The Rest of the Story

Isaiah chapter 37 verse 9. Surely you have heard what the kings of Assyria have done to all the countries, destroying them completely.

And will you be delivered? Did the god of the nations that were destroyed by my forefathers deliver them? The gods of Gozan, Haran, Rezeph, and the people of Eden who were in Telesar.

Where is the king of Hamath, the king of Arpad? The king of the city of Sepharvaim or of Hina or of Iba.

Hezekiah received the letter from the messengers and read it. Then he went up to the temple of the Lord and spread it out before the Lord.

And Hezekiah prayed to the Lord. O Lord Almighty, God of Israel, enthroned between the cherubim, You alone are God over all the kingdoms of the earth.

You have made heaven and earth. Give ear, O Lord, and hear. Open your eyes, O Lord, and see. Listen to all the words Sennacherib has sent to insult the living God.

It is true, O Lord, that the Assyrian kings have laid waste of all these peoples in their lands. They have thrown their gods into the fire and destroyed them.

For they were not gods, but only wood and stone fashioned by human hands. Now our Lord God, deliver us from His hand, So that all the kingdoms on earth may know that You alone, O Lord, are God.

Then Isaiah, son of Amos, sent a messenger 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 the Lord has spoken against him.

The virgin daughter of Zion despises and mocks you. The daughter of Jerusalem tosses her head as you flee. Who is it you have insulted and blasphemed?

Against whom have you raised your voice and lifted your eyes in pride? Against the Holy One of Israel. By your messengers you have heaped insults on the Lord.

You have said, With my many chariots I have ascended to the heights of the mountains. The utmost heights of Lebanon. I have cut down its tallest cedars, the choicest of its pines.

I have reached its remotest heights, the finest of its forests. I have dug wells in foreign lands and drunk water there.

With the soles of my feet, I have dried up all the streams of Egypt. Have you not heard? Long ago I ordained it.

In the days of old I planned it. Now I have brought it to pass that you have turned fortified cities into piles of stone. Their people, drained of power, are dismayed and put to shame.

They are like plants in the field, like tender green shoots, like grass sprouting on the housetops, scorched before it grows up.

But I know where you stay, King Sennacherib, and when you come and go, and how you rage against me, because you rage against me, and because your insolence has reached my ears, I will put a hook in your nose, and my bit in your mouth, and I will make you return by the way you came.

This will be a sign for you, O Hezekiah. This year you will eat what grows by itself, and the second year what springs from that.

But in the third year sow and reap, plant vineyards and eat their fruit. Once more a remnant of the house of Judah will take root below and bear fruit above.

For out of Jerusalem will come a remnant, and out of Mount Zion a band of survivors. The zeal of the Lord Almighty will accomplish this.

Therefore, this is what the Lord says concerning the king of Assyria. He will not enter this city or shoot an arrow there. He will not come before it with shield or build a siege ramp against it.

By the way that he came, he will return. He will not enter this city, declares the Lord. I will defend this city and save it for my sake and for the sake of David, my servant.

Then the angel of the Lord went out and put to death a hundred and eighty-five thousand men in the Assyrian camp. When the people got up the next morning, there were all the dead bodies.

So Sennacherib, king of Assyria, broke camp and withdrew. He returned to Nineveh and stayed there. One day, while he was worshiping in the temple of his god Nisroch, his sons Adrammelech and Sherezer cut him down with the sword and they escaped to the land of Ararat and Aserhaddon, his son, succeeded him as king.

Some trials are longer than others and the longer they last, the more momentum and power they sometimes gain over us.

And though the trial is not new or different than it was yesterday, each new day of the trial brings us back to this critical question.

Whom will I trust today? Today, who will I trust? It's not enough that I trusted in the Lord yesterday with my problem.

I can't live on yesterday's faith any more than the Israelites could live on yesterday's manna. It had to be gathered every day afresh. And so every day of our problems and trials, we've got to act fresh faith upon the Lord Jesus.

