2Ki 19:1 And it came to pass, when king Hezekiah heard it, that he rent his clothes, and covered himself with sackcloth, and went into the house of the LORD.
2Ki 19:2 And he sent Eliakim, which was over the household, and Shebna the scribe, and the elders of the priests, covered with sackcloth, to Isaiah the prophet the son of Amoz.
2Ki 19:3 And they said unto him, Thus saith Hezekiah, This day is a day of trouble, and of rebuke, and blasphemy: for the children are come to the birth, and there is not strength to bring forth.
2Ki 19:4 It may be the LORD thy God will hear all the words of Rabshakeh, whom the king of Assyria his master hath sent to reproach the living God; and will reprove the words which the LORD thy God hath heard: wherefore lift up thy prayer for the remnant that are left.
2Ki 19:5 So the servants of king Hezekiah came to Isaiah.
2Ki 19:6 And Isaiah said unto them, Thus shall ye say to your master, Thus saith the LORD, Be not afraid of the words which thou hast heard, with which the servants of the king of Assyria have blasphemed me.
2Ki 19:7 Behold, I will send a blast upon him, and he shall hear a rumour, and shall return to his own land; and I will cause him to fall by the sword in his own land.
2Ki 19:8 So Rabshakeh returned, and found the king of Assyria warring against Libnah: for he had heard that he was departed from Lachish.
2Ki 19:9 And when he heard say of Tirhakah king of Ethiopia, Behold, he is come out to fight against thee: he sent messengers again unto Hezekiah, saying,
etc.
Sermon Transcript
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We're going to 2 Kings chapter 19. 2 Kings chapter 19, and we're reading from verse 1. Again, we're thinking about the life of Hezekiah these weeks, and this is the word of the Lord. And it came to pass when King Hezekiah heard it, that is, all the things that Rabshakeh spoke against Jerusalem, spoke against Hezekiah, and perhaps most importantly of all, spoke against the Lord God. And it came to pass when King Hezekiah heard it, that he rent his clothes and covered himself with sackcloth and went into the house of the Lord. And he sent Eliakim, which was over the household, and Shebna the scribe, and the elders of the priests, covered with sackcloth, to Isaiah the prophet, the son of Amoz.
And they said unto him, Thus saith Hezekiah, This day is a day of trouble, and of rebuke, and blasphemy. For the children are come to the birth, and there is not strength to bring forth. It may be the Lord thy God will hear all the words of Rabshakeh, whom the king of Assyria his master hath sent to reproach the living God, and will reprove the words which the Lord thy God hath heard. Wherefore, lift up thy prayer for the remnant that is left, that are left.'
So the servants of King Hezekiah came to Isaiah. And Isaiah said unto them, Thus shall ye say to your master, Thus saith the Lord, Be not afraid of the words which thou hast heard, with which the servants of the king of Assyria have blasphemed me. Behold, I will send a blast upon him, and he shall hear a rumor, and shall return to his own land, and I will cause him to fall by the sword in his own land. Zorab Shaki returned and found the king of Assyria warring against Libna, for he had heard that he was departed from Lashish.
And when he heard say of Terhaka, king of Ethiopia, behold, he has come out to fight against thee, he sent messengers again unto Hezekiah, saying, Thus shall ye speak to Hezekiah, king of Judah, saying, Let not thy God in whom thou trustest deceive thee, saying, Jerusalem shall not be delivered into the hand of the king of Assyria. Behold, thou hast heard what the kings of Assyria have done to all lands by destroying them utterly, and shalt thou be delivered? Have the gods of the nations delivered them which my fathers have destroyed, as Gozan and Haran, and Rezeph, and the children of Eden, which were in Telassar? Where is the king of Hamath, and the king of Arpad, and the king of the city of Sepharvim, of Hena, and Eva?'
And Hezekiah received the letter of the hand of the messengers, and read it. And Hezekiah went up into the house of the LORD, and spread it before the LORD. And Hezekiah prayed before the Lord, and said, O Lord God of Israel, which dwellest between the cherubims, thou art the God, even thou alone, of all the kingdoms of the earth, thou hast made heaven and earth.
