of kings and lord of lords, when we understand the text.

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This is When We Understand The Text, a daily Bible commentary to help encourage your time in the

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Word. Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday we feature New Testament Study, an Old Testament book on Thursday, and our

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Q &A on Friday. Now here's your teacher, Pastor Gabe. Thank you, Becky. We continue with our study of the book of 2

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Kings, and today we will be introduced to the prophet Isaiah. 2 Kings 19 is where we are, picking up where we left off last week, right in the middle of this conflict between Jerusalem and the

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Assyrians. We kind of got a standoff going on here. So let's do a quick recap of where we've been up to this point.

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The northern kingdom is no more. The Israelites have been exiled out of the land of Samaria.

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They have been relocated in other regions after they were conquered by the Assyrians, who then moved another group of people to resettle

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Samaria, and they worshipped a hodgepodge of false gods. So God cursed them because they were a depraved people living in a land that God had given to his people.

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So he sent lions among them who killed a number of the people. They realized that they had made the God of the

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Israelites mad. So a priest was sent back into the land of Samaria, an

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Israelite priest, to tell them about the law of Moses. And so they feared the

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Lord God of Israel, and they obeyed the law of Moses, but they also feared their own false gods and worshipped them too.

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So there's kind of a whole hodgepodge of religion that was going on there in Samaria. So that's where we've left that region of the promised land.

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Judah remains, and Jerusalem is being restored under the rule of Hezekiah, particularly the temple.

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Hezekiah's father, Ahaz, was the most wicked king that Judah had. He desecrated the temple.

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He raised up idols within the temple. He even sacrificed his son to a false god.

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He was just a horribly wicked king. And Hezekiah comes in and brings all these reforms back into the temple.

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He reinstates temple worship. He tears down the high places, since God was being worshipped at all these other locations, which was against the law of God.

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He was only supposed to be worshipped in the temple. So Hezekiah tore down the high places, reinstated temple worship, reinstated the

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Sabbath, festivals, law -keeping, all the things that Judah was supposed to be doing.

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These reforms were enacted under Hezekiah. Now we don't read about those things as much in 2

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Kings. We read about them more in 2 Chronicles. And there are several chapters there dedicated to the reforms that Hezekiah brought back into the temple, and some of the things in the temple that they had to reconstruct because of how much

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Ahaz kind of tore things apart. But then even Hezekiah desecrated some of the beauty there in the temple when the king of the

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Assyrians came against him, and he took the gold off the doors of the temple and tried to bribe the king of the

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Assyrians with it. At first, Hezekiah wasn't afraid of the king of Assyria.

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He feared the Lord. He didn't fear this other king. But then once force was demonstrated against Jerusalem, Hezekiah got a little intimidated.

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And so he did indeed take some of those treasures from the temple after all of this reconstruction that he had done and tried to buy peace with the

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Assyrians. Well, that actually prompted the king of Assyria to come against Jerusalem all the more.

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Hey, if I can intimidate the king this much, well, he may not have that much force to be able to fight me off.

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I can take over Judah, or maybe I can get more out of him. So Sennacherib, who is the king of the

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Assyrians, sends his rabshaka to kind of be his mouthpiece.

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See, the king of Assyria believes himself to be a god, and it is beneath him to address anyone else who is not a god.

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And he doesn't think of Hezekiah as being on his level. So he sends the rabshaka or rabshaka, however you want to pronounce it.

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I like rabshaka. It sounds funny. But anyway, the rabshaka to Hezekiah. And then in chapter 18, starting in verse 19, we read a very devilish sort of a speech like the rabshaka tries to intimidate

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Hezekiah by making him feel guilty for tearing down the high places. Oh, you tore down the high places where God was worshipped.

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The Lord your God is not on your side. But of course, Hezekiah was doing what the

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Lord wanted him to do. He wasn't supposed to leave the high places intact. But the rabshaka was making him doubt some of the reforms that Hezekiah had brought to Jerusalem.

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And then the rabshaka turned or tried to turn the people against Hezekiah, tried to tell him, hey, if you follow us, the king of the

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Assyrians is going to give you land and vineyards. You're going to get all sorts of good stuff if you turn against Hezekiah.

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Don't trust him. Don't trust him when he says the Lord your God is on your side. He's not on your side.

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Has anyone ever come against the king of Assyria and won? That's kind of the way that the rabshaka is trying to intimidate everybody.

