Hezekiah, Part 2 : Downward Root & Upward Fruit

So, we are in the book of 2 Kings. If you're new with us today, it's in the Old Testament. If you want to turn back, 1 and 2 Samuel, 1 and 2 Kings, 2 Kings, and we're all the way up to chapter 19. And as we open that chapter, if you've been with us, you know

this. If not, we have a city that is surrounded by a taunting enemy. And that enemy has just finished saying a lot of words. And so, I want you to look with me at verse 1. We'll begin reading in verse 1. I'm going to read the first half of the chapter, and then we'll

talk a little bit, and then I will finish, and we will hear what happens at the end. So, beginning in verse 1, hear the word of the Lord. As soon as King Hezekiah heard it, he tore his clothes and covered himself with sackcloth

and went into the house of the Lord. And he sent Eliakim, who was over the household, and Shebna, the secretary, and the senior priests, covered with sackcloth, to the prophet Isaiah, the son of Amoz. They said to him, Thus says Hezekiah, This is a day of distress, of rebuke,

and of disgrace. Children have come to the point of birth, and there is no strength to bring them forth. It may be that the Lord your God heard all the words of the Rabshakei, whom his master, the king of Assyria, has sent to mock the living God, and will rebuke the words

that the Lord your God has heard. Therefore, lift up your prayer for the remnant that is left. When the servants of King Hezekiah came to Isaiah, Isaiah said to them, Say to your master, Thus says the Lord, Do not be afraid because of the words that you have heard, which

the servants of the king of Assyria have reviled me. Behold, I will put a spirit in him, so that he shall hear a rumor, and return to his own land, and I will make him fall by the sword in his own land. The Rabshakei returned and found the king of Assyria fighting against Libna,

for he heard that the king had left Lachish. Now the king heard concerning Tir-hakah, king of Cush. Behold, he has set out to fight against you. So he sent messengers again to Hezekiah, saying,

Thus you shall speak to Hezekiah, king of Judah. 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. Behold, you have heard what the kings of Assyria have done to all the lands, devoting them to destruction,

and shall you be delivered? Have the gods of the nations delivered them, the nations my fathers destroyed, Gozen, Haran, Rezeph, and the people of Eden who were in Telassar? Where is the king of Hamath, the king of Arpad, the king of the city of Sepharvim, the king of Hina, or

the king of Eva? Hezekiah received the letter from the hand of the messengers, and he read it. And Hezekiah went up to the house of the Lord and spread it before the Lord. And Hezekiah

prayed before the Lord and said, O Lord, the God of Israel, enthroned above the cherubim, you are the God, you alone, of all the kingdoms of the earth, you have made heaven and earth.

Incline your ear, O Lord, and hear. Open your eyes, O Lord, and see and hear the words of Sennacherib, which he has sent to mock the living God. Truly, O 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, but were the work of men's hands, wood and stone. Therefore, they were destroyed. So now, O Lord, our God,

save us, please, from His hand, that all the kingdoms of the earth may know that you, O Lord, are God alone. Will you pray with me again? Father, you are God alone, and this is your word,

and you've given it to us for our good. And so, Lord, remove our distractions this morning. Let us focus our minds and hearts on what you are teaching us, and we will give you all the praise

in Jesus' name. Amen. Can you feel it? Can you sense the palpable fear? What it must have been like to be boxed up like a bird in a cage, right, in this city of Jerusalem with a mighty war machine of an army

surrounding you, wanting to destroy you? Think about the grave anxiety in the heart of this King Hezekiah. There he is, sprawled out on the temple floor. I don't know if you've ever experienced intense

fear or even panic at some moment in your life. Maybe you were driving on the road somewhere, and you had a really close call. Or maybe some of us here this morning have served in the armed services and have been in a combat situation. Or maybe it's just waiting on a loved one who's still back in

surgery. I can remember a time, I think the moment I ever experienced the most fear. I was awoken in the middle of the night, and I was absolutely convinced that there was an intruder in our house.

Well, Hezekiah might be a king, but this city is surrounded by this war machine, the likes of which scholars say the world had not yet seen. There are 185,000 Assyrian troops encamped around this city,

and that's not even the complete force because, as we read, Sennacherib himself is not here. He's back in these other cities of Judah, waging war, taking Lachish, and then on to Libna, and they are getting closer and closer, they're closing in. As one scholar puts it, Hezekiah knows that the noose

on his city is tightening. And that's why as our Rabshakeh finishes his taunting threat, casting fear into the hearts of everyone within earshot up on those walls,

what Hezekiah does is he now joins his top officials with the appropriate garb of the moment, the clothes of mourning, sackcloth. What's our king going to do? Where's he going to go?