Last week, we saw the trial that came to test the faith of Hezekiah, the king of Judah. The dreaded Assyrians and their new king, Sennacherib, were conquering the world in horrific fashion.

No one could stop them. And Jerusalem is the last of the fortified cities standing in Judah. All the rest have been conquered. And while Sennacherib was busy fighting with his troops in Lachish, he sent his field commander and a large army up to Jerusalem in a show of power to threaten them into surrender.

And his message to Hezekiah and the people of Jerusalem is it's futile to trust your God to save you from me. That's just folly. None of the gods of the nations were able to deliver them from my hand, neither will the Lord your God be able to deliver Jerusalem from my hand.

So the real issue here, the real test of faith, is whose word rules history? The Lord's or Sennacherib's?

Whose plans and purposes will not fail? God's or man's? Can God be trusted in impossible situations in my life like this one?

Well, Isaiah had been preaching to them for some 36 chapters. Yes, yes, yes. For many years he'd been preaching. You can trust in the Lord in all your problems. And he is our king.

It is he who will save us. And whoever trusts in him will never be dismayed, never be put to panic. Well, Hezekiah's response was to go to his God in prayer.

And into the temple he went. And there we saw faith on its knees. And he prayed a prayer of repentance, of utter dependence on the Lord with a desire for God's glory.

And God sent his answer through Isaiah back to Hezekiah. And the message was, don't be afraid of Sennacherib's words. I'm going to put a disposition in him so that when he hears a certain report, he's going to return to his own country and there I will have him cut down by the sword.

Now that was good news to Hezekiah and all Jerusalem, but it didn't change a thing as far as the present circumstances.

The large army was still on the outside of the walls. The field commander and his captains were all there. And as for Sennacherib, he's still wreaking havoc in the land of Judah, mopping up city after city.

In other words, the trouble continued. And it went on for month after month after month.

In other words, there would be need for fresh faith every day of this trial on the part of Hezekiah and the people in Jerusalem. So we get to see Hezekiah's faith as the trial drags on.

Now, Sennacherib had heard that a Cushite king was marching out to find him. So he withdrew his field commander in the large army that was there at Jerusalem to come and help him fight against this coming, this king that was coming against him.

He probably left a detachment, a small detachment of soldiers there outside of Jerusalem just to keep them penned up in their little cage there. But he also sent a message to King Hezekiah at this point, a second message.

Don't get your hopes up. I'm leaving right now with my forces, but I'll be back to finish you off. That's the essence of it. And in this second message to Hezekiah, we have, first of all, Sennacherib's renewed threat.

He gives the same threat, but he gives it a second time. And this time, he also adds it in a letter. Don't let the God you depend on deceive you when he says Jerusalem will not be handed over to the king of Assyria.

He's out to discredit God and to destroy any faith Hezekiah would have in him. So what does he do? Well, he rehearses some of his notable victories of his forefathers and how they destroyed countries and lands.

And are you guys going to be the lone exception to that? Did their gods deliver them? Your God is no different. Where are their kings? You see, kings that opposed the Assyrians suffered tremendously.

Don't think you're going to escape, O king. Where are all these other kings? You know where they're at. You knew some of them and you know what we did to them. You can't trust God for this.

Surrender. And it will be fine for you. So the test for Hezekiah was this. Are you willing to stake your life on your God?

It was everything. Are you willing to stake your life on your God and his word? Well, will you trust your God with your life?

You see, we have those same fears, don't we? A future. And what will happen to us if we follow him and if we just trust him? Well, Hezekiah had great desires to preserve himself.

Self-preservation is natural, but his faith in God was stronger. And the God of his faith was the strongest. And that's where he put his faith. So Hezekiah's response.

What is his response? Well, it's similar to last time. And we see this. These three points. Sennacherib's threat. Hezekiah's response. Well, verses 14 and following says that he received the letter from the messengers and he read it and then he went up to the temple of the Lord and spread it out before the Lord in prayer.