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Do you know of anybody who has beaten the king of Assyria? Do you know anyone who has defeated our gods?

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And yet Hezekiah was not immediately shaken, at least in the sense that he showed his enemies that that he was a little bit intimidated by this.

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Nor did the people respond to the rabshaka according to the words that he said. As it says in verse 36, the end of 18, the people were silent and answered him not a word for the king's command was do not answered do not answer him.

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Verse 37, then Eliakim, the son of Hilkiah, who was over the household and Shebna, the secretary and Joah, the son of Asaph, the recorder, came to Hezekiah with their clothes torn and told him the words of the rabshaka.

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And so that's where we pick up with Isaiah entering into the story in chapter 19, because Hezekiah is going to go and consult the prophet of God.

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This is something that we haven't seen happen in a while. Generally, a prophet of God would come and speak to the king.

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And the king is going to ignore the words of the prophet of God. But here

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Hezekiah, who was a righteous king, comes and consults Isaiah on what it is that he is supposed to do now in our narrative, as we've been reading through first and second kings, we haven't seen

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Isaiah introduced until this point. But Isaiah has been serving the

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Lord and has been active in Israel and Judah prior to this encounter with Hezekiah.

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So if you go to the book of Isaiah, we're in about Isaiah chapter 36, like the stuff that we're reading about right here.

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You can read verbatim in the book of Isaiah chapters 36 through 39 chronicles the things that we're reading about exactly right here in second kings.

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Now, there were some other things that Isaiah prophesied from the Lord in the chapters previous to chapter 36, like in Isaiah chapter 20, for example, is the famous account of Isaiah walking around naked for three years.

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And this was supposed to be a prophecy as to what was going to happen to Egypt because they were going to be exiled themselves.

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They would be conquered by their enemies and their exile would they would all be exiled naked. And so that was what

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Isaiah was prophesying with his walking around naked as the Lord had instructed him to do.

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That all happened about 10 years prior to what we're reading here. So that was in about 711

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BC. This is in about 700 or 701 BC. So let's pick up here in chapter 19, starting in verse one.

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As soon as King Hezekiah heard the word of his messengers who came back and told him what the rapture had said, that Assyria was going to destroy

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Jerusalem, that he was trying to turn the people of Israel or the people of Judah rather against Hezekiah.

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He tore his clothes. He covered himself with sackcloth and went into the house of the Lord. And he sent

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Eliakim, who was over the household and Shebna, the secretary and the senior priest, covered with sackcloth to the prophet

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Isaiah, the son of Amoz. And they said to him, thus says Hezekiah, this is a day of distress, of rebuke and of disgrace.

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Children have come to the point of birth and there is no strength to bring them forth. It may be that the

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Lord your God heard all the words of the rapture, whom whom his master, the king of Assyria, has sent to mock the living

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God and will rebuke the words that the Lord your God has heard. Therefore, lift up your prayer for the remnant that is left.

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When the servants of King Hezekiah came to Isaiah, Isaiah said to them, say to your master, thus says the

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Lord, do not be afraid because of the words that you have heard with which the servants of the king of Assyria have reviled me.

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Behold, I will put a spirit in him so that he shall hear a rumor and return to his own land.

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And I will make him fall by the sword in his own land. So why is it that God allowed the

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Assyrians to come against Jerusalem in this way and display this show of force, despite the fact that Hezekiah was such a righteous king, he was instituting reform in the temple.

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He was worshipping God and instructing the people of Judah to worship God the right way.

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He was consulting the prophets to show to show that he believed the word of a prophet and was not intimidated even by the king of a foreign land.

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Well, all of this was to show Hezekiah's righteousness. God allowed the Assyrians to come against Judah to show that Hezekiah would indeed listen to the

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Lord. This this was a test that God was putting even upon the king of Judah. And Hezekiah passed that test.

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He listened to God and consulted one of God's prophets where previous kings were not doing that.

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Kings in both Judah and Israel. We're ignoring the words of prophets. And so this shows the righteousness of Hezekiah and that he consulted

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Isaiah. Now, there was indeed a little bit of punishment involved in this, that God would send the

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Assyrians as an instrument, as an iron rod. We're kind of going to see that as we continue here.

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So he would send the Assyrians as an iron rod against Judah because of the sinfulness of Ahaz, but also because of the pride of Hezekiah.

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Now, Hezekiah was struck with an illness because of his pride. We read about that in Chapter 20. It's actually kind of a flashback sequence.

