WWUTT 2024 When Yahweh Takes the Sword in His Own Hand (Isaiah 37:1-38)

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The King of Assyria mocked God and the people of God. The King of Judah came before God and said, don't let him mock your name in this way.

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And indeed God took matters into his own hands when we understand the text. This is

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When We Understand the Text, a daily Bible commentary to help encourage your time in the Word. Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday we feature

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New Testament Study, an Old Testament book on Thursday, and our Q &A on Friday.

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Now here's your teacher, Pastor Gabe. Thank you, Becky, and greetings, everyone. Always a pleasure to be with you in the study of God's Word.

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And today in our Old Testament study, we come back to the book of Isaiah. We're right in the middle of the book in that narrative section that goes from chapters 36 to 39.

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Last week, we read chapter 36, and if you'll remember, the Rabshakeh, who was like a prophet for Sennacherib, the

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King of Assyria, comes to Jerusalem and speaks in the tongue of the Hebrew people so that they may understand him.

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The Rabshakeh says that Yahweh will not be here to protect you because you tore down his high places.

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Of course, that's what they should have done. They should have torn down the high places because God was only to be worshiped in the temple.

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But here the Rabshakeh, acting as Satan, is planting doubt in the hearts of the Hebrews. They think

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God will not be on their side. We had done something to anger God. The Rabshakeh said you tried to rely on the

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Pharaoh, the King of Egypt, and we overthrew him. So if you want to save yourselves, you must turn from Hezekiah to Sennacherib, the

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King of Assyria, and he will give you a land just like yours. In fact, you'll have your own fig tree, your own vineyard, your own cistern to draw from.

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This was like when Satan tried to tempt Jesus and said, I'll give you all the kingdoms of the world. The Rabshakeh was trying to do the same thing with the

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Hebrews so that they would turn against Hezekiah and it would be easier for the King of Assyria to conquer

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Judah. And so the Rabshakeh has made all of these blasphemous comments about Yahweh.

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And what we're going to read here in chapter 37 is that Hezekiah will make an appeal to the prophet

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Isaiah to speak on behalf of the people to Yahweh. So here we are in chapter 37.

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I'll read verses one through 13 out of the Legacy Standard Bible. Hear the word of the

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Lord. Now it happened that when King Hezekiah heard it, he tore his clothes, covered himself with sackcloth and entered the house of Yahweh.

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Then he sent Eliakim who was over the household with Shebna the scribe and the elders of the priests covered with sackcloth to Isaiah the prophet, the son of Amoz.

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And they said to him, thus says Hezekiah, this day is a day of distress, reproof and rejection for children have come to the point of breaking forth but there is no strength to give birth.

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Perhaps Yahweh your God will hear the words of Rabshakeh whom his master, the King of Assyria has sent to reproach the living

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God and will reprove the words which Yahweh your God has heard.

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Therefore lift up a prayer for the remnant that is left. So the servants of King Hezekiah came to Isaiah and Isaiah said to them, thus you shall say to your master, thus says

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Yahweh, do not be afraid because of the words that you have heard with which the young men of the

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King of Assyria have blasphemed me. Behold, I will put a spirit in him so that he will hear a report and return to his own land and I will make him fall by the sword in his own land.

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Then Rabshakeh returned and found the King of Assyria fighting against Libna for he had heard that the

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King had set out from Lachish. Then he heard them say concerning Terokah the King of Ethiopia, he has come out to fight against you.

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So he heard it and sent messengers to Hezekiah saying, thus you shall say to Hezekiah King of Judah, do not let your

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God in whom you trust deceive you saying Jerusalem will not be given into the hand of the

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

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So will you be delivered? Did the gods of those nations which my fathers have brought to ruin deliver them even

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Gozin and Heron and Rezif and the sons of Eden who were in Telassar? Where is the

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King of Hamath, the King of Arpad, the King of the city of Sepharvim and of Hena and Iva?

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So you hear what it is that the King of Assyria is doing before he had sent a man who was like his prophet to try to sway the hearts of the people of Jerusalem away from Hezekiah.

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But here, the King of Assyria even sends somebody to the King himself, to Hezekiah and says, hey, you're gonna hear from your

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God that I'm not gonna let Jerusalem fall into your hands. Don't believe it. Don't let your

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God deceive you. What about all these other people? Lays out all these other names.