Lord, bow down thine ear and hear. Open, Lord, thine eyes and see, and hear the words of Sennacherib, which hath sent him to reproach the living God. Of a truth, Lord, the kings of Assyria have destroyed the nations and their lands, and have cast their gods into the fire. For they were no gods, but the work of men's hands, wood and stone, Therefore they have destroyed them.
Now therefore, O Lord, our God, I beseech thee, save thou us out of his hand, that all the kingdoms of the earth may know that thou art the Lord God, even thou only. Amen. May the Lord bless to us this reading at this time. Our God, has promised not to leave himself without a witness. And during the period of Hezekiah's reign, the prophet Isaiah was the Lord's principal witness to Judah. When Hezekiah heard of Rabshake's insults and blasphemy, he went personally to the temple.
He went to the house of God in Jerusalem to pray and he sent his nobles to see Isaiah the prophet and ask him to pray as well for the nation, for the remnant that was left to discover the mind of the Lord and to inquire what help the Lord might give.
Now, a remnant, just in case you don't know, a remnant is a small part of a larger whole. And by using that phrase, Hezekiah may mean Judah and Benjamin, the two tribes that remained after the 10 tribes were transported away. So that in that sense, Judah and Benjamin with it was the remnant of the children of Israel. Or else it's possible also that the relatively few Jews now remaining inside Jerusalem, since much of the rest of the land of Judah was already captured and destroyed by Sennacherib, are the people that Hezekiah is referring to.
But whatever is in his mind, he is asking for the Lord's help on this little group that remains. And of course, there's some lovely pictures flow from that with respect to the Lord's people in this world. Because the Lord's people are also called a remnant people. That group of people whom the Lord has preserved for himself from all eternity. The Church of Jesus Christ, believers who trust in Christ as their saviour, are sometimes in the Bible called a remnant. Well, Hezekiah sent to Isaiah and he said, pray for us that the Lord will help and deliver the remnant people. And the response of the prophet was a great encouragement to Hezekiah.
Isaiah told him, Thus saith the Lord, Be not afraid of the words that thou hast heard, wherewith the servants of the king of Assyria have blasphemed me. Behold, I will send a blast upon him, and he will hear a rumour and return to his own land, and I will cause him to fall by the sword in his own land. This is what the Lord promised that he would do. The Lord himself, through Isaiah, told Hezekiah that he would send a blast upon the king of Assyria. And we're going to hear about that blast before the end of our study today. He also said that he would send a rumour, or that the king would hear a rumour.
And we're told that the king of Assyria heard that the king of Ethiopia was come with an army to fight. Now I don't know whether the rumour that Sennacherib heard was that the king of Ethiopia, or whether it was something else. That's not explicitly said, but it kind of appears that that might have been the rumour that he heard. Whatever it was, it's quite clear that Sennacherib realised that he had to speed up his conquest of Judah. if indeed there was a king coming out of the south, coming out of Africa, effectively. Ethiopia is in Africa, and if there was a king coming out of Africa with an army to fight against Assyria, which was in southern, well, Europe and Asia, where Europe and Asia kind of joined together at Turkey there, then, The king of Assyria was well out of his own area now and he realized that he might be hard pressed if he was called to fight another army here in Judah.
He started to work out how he might deal with the problem of Hezekiah and Jerusalem as quickly as possible. And he sent another letter. He had already spoken to Hezekiah via Rabshakeh. Whether it was Rabshakeh that carried the second letter, I don't know. That's not specifically said. But a letter was sent to Hezekiah, And again it is full of threats and it's commanding that Hezekiah surrender Jerusalem and repeating the blasphemous things that Rabshake had already said concerning the Lord. Actually...
