Dusk from the lower slope of the Mount of Olives across the Kidron valley: Jerusalem’s east wall and the temple height dark and still, one lamp in a high window, a few campfires far off on the south-western hills.

Hezekiah’s crisis

Isaiah 37

What do you do with the letter, the message or the news that frightens you?

38 verses≈ 8 min1 personBSB

Images are artistic interpretations.

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In this chapter

Where we are

1–5Zion on trialJudah’s sin, the mountain raised, the vineyard’s song
6Holy, holy, holyIsaiah’s call, in the year King Uzziah died (about 740 BC)
7–12ImmanuelAhaz’s fear, the sign, the Child, the shoot of Jesse
13–23The nations judgedBabylon to Tyre: the LORD is Judge of all the earth
24–27The whole earthThe earth laid waste, and death swallowed up
28–35Woe and a KingEgypt’s help or the LORD’s, and the King in His beauty
36–39Hezekiah’s crisisSennacherib, 701 BC: the prayer, the sickness, the envoysChapter 37
40–48Comfort My peopleTo the exiles ahead: Cyrus, the idols, the Servant
49–55The Servant and ZionPierced for our transgressions; Zion restored
56–66New heavens and earthA house of prayer, the Anointed One, all things new

Isaiah’s Message of Deliverance

On hearing this report, King Hezekiah tore his clothes, put on sackcloth, and entered the house of the LORD.

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Hezekiah

And he sent Eliakim the palace administrator, Shebna the scribe, and the leading priests, all wearing sackcloth, to the prophet Isaiah son of Amoz to tell him, “This is what Hezekiah says: Today is a day of distress, rebuke, and disgrace; for children have come to the point of birth, but there is no strength to deliver them.

Hezekiah

Perhaps the LORD your God will hear the words of the Rabshakeh, whom his master the king of Assyria has sent to defy the living God, and He will rebuke him for the words that the LORD your God has heard. Therefore lift up a prayer for the remnant that still survives.”

Isaiah

So the servants of King Hezekiah went to Isaiah, who replied, “Tell your master that this is what the LORD says: ‘Do not be afraid of the words you have heard, with which the servants of the king of Assyria have blasphemed Me. Behold, I will put a spirit in him so that he will hear a rumor and return to his own land, where I will cause him to fall by the sword.’”

Sennacherib’s Blasphemous Letter

When the Rabshakeh heard that the king of Assyria had left Lachish, he withdrew and found the king fighting against Libnah.

Now Sennacherib had been warned about Tirhakah king of Cush: “He has set out to fight against you.”

Sennacherib

Sennacherib

On hearing this, Sennacherib sent messengers to Hezekiah, saying,

“Give this message to Hezekiah king of Judah: ‘Do not let your God, in whom you trust, deceive you by saying that Jerusalem will not be delivered into the hand of the king of Assyria.

Surely you have heard what the kings of Assyria have done to all the other countries, devoting them to destruction. Will you then be spared? Did the gods of the nations destroyed by my fathers rescue those nations—the gods of Gozan, Haran, and Rezeph, and of the people of Eden in Telassar? Where are the kings of Hamath, Arpad, Sepharvaim, Hena, and Ivvah?’”

Question

Quick question

Sennacherib’s second message came in writing, and it aimed higher than the first.

Who did Sennacherib’s letter say would deceive Hezekiah?

Hezekiah’s Prayer

So Hezekiah received the letter from the messengers, read it, and went up to the house of the LORD and spread it out before the LORD.

And Hezekiah prayed to the LORD:

Hezekiah

“O LORD of Hosts, God of Israel, enthroned above the cherubim, You alone are God over all the kingdoms of the earth. You made the heavens and the earth.

Isaiah 37:16

Hezekiah

Incline Your ear, O LORD, and hear; open Your eyes, O LORD, and see. Listen to all the words that Sennacherib has sent to defy the living God.

Hezekiah

Dusk across a wide plain: a conquered town on its mound with broken walls and a burned gate, and before it a great bonfire heaped with broken wooden figures and toppled stone statues, a few Assyrian soldiers standing far off beside it.

Truly, O LORD, the kings of Assyria have laid waste all these countries and their lands. They have cast their gods into the fire and destroyed them, for they were not gods, but only wood and stone—the work of human hands.