He goes right into the house of the Lord. That's interesting. He goes to church, but not before he grabs two of his top officials and flanks them with a delegation of what we're told are his senior priests, and he sends them off to the prophet Isaiah, as in the book of Isaiah.

Yeah. And what is the king's message to Isaiah? Verse 3, he says, this is a terrible day, a day of distress, of rebuke, of disgrace. Children have come to the point of birth,

and there's no strength left to bring them forth. In other words, what this envoy is communicating to the prophet is, the king is desperate. We are desperate. And if the Lord has indeed allowed this

to happen, to chastise his people, believe us when we say it has totally worked, because we know that we have no way out. But, verse 4, listen to their plea here. It may be that the Lord your God

heard all the words of this Rabshakeh, who's been out there mocking the Lord our God. Hezekiah's plea is basically this, if God won't do it for our sake, maybe he'll do it for his own.

Did the Lord our God hear what this Assyrian has been out there saying? We heard it a week ago in our last chapter, but you know, honestly, kings gives us a tamer version. I was looking over at 2 Chronicles, and over there, the words from this Rabshakeh, if you can believe it, they're even worse.

Here's what he says, speaking for his master Sennacherib. Look at it on the screen. 2 Chronicles 32, 15. Now, therefore, do not let Hezekiah deceive you or mislead you in this fashion, and do not believe him,

for no God, get this, no God of any nation or kingdom has ever been able to deliver his people from out of my hand or from the hand of my fathers. How much less will your God deliver you out of my hand? He goes on. Very next verse, verse 16.

And his Sennacherib servant said still more against the Lord God and against his servant Hezekiah, and he wrote letters to cast contempt on the Lord, the God of Israel, and to speak against him, saying, like the gods of the nations of the lands who have not delivered their people from my hands,

so the God of Hezekiah will not deliver his people from my hand. them are some strong words, right? And Hezekiah is now asking Isaiah, did the Lord hear them?

But it's not like, is God somehow unaware? Is he disinterested? Is he away? No. He knows God hears everything. What he means is, did he hear them in the sense of, is he going to do anything about

them? Hezekiah finishes his plea by simply asking the prophet to pray for us. Please, he says, lift up your prayer, Isaiah, for the remnant that is left. What is this? Desperation time? Yeah. But you know,

it's also wisdom. What you might call theologically informed wisdom that we're hearing from our king, because Hezekiah knows that Israel's God really is the only true God. And as much as he's been

scandalized by listening to all the taunts of these arrogant Assyrians, he's hoping that Yahweh is even more so. Because our enemies are basically speaking blasphemy, and you're hearing it, right, Lord? You're

going to stand for blasphemy as this rabshakeh stands out there and taunts and tells us, we win, we win every time, we take whatever we want. Every people, every nation, no matter what God they think

they have, we take them. Yahweh, are you really okay with them saying that you are like all the other false gods, and it's not going to be any different? Well, this is the message that Isaiah receives, and

I want you to check out his response in verse 6. He says, tell your master, tell Hezekiah, thus says the Lord, do not be afraid of these words that you've heard from the Assyrians who've reviled

me. Behold, verse 7, I will put a spirit in him so that he shall hear a rumor or report and return to his own land, and I will make him fall by the sword in his own land. That's a prophecy.

First thing he says is, do not be afraid. Hezekiah is in a panic from a human standpoint, and we would say rightly so, but the Lord says to his people, do not be afraid. Do not be afraid. How incredibly encouraging is it to hear that? If you're someone who is with the Lord, if you're a believer,

to know that you do not have to be afraid no matter what comes at you. Do not be afraid. Isaiah then goes on to predict that Sennacherib's going to hear this rumor, or a better translation would be a report, because it's going to be a true report. We hear rumor, we think it's false. He's

going to hear a report, and it's going to lead to him returning to his own land where he will meet a violent death. Now, does Hezekiah get all the specifics? Specifics about his deliverance? No, he

doesn't. Does Hezekiah get so much as a timetable for when it's all going to happen? No. And that may be something to note, because as we go on to read in verse 8 of these other events of how the

Rabshakeh travels back to his master Sennacherib, who's no longer at Lachish, because that city's fallen. He's now over at neighboring Libna. I think I've got a map somewhere. He's at this next Judaite city that's going to fall. And even though the king does hear a report, it's the stuff about

the Egyptian king, the king of Cush that's mentioned here, Tirhakah, who has come, who has set out to come fight Sennacherib. Although our text doesn't tell us, history tells us that this amounts to nothing.