Sennacherib's blasphemy in his letter was worse than Rabshake had shouted out against the walls of Jerusalem. Rabshake accused Hezekiah of not telling the truth. Sennacherib accused God of not telling the truth. Oh the wicked heart of man. This was the very sin that Satan had perpetrated in the Garden of Eden. And that's the reason why Satan is called the father of lies. He had told Eve Let not thy, or not Satan to Eve, but rather Sennacherib had told Hezekiah, let not thy God in whom thou trustest deceive thee, saying Jerusalem shall not be given into the hand of the king of Assyria. Satan told Eve that she wouldn't die if she ate the fruit of the tree. Basically both, Satan and Sennacherib said that God was telling lies. Hezekiah's next move was very interesting.
He returned to the temple once again, carrying the letter from Sennacherib with him. And we read this, he went up onto the house of the Lord and he spread it before the Lord. Hezekiah spread the letter before the Lord. It was almost as if he was saying, Lord, I need you to look at this. I need you to look at what that man has written. Not so that the Lord could read it or learn what was in it. I'm sure that Hezekiah understood perfectly that the Lord already knew what was in the letter. No, I think what Hezekiah was doing here was simply saying, Lord, You said that you will deliver us out of the hand of this man. Here's what he said. Now, what are you going to do about it? This was Hezekiah bringing the problem to the Lord. The Lord had said Assyria and Sennacherib is my problem. I am going to deal with it.
So Hezekiah says to the Lord, OK, Lord, deal with it. And Hezekiah's prayer is a fine prayer honouring to God. It concludes like this, I don't think Hezekiah was doubting the Lord at all or even becoming impatient with the Lord. Nevertheless, as soon as he had laid this letter before the Lord, God at once gave an answer by the prophet Isaiah. We didn't read these verses. It was kind of a long chapter, so I broke off at this point.
But Isaiah sends a message to Hezekiah, and he tells him that the Lord would deal with Sennacherib as a man puts a ring in the nose of a bull to lead it about, or as a man might put, a bit in a horse's mouth in order, again, to pull on its reins and direct it wherever the rider wants it to go. And there is another part in Isaiah's message to Hezekiah as well. The Lord gave Hezekiah a sign that these things that Isaiah had told Hezekiah that God was going to do would certainly come to pass. God gave Hezekiah a sign. And it was a very blessed sign.
Remember Assyria and the armies of Assyria are now in the land of Judah. There is a huge army already besieging Although Sennacherib and another part of his army is destroying the walled cities of Judea, wherever he can find them. He had been at Lachish and now he was at another city. But there was already a huge army besieging Jerusalem. Here was the sign that the Lord gave to Hezekiah.
Despite the ravages of the Assyrian army upon the land, Judah, the people of Judah, would this very year feed on crops that grew by themselves out of the earth in their fields. The Assyrians had devastated the land. They had eaten everything that they could eat. They had turned it all up. They had trodden it all down. And yet the Lord promised Hezekiah that the land would produce food even though the children of Judah had not been able to till it or to fertilise it or to in any way care for it.
Not only that, the fields would produce the second year as well. Now it has been suggested that this second year might have been a sabbatical year when the ground was supposed to be left to rest. That happened every seven years. The children of Israel were told to let the land lie fallow one in every seven years and that helped to restore and nourish the land. Well, it may well be that the next year, the second year, was actually a sabbatical year, a seventh year.
But the Lord said, don't you worry about that, Hezekiah. The land will produce in the second year as well. and then in the third year you can send the people back to till the ground and to care for the land, return to farming as usual. This was a real blessing. Despite the siege, despite the people's inability to sow and tend their crops, their fields would be fruitful and the remnant for whom Hezekiah had enjoined the prayers of Isaiah, would be delivered from the siege and they would be provided with food. They would not starve. The Lord would both deliver His people and provide what they needed to survive. For His own honour, says the Lord in verse 35, I will defend this city to save it for mine own sake and for my servant David's sake. And then God's judgment came.
In one night, 185,000 Assyrian troops were slain by God's angel. This is a huge number of men and it must have severely depleted the military capability of the whole Assyrian army. When news arrived with Sennacherib that all of his soldiers around Jerusalem were dead, he at once turned around and headed back to Assyria, back to his capital Nineveh. He certainly could not risk encountering the Ethiopian army now.