This is what faith looks like in trials. A man on his knees before his God. praying. And it reminds us, well, that's what he did the last time.

Right. And every time the threat is renewed, we need to go back and pray again. And whenever anxiety comes in, we need to cast it afresh upon the Lord.

We're not just seeing the first time what Hezekiah did in his trial, but the second, the third, the fourth. This was his pattern. The new threat to the temple he runs and he spreads this letter out before the Lord this time.

Now, that's not to inform him as if he thinks God doesn't know. But I think that it was his declaration of his faith in the presence of his God.

He comes to spread the matter before the Lord and so he just lays the letter out before him as if the Lord is actually reading it over his shoulder even as he now is going to, in his prayer, work right through this letter and lay it before the Lord in prayer.

Lord, look what they're saying about you. Look at the mess we're in. I wonder if you get that real with God in your praying to just lay the whole matter out before him.

Lord, look, look at this, look at that. I need you. And so Hezekiah is praying. And the first time his prayer was not recorded back in chapter earlier in chapter 37.

But the second time he prays here it is recorded. We get to listen in and when we do we discover here's a man who knows his God. This Hezekiah.

You see, it's impossible to trust God as we ought unless we know him as he is. You will trust God in your trouble no more than you know the God that is yours.

And we listen in on his prayer and we say, wow, Hezekiah knows God. And in your trials it will be shown how well you know him. well, why is this prayer recorded?

Well, I suppose it's fair enough to say that we might learn to pray in our trials, right? All these things were written for us and so how do you pray in your trials?

Let's come and listen in to Hezekiah and see if we don't have something to learn for how we pray in our trials. In the first place, notice his prayer is preoccupied with God.

Not his problem, not even his request. God is the center of his prayer. We don't even get to his request until the very last verse, verse 20.

And even then it remains God-focused. In its theme. So prayer is not only to God, prayer is about God. That's what he's showing us.

Even in those things that concern us. So he starts with God, he continues with God, and he ends with God. That's the way Hezekiah prays in his trouble.

Now if you're anything like me, we jump way too fast into our asking. we rush right over this first part of prayer, the addressing of God, the adoring of God.

And when we do, we impoverish ourselves. And we fail to give God the honor, do his name. And so, instead of focusing on God, we just rush to our request and our problem becomes the focus and our request becomes the focus.

And God himself is a sideline rather than the center. Let's learn from Hezekiah in the second place that he takes time to acknowledge God for who he is.

Notice all the different ways he addresses God and praises him here at the beginning. Verse 16, O Lord Almighty, God of Israel, enthroned between the cherubim, you alone are God over all the kingdoms of the earth, you have made heaven and earth.

Sometimes we might think of these as empty formalities. Maybe just mere preliminaries. Come on, get on with it. Get to the prayer. No. No, no, not at all.

Could it be that the most important part of your prayer is not your request, but you're acknowledging who the Lord is? As David says in Psalm 96, ascribe to the Lord the glory, do his name.

That's what David's doing. He's calling on the name of the Lord. He names it. He talks about who he is and what he's done. And this brings honor to God, but it also strengthens our faith.

Notice how this works. What does he say? He says, O Lord Almighty. mighty. That's not just a formality. Hezekiah is on the inside of a walled city, and Sennacherib and his army is on the outside of the city.

He's boxed in by a mighty foe. What does he do? He calls on an almighty God. The Lord of hosts, the Lord of all the armies is who he's talking to now.

Sennacherib has insulted God saying he's powerless to save from me. And Hezekiah says, Oh no, Oh Lord, you are almighty in power. You are omnipotent.

Then he calls him the God of Israel. The God in covenant with us. The God who has said to us, I'm going to be your God and you're going to be my people. Oh, that's a wonderful comfort to Hezekiah at this point to know that, Lord, we are yours.