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None of their gods protected them. Your God will not protect you. This is the King of Assyria claiming that he is greater and higher than God.

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And if he is able to overthrow Jerusalem and seize Judah and bring that into the

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Assyrian Empire, it will bolster him all the more to think that he is greater than the

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God of heaven. Will God allow his own people to be conquered in this way and is named to be blasphemed by this pagan king?

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Judah certainly deserved to be judged. They had turned away from God. But Hezekiah is making an appeal.

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He is covering himself in sackcloth and ashes. He is repenting before God and asking that he would be spared, that Jerusalem would be rescued, that God would stand for his namesake against the

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King of Assyria and embarrass him. And here, Yahweh has given this promise to Hezekiah.

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He has said to him, I'm gonna give a word to the King of Assyria that's gonna make him return back to his own land so that he will fall by the sword in his own land.

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This is the word of God. The King of Assyria is still trying to sway the

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King of Judah by saying, don't let your God deceive you, but he just blasphemes God all the more.

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So we pick up in verse 14. Then Hezekiah took the letter from the hand of the messengers and read it, and he went up to the house of Yahweh and spread it out before Yahweh.

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So this is that letter that has come from the King of Assyria saying, don't let your

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God deceive you. What an incredibly blasphemous thing for the King of Assyria to say.

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Hezekiah takes it to the house of God and lays it out there before God. Hezekiah knows that they worship the true

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God, the God who is gonna wipe out all these nations that would come against Judah. Hezekiah knows that.

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This is a demonstration of his own faith that he would come into the temple of God and lay this letter out and say,

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God, will you allow this man to continue to blaspheme your name in this way? Verse 15,

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Hezekiah prayed to Yahweh saying, oh, Yahweh of hosts, the God of Israel who is enthroned above the cherubim, you are the

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God, you alone of all the kingdoms of the earth, you have made heaven and earth.

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Incline your ear, oh, Yahweh, and hear, open your eyes, oh,

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Yahweh, and see and listen to all the words of Sennacherib who sent them to reproach the living

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God. Truly, oh, Yahweh, the kings of Assyria have laid waste to all the countries and their lands and have cast their gods into the fire for they were not gods, but the work of man's hands, wood and stone, so they have destroyed them.

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But now, oh, Yahweh, our God, save us from his hand that all the kingdoms of the earth may know that you are

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Yahweh, you alone. What an impassioned appeal.

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And once again, a demonstration of the faith of Hezekiah. He is not even for a moment persuaded by the deceptive words of the king of Assyria.

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He throws himself before God in the sanctuary of God and asks that he would uphold his name, make his name great even among these wicked peoples, these people who worship false gods.

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And Hezekiah says, they're not really gods at all. They don't exist, they're just wood and stone. They are the creation of man's hands.

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That's why the Assyrians have been able to overthrow these other people who worship false gods, but we worship the true

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God. Don't let them have their way with your people.

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Make your name great among them. And so a response comes from Isaiah the prophet, verse 21.

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He sent word to Hezekiah saying, thus says Yahweh, the

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God of Israel, because you have prayed to me about Sennacherib, king of Assyria, this is the word that Yahweh has spoken against him.

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She has despised you and mocked you, the virgin daughter of Zion. She has shaken her head behind you, the daughter of Jerusalem.

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Whom have you reproached and blasphemed and against whom have you heightened your voice and haughtily lifted up your eyes against the

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Holy One of Israel? Through your servants, you have reproached the

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Lord and you have said with my many chariots, I came up to the heights of the mountain, to the remotest parts of Lebanon and I cut down its tall cedars and its choice cypress and I will go to its highest peak, its thickest forest.

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I dug wells and drank waters and with the sole of my feet, I dried up all the rivers of Egypt.

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Have you not heard? Long ago, I did it. From days of old,

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I formed it. Now I have brought it to pass that you should devastate fortified cities into ruinous heaps.

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Now let me stop there so that you understand who's talking and why and what's being said. So this is

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God who is speaking through the prophet Isaiah and God says that the

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King of Assyria has made these statements about his successes, his triumphs, his victories.

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He has even boasted in himself to the extent that he has said, I went to Egypt and with the sole of my feet,

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I dried up all the rivers of Egypt. That would be the King of Assyria who's making that boast.

