2 Kings 19:20-37 (CLICK HERE FOR BIBLE VERSES)
Hi GAMErs,
Today’s passage is 2 Kings 19:20-37. As usual, I encourage you to open your Bible and read the passage yourself first. See what you can glean with the Holy Spirit’s help. Then read the GAME sharing below. Let’s go!
2 Kings 19:20-21 (NIV)
20 Then Isaiah son of Amoz sent a message to Hezekiah: “This is what the LORD, the God of Israel, says: I have heard your prayer concerning Sennacherib king of Assyria.
21 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 tosses her head as you flee.
On verses 20-21: Here God responds to King Hezekiah’s plea for help against King Sennacherib of Assyria. Through the prophet Isaiah, God sends a reassuring message to Hezekiah. First, the Lord tells Hezekiah that He has heard Hezekiah’s prayer (v20). Second, the Lord tells Hezekiah what He has spoken against Sennacherib. The Lord’s message to Sennacherib begins with the words: “The Virgin Daughter of Zion despises you and mocks you. The Daughter of Jerusalem tosses her head as you flee.” (v21)
What can we learn from this?
1. When you know that God has heard about your situation and has spoken favourably about your situation, it gives you hope, strength and peace.
2. God is committed to defending His people when they are under attack.
3. Despite all the ways that God’s people had been unfaithful to Him, God amazingly still calls His people “the virgin daughter of Zion” and the “daughter of Jerusalem” (v21). How could God do that with a people who have been bent on rebelling against Him and worshiping other gods? Yet that’s what God does for us. He sent Jesus Christ to die on the cross for our sins, such that if you have trusted Jesus Christ as your Saviour, God sees Christ’s righteousness covering your sin. Through Jesus God calls “holy” those who have not been holy, and “pure” those who have not been pure. Just as God’s mercy enabled God to call Judah the “Virgin Daughter of Zion”, it’s God’s mercy that enables God to call us His children.
2 Kings 19:22 (NIV)
22 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!
On verse 22: Both King Sennacherib’s field commander and King Sennacherib himself spoke words casting doubt on the Lord’s ability to save the people of Judah. In 2 Kings 18:33-35, Sennacherib’s field commander called the Lord weak and undependable. In 19:10-13, Sennarcherib himself suggested that the Lord is a deceiver. Verse 22 shows that God took those words personally and saw them as an insult and as blasphemy.
What is blasphemy? Blasphemy is speaking evil of God, saying things about God that are untrue and that disparage His character.
What can we learn from this? God takes seriously and personally what you say about Him. As Jesus says, He will hold us accountable for every careless word we speak (Matthew 12:36).
2 Kings 19:23-28 (NIV)
23 By your messengers you have heaped insults on the Lord. And you have said, “With my many chariots I have ascended 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 parts, the finest of its forests.
24 I have dug wells in foreign lands and drunk the water there. With the soles of my feet I have dried up all the streams of Egypt.”
25 “‘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 have turned fortified cities into piles of stone.
26 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 roof, scorched before it grows up.
27 “‘But I know where you stay and when you come and go and how you rage against me.
28 Because you rage against me and your insolence has reached my ears, I will put my hook in your nose and my bit in your mouth, and I will make you return by the way you came.’
On verses 23-28: Sennacherib attributed all his power and success to himself. Notice how many times the word “I” appears in verses 23-24. Yet God responds to Sennacherib’s self-absorption. First, God clarifies that it was He who planned and enabled Assyria’s dominance (v25). Second, God says that considering how Sennacherib rages against the Lord with his boasting and blasphemy, the Lord will humble Sennacherib and bring him low.
What can we learn from this? Whenever a person has power, remember that it’s ultimately because God in His sovereignty has chosen to allow that person to have power. So stay humble and remember that any success or power you have is ultimately because God decided in His mercy to let you have such success and power. As Psalm 75:4-7 says:
4 To the arrogant I say, ‘Boast no more,’ and to the wicked, ‘Do not lift up your horns.
5 Do not lift your horns against heaven; do not speak with outstretched neck.'”
6 No one from the east or the west or from the desert can exalt a man.
7 But it is God who judges: He brings one down, he exalts another.
2 Kings 19:29-34 (NIV)
29 “This will be the 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.
30 Once more a remnant of the house of Judah will take root below and bear fruit above.
31 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.
32 “Therefore this is what the LORD says concerning the king of Assyria: “He will not enter this city or shoot an arrow here. He will not come before it with shield or build a siege ramp against it.
33 By the way that he came he will return; he will not enter this city, declares the LORD.
34 I will defend this city and save it, for my sake and for the sake of David my servant.”
On verses 29-34: Hezekiah and the people of Judah were facing the threat of extinction by the Assyrians. Yet here, after promising to bring down King Sennacherib of Assyria, the Lord further promises that rather than seeing the demise of their nation, the people of Judah would eat what their land naturally produced for two years, and then in the third year they would return to their regular sowing and reaping. In other words, by God’s grace and “the zeal of the Lord Almighty” (v31), Judah would continue on as a nation and survive this Assyrian threat. The Lord gets even more specific in verses 32-34, promising to defend Jerusalem and save it, and further promising that Sennacherib will not enter the city but will return from where he came. In this case, “unstoppable” Assyria would not shoot another arrow against the people of Judah. For God Himself would defend and save the city for His own sake and the sake of David (v34).
2 Kings 19:35-37 (NIV)
35 That night 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!
36 So Sennacherib king of Assyria broke camp and withdrew. He returned to Nineveh and stayed there.
37 One day, while he was worshiping in the temple of his god Nisroch, his sons Adrammelech and Sharezer cut him down with the sword, and they escaped to the land of Ararat. And Esarhaddon his son succeeded him as king.
On verses 35-37: After speaking the promises we read about in verses 29-34, the Lord proves faithful to all His promises when that same night the Lord strikes down 185,000 men in Assyria’s camp. Sennacherib withdraws from Judah. Some time later Sennacherib is assassinated by his sons while worshiping in the temple of his god Nisroch. God was faithful to His Word. Whereas Sennacherib boasted that the Lord would not save Judah, it was Sennacherib’s god Nisroch that could not save Sennacherib.
What can we learn from this? God is faithful to His promises and specializes in great rescues. Likewise, when we seemed destined for destruction, God delivered us. He sent Jesus Christ to be our hero and to defeat our enemy on our behalf, so that we could continue to live in freedom.
Father, You alone decide who to exalt and who to bring down. Thank You that 2,000 years ago You decided to stoop down to make us great when You sent Jesus Christ to die for our sins. Thank You that we were the beneficiaries of the greatest rescue story of all time. Since it is ultimately because of Your mercy and grace that we experience any success or influence in our lifetime, may we always be humble in the way we speak and act. In Jesus’ name, AMEN!
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