6/14/2011 7:04:11 AM
SPIRITUAL DIARY
My Worship Time Focus: Hezekiah the commander PT.-3 (The
Proclamation)
Bible Reading
& Meditation Reference:
2Ki.
18:19-36; 2Chron. 32:9-19; Isa. 36:4-21
Message of the verses: “19
Then Rabshakeh said to them, "Say now to Hezekiah, ’Thus says the
great king, the king of Assyria, "What is this confidence that you have?
20 "You say (but they are only
empty words), ’I have counsel and strength for the war.’ Now on whom do you
rely, that you have rebelled against me? 21
"Now behold, you rely on the staff of this crushed reed, even on
Egypt; on which if a man leans, it will go into his hand and pierce it. So is
Pharaoh king of Egypt to all who rely on him. 22 "But if you say to me, ’We trust in the
LORD our God,’ is it not He whose high places and whose altars Hezekiah has
taken away, and has said to Judah and to Jerusalem, ’You shall worship before
this altar in Jerusalem’? 23 "Now
therefore, come, make a bargain with my master the king of Assyria, and I will
give you two thousand horses, if you are able on your part to set riders on
them. 24 "How then can you repulse
one official of the least of my master’s servants, and rely on Egypt for
chariots and for horsemen? 25 "Have
I now come up without the LORD’S approval against this place to destroy it? The
LORD said to me, ’Go up against this land and destroy it.’"’" 26 Then Eliakim the son of Hilkiah, and Shebnah
and Joah, said to Rabshakeh, "Speak now to your servants in Aramaic, for
we understand it; and do not speak with us in Judean in the hearing of the
people who are on the wall." 27 But
Rabshakeh said to them, "Has my master sent me only to your master and to
you to speak these words, and not to the men who sit on the wall, doomed to eat
their own dung and drink their own urine with you?" 28 Then Rabshakeh stood and cried with a loud
voice in Judean, saying, "Hear the word of the great king, the king of
Assyria. 29 "Thus says the king,
’Do not let Hezekiah deceive you, for he will not be able to deliver you from
my hand; 30 nor let Hezekiah make you
trust in the LORD, saying, "The LORD will surely deliver us, and this city
will not be given into the hand of the king of Assyria." 31 ’Do not listen to Hezekiah, for thus says the
king of Assyria, "Make your peace with me and come out to me, and eat each
of his vine and each of his fig tree and drink each of the waters of his own
cistern, 32 until I come and take you
away to a land like your own land, a land of grain and new wine, a land of
bread and vineyards, a land of olive trees and honey, that you may live and not
die." But do not listen to Hezekiah when he misleads you, saying,
"The LORD will deliver us." 33
’Has any one of the gods of the nations delivered his land from the hand
of the king of Assyria? 34 ’Where are
the gods of Hamath and Arpad? Where are the gods of Sepharvaim, Hena and Ivvah?
Have they delivered Samaria from my hand? 35
’Who among all the gods of the lands have delivered their land from my hand,
that the LORD should deliver Jerusalem from my hand?’" 36 But the people were silent and answered him
not a word, for the king’s commandment was, "Do not answer him.’”
“9
¶ After this Sennacherib king of Assyria
sent his servants to Jerusalem while he was besieging Lachish with all his
forces with him, against Hezekiah king of Judah and against all Judah who were
at Jerusalem, saying, 10 "Thus says
Sennacherib king of Assyria, ’On what are you trusting that you are remaining
in Jerusalem under siege? 11 ’Is not
Hezekiah misleading you to give yourselves over to die by hunger and by thirst,
saying, "The LORD our God will deliver us from the hand of the king of
Assyria"? 12 ’Has not the same
Hezekiah taken away His high places and His altars, and said to Judah and
Jerusalem, "You shall worship before one altar, and on it you shall burn
incense"? 13 ’Do you not know what
I and my fathers have done to all the peoples of the lands? Were the gods of
the nations of the lands able at all to deliver their land from my hand?
14 ’Who was there among all the gods of
those nations which my fathers utterly destroyed who could deliver his people
out of my hand, that your God should be able to deliver you from my hand? 15 ’Now therefore, do not let Hezekiah deceive
you or mislead you like this, and do not believe him, for no god of any nation
or kingdom was able to deliver his people from my hand or from the hand of my
fathers. How much less will your God deliver you from my hand?’" 16 His servants spoke further against the LORD God and against His servant
Hezekiah. 17 He also wrote letters to insult
the LORD God of Israel, and to speak against Him, saying, "As the
gods of the nations of the lands have not delivered their people from my hand,
so the God of Hezekiah will not deliver His people from my hand." 18 They called this out with a loud voice in the language of Judah to the
people of Jerusalem who were on the wall, to frighten and terrify them, so that they might take the
city. 19 They spoke of the God of
Jerusalem as of the gods of the peoples of the earth, the work of men’s hands.”