Save us. We are yours. God of Israel. Enthrown between the cherubim is his next description of God. Do you know where Hezekiah is?

He's in the temple. He's not in the most holy place of the temple. Only the high priest could go there once a year. And inside behind that curtain was a box called the Ark of the Covenant.

On top of that was the atonement seat, the mercy seat. And there were the cherubim, two of them on each side and their wings reached forward. And in between the cherubim, God was pleased to put his presence, his earthly presence, dwelt there in the Shekinah glory.

And so, as Hezekiah prays, he says, Oh, you who are enthroned between the cherubim. We're boxed in here in Jerusalem, but it is a comfort knowing that you're boxed in with us.

You're here in the temple with us. You're a God who's near to us. You have chosen not to be a God of far off, but a God who comes near to dwell in the midst of his people.

What a wonderful thing in our troubles to pray to a God who is near and is accessible, who is at hand and never present help in trouble. And he's enthroned between the cherubim.

From that seat, he rules the universe. So, so he's sovereign. What a beautiful picture to have as you're about to bring a request. I'm coming to the sovereign who rules everything from his throne.

And you alone are God over all the kingdoms of the earth. You're the only true God. There aren't any others. You're Lord over all the kingdoms.

And if you're over them, that means that they're under you and under your hand. And you have made heaven and earth. You're the creator of all things that exist.

God has been spoken of as being no different from all the other gods. When Hezekiah addresses him, he points out the things that are unique about his God.

You're the creator and everything else that exists is the created. There's none like you. And if you have power to create everything out of nothing, then there's nothing you cannot do.

And so we're not surprised when we read our Bibles that this is one of the favorite places that people in trouble go when they pray and they bring back to mind, Oh Lord, you created the heavens and the earth.

And they address him as such. And they ascribe glory and adore him as such before they ever come to ask his help. God. So Psalm 121, I lift up my eyes to the hills.

Where does my help come from? My help comes from the Lord, the maker of heaven and earth. You find it in Acts chapter 4 when the apostles have been threatened not to preach in Jesus name anymore and they went back to their people and they're all met together and pray and they pray to him who created the heavens and the earth.

people in trouble love to come back to this reality. God is my creator. He's the one that made it all. He has the right to rule over everything he's made.

Do you see how glory is given to God by his addressing God and his adoration and also how faith is being strengthened in Hezekiah because who God is and what he has done is meant to strengthen our faith in our trouble.

No trouble ever looks the same in the light of who God is and no troublemaker like Sennacherib ever looks the same in the light of who God is.

So when we pray let's spend more time on who God is. Well then he continues praying through the letter with God as it were line by line he's still preoccupied with God look what they're saying Lord they're insulting you again that's what bothers Hezekiah the most that men are thinking and speaking of his Lord as if he's just like one of the other gods and and Lord what what what he says here about about these things is true he's right they have laid waste at all all these peoples in their lands and they have destroyed their gods but that's only because they were just wood and stone they weren't gods in the first place you're not like that you're the living God and now at last he gets to his request and we learn the third thing about prayer he makes the glory of God the goal of his request he makes the glory of God the goal of his request verse 20 is the request now oh Lord our God deliver us from his hand it's first mention of us by the way so it's been all about him now he makes the request deliver us from his hand and what's the goal of this request so that all kingdoms on earth may know that you alone oh Lord our God so even when he comes to make his request he's still

God centered isn't he he's still God focused Lord would you do this for us and do it for us so that others will see who you are they will see how great and glorious and good you are to your people they will see your power deliver us so that the world might know who you are you see we're at the very heart of all true prayer which is concerned for God's glory that's why Jesus teaches us when we pray we're to start hallowed be your name we want to see God elevated and people viewing him as he is it's not right that men think of you this way it's not right that they say things like this about you so deliver us that men might know that you alone are God that there's none like you not just that you're the greatest of all the gods know but that you alone are God and not just that Sennacherib and his army would know know that all the kingdoms!