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But then God comes back in and speaks in verse 26. Have you not heard? Long ago,

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I did it. I am the one that dried up the rivers of Egypt. And by the way, people knew about this.

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This was not just something that existed in the history of Israel. This was something that existed in the word that had spread to all of the peoples in all of the kingdoms and all of the lands since Israel came out of the land of Egypt.

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They know of Yahweh. The people in other pagan lands know of Yahweh.

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They know about how God had rescued his people out of Egypt, even parting the Red Sea for them that they would walk through on dry land and then bringing the sea back together to destroy the

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Egyptians. By the way, do you want to know why in Egyptian history that we have no record of that?

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Why is it that when you go to the Egyptian hieroglyphs, you don't find out when and where, exactly what time period, what century did all of these things happen?

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There's a lot of dating that we use before Christ. One of the number one sources that are used by archeologists for dating before Christ is the

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Egyptian calendar because they were so good at keeping records. Why then, when we go into Egypt's history, do we not find any sort of account of a group of Hebrew people that were the largest body of people making up Egyptian slaves and that they fled from Egypt and God wiped out

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Pharaoh's entire army when they pursued the Hebrews through the Red Sea and it came in and collapsed on them?

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Why is that not in the Egyptian record? Because these pagan peoples did not keep historical records of their defeats.

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It's embarrassing. They don't want to admit that Yahweh showed them up with all of these massive plagues that came upon the land when

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God even embarrassed all of the Egyptian gods because every one of those plagues, all 10 of those plagues had something to do with one of the gods that the

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Egyptians worshiped. You just take, for example, when God blotted out the sun and had darkness over the land, that was to show up that there was no

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God named Ra who controlled the sun. When God caused the frogs to plague the land, there was a

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God that the Egyptians worshiped that had the head of a frog. All of these different plagues had something to do with the

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Egyptian gods. God demonstrating those gods were not real and it is Yahweh who controls all.

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This was known to people throughout the lands. It was not just in Hebrew's history.

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It was not just in Israel's history. Even though the Egyptians didn't keep a record of it, they knew about it and so did people from other lands so that the fear of the

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Israelites were in the hearts of all the people. Until here, the Assyrians are not trembling at them at all.

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The King of Assyria is saying he's going to come against this people and he's going to destroy them so they can save themselves by giving up now and turning to his side.

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The King of Assyria is boasting in himself saying, yeah, you know those stories of the

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Egyptian waters drying up? I'm the one who did that. Now, not going back to the Red Sea, but the fact that the

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Assyrians came against the Egyptians and overthrew them. This was after Judah had made a pact with Egypt hoping that the

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Egyptians would rise up and protect Judah from the Assyrians, but here the Assyrians overthrew them. So the

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King of Assyria is boasting, I made the rivers of Egypt dry up. I'm the one that went over there and conquered them. God is saying, don't you know,

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I did this before you. And God did it with much more splendor and grandeur than the

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King of Assyria did. So that's what God is saying here in verse 26. And this should indeed, it should cause the heart of the

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King of Assyria to tremble. It would make the people in the other lands around to hear such a reminder.

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It would make them tremble. Oh yeah, that's right. We remember now the God of Israel is

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Yahweh. Who can contend with Yahweh? So God says, once again, verse 26, have you not heard long ago,

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I did it. From days of old, I formed it. Now I have brought it to pass that you should devastate fortified cities into ruinous heaps.

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So this thing that the Assyrians are doing when they're coming and conquering all these people, these peoples that were listed in verses 12 and 13 as a reminder to Hezekiah, look, none of these people were able to fight me off.

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Do you think your God is gonna be able to deliver you like their gods were not able to deliver them?

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God is saying here, reason why you've had success against these people is because I am the one that raised you up to turn these fortified cities into ruinous heaps.

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Going on in verse 27, so their inhabitants were short of power. They were dismayed and put to shame.

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They were as the plant of the field and as the green herb, as grass on the rooftops is scorched before it rises.

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But I know you're sitting down and you're going out and you're coming in and you're raging against me.

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Because of your raging against me and because your presumptuousness has come up to my ears.

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Therefore, I will put my hook in your nose and my bridle in your lips.

