The Inspiring King Hezekiah (part 1)

We'll teach in here. All

right. Good morning, everybody.

Go ahead and turn in your Bibles 2 places, Second Kings 18 and

then put a finger in Second Chronicles 29 and we are going

to kind of skip forward Last week we talked about King Good.

I'm glad I'm talking to myself. King you Uzziah good.

Thank you. Trey's paying attention.

Thank you. At least I got one guy

appreciate that. So King Uzziah and what happens

to King Uzziah at the end of his life?

He is struck with leprosy because he decided he was going

to be a priest instead of being a king and became very puffed up

and proud and thought that he, the king, was the king and he

could do everything whether he was appointed by God to do such.

But he found out the hard way that that wasn't the fact.

So we Fast forward to go through his son and the next son and we

get to King you Hezekiah and Hezekiah gets go ahead, you're

we're going to start in second Kings 18 verse one.

Now it came to pass in the third year of Hoshiya, son of Elah,

king of Israel, that Hezekiah, the king of a the son of a has

king of Judah began to reign 20 and five years old was he when

he began to reign and he reigned 20 and nine years in Jerusalem.

His mother's name was also name also was Abby and the the

daughter of Zechariah in verse 3 and he did that which was right

in the sight of the Lord according to all that David his

father did. And then it goes on and it lists

the things that he did about removing the high places and

breaking down the images all the way to, we know the bronze

serpent that Moses makes in the wilderness for the children to

when they're dealing with the, the fiery serpents.

And they, it had gotten to the point that they started to

actually worship that Brazen's brazen serpent.

And Hezekiah destroys it and says this, this is not what

we're here for. We're not here to worship an

idol, which is what you're making this out to be.

And he cleans out, he cleans house really.

And, and we see Hezekiah in both Second Kings, Second Chronicles

and in Isaiah, and he has probably the most recorded about

his reign other than David and Solomon.

He is the next king in the quantity of how much the Bible

gives about his reign. And because of that, I think

there's a reason God wanted to show over and over like Uzziah.

We we read about Uzziah that he did and he did that which was

right in the sight of the Lord according to all his father and

Messiah did and he sought God in the days of Zechariah who had

understanding in the visions of God.

And as long as he sought the Lord God made him to prosper.

And Hezekiah knows this, watches his grandfather, great

grandfather Uzziah, reads about Uzziah, what he did early on in

his life, how he fails and falls into leprosy.

Then his father or his great, that would be his grandfather

Jotham takes over. And Jotham is not against what

God does. In fact it says in the Bible

that Joseph or Joseph verse 2 of 20 chapter 27.

And he did that which was right in the side of the Lord

according to all that his father Uzziah did.

Howbeit he entered not into the temple of the Lord and the

people did yet corruptly he he he didn't go against what God

wanted. He didn't shut the House of the

Lord. He didn't go sacrifice under

idols, but he watched and saw what happened to his dad and

said, I don't want anything to do with this.

That's fine with you. You can go ahead and have your

religion thing, but I'm I'm good.

I I don't want anything to do with what my dad had to deal

with. And and you kind of look at it

and kind of don't want to give him a pass, but you could

understand the wow, my dad doing well, doing, doing what God

wants. And and from a kids perspective

and a worldly perspective, you kind of look at Uzziah and go,

he was doing great. He was doing great.

And then God gave him leprosy. How is that a good thanks for

following me? And and you, you do one wrong

thing and now you're cursed for eternity and and you're you

basically die a horrible death. And now Jotham gets on the

throne and he kind of has that. I don't want anything to do with

this. I don't look at what God God did

to my dad. And so he takes a very cold

stance on on on following the Lord.

He he again, it says that he does everything that was right

in the sight of the Lord according to all that his father

Uzziah did, but he entered not into the temple of the Lord.

He he didn't want anything to do with it.