That this king Tirhakah comes to nothing. The Assyrians quickly dispatch him. And so what it means is that this Egyptian incursion amounts to nothing more than just a little distraction, just something to flick

away for the mighty Assyrian army. So think about it. What this means is that as Hezekiah gets news about what's happened, about how Sennacherib has heard a report about someone else coming against him,

and it's supposed to make him withdraw and go home, right? Only Hezekiah now hears that it's amounted to nothing. That the king that came against him was taken care of quickly. The king of Assyria has not

returned home. End of verse 9. In fact, we read now in verse 9 that he's actually sent back more messengers to Jerusalem, more messengers to come to Hezekiah. And this time they come with a message

that's not just verbal. They come with a written message. They come with a letter. And what's this letter say? It's basically the same thing. It's more taunts, but there is a difference now.

Only this time, rather than speaking to the people as the Rabshakeh had, you shouldn't trust Hezekiah. Now in the letter, Sennacherib directs his words to Hezekiah. And he says, Hezekiah,

you shouldn't trust your God. He is deceiving you. He is going to be as impotent as all the rest. Verse 10. Do not let your God in whom you trust deceive you, Hezekiah, by promising that Jerusalem's

not going to fall to me. Verse 11. Behold, you've heard what we, the kings of Assyria, have done to all the lands. You really think you're going to be delivered? I mean, verse 12. Have the gods of any

other nations delivered them? Again, 2 Chronicles 32 adds that they, quote, spoke of the God of Jerusalem as they spoke of the gods of every other people.

And what about Hezekiah's hope for deliverance now? Are those hopes being dashed? No deliverance? Realizing that Sennacherib's only been momentarily distracted by the Egyptians? Have your hopes been

false? Has the prophet's prophecy been false? Well, praise God and give Hezekiah some credit because look what he does. He does not despair.

He does not get angry. He does not put the prophet in chains as predecessors of his would have done. Instead, he goes back to church. He goes back to the house of the Lord. And this time, he walks

into those courts. He's got the letter with him. And he kneels down and he spreads out that letter in front of him. And now what our king does is he prays. He himself prays. He doesn't go get Isaiah the

prophet to pray for him and say, pray harder, please. He's not using some other proxy, a delegation of priests. Would you do a lot of praying? Maybe he is asking them. But right now, his attention is on his prayer, a very powerful prayer that he prays in verse 15. He says,

O Lord, God of Israel, enthroned above the cherubim, you are the God. And you alone, of all the kingdoms of the earth, you made all the heavens and the earth. Understand that these are theological statements

that he is making. Imagine this, a king in Judah making theological statements, accurate theological statements about God as sovereign, about God being the creator of everything and the ruler of everything.

I wonder, can you pray like this when you're in the next crisis? Can I? Can we cling to God's sovereignty in whatever scary situation it is that's threatening to make a mess of our life?

Are you able to trust in the one who created everything, including our own bodies when there's a health scare? Well, Hezekiah goes on to his specific request in verse 16. He comes to it. And listen, I want you to

listen to what He appeals to. It's not to Himself or even to the desperate need of His people. Fundamentally, what He appeals to is God's glory. Verse 16,

Incline your ear, O Lord, and hear. Open your eyes, O Lord, and see and hear the words of Sennacherib, which He has sent to mock you, the living God.

It's like, God, I know you've heard these people. I know you've heard the words of Sennacherib challenging you and mocking you. Please listen carefully to what He said about you.

Understand that when Hezekiah asks God to incline his ear, what he's basically saying is, are you, Lord God, going to stand for this? They're bragging about how they laid waste every other nation and cast every other God into the fire. But we know what they were. They were just

lifeless idols, just hunks of wood and stone. And so, yeah, they destroyed them with ease. But now they're talking about you like that, O Lord God.

Verse 19, Please save us from His hand so that every kingdom, so that every kingdom on earth will know that you alone, O Lord, are God.

And what happens now? Well, let's keep reading. Verse 20. Take a look. Verse 20. Then Isaiah, the son of Amoz, sent to Hezekiah, saying, Thus says the Lord, the God of Israel, Your prayer to me about Sennacherib, king of Assyria, I have heard.