Hezekiah

And now, O LORD our God, save us from his hand, so that all the kingdoms of the earth may know that You alone, O LORD, are God.”

Pray

O LORD of Hosts, You alone are God over all the kingdoms of the earth. I spread out before You what frightens me. Incline Your ear and see, and save, so that all may know You alone are God.

Sennacherib’s Fall Prophesied

God

God

Then Isaiah son of Amoz sent a message to Hezekiah: “This is what the LORD, the God of Israel, says: Because you have prayed to Me concerning Sennacherib king of Assyria, this is the word that the LORD has spoken against him:

‘The Virgin Daughter of Zion

despises you and mocks you;

the Daughter of Jerusalem

shakes her head behind you.

God

Whom have you taunted and blasphemed?

Against whom have you raised your voice

and lifted your eyes in pride?

Against the Holy One of Israel!

God

Midday on a town mound in Syria: the fallen wall lies in a long heap of rubble and tumbled stones, the gateway gone, grass and thistles growing through, an empty road past it.

Have you not heard?

Long ago I ordained it;

in days of old I planned it.

Now I have brought it to pass,

that you should crush fortified cities

into piles of rubble.

God

Close and low across the flat mud-plastered roof of a Judean house in hot morning light: a thin crop of grass sprouted in the packed earth, already scorched yellow-brown and bent by the wind, a stone roof roller on its side, flat roofs and a hazy hill beyond.

Therefore their inhabitants, devoid of power,

are dismayed and ashamed.

They are like plants in the field,

tender green shoots,

grass on the rooftops,

scorched before it is grown.

God

God

But I know your sitting down,

your going out and coming in,

and your raging against Me.

Because your rage and arrogance against Me

have reached My ears,

I will put My hook in your nose

and My bit in your mouth;

I will send you back

the way you came.’

God

Late spring on terraced fields below a Judean hill village: thin uneven barley sprung up on its own among old stubble and weeds, unpruned vines straggling over the terrace walls, a farmer and his young son gathering the self-sown heads by hand into a basket.

And this will be a sign to you, O Hezekiah:

This year you will eat

what grows on its own,

and in the second year

what springs from the same.

But in the third year you will sow and reap;

you will plant vineyards and eat their fruit.

God

And the surviving remnant of the house of Judah

will again take root below

and bear fruit above.

God

Early morning at Jerusalem's thick plain stone wall and gate on the ridge, whole and quiet: no ramp, no arrows, no army, two watchmen on the wall looking out, the road below empty and mist lifting from the valley.

So this is what the LORD says about the king of Assyria:

‘He will not enter this city

or shoot an arrow into it.

He will not come before it with a shield

or build up a siege ramp against it.

He will go back the way he came,

and he will not enter this city,’

declares the LORD.

‘I will defend this city

and save it

for My own sake

and for the sake of My servant David.’”

Jerusalem Delivered from the Assyrians

Gray first light over a vast Assyrian camp on a wide plain: rows of low tents with still flaps, spears stacked in bundles, wicker shields leaning on tent poles, cooking fires gone cold, a thin mist between the rows, horses tethered at the far edge, no one in sight.

Then the angel of the LORD went out and struck down 185,000 men in the camp of the Assyrians. When the people got up the next morning, there were all the dead bodies!

Late afternoon from a high hill in Judah: far below, a long Assyrian column with glinting helmets and tall shields winds away north along a dusty road through the hills, golden dust in the low sun, a pale empty sky above.

So Sennacherib king of Assyria broke camp and withdrew. He returned to Nineveh and stayed there.

0:05

Narrated by Bob Souer · BSB audio, public domain

One day, while he was worshiping in the temple of his god Nisroch, his sons Adrammelech and Sharezer put him to the sword and escaped to the land of Ararat. And his son Esar-haddon reigned in his place.

Two messages, one answer

Whiteboard

Assyria sent words twice. Hezekiah answered once, in prayer, and God answered in one night.

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Isaiah 37

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A verse to carry with you

O LORD of Hosts, God of Israel, enthroned above the cherubim, You alone are God over all the kingdoms of the earth. You made the heavens and the earth.

Isaiah 37:16

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