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And I will turn you back by the way which you came. Thus says

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Yahweh to the King of Assyria. Oh, but he's not done yet. God continues on verse 30. Then this shall be the sign for you.

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You will eat this year what grows of its own accord in the second year, what springs from the same.

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And in the third year, so replant vineyards and eat their fruit. And the surviving remnant of the house of Judah will again take root downward and bear fruit upward.

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For out of Jerusalem will go forth a remnant and out of Mount Zion survivors.

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The zeal of Yahweh of hosts will do this. Therefore, thus says

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Yahweh concerning the King of Assyria. He will not come to this city or shoot an arrow there.

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And he will not come before it with a shield or throw up a siege ramp against it. By the way that he came, by the same he will return.

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And he will not come to this city declares Yahweh. Indeed, I will defend this city to save it for my own sake and for my servant,

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David's sake. So God is saying, not only is the King of Assyria not going to have

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Jerusalem, he's not even going to come here. Not one arrow will be shot against it.

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Not one siege ramp will be laid against its walls. He will go back by the way which he came.

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And now here about what God did. I spoiled the ending to this a few weeks ago.

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Remember, first of all, what it is that God had said to Hezekiah. I will put a spirit in him so that he will hear a report and return to his own land.

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And I will make him fall by the sword in his own land. Remember that, right? That was what

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God said to Hezekiah. The story finishes in three verses, verses 36 to 38.

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Then the angel of Yahweh went out and struck 185 ,000

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Assyrians in the camp. And the men arose early in the morning and behold, all of them were dead bodies.

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So Sennacherib, King of Assyria, sent out and returned home and lived at Nineveh. Now it happened that as he was worshiping in the house of Nisroch, his god,

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

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And Esarhaddon, his son, became king in his place. Thus, the end of the

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King of Assyria. How did Yahweh step up for the sake of his own name and strike down the

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Assyrians? He didn't even empower the armies of Judah to come against the Assyrians so that they could take no credit at all for being able to fight the

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Assyrians. This was all for the sake of God and his own name. That the angel of Yahweh, who was very likely

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Jesus Christ, remember the angel of the Lord? And a lot of arguments about that was that one particular angel, is it a

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Christophany? Like an appearance of Christ before his incarnation? Yeah, I believe it's

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Jesus Christ himself before he is incarnate and known by that name, Jesus Christ. He is the son of God.

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The angel of Yahweh went out and struck 185 ,000 in the camp of the

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Assyrians. Jesus himself just took care of it. Struck down 185 ,000 men.

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And that was the end of the Assyrians' pursuit against Judah so that the king of Assyria even went back to his home and died.

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All of that happening exactly as God said, all of that happening by his sovereign hand. My friends,

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I want you to remember this. There is absolutely nothing that is happening in the world right now that God is not sovereign over.

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He is in control of all of it. He will bring everything to its desired end.

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We need only to trust in God that he will do it. All those who believe in the

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Lord Jesus Christ, your sins are forgiven. You will not perish with this world when the judgment of God comes against it, but you will be raised anew to live with God forever in his eternal kingdom because of the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ.

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Turn from your sin to Jesus and live. You are on the winning side.

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Heavenly father, we thank you for the goodness that you show to us. We read in your scriptures, a day is coming in which you will judge the world in righteousness.

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And you have shown by whom you will judge the world by raising him from the dead as Paul preached in Acts chapter 17.

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Jesus will return to judge the nations with a rod of iron. He will strike down the wicked and consign them to eternal punishment in hell.

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But the righteous, those who were made righteous by faith in Jesus Christ will be lifted up, will be placed in your eternal kingdom where we will live with you forever in that perfect place where there is no more sin, no more dying, no more tears.

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You will wipe every tear from our eyes. Death will be no more. Come quickly,

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Lord Jesus. Remind us even in these days that you are still sovereign and you are still in control.

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That we would doubt nothing, but trust you for everything. It's in Jesus' name we pray, amen.

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This has been, When We Understand the Text of Pastor Gabriel Hughes. For all of our podcasts, episodes, videos, books, and more, visit our website at www .utt

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.com. If you'd like to submit a question to this broadcast or just send us a comment, email whenweunderstandthetext at gmail .com

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and let your friends know about our ministry. Join us again tomorrow as we grow together in the study of God's word,