This is the word that the Lord has spoken concerning him. She despises you. She scorns you, the virgin daughter of Zion. She wags her head behind you, the daughter of Jerusalem.

Whom have you mocked and reviled? Against whom have you raised your voice and lifted your eyes to the heights? Against the Holy One of Israel.

By your messengers you have mocked the Lord, and you've said, With many chariots I've gone up to the heights of the mountains, to the far recesses of Lebanon.

I felled its tallest cedars, its choicest cypresses. I entered its furthest lodging place, its most fruitful forest. I dug wells and drank foreign waters.

And I dried up with the sole of my foot all the streams of Egypt. The Lord says, verse 25, Have you not heard that I determined it long ago?

I planned from days of old what now 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 the plants of the field, and like the tender grass, like grass on the housetops, blighted before it is grown.

But I, the Lord, know you're sitting down, and you're going out, and you're coming in, and you're raging against me. Because you've raged against me, and your complacency has come to my ears, 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. And this should be the sign for you, talking now to Hezekiah, this year, eat what grows of itself, and in the second year what springs of the same.

Then in the third year sow and reap and plant vineyards and eat their fruit, and the surviving remnant of the house of Judah shall again take root downward and bear fruit upward.

For out of Jerusalem shall go a remnant, and on Mount Zion a band of survivors. The zeal of the Lord will do this. Therefore, thus says the Lord concerning the king of Assyria, He shall not come into this city, or shoot an arrow here, or come before it with a shield,

or cast up so much as a siege mount against it. By the way he came, by the same he shall return. And he shall not come into this city, declares the Lord, for I will defend this city to save it for my own sake, and for the sake of my servant David.

And that night, that night the angel of the Lord went out and struck down 185,000 in the camp of the Assyrians. And when people arose in the morning, behold, these were all dead bodies.

Then Sennacherib, king of Assyria, departed and went home, and lived at Nineveh. And as he was worshiping in the house of Nishrak, his god, Adrammelech, and Shar-Ezer, his sons, struck him down with the sword, and escaped into the land of Ararat,

and Esarhaddon, his son, reigned in his place. How long did Hezekiah stay in the temple pray?

Was it like a half hour? For some of us, that's a long time. An hour? Two hours? All day? We don't know, but what we do know is that, presumably, while he's still in there, he gets this message back from Isaiah.

It's a thus says the Lord message, which is certainly one you're going to want to pay attention to. And beginning in verse 1, let me try to explain what this message is, because there are different parts to it.

The first part is about Jerusalem. She, Jerusalem, despises you, Assyria. She scorns you. She, the virgin daughter of Zion. In other words, Isaiah's prophecy is saying, this city will remain an untouched virgin.

She will not be ravaged by your foreign army, and world-class war machine. In fact, she's going to wag her head behind you, mockingly. Verse 22 begins to directly address Sennacherib himself.

The Lord says, who do you think you've mocked and reviled? Against whom have you dared to raise your voice and lift up your eyes? I'll tell you who.

The mighty one of Israel. The holy one of Israel. That's who. And then in verse 23, in verse 24, we get to hear the Lord himself. Get this. The Lord himself starts mocking the king of Assyria.

He's mocking him in his own voice. About all of his exaggerated boasts, because that's what the Assyrians like to do. They like to exaggerate.

I've heard lots of your bragging about your many chariots. The Lord says, I've heard a lot of your big talk about how you've climbed the highest mountain, and you felled the tallest cedars of Lebanon.

Yeah, you've conquered a lot of people and dug a lot of wells. Even put your foot down on Egypt. Good for you. But let me ask you something, you arrogant, foolish king.

Who do you think determined this long ago? Who do you think really is sovereign and planned from days of old, what's now coming to pass? I did, the Lord says.

I, the Lord of heaven. And I know, verse 27, look at this. I know you're sitting down and you're going out and coming in. This is basically God's way of saying, I see you when you're sleeping.

I know when you're awake. I know when you're relieving yourself, going to the bathroom. And I know you've been raging against me. Verse 28, because you have raged against me and your complacency has come before my ears,

guess what? I got a hook for your nose. I got a bit for your mouth, you dumb animal. And like an animal, I'm going to turn you back on the way by which you came.

I'm going to see that you are led home in humiliation, just like you Assyrians like to do to your own prisoners of war.