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This is also talked about in Second Chronicles and Hezekiah repents. And then all this reform is brought to Judah.

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But but the Lord allowed these things to happen to Judah to show his might and his power in their greatest time of need.

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Assyria was indeed a massive army. They were so powerful that even

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Egypt did not stand a chance. Some of these officials in Judah had bartered a deal with Egypt and they felt like they were safe because of this pact that they had made with Egypt.

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And it's one of the things that the Rabshakeh mocks Judah for. When you read his speech in verses 19 through 25, he talks about how the

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Pharaoh, the king of Egypt, are you going to trust in him? He's not going to save you. The Assyrians were even more powerful than the

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Egyptians. So with all of this might and power in this army, one of the most dominant nations, kingdoms on Earth at this time,

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God is going to demonstrate his power and his faithfulness to Judah because they have repented of their sin, because they have turned back from worshipping false gods and worshipping

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God even in wrong places and instead have instituted right worship, according to the instructions that were given through the prophet

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Moses. And so the Lord is indeed going to bless Hezekiah and Judah.

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As we continue, verse 8, the Rabshakeh returned and found the king of Assyria fighting against Libna, for he heard that the king had left

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Lachish. Now the king heard concerning Terhaka king of Cush. Behold, he has set out to fight against you.

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So he sent messengers again to Hezekiah saying, thus shall you speak to Hezekiah, king of Judah.

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Do not let your God in whom you trust deceive you by promising that Jerusalem will not be given into the hand of the king of Assyria.

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Behold, you have heard what the king of Assyria have what the kings of Assyria have done to all lands, devoting them to destruction.

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And shall you be delivered? Have the gods of the nations delivered them, the nations that my father's destroyed,

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Gozin, Haran, Rezep, and the people of Eden who were in Tel Asser?

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Where is the king of Hamath, the king of Arpad, the king of the city of Sefer Vane, the king of Hena or the king of Eva?

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And this is very similar to something that the Rabshakeh had said in his previous speech when he first entered into Judah.

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He's just repeating the same words again, trying to intimidate Hezekiah.

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Are you really going to trust your God? If your God has told you something other than what I'm saying to you, don't trust him.

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I mean, you can you can hear just how satanic the Rabshakeh is. He sounds like the serpent in the

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Garden of Eden, the way that he would whisper to Eve. Did God really say? And that's a seed of doubt that Satan has been attempting to plant in our ears ever since.

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Did God really say that? I mean, that part of the Bible, that's not really all that important. Right. You don't have to pay attention to that part.

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When the apostle Paul said there must not even be a hint of sexual immorality in you.

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Well, he meant everything but this. Right. That's not under the blanket of sexual immorality.

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That is perfectly acceptable practice. The Lord would be OK with you doing that. Or did

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God really say that women can't be pastors in churches? Surely. Yeah. That part of First Timothy chapter two, you can ignore that.

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That's all that's all archaic. You know, it's old. It was tradition back in that particular day.

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It was a Greco Roman influence has nothing to do with the way that the church should be governed now or the roles that God has designated men and women for.

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Ladies, you can do everything just as good as men can do. Don't let anything in the

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Bible that is old like that hold you back. Or is the Bible really

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God's word? What about the thoughts that you think in your mind? You've asked

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God for something. He answered you in your mind. So the thought that you thought that that's just as good as God's word.

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That's just as that is God. So just listen to the thought that you had. And you don't have to read this.

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You don't have to pay attention to what's in the Bible. It's just an old book anyway. You know, stuff just like that.

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Just those kinds of lies that Satan has been attempting to plant in our ears ever since, ignoring parts of the

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Bible that we don't like, thinking that God would be perfectly permissible with it. And we don't have to pay attention to these things.

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Did God really say? And it's a very indicting word from Jesus. When you read in the

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Gospels, him say something like, have you not read it? Don't you know, have you not gone to the word of God and read it for yourself?

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Then why aren't you obeying it? So it's quite an indictment to hear that from Christ. It's kind of like the the opposite of the devil's working to try to make us doubt with that question.

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Did God really say? Does God's word really say that? So let's continue on here.

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Verse 14. So Hezekiah has received now the letter from the hand of the messengers and read it.

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This the word from Isaiah. So who's he going to listen to? The prophet of God or the prophet of the king of the

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Assyrians. Hezekiah went up to the house of the Lord and spread it before the

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Lord. And Hezekiah prayed before the Lord and said, Oh, Lord, the God of Israel enthroned above the cherubim.