So you have Uzziah, who started out well, got puffed up and

thought he was going to be the priest as well as the king And

God said Nope, strikes him with leprosy.

Jotham comes on the scene and says fine keep doing your whole

God thing but I'm out of here I don't want anything to do with

it. Then his son A has comes on the

scene and you can imagine from a father that turns away from God

to a son that doesn't want anything to do with God to the

next son A has who jumps total ship.

Your look, you're there in Second Chronicles 29 turn back

to 28 verse one and a has was 20 years old when he began to reign

and he reigned 16 years in Jerusalem.

But he did not that which was right in the sight of the Lord

like David his father, for he walked in the ways of the kings

of Israel and made also molten image images of Balaam.

Moreover, not just that he he worshipped and he he had images

made. Moreover, he burnt incense in

the valley of the son of hymnal and burnt his children in the

fire after the abominations of the heathen whom the Lord has

cast out before the children of Israel.

He sacrificed also and burnt incense in the high places, on

the hills and under every green tree.

Wherefore the Lord his God delivered him into the hand of

the king of Syria, and they smote him and carried away a

great multitude of them captives, and brought them to

Damascus. And he also was also delivered

into the hand of the king of Israel, who smote him with a

great slaughter. A has jumps, I mean, headlong

into idol worship to the point that he's sacrificing his own

children in worshipping these gods.

And and you can kind of think, all right, well, we, we went

from Uzziah, who started out great ended horribly.

His son doesn't really want to see anything about God, but just

allows it to continue to we're we're we're not even talking

about God. We're jumping into the other pit

and, and now come Hezekiah and you can almost wonder that the

the children are in those that are living in Judah are going,

what are we going to get into next?

I mean, we were we were up on the mountaintop.

Uzziah had our Kingdom was set up so much that it was almost

like Solomon. It was that prosperous and we

were up on the mountain. And then he kind of takes a

downhill turn and then Jotham, his son comes and we we level

off on the little plateau. It's not as great as it used to

be, but we're we're not in captivity.

And then his son Ahaz and we just plummet to the bottoms of

the depths and we're sacrificing children to our God and the gods

of those heathens. And and and then his son comes

who, who has watched his dad do this now, you know, as as a

child or as a once he starts getting older, you're like, how

many brothers of mine and sisters of mine have you

sacrificed? Luckily I didn't get sacrificed

because obviously I'm here as a king, but you've watched all

that happen and you go, all right, what's next?

Are we going further into the depths?

Are we going into worst case? But Hezekiah, if you look there

verse two, and he did that which was right in the side of the

Lord according to all that who David his father had done.

Now Hezekiah is known. If you're still, if you still

have a finger in second Kings, look at verse 5, Second Kings

2 Kings 18:5

18, verse 5. He talking about Hezekiah

trusted in the Lord God of Israel, so that after him was

none like him among all the kings of Judah, nor any that

were before him. Now that's a high praise.

God says that Hezekiah was such a great king that there was

nobody better than him before or after him.

That's including David and Solomon and Hezekiah looks and

we're going to get into some of his characteristics, I guess is

a way what we'll talk about and he's probably going to turn into

two weeks, but that's all right. He follows after God so closely

because he's seen what has happened.

He's a, he's a 25 year old man who decides that I'm not just

going to follow after what my dad did.

I'm going to look back in history and I'm going to read

about those kings that came before me.

And just like every king that has ever taken the throne, I

don't think even Ahaz or Ahab or any of them said I would like

this country, this Kingdom to be captured and destroyed and

plummeted into wickedness. I want this Kingdom to be

desolate. Every king that is in the Bible

and every king that ever sits on the throne wants best, the best

for the Kingdom They because if the Kingdom does well, I get

more money, I get better puffed up and everything.

So the kings even Ahab and a has want what's best for the

Kingdom. But just like Uzziah, God only

blessed when they sought after him and we'll see in Hezekiah's

life the characteristics that he had to look at the history of

all the kings. Yes to to learn about them to

see who did they align themselves with who who because

think of I mean, you're a kid growing up in the palace, just

like Moses learned all the things that needed to happen.