And then in verse 29, this is interesting, new paragraph probably in your Bible, the prophecy turns back to Judah and Hezekiah again. And we're told that the Lord is giving them a sign.

And although the Lord calls it a sign, honestly, Hezekiah and his people might see it more like a test. Let me explain what we mean. For right now, given that the Assyrians have invaded the land and presumably ruined their harvest or taken it, for this season, the Lord says,

you just eat what grows of itself. Do that for the remainder of this year. But that's some interesting verbiage, the language that we read here of eating what grows of itself.

This is very unique in Scripture. It doesn't appear, well, it only appears in one other place. And this language, eat what grows of itself, is a direct echo of the same identical language that we find back in Leviticus chapter 25.

Leviticus 25 · chapter mention

You say, well, Leviticus has got a lot of stuff in it. What was that about? It's about Sabbath loss. Basically, the people of Israel were commanded to treat every seventh year as a Sabbath year, requiring them to rest from the usual cycle of planting and harvesting,

allowing their land to literally lie fallow, to rest for a season. And then, in that seventh year, the Lord promised there would be enough of what grows of itself.

Same words. That they could go out and glean and eat, and crops would spring up naturally from the seed that was scattered. So understand that when the Lord instructs Hezekiah and the people, like he does in verse 29, it really is kind of a test.

He is saying, I want you to do the very same thing next year, what you're doing now. You could go out and plant right away in the spring. Common sense would say to do that in the second year.

But I'm telling you, in the second year, you will eat only what springs of the same.

So we presume that what this year is, is it's the sixth year. And what the Lord is telling them is they need to observe His law like normal for all of next year.

In spite of the challenging situation, in spite of this great trial, He is basically saying, be faithful to me. Because that's how God's people show their faithfulness.

They obey His law. Yeah, I know you're in crisis right now due to this invasion, one that I'm about to rescue you from. But that doesn't mean that you get to opt out of the commands in my word.

The calendar says next year is not a year that you're allowed to go out and sow and cultivate your fields. You're going to stick to that. You're going to allow the land to rest.

And you're going to watch me provide. You're going to do that. And then you can resume normal agricultural activities in the third year. In the third year, go ahead, sow, replant vineyards and eat their fruit.

Do this, the Lord says. Trust me in this and follow my word. Verse 30, and the surviving remnant of the house of Judah shall again take root downward and bear fruit upward.

Because the upward fruit you will bear will be more than just your crops of grain and wine and whatnot. The upward fruit you bear will be the upward fruit of your righteousness.

The upward fruit of you showing me your trust even after the crisis has passed. You'll do that through the downward root of obeying my word even when times are uncertain.

You will watch as I show you my magnificent deliverance and you will continue to trust me. Because the final word about the king of Assyria, verse 32, that king that's out there harassing you, the Lord says he shall not come into this city.

There's not going to be so much as an arrow shot or a shield raised. You will not see any siege works built. No, by the way that he came he shall return.

He is not coming into this city declares the Lord because I personally am going to defend this city to save it for my own sake. And for the sake of my servant David.

Now David's long since dead and buried about 300 and some years prior. So who's his servant David that he's talking about? He's talking about his promise that he made to David.

A promise to preserve a line from David. A line that would lead to an ultimate and better David. A perfect David. And that would be his own son.

The Lord Jesus Christ himself. God's saying I'm going to do this to preserve my glory, my name and the work of the gospel. So that my son can be sent and come and do what he's going to do to save people.

And then we get to verse 35 and it almost reads like a postscript. It's like so anticlimactic. So matter of fact. We're told that that very night the very same night that the threatening letter got delivered.

The very same night of Hezekiah's desperate prayer and plea. The same night of Isaiah's prophecy. The second one. We're told that that night an angel of the Lord just one went out and struck down 185,000 in the camp of the Assyrians.

Can you imagine everybody waking up the next morning and by everybody waking up we mean people inside the city, right? And they look out and they're like that's funny there's no one moving in the camp of the Assyrians.

What is everybody sleeping in? It's just so deadly silent. But what they quickly learn is that everybody every fighting man every officer to the tune of 185,000 anyway they are not just sleeping in and they're not just dead asleep they're dead dead.

all slain by the angel of the Lord in an event that looks an awful lot like God's deliverance from an oppressor about 750 years earlier in the book of Exodus the angel of death first Passover anybody?

