Late afternoon in a palace court in Jerusalem: an outdoor stone stairway of wide plain steps climbs beside a wall, the wall’s shadow lying down across the lower steps; nobody there.

Hezekiah’s crisis

Isaiah 38

What would you pray if you were told you had only days left?

22 verses≈ 4 minBSB

Images are artistic interpretations.

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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 38
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

Hezekiah’s Illness and Recovery

Isaiah

In those days Hezekiah became mortally ill. The prophet Isaiah son of Amoz came to him and said, “This is what the LORD says: ‘Put your house in order, for you are about to die; you will not recover.’”

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Hezekiah

Then Hezekiah turned his face to the wall and prayed to the LORD, saying, “Please, O LORD, remember how I have walked before You faithfully and with wholehearted devotion; I have done what is good in Your sight.” And Hezekiah wept bitterly.

0:16

Narrated by Bob Souer · BSB audio, public domain

God

And the word of the LORD came to Isaiah, saying, “Go and tell Hezekiah that this is what the LORD, the God of your father David, says: ‘I have heard your prayer; I have seen your tears.

God

Behold, I will add fifteen years to your life. And I will deliver you and this city from the hand of the king of Assyria. I will defend this city.

God

This will be a sign to you from the LORD that He will do what He has promised: I will make the sun’s shadow that falls on the stairway of Ahaz go back ten steps.’” So the sunlight went back the ten steps it had descended.

Question

Quick question

Isaiah came back to the dying king with a different word from the LORD.

How many years did the LORD add to Hezekiah’s life?

Hezekiah’s Song of Thanksgiving

Hezekiah

This is a writing by Hezekiah king of Judah after his illness and recovery:

Hezekiah

I said, “In the prime of my life

I must go through the gates of Sheol

and be deprived of the remainder of my years.”

Hezekiah

I said, “I will never again see the LORD,

even the LORD, in the land of the living;

I will no longer look on mankind

with those who dwell in this world.

Hezekiah

Dusk on a high stone ledge of the palace: two gray rock doves hunch together while a swallow darts past against a pale, empty sky.

I chirp like a swallow or crane;

I moan like a dove.

My eyes grow weak as I look upward.

O Lord, I am oppressed; be my security.”

Hezekiah

What can I say?

He has spoken to me, and He Himself has done this.

I will walk slowly all my years

because of the anguish of my soul.

Hezekiah

O Lord, by such things men live,

and in all of them my spirit finds life.

You have restored me to health

and have let me live.

Hezekiah

Surely for my own welfare

I had such great anguish;

but Your love has delivered me from the pit of oblivion,

for You have cast all my sins behind Your back.

Isaiah 38:17

Hezekiah

For Sheol cannot thank You;

Death cannot praise You.

Those who descend to the Pit

cannot hope for Your faithfulness.

Hezekiah

Hezekiah

The living, only the living, can thank You,

as I do today;

fathers will tell their children

about Your faithfulness.

Hezekiah

Morning in the temple court: Levites in white linen stand in a row playing wooden lyres and harps, the altar’s smoke rising straight, the plain temple behind.

The LORD will save me;

we will play songs on stringed instruments

all the days of our lives

in the house of the LORD.

0:07

Narrated by Bob Souer · BSB audio, public domain

Pray

Lord, You have cast all my sins behind Your back, and Your love has brought me up from the pit. While I live, let me thank You, and tell the next generation of Your faithfulness.

Isaiah

Isaiah

Now Isaiah had said, “Prepare a lump of pressed figs and apply it to the boil, and he will recover.”

Hezekiah

And Hezekiah had asked, “What will be the sign that I will go up to the house of the LORD?”

You’ve experienced

Isaiah 38

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A verse to carry with you

Surely for my own welfare I had such great anguish; but Your love has delivered me from the pit of oblivion, for You have cast all my sins behind Your back.

Isaiah 38:17

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