So you when you become king, when you become Pharaoh, like

Moses was trained to be, he would know what to do.

Hezekiah was trained the same way of what here's here's the

book about David, here's a book about Solomon, here's a book

about all the kings before you so you can learn what to do when

your turn comes to be king. That was just the normal thing.

And and the sad thing is a lot of them that grew up decided, I

like some of this. And I know he kind of fell into

idol worship, but he was all right.

I mean, the Kingdom still survived.

And, and so they, they do what a lot of Christians do where

they'll stick 1 foot into religion and 1 foot into the

world. They're miserable.

They would never tell you they're miserable, but they're

just happy just getting right by.

I can say I'm good enough to be called a Christian, but don't

put me into that, that category of sold out and crazy and and

and Bible thumping and I ain't that crazy.

I I'd like to have a little bit of fun.

So a lot of the kings balance that and Jotham is a good

example of that. You go ahead, have your religion

that go, go ahead and worship God the way you want to do.

And, and I'll even do what I can to not go against that, but

you'll never find me in that temple.

You'll never find me at church. I'm just a good person.

I'm morally right. But Hezekiah looks at everything

and looks at back through the ages and goes, I don't want to

follow after what my dad did. I don't want to follow after

what my grandfather, what my great grandfather, what all the

generations before me of the kings that did somewhat right.

I'm going to look back and it's talks about that all that David,

his father had done. I'm going to go back to the man

who was the king who loved God, who loved God's word and try to

follow humans still, but try to follow as close that he could to

what God wanted that Kingdom to be.

And Hezekiah looks back and goes, that's what I want to

model after. When, when you look at your life

and you as a Christian, look at examples, we, we have all these

autobiographies and, and different people in, in our

bookstore about, you know, praying hide and, and you've got

a bunch of different men and, and ladies that have came

through the history and we can look at their lives and go, OK,

I'm going to model this. I'm going to model that, but the

problem is, is we, we always model it after someone down the

line, someone that still isn't as as close as they can be when

we need to be following after what Christ did when, when you

look and try to model your life, you need to model it after

Christ, not not after praying hide.

He had a great a lot of good things to add into your life and

to follow after. But your bar needs to be set a

lot higher. It needs to be set higher.

Just like Isaiah, Hezekiah looked at, OK, he did well.

He did well, but he failed here. He did well, but he failed here.

He's going to look as far back as who was the closest to what

God wanted him to be, and that was David.

Now he didn't have Christ. He didn't have the New Testament

to model his life after Christ. He didn't have the the no

account of God ruling. He ruled through Moses and those

and he he looked after those. But there wasn't a God sitting

on a throne like we see in Revelations.

So the model that that Hezekiah had to look at the best and the

the the the closest to the word of God would have been David.

And he said, I want to have that as my Kingdom.

I want to have that as my life. I want to model after the best

possible, not the kind of good, not the horrible, but I'm not

fine with just being in the middle.

I want to find what who the best one was and follow after that.

And that's what we see him do through his life.

Let's pray and we'll get into this lesson.

Heavenly Father, I thank you so much for being in your house

this morning, for the rain and for the, the safety that you've

given us. I thank you for your word, God,

those that you've given us as examples and, and people to

model after and to model, not to do.

And God, I, I pray that you help us as we look at Hezekiah's

life, that you showed him through your word how to live.

And I've just pray that you help us to, to see the, the things to

gain and the things to shun as we look at these kings.

God, I just pray that most importantly that we look at your

life that you lived here on earth and we model our life

after yours and we get as close as we can to you and and get as

close as we can so that those around us can see you and not

us. God, I thank you for everything

that you do in Jesus name I pray Amen.

First thing I want to see is his stability.