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You are the God, you alone of all the kingdoms of the earth.

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You have made heaven and earth incline your ear. Oh, Lord. And here, open your eyes, oh,

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Lord, and see and hear the words of Sennacherib, which he has sent to mock the living

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God. Truly, oh, Lord, the kings of Assyria have laid waste the nations and their lands and have cast their gods into the fire, for they were not gods.

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But the work of men's hands, they were wood and stone. Therefore, they were destroyed.

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So now, oh, Lord, our God, save us. Please, from his hand that all the kingdoms of the earth may know that you, oh,

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Lord, our God alone, all these other false gods could not protect their wicked kings, but we don't worship false gods.

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We worship the one true God. So show your might and power to these

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Assyrians who have gotten so puffed up on their pride because they've overthrown all these other nations worshiping their false gods.

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The Assyrians worship their false God. So you, oh, Lord, are the one true living

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God. Let your mighty power be seen among all the nations. And here's what we have next.

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Verse 20. Then Isaiah, the son of Amoz, sent to Hezekiah, saying, Thus says the

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Lord, the God of Israel, your prayer to me about Sennacherib, king of Assyria. I have heard this is the word that the

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Lord has spoken concerning him. She despises you. She scorns you, the virgin daughter of Zion.

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She she wags her head behind you, the daughter of Jerusalem. Whom have you mocked and reviled against?

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Whom have you raised your voice and lifted your eyes to the heights against the holy one of Israel by your messengers?

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You have mocked the Lord and you have said with many with my many chariots,

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I have gone up the heights of the mountains to the far recesses of Lebanon.

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I felled its tallest cedars, its choices, cypresses. I entered its farthest lodging place, its most fruitful forest.

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I dug wells and drank foreign waters and I dried up the sole of my foot, all the streams of Egypt.

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Have you not heard that I determined it long ago? I plan from days of old what now

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I bring to pass that you should turn fortified cities into heaps of ruins while their inhabitants, shorn of strength, are dismayed and confounded and have become like plants of the field and like tender grass, like grass on the housetops blighted before it is grown.

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But I know you're sitting, sitting down and you're going out and coming in and you're raging against me because you have raged against me and your complacency has come into my ears.

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I will put my hook in your nose and my bit in your mouth and I will turn you back on the way by which you came.

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There's a godly smackdown to the king of Assyria right there. The only reason why you have been successful against any of these nations is because I decreed that you would be

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God showing his sovereignty over the king of Assyria, who was declaring his own sovereignty over God.

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And Psalm 2, 4 says of a wicked king like this, he who sits in the heavens laughs, the

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Lord holds them in derision. So now God is going to make small this mighty king of Assyria.

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Verse 29. And this shall be the sign for you. This is God speaking to Hezekiah through the prophet

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Isaiah. This shall be the sign for you this year. Eat what grows of itself.

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And in the second year, what springs of the same. Then in the third year, so and reap and plant vineyards and eat their fruit.

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And the surviving remnant of the house of Judah shall again take root downward and bear fruit upward.

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For out of Jerusalem shall go a remnant and out of Mount Zion a band of survivors.

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The zeal of the Lord will do this. Therefore, thus says the Lord concerning the king of Assyria, he shall not come into the city or shoot an arrow there or come before it with a shield or cast up a siege mound against it by the way that he came.

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By the same, he shall return and he shall not come into this city, declares the

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Lord, for I will defend the city to save it for my own sake and for the sake of my servant

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David. Now watch what he does here. Verse 35. That night, the angel of the Lord went out and struck down a hundred and eighty five thousand in the camp of the

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Assyrians. And when people arose early in the morning, behold, these were dead bodies.

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Then Sennacherib, king of Assyria, departed and went home and lived in Nineveh. And as he was worshiping in the house of Nisroch, his

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God, Adramelech and Sherazer, his sons, struck him down with the sword and escaped into the land of Ararat.

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And Esarhaddon, his son, reigned in his place. Almighty is the

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Lord, our God, king of kings and Lord of lords. And we are privileged to be able to break bread at the king's table and fellowship with him.

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All those who are in Christ Jesus. He is a good God who takes good care of us and delivers us.

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May we exalt him and glorify his name now and forever. Amen.

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Gabriel Hughes is the pastor of First Southern Baptist Church in Junction City, Kansas. Find out more online at www .utt