But it gets worse for Sennacherib himself doesn't it? Because once the rumor slash report gets to him of what's happened he tucks tail and runs in defeat and humiliation he heads home and though it's some 20 years after the fact 20 years later

history tells us it happens God's word always happens it never fails just as the prophet predicted back up in verse 7 Sennacherib himself is going to fall by the sword in his own land so there he is one day verse 37

in the supposed safety of the temple of his own God worshiping Nishrak whose name again appears to be a deliberate mashup and misspelling and there two of his own sons find him and they strike him down and kill him leaving a third

youngest son to take the throne in his place who's mocking now Mr. Sennacherib I think it's pretty safe to say we have a very dramatic story and the apostle Paul reminds us that everything written back here in our

old testament is written for us the new testament believers it's written for our benefit to teach us and so if we were to summarize what we're seeing here in terms of the action that gets taken or that's called for either by the king Hezekiah himself

or by the people I think we could sum things up like this seek the Lord seek the Lord 2nd Kings 19 is showing you that God's people should seek the Lord we should seek him in our

times of trouble we should seek him when there's recovery and stability seek the Lord and I think we could go so far as to say that this chapter is actually showing us four ways that we're to do that so let me offer you four ways that we should seek the Lord

the first way maybe is pretty obvious it's this number one pursue prayer pursue prayer what is the first thing that Hezekiah does in this chapter other than tearing his clothes and putting on sackcloth

he goes to the temple to seek the Lord and even as he does this he sends a delegation to Isaiah the prophet to basically say please pray for us please pray for us lift up your prayer for us and yet as the story goes on

it's very clear to us that the pursuit of prayer doesn't stop with Hezekiah simply asking other people other holy people to pray for him and it doesn't stop with people like you and me simply asking others to pray for us either because Hezekiah doesn't just ask for prayer

we know that once that letter shows up that becomes the object that he lays out in the temple as he lays out his own prayer a very simple but often neglected way of seeking the Lord in your life is by prayer yes this includes asking

other people to pray with you and join you in praying for a need but make sure they're joining you and that you yourself are actually praying let me ask you are you fervently and consistently laying out your needs before the Lord

or you just find it easier to ask everybody else to pray for you remember Hezekiah's example here and seek the Lord by pursuing prayer and then we look at the content of what he actually prays and here's where we find a second way to seek him number two

dwell on God's character character and attributes dwell on God's character and his attributes focus your mind concentrate settle your mind on God's character and his attributes

because this is exactly what Hezekiah does he reminds himself that the God he's praying to is enthroned above the cherubim and that he's the God of all the kingdoms of the earth that's sovereignty he's talking about a God who is in charge a God who is

supreme a God who is in complete command of this universe after all he says you made it you made heaven and earth Hezekiah says you know sometimes it's important for you and I to slow down in our minds maybe slow down in our conversations

with others as we're worried about all of our problems and challenges and simply speak words like these God is sovereign God I know that you are all powerful God I know that you are all knowing I know that you're everywhere present

you don't need my updates God you are eternal and I know that you are completely unbound by all of the human limitations I experience we dwell on his attributes because he is all that we are not and he has

all that we lack and then there's his character too sometimes his character referred to as his moral attributes what's he like we're to dwell on that too because he's more than just an all powerful sovereign God he's also holy

and good and righteous and truth and he is loving and caring and he loves to show grace to his people and he is perfectly faithful and he is full of compassion and mercy these are all the things that scripture tells us

about God's character and it also tells us that he's just and this is part of what Hezekiah is appealing to justice is a part of His character too that He is a just and sovereign judge and He holds true to His promises and brings

His plans to fulfillment He does this for the righteous and He does it for the wicked and for the wicked it's not good for the person persistently rebellious in their sins it's going to mean judgment for an evil

boastful egomaniac king like Sennacherib was it's going to mean a bad ending both in this world and in eternity how many times in our thinking how many times in your praying in my praying do we spend so much time

telling the Lord all the details of what we think He needs to know usually with a suggested course of action telling Him all the details that we think He needs to understand about our circumstances I remember doing this at a time in my life our youngest son

was undergoing open heart surgery as a six month old and I remember getting you know all the medical information that I don't understand and I'm trying to relay it on the phone to family members and I remember praying oh Lord please guide the surgeon's hands I mean that's fine I still pray that for people

oh Lord his heart rate's too fast the doctors say it's got to slow down oh Lord his body temperature's too high Lord please fix this please fix that as if as if he doesn't know as if he didn't create that little body