We we've talked about a lot of kings about they started out

well and then they failed. They they were turned to and fro

from this wind of doctrine is what in the New Testament talks

about as in the later days. But Hezekiah was, was stable in

his his faith and stable in what he was going to do for this

Kingdom. And it was all dealt with, how

he looked at history, how we looked at those around him and

how he looked upwards. And the first thing as we see is

he looked backwards, like I said there.

And in Second Chronicles it says that he did that which was right

in the sight of the Lord according to all that David, his

father did. David was the, the like I said,

the best example of a king that would follow after God.

And that's the example that Hezekiah looked at.

He he could have looked at his great, great grandfather,

Uzziah, who who did well, started out great, and he could

have modeled his life after that.

But then there was the ending. I don't want that.

I don't want leprosy. All right, well, let's look at

we can look at a man who was not too bad.

We we can go, we can go further back to ASA or Jehoshaphat, or

we can look at, but those kind of had the same where they did

some good things, they did some bad things.

And, and he looks back at David because while, while his

father's before him didn't do horribly, he didn't want just to

meet the minimum standard. And that's what so many

Christians do is we meet the minimum standard.

What is the minimum I have to do to still be called a Christian?

What's the minimum I can get by with and not look so weird to

the world? And, and, and as a king, you got

to think that you're you're, you're the, you're the Kingdom

of Judah. Only Israel's up here.

And we'll look at this when we look later, but I don't want to

stick out to where people are like, that's a weird king.

That is it. Look at what he's doing.

I mean, we could look at his father Ahaz and go, you

sacrificed your sons, you sacrificed your children.

We look at that as weird, but it talks about that's what the

heathens around him were doing. So he was just trying to blend

in with everybody else. But Hezekiah wanted to be

different. He wanted Judah to be like

Israel was back When David was there, he looked back and he

looked to a man who loved God and loved God's word.

But he didn't just look back, he looked around them.

Look at if you're still there, Second Kings 18 and look in

verse 10/9 and it came to pass in the fourth year of king

Hezekiah, which was the 7th year of Ho Hoisha, son of Elah, king

of Israel, that shall met shall I practice these shamanizer king

of Assyria came up against Samaria and besieged it.

And at the end of three years, they took it.

Even the sixth year of Hezekiah, that is the 9th year of Hoisha,

king of Israel, Samaria was taken.

Now this is during Hezekiah's reign, very early in his reign.

But Hezekiah saw what happened to Israel and goes, I don't want

that. I'd rather stay in my place.

I don't want another country to come and destroy my my people,

my city, everything that I'm building.

And then he kind of looks and goes, Why did that happen?

Because all accounts, they were fortified.

Ahab had had fortified the cities.

Samaria was well protected. But what was it that destroyed

Samaria? It was their sin.

And Hezekiah saw what the sin of a nation did for them.

So he knew. He looked back and said, David,

that's the one I want to follow after.

That's the one that I want to try to become and and have the

same nation like looked at Israel and said, I, I don't want

that taken captive, my city destroyed, besieged the people

murdered and and taken into captivity.

I don't want that either. So follow after David, get rid

of the sin, and most importantly, as he looks upward,

Isaiah 11 talks about who Isaiah was.

And Isaiah was the prophet in the days of Uzziah, Jotham,

Ahaz, and Hezekiah. He was the prophet at that point

in time and and being Hezekiah being the end of that.

Isaiah's older Isaiah has a lot of wisdom, a lot of

understanding of going on of what has happened in the prat in

the past. And Hezekiah looks to him and

and tries to glean as much off of the man of God that he can to

get things right. And we see there in Second

Chronicles 29 verse three, what he does.

He talking about Hezekiah in the first year of his reign, in the

first month opened the doors of the House of the Lord and

repaired them. Now if you look back, Second

Kings opened the doors. Why?

Why are we talking about opening doors?

Well, the his father had shut them not not Second Kings.