of the earth might know who you are you see we are not at the center of what God's doing on the earth even saving us is not the center the end game for what God is doing on the earth no he saves us as the means to a greater end which is his own glory that by saving us he might put on display who he is to the ends of the earth to all the nations he's out to display his power yes but he's also out to display his grace because everybody on the inside of that city that he saves are sinners rebels and when the word gets out that he saved them they will wonder at his grace to men so we're not at the center God is and

I wonder if we've seen that your life with all of its trials is a stage on which God and his glory is to be seen by the!

God is you're the stage your problem your ongoing problem is the stage on which God intends to show the world that he's real he's a savior worth trusting in he's faithful he's gracious he's good that that that that that that that that that that that to your prayers deliver us Lord so that or is it just deliver us Lord this doesn't feel good it does I don't like it it it not good deliver us oh we're we're coming short brethren the so that of our prayers is so that you might be honored well the renewed threat from Sennacherib Hezekiah's response in prayer and now thirdly God's answer and he answers in word and in action deed and his answer is sent through the prophet

Isaiah again just as it was last time and let's not miss the obvious that God hears and answers prayer that's that's emphasized on the very face of it prayer really is the practical way of dealing with nitty gritty problems in your life and that's the whole question what good does it do to pray to God about a situation like this and there's real soldiers there with real butchers hearts and spears and swords what can prayer do against that kind of enemy and what we're learning is that it can do everything about the nitty gritty problems in our lives prayer accomplished what all other efforts failed to achieve and so God says through Isaiah it's because you have prayed to me about this that this is the word the Lord has spoken about Sennachera so this is answer to prayer because you prayed this is what

I'm going to do with Sennachera so the answer comes first in word here's the promise that's the promise of the Assyrian departure and of Jerusalem's deliverance God announced that Sennacherib and his army would go home and as they ran away that the people of Jerusalem would mock and shake their heads with scorn now we kind of do this maybe kids when we mock somebody well in their day they shook their head with scorn they just kind of gave a shake of their head like can you believe it here they came boasting about what they're going to do and look at him run they're going home and they mocked them they scorned them as they ran off that's the picture we have of the Assyrian army on the run going home to the scorn and mockery of Jerusalem's people he couldn't capture Jerusalem as he boasted why not well he tells us because he finally found himself opposed by the living

God he's used to insulting and blaspheming the gods of the nations that he trampled but this time would be different because it was the holy one of Israel he blasphemed Sennacherib didn't know him but before this would be over he would know more about him have you ever thought what must God think when he hears men talking like Sennacherib talks what does God think when he hears men all puffed up with their pride about everything that I have done well we don't have to wonder he tells us what he thinks about it and that's found in this very text he tells us that he opposes the proud and he says Sennacherib I've heard what you say that with my many chariots I have ascended the heights of the mountains I have I have I have I have I I I you're you're just oozing with self-sufficiency and pride you're boasting of your conquest as if you were the master of your own fate as if you're the cause of all your successes if you're the creator of your victories you make plans as if you're

God and no obstacles can stand in your way if it's rivers you just dry up the rivers poetic way of there's no obstacle that can stop me from going where I want to go conquering what I want to conquer and I heard you Sennacherib I've heard what you say all pride exalts itself against God he takes it personally and he's taken it personally in Sennacherib's life and he takes it personally in our lives that's why he says he opposes the proud because you're exalting yourself above him he gives you life in your breath in your mouth and you say I have I have I have no God says I've heard what you say!

Sennacherib and this I problem is the problem that we all have and the only way it's it's replaced is when when Jesus Christ takes that central place and my life becomes about him and I take my place beneath him but here's Sennacherib boasting about himself and so God opposed Sennacherib the proud and he puts him in his place he says in verse 26 have you not heard you ought to know this by now Sennacherib have you not heard long ago I ordained it in days of old I planned it and now I have brought it to pass that you have turned these fortified cities into piles of stone God answers Sennacherib's eyes with his own eyes you can't take credit for any of this!