listen it's not wrong to lay out our letters before the Lord but let's not act like Hezekiah had to spread out the letter for God to read it so Hezekiah simply prays his emphasis is Lord incline your ear and hear

hear what this dude saying Lord open your eyes and see how he mocks you and then he leaves it to a God whose character and attributes he knows he can fully trust that's the second way we seek the Lord is by dwelling on his character and his attributes

here's a third way number three look to his glory look to his glory how does Hezekiah close his prayer what is his final appeal if he's a salesman what's his closing pitch right

save us Lord yes but do it so that all the kingdoms of the earth may know that you oh Lord are God alone king of Assyria is running around saying you're like all the rest he's lumped you in into the same category

of all those lumpy carved idols wood and stone he said that you are as impotent as they are so Lord act for your glory and the exoneration of your name Hezekiah appealed to and looked to and kept his focus

on the glory of God in his case on God's name being exonerated now you and I may not have a similar situation I don't know that you're going to be literally surrounded by enemies that want to kill you but you can still look to his glory in whatever situation you're facing

in whatever need that you have praying not just for your own personal relief but for his glory is a way to get him to attune his ear to your prayer pray in a way that is attuned to God's glory Lord

I don't understand this trial I am confused and frightened by this scary thing happening I'm perplexed at the prospect of losing my job hearing a diagnosis but Lord let your name be glorified in it a third way we seek the Lord is by looking to his glory

and finally a fourth way that we pray number four trust in and obey his word trust in and obey his word look again at verses 29 and 30 honestly

as I was studying this passage this week I thought they were a little strange I just didn't quite know why this detail how do they fit if I didn't know any better I would almost say like if I was just doing my devotional reading I'd say that seems random why can't people who've been

cooped up in a city go out and immediately plant why can't they now that the Assyrian threat's gone just resume life and and get to work and honor the Lord by working for their own bread start farming right away I mean they just survived a crisis but the reason they

could not the reason that they were told to eat what grows of itself for not just the remainder of the year that they're in but for the entire next year is because of the law of the Lord Leviticus 25 that key phrase repeated several times

back in that chapter which is again reiterated and repeated a couple of times here eat what grows of itself those words clue us in on what year it is it's the sixth year meaning that the next year would be the

Sabbath year and the Lord's word to his people was still in force yes they've been invaded but the Lord was telling them I'll rescue you I will not only rescue you I'll also provide for you I'll make sure you don't starve

but you're going to have to trust me and obey my word and if you do this if you work out and prove your belief in me by showing me your trust by being willing to wait to plant until after next year Sabbath year verse 30

you will take downward root and bear upward fruit and what's that mean for you and me it means that we too are to trust in and obey God's word and as we do that we take

downward root and as we take downward root in our obedience we too will bear upward fruit in our lives so that means that if you're married you root down in your marriage in the principles of God's word it means if you're

a parent if you have a family you root down the way you do family the way you parent in the principles of God's word and you live in ways that are consistent with the Bible's teaching if you do that God's word is telling you that you will bear fruit in all of those relational areas

of your life you'll bear fruit or we root down in faithfulness with our finances and we honor the Lord with our first fruits and he says there will be upward fruit there too there's a chapter in the New Testament a couple of chapters that talk about that in 2nd Corinthians 8 and 9

whether it's your job needs or some difficult workplace dynamics or your studies and how you pursue those doing things in a way that honors and pleases the Lord in ways that root us downward in the principles of his word

will always produce upward fruit in our lives and God will be pleased to see it amen let's pray heavenly father I'm sure

there's someone here with a situation where they are challenged they are scared I'm sure there's someone here or someone listening who's facing a scary trial a challenge and the enemy wants to threaten and taunt and mock and destabilize their confidence

in you and try to tell them that it won't work out if they don't compromise open the gates of their life to compromise and so Lord this passage that you've preserved for us let it soak into our hearts let us Lord be rallied in our confidence in you

and Lord help us as a people to take downward root in your word trusting that as we do the fruit that you want will bear out and we will bear up we'll bear up under that trial we will bear up in that suffering as we look to your

glory as we ask you to make your name great because the way you make your name great always means good things for your people ultimately and so Lord we can pray we can pursue prayer with that kind of confidence so Lord make your people like

yourself make us a holy people make us a dependent people and Lord let us make your glory known we pray this in the name of the one who makes our salvation possible the name of that promise Davidic heir in Jesus name Amen

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go go