I wrote it down. Second Chronicles 28 verse we

read talking about who A has what 2 through 4.

But look at verse 22 of Second Chronicles 2822.

And at the time of his distress, talking about A has, did he

trespass yet more against the Lord?

This is that King A has, for he sacrificed unto the gods of

Damascus, which smote him. And he said, Because the gods of

the kings of Syria help them, therefore will I sacrifice to

them, that they may help me. But they were the ruin of him

and of all Israel. 24 And A has gathered together the vessels of

the House of God, and cut in pieces the vessels of the House

of God, and shut up the doors of the House of the Lord.

And he made him altars in every corner of Jerusalem.

A has doesn't just go against what God says to do and goes and

it talks about he goes yet more against the Lord.

Ahaz closes the doors of the temple says nobody's going in

here not not just that I'm going to go follow after idols, but

nobody's worshiping God. We're we're destroying

everything. We're getting rid of this one

God and and getting rid of following the the God of Abraham

Isaac that led us out of Egypt and all the history of

everything. But he looks at those gods,

little G of those around him and said that's who we're going to

follow after and and shuts the the doors.

And that's that's why it talks about in verse 3 of Hezekiah's

reign that he opens the doors of the House of the Lord and

repaired them. And he brought in the priests

and the Levites and gathered them together in the East St.

and said unto them, Hear me, ye Levites, sanctify now yourselves

and sanctify the House of the Lord God your Father's and carry

forth the filthiness out of the holy place.

Now, now, remember the a has a shut the doors basically said no

more worship in here. What are the point?

What is the job of the Levites to take care of the House of God

to to that's where the priestly lying through Aaron basically

all you have no jobs anymore. Yeah, I'm I'm shutting down the

factory. So now you have no job.

And so these Levites were obviously had to do something

during a has light his reign. So they start working and doing

other things and and that is why Hezekiah says we're opening the

doors. But before you get going in

there, you got to sanctify yourself.

You've been in this world and and getting muddy and getting

dirty. You're not stepping foot in this

place that way. Sanctify yourselves and sanctify

this house. Hezekiah spirituality again

going from his father to him is like going from darkness to

turning on the lights. It was a total 180 in between

his father and him and And as we consider the life of Hezekiah

from the Bible of the record, it seems that the most important

place Hezekiah had was the House of God.

He cared about the House of God. Second Chronicles 29 three

specifically says that in the first year of his reign, the

first thing it does in the first month open the doors of the

House of the Lord and repaired them.

He made this his priority. When I take office, these are

the first things I'm going to do is what he would have, you know,

when trying to run for, I guess you don't run for kingship.

But you know, if they were running for it and he had his

slogan or, or the first things he was going to do, he would

have talked about the first thing I'm going to do is open

these doors and we're fixing this.

And he does that not just after everything's hunky Dory and

things are running smoothly. He does it in the first month as

he starts because he realizes where he needs to start with

this country. Where do I and how do I get this

country from the depths of depravity of murdering and

sacrificing children to being pleasing to the Lord.

It starts in the House of God and and he first takes care of

that. He wanted the place to be

accessible and he wanted to to be attractive, which is why he

repairs it. And he tells them to carry forth

the filthiness out of this whole out of the holy place.

In, in if you continue reading, he, it's almost like these

Levites had forgotten what they were supposed to do.

And and he knowing he's not a priest, so he's not trying to

step like his great grandfather did and step over and get

struck, but he tries to instruct them.

You've got to get yourself clean to the point that there the

amount of priests to be clean, to be able to do the sacrificing

weren't enough. So he tells the Levites because

they are already more sanctified than they then the priests were,

which kind of, I don't know that reading through this, that that

was one thing that stuck out the most to me.

The Levites. Now remember some, sometimes you

think the Levites, well, they were all priests.

No, only Aaron's lineage was the priests.