Sennacherib all these victories of yours were my plans long ago I planned it long ago I ordained it I even announced it through my prophet Isaiah several times we've seen in chapter 8 and 10 how God said I'm going to bring the Assyrians years before he did it now the Assyrian is out here boasting about what I have done and God says haven't you heard I planned that long ago before you were born I planned it from eternity I decreed it and now I have brought it to pass all your efforts you have not done one thing but what I planned to be done by you you see I have brought it to pass I not only planned it but now I have brought it to pass you are saying I have I have God says no I have I made you the club of my wrath I have made you the club in my hand to punish the nations and when

I'm done punishing the nations I'm going to punish you for your pride and insolence and blasphemy against me I am the one who works out everything according to my plan Ephesians 1 11 nothing happens but what God decrees it was true then it's true today don't know what's going to be in the news tomorrow but I know this whatever it is long ago God ordained it he planned it nothing happens but what he plans and everything that he planned happens he's God and that is his prerogative as God and he bumps heads with proud Sennacherib who says I have and God says no I have the Lord performs what he decrees and we're seeing that he performs what he decrees in answer to our prayers it's because you prayed well is it because

God decreed it in eternity past or is it because Hezekiah prayed yes he performs what he decrees through the prayers of his people prayer is the means by which he brings to pass in this world what he has planned from eternity but I know you Sennacherib I know where you stay isn't that I'm God I know I know everybody's addresses I know where you live and I know when you leave that place of residence and you go here and then you come back I know!

every time you go in and out and I know how you rage against me in your pride and because you rage against me and because your insolence has reached my ears I will put my hook in your nose and my bit in your mouth and I'll make you return by the way you came how do you control large animals well sometimes you put a ring in their nose on a halter sometimes a bit in their mouth and you can control that animal because it's got the ring in its snout God says you're big stuff you're proud you're insolent you're stubborn but I'm going to put a ring I'm going to put a hook in your nose and you're going to do an about face and you're going to go back home the same way you came God will do it God will he is departure they're present in the land now wreaking havoc they're going home wonderful promise to the praying

Hezekiah and he gives Hezekiah a sign the sign here is not something that would happen before the event to strengthen his faith but it's something that would happen so that when it happened he would know the Lord has done this Sennacher is not just going to pack up and go home for willy nilly chance reasons he's going to go home because God sent him packing and you'll know that because of this sign here's what's going to happen for two years two harvests you're only going to be able to eat what the earth produces by itself because when the Assyrians are in the land you don't venture out to farm your fields to plow and plant and harvest you stay inside and you sneak out and get something perhaps but in the third year you will be sowing and reaping planting harvesting and eating well and when you're eating well you will know the reason you're eating well is because I sent the Assyrians home and you'll give me the glory for that deliverance and once more the remnant of the house will survive there's a time it was a time when it looked impossible that anybody inside of

Jerusalem would live and yet God promises that a remnant a band of survivors would make it through and would exist to the praise of God who delivered them and what is his signature guarantee that it's going to happen it looks like there's no way that can happen it's impossible for that to happen but God signs it with his signature guarantee and what is that the zeal of the Lord almighty will accomplish this do you know what the zeal of God is ever seen zeal in a man watching basketball and you see some coaches get real zealous and worked up about what they're doing we saw the zeal of God in the temple when people had turned the house of prayer into a place of merchandise and we saw the God man make a cord and drive them out the temple and what did the disciples say then they realized what was written about him the zeal of the

Lord had eaten him up had consumed him now you take that kind of zeal along with the Lord almighty zeal and power and that's the guarantee that it's going to get done when God is zealous to do something and is almighty to be able to bring it about that's his guarantee the zeal of the God's or man's God says no by the way he came he will return he'll not enter the city declares the Lord he's going to slink home like a dog with his tail between its legs his bark was bigger than his bite he'll be humiliated and the reason