And then, the second part of God's judgment. Sometime later, we're told, while Sennacherib was worshipping in his idol God's temple, two of his own sons slew him with a sword. Now, of course, the same angel that had slain the soldiers could have slain Sennacherib as well. But God gave him up, rather, to the betrayal and slaughter of his own household, of his own blood, in order to intensify Sennacherib's shame and aggravate his punishment. And meanwhile, the Lord blessed Hezekiah, the remnant of Judah was safe, Jerusalem was preserved, and God's name was honoured by this mighty deed.
Here are a few lessons that I want us to take from this passage today. When Hezekiah learned about Rabshakeh's speech, he took it to the Lord. When he received Sennacherib's letter, he took it to the Lord and he spread it before him. And this was very wise. And that's our first lesson. When we are in trouble, we ought to take our problems to the Lord and pray to him for help. Hezekiah tore his clothes and wore sackcloth. This was how in the olden days, in the Old Testament times, this was how there used to be performed a public display of humility. He was making a statement to the people as their king. He was admitting, I can't save you. I can't save myself, but we both can trust in the Lord.
And he went to the temple. Why would he go to the temple? Because in the Old Testament, God promised his people that his presence would dwell among them in the temple. So again, Hezekiah was publicly going to the Lord. And this is one of the reasons that we come together to worship, because the Lord is here. He has promised to meet us when we come to worship him.
Here's another thing that we learn. He said to Isaiah, or another thing that Hezekiah did, he took it to the Lord, he went to the Lord in the temple, and the third thing he did was he sent his nobles to Isaiah. He sent them to God's prophet in the land, and he asked Isaiah for his help in prayer. We should do all of these things as well.
We should humble ourselves by confessing our sin and our need for God's help. We acknowledge that we can't deliver ourselves or fix our own problems. And we go to the Lord. We go to the Lord by the means that he has supplied. In the Old Testament, it was to the temple. In the New Testament, it is to the Lord Jesus Christ himself who is our intercessor. It is to the Lord who meets his people in worship. We go to the Lord by trusting the merits of his blood, the merits of the Lord Jesus Christ crucified.
And we ask him to save us from all our trouble. Salvation and deliverance with God comes by asking for His help and trusting in the Lord Jesus Christ to intercede for us in heaven. And let me say just a couple of things about that. Our biggest problem is our sin. If we ask God to forgive us through Jesus Christ, He will forgive us.
And thereafter, all our other problems can be taken to the Lord as well. Hezekiah could not rely upon his own strength for salvation, and neither can we. Hezekiah humbled himself and went to the Lord, and the Lord saved him and provided for him. And so should we. And let me say something else here. Hezekiah asked Isaiah to help him to pray. It is okay to pray directly to the Lord for ourselves. It is okay to pray for others. We should do that. And it is okay to ask one of the Lord's preachers to pray with you.
That's what Hezekiah did and you can do that as well. If you have a problem that you would like to share, you can tell me or you can tell another mature believer and I for one will be happy to pray for you and with you. Here's the second lesson that we can learn.
Hezekiah knew that God will not allow men and women and boys and girls to mock him or despise his glory. Sometimes when I hear God's name taken in vain or people ridiculing God and mocking his son, Jesus Christ, I think to myself how fearful a position they are putting themselves in. They need to ask forgiveness because our God does not forget.
Within a short time, the Lord broke Sennacherib's army by slaying 185,000 troops in a single night by his angel. He didn't even let another country like Ethiopia or Egypt or some other Army, do it for him. The angel of the Lord slew 185,000 men. And sometime later, it might have been weeks or years, he caused Sennacherib, he caused this mocker to be slain in the house of his God by his own sons.
And it was as though God said, your God can't protect you even in his own house. as though God said, I don't even need to send a punisher, an executioner to you. Your own family hate you so much that they want you dead and they're ready to slay you. Our God will deliver his people from their sins, from their enemies, and he will judge this world in righteousness. People imagine that they can ignore God or mock him. but he is jealous for his own glory.