They were a part of the Levites. But only Aaron's line were

priests. The rest of the Levites were

those that helped in the sanctuary, help clean, help take

care of the grounds, help do the duties of taking care of the

temple. But they were not priests.

So you could almost think of pastors and you have the layman

and Hezekiah gets to the point where there's not enough pastors

or the pastors aren't sanctified enough, but the laymen were.

Look down at verse. I think it's actually in Second

Kings. I'm in Seneca.

Yes, thank you. Verse 342934 But the priests

were too few, so they that they could not flay all the burnt

offerings. Wherefore their brother in the

Levites did help them till the work was ended, and until there

the other priests had sanctified themselves.

For the Levites were more upright in heart to sanctify

themselves than the priests. If that doesn't explain where we

are in Christianity Today that that more of those that are

sitting in the pews in churches are more right with God than

those standing behind the pulpit to the point that that the king

says I need, I got to fill this. I've, I've got to have people

that are sanctified to be allowed to do this job.

Johnny, you're more qualified and closer to walking with God

than the person standing or the next pastor in line.

So you fill the spot until he gets clean.

How sad that was that the priests had not kept themselves

clean enough to be able to just go.

All right, time to go. Let's get working on this.

But it just shows that how quickly and how easy it is to

just fall out of doing what is right.

We can get as Christians get so far away from God that we feel

comfortable. Yeah, I've got a lot of sin.

But you know, when I need to, I'll just get clean it up.

I'll when I, when I need to pray, I'll, I'll clean up my

life. What does the Bible say about

those that have iniquity in their heart?

The Lord will not hear them. God wouldn't use priests that

weren't sanctified, and the the priests had to sanctify more

than the Levites had to because the Levites were closer to doing

what was right than the priests were.

That's scary in my opinion, that that those that were set apart

that were in the errands line of lineage of life of being priests

had dirtied themselves so much that it took so much longer for

them to get clean than just the normal Levites.

Make sure you're clean, Pastor says a lot of times when when

somebody comes and has a problem and they say pray for me.

Are you able to just drop on your knees and pray and talk to

God about what's going on, or do you have a whole host of stuff

that you've got to clean out before you can even talk to God?

I'm sorry, I'll get to your problem, but I've got a closet

full of sin that I need to get rid of.

Be like the Levites, whether you're a pastor in a position or

you're sitting in the Pew, make sure your count short because

there's there's times when God will call upon you to do

something. And if your account is short,

he's going to be able to use that vessel.

If you're a dirty vessel, it's hard to use until after you

clean it. Pastor talked about, you know

it, if you, if you get a speck on this vessel, a cup, it's

still dirty. But if it's a speck, I can clean

that off quick versus a glass full of mud.

And that's, that's the difference between the Levites

and the priests here. And we're off on a tangent, but

that's all right. Make sure your vessel is clean

enough to be able to be used. Don't have so much dirt in your

life that you've got to clean that up before you can ever be

used by God. The Levites knew their job new

we made the temple may be shut and we may not have a job, but

we're still going to follow after what we're supposed to do.

You may see the world running every which way except for the

foot of the cross. Doesn't mean that you get to

just put it in coast and coast through this life thinking,

well, I'm not as bad as that person.

God wants a clean vessel. Make sure we're clean.

So so yeah, we're going to go into next week.

So let's pray and we'll get into the next morning message.

Heavenly Father, I thank you so much for your word for for what

it shows us in history of what the lives that you used in the

lives that you couldn't use. God, I just pray that you help

us to to focus on being as close to you as we can and and to get

out the sin to get out all the iniquity that we we can have a

fellowship and to have a relationship with you and be

able to be used by you. God, I just pray that you help

us to clean our lives out that we are a fit vessels to be used

whenever you need us. I pray that you be with Pastor

Phil and with your spirit as we get ready for what you've given

him for us. I pray that we open our eyes and

our ears and our hearts to what Your Word has for each and

everyone of us today. In Jesus name I pray.

Amen. Dismissed.