Jerusalem will be spared and he'll not enter is because the Lord himself defends his people I will defend this city and I will save it for my sake and for the sake of David my servant can you see that the answer to prayer is as God centered as the prayer itself Lord do this deliver us so that you will be seen for who you are God says I am going to deliver Jerusalem I am going to do it for my sake not doing it for your sake you rebels you don't deserve to have me save you but I am going to do it for my own namesake I am going to do it to show off my power and my grace and my love for sinners I'll do it for my sake and I'll do it and so he says for my own namesake

I'll deliver Jerusalem and also for the sake of that promise I made to David about his son that would reign on the throne and would reign forever does it not strengthen your faith to see God's commitment to his promises in the past that's an old promise!

promise to David and yet here he is ready to wipe out this Assyrian army all through him happy the people who have God as their shield and defender from how many dangers and temptations has he shielded us even this week when we were unaware well I say God answered in word and that's all we've seen so far the scene has not changed but he also answered in action

Sennacherib's boastful accounts of his exploits have been found in Nineveh you find these accounts of his military exploits and you can read them in the British Museum and other places but they only list the names in his win column the Assyrians were not good at recording any failures and defeats just their victories and so you can read there about some 46 cities and Judah that he conquered and you'll read there how he says that he boasts that he had Hezekiah its king trapped in Jerusalem like a bird in a cage and that's where his account ends well of course we know that's not where it ended and so as Paul Harvey used to say and now the rest of the story and the rest of the story is that during the night an angel of the

Lord went out and put to death 185,000 men in the Assyrian camp and when the people got up the next morning there were all the dead bodies 185,000 of them silently struck dead in the night didn't even rouse the rest of the group it was only in the morning they woke up and there they are that's the entire population of South Bend Mishawaka Bremen Plymouth Warsaw you can throw in Lakeville Wyatt Woodland and half of Napanee that's a lot of people it made more than a dent in Sennacherib's army it's no wonder that he packed up and went home to Nineveh never again to set foot in Judah he just met Judah's God and realized what he was up against the God he blasphemed was not like all the other gods he intervened supernaturally and spared this city but the story is not over yet for God not only promised to defend

Jerusalem but back in verse seven he had promised Hezekiah that Sennacherib would be cut down by the sword in his own land now what you might not recognize is that between verses thirty seven and thirty eight twenty years past you say why doesn't Isaiah talk about what happened in those twenty years of Sennacherib's life because he that's not his point he wants you to see whether the word of God came true or not and so he shrinks the whole life of Sennacherib right down twenty more years went about and Sennacherib went about his his pompous kingly work that he was always doing never back in Judah and every day that he did his job the promise of God was ripening ripening ripening and then one day he went into the temple of his God Nisra Nisra to to worship and two of his own sons cut him down with a sword and fled and a third son reigned in his place the end the end and it all happened just as

God said it would and it always does happen the way God said it will because he's God and all he plans comes to pass no one can thwart his plan and those who exalt themselves will be humbled Sennacherib and those who humble themselves like Hezekiah will be exalted there's Sennacherib back in his home country Nineveh far from Judah but not far from Judah's God and God reaches him there and cuts him down with the sword he said I will prepare someone there to take his life don't miss the irony of the ending Sennacherib went into the temple of his God and got killed this is your

God people of Zion this is your God he is Lord over the nations he's Lord over everything he's mighty to save he's able to do immeasurably more than all you ask or imagine trust in him and all your troubles go on praying casting your hopes upon him he's out to get glory glory to himself by proving that he's real I wonder if you're up for that are you up for that are you ready to be the stage on which God displays his glory his faithfulness his power his grace his love are you ready to prove in your troubles that he's God and that his grace is sufficient and that no one who trusts in him will ever be dismayed amen