Listen to what he said to Sennacherib. Whom hast thou, it's verse 22, we didn't read it, but this is what he said to him. Whom hast thou reproached and blasphemed? And against whom hast thou exalted thy voice and lifted thine eyes on high proudly? Even against the Holy One of Israel.
I will defend this city to save it for mine own sake and for my servant David's sake. What is God saying here? He promises he will vindicate his own name. He will guard his own glory. He promises he will deliver his people as he said he would. God made promises to David concerning Jerusalem.
But I think actually the promised Messiah is meant here when David is mentioned. It was for Christ's sake that God preserved Jerusalem and delivered Hezekiah and the remnant of the people. And then just a wee word about this remnant. I mentioned before a remnant is a small piece that's left or set apart.
And our God has a remnant people, his chosen people, his elect people, whom he promises to save out of this world. Did you notice how the Lord gave a sign about the fruitful crops in the coming years? Our Lord saves his people from their greatest enemy, which is sin, and he also provides for us in every other way as well. He saves us and he keeps us. He saves us and then he provides for us that we might feed on him spiritually every day, that we might grow in grace and grow up in his service to live for his glory. Hezekiah is a wonderful and the account of Hezekiah is a wonderful picture of a saved sinner and the Lord's dealings with him. and it is a fine picture of how our God looks after all his people, all his remnant people who trust in him. May the Lord bless these thoughts to us today. Amen.
About Peter L. Meney
Peter L. Meney is Pastor of New Focus Church Online (http://www.newfocus.church); Editor of New Focus Magazine (http://www.go-newfocus.co.uk); and Publisher of Go Publications which includes titles by Don Fortner and George M. Ella. You may reach Peter via email at peter@go-newfocus.co.uk or from the New Focus Church website. Complete church services are broadcast weekly on YouTube @NewFocusChurchOnline.
Pristine Grace functions as a digital library of preaching and teaching from many different men and ministries. I maintain a broad collection for research, study, and listening, and the presence of any preacher or message here should not be taken as a blanket endorsement of every doctrinal position expressed.
I publish my own convictions openly and without hesitation throughout this site and in my own preaching and writing. This archive is not a denominational clearinghouse. My aim in maintaining it is to preserve historic and contemporary preaching, encourage careful study, and above all direct readers and listeners to the person and work of Christ.
Everything that exists is a thought in the mind of God.
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I spent the majority of my adult life building something I didn't know had a name. It started with the Scriptures and a lot of late nights. It ended with one sentence that generates every theological position I hold, from the nature of God to the nature of heaven and hell, without contradiction. One sentence. Thirty chapters. Sixteen appendices. And if you accept the sentence, everything else follows.
Most systematic theologies start with a list of doctrines and work through them one by one. This book starts with an ontological claim - that everything that exists is a thought in the mind of God - and derives everything from that single proposition. This is not a rearrangement of existing theology. This is a paradigm shift. Since Augustine imported Plato's metaphysics into the church in the fourth century, every major system of Christian theology has been built on a foundation the Scriptures never laid. This book identifies that foundation, names it, traces its influence across sixteen centuries, and replaces it with an ontology derived from Scripture alone. If the claim holds, this is the most significant shift in the theological starting point since Augustine. And I believe it holds.
This is not a devotional. This is not a commentary. This is a systematic theology built from the ground up by a computer programmer with no seminary degree, no denominational backing, and no one's permission. It uses the vocabulary of information theory, computer science, and quantum physics to describe realities that traditional theological language has never been able to reach. If you are a scientist who suspects that information is fundamental to reality but can't bring yourself to call it God, this book speaks your language. If you are a sovereign grace believer looking for a system that follows the logic all the way, this book does that. And if you have been told that the sharpest doctrine produces the coldest heart, this book ends with the widest arms you have ever seen in a Reformed theology.
The digital edition is free. The truth doesn't come with a price tag. - Brandan Kraft
Where this book stands in the tradition
4th century BC
Plato
Idealism — forms over particulars
The Republic ethic: “God is not the author of evil”
“Everything that exists is a thought in the mind of God, sustained by His will, authored by His purpose, and held together by personal covenants of love.”
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