“4 Then Rabshakeh said to them, "Say now to
Hezekiah, ’Thus says the great king, the king of Assyria, "What is this
confidence that you have? 5 "I say,
’Your counsel and strength for the war are only empty words.’ Now on whom do
you rely, that you have rebelled against me? 6
"Behold, you rely on the staff of this crushed reed, even on Egypt,
on which if a man leans, it will go into his hand and pierce it. So is Pharaoh
king of Egypt to all who rely on him. 7
"But if you say to me, ’We trust in the LORD our God,’ is it not He
whose high places and whose altars Hezekiah has taken away and has said to
Judah and to Jerusalem, ’You shall worship before this altar’? 8 "Now therefore, come make a bargain with
my master the king of Assyria, and I will give you two thousand horses, if you
are able on your part to set riders on them. 9
"How then can you repulse one official of the least of my master’s
servants and rely on Egypt for chariots and for horsemen? 10 "Have I now come up without the LORD’S
approval against this land to destroy it? The LORD said to me, ’Go up against
this land and destroy it.’"’"
11 ¶ Then Eliakim and Shebna and
Joah said to Rabshakeh, "Speak now to your servants in Aramaic, for we
understand it; and do not speak with us in Judean in the hearing of the people
who are on the wall." 12 But
Rabshakeh said, "Has my master sent me only to your master and to you to
speak these words, and not to the men who sit on the wall, doomed to eat their
own dung and drink their own urine with you?" 13 Then Rabshakeh stood and cried with a loud
voice in Judean and said, "Hear the words of the great king, the king of
Assyria. 14 "Thus says the king, ’Do not let Hezekiah deceive you, for he
will not be able to deliver you; 15 nor
let Hezekiah make you trust in the LORD, saying, "The LORD will surely
deliver us, this city will not be given into the hand of the king of Assyria."
16 ’Do not listen to Hezekiah,’ for thus
says the king of Assyria, ’Make your peace with me and come out to me, and eat
each of his vine and each of his fig tree and drink each of the waters of his
own cistern, 17 until I come and take
you away to a land like your own land, a land of grain and new wine, a land of
bread and vineyards. 18 ’Beware that
Hezekiah does not mislead you, saying, "The LORD will deliver us."
Has any one of the gods of the nations delivered his land from the hand of the
king of Assyria? 19 ’Where are the gods
of Hamath and Arpad? Where are the gods of Sepharvaim? And when have they
delivered Samaria from my hand? 20 ’Who
among all the gods of these lands have delivered their land from my hand, that
the LORD would deliver Jerusalem from my hand?’" 21 But they were silent and answered him not a
word; for the king’s commandment was, "Do not answer him.’”
The
verses above in three different books of the Bible are very similar in telling
this story of some very proud men who would soon see things from a different
prospective to say the least. This the
third sub-point under this second main point in Warren Wiersbe’s commentary on
2Kings and parts of 2Chronicles called “Be Distinct.”
This
is a story about a king who had had his own way in conquering nations that he
went up against in the past and had even done the Lord’s bidding when he
conquered the northern kingdom of Israel.
He will soon find out that in his strength alone he will only do what
the Lord allows him to do.
This
story has three different speeches in it that must be understood to understand
what and how things came about. First of
all there was the speech that the field commander gave to Hezekiah and the rest
of the Jews which blasphemed the Lord their God. After this Hezekiah went to the temple to
talk to the Lord his God and lay down before him the things that were on his
mind. Next there was the speech that
Isaiah gave to Hezekiah because it had been given to him by the Lord and as Dr.
Wiersbe says the Lord always has the LAST WORD.
As
you read through the field commander’s speech you get the idea that he must
have had someone inside the walls of Jerusalem because he knew many things
about the king and about what the situation that was going on in there. He knew that Hezekiah had torn down the high
places so that Israel must worship at the temple, he knew that there were those
who wanted to get help from Egypt, and he also knew that the army was small for
he offered 2000 horses to them if they had the riders to put on them.
In
his speech the field commander told his listeners who they were trusting in so
that he could make the points he wanted to make in order to scare all of
them. They were trusting in Egypt, and
they were trusting in the Lord their God and he insisted that none of the other
gods helped those whom he had defeated earlier.
They were trusting in their military resources, which meant that they
were in big trouble.
The
field commander called the king of Assyria “the great king” and he probably did
this to put down Hezekiah, but in doing this he was also putting down the
Lord. “For the LORD Most High is to be
feared, A great King over
all the earth, (Psalm 47:2)”. “Beautiful
in elevation, the joy of the whole earth, Is Mount Zion in the far north, The city of the great King,
(Psalm 48:2)” “"But cursed be the
swindler who has a male in his flock and vows it, but sacrifices a blemished
animal to the Lord, for I
am a great King," says the LORD of hosts, "and My name is
feared among the nations, (Mal. 1:14).’”
Spiritual meaning for my life today: I have been listening to a series of sermons
by John MacArthur on the fifteenth chapter of John, the chapter that speaks on
“abiding.” The reason that I bring this
up here is because in order for any believer to abide, which means remain, is
that they must have their trust completely in the Lord in order to produce
fruit in their lives and when this trust is in something else and they try and
produce fruit on their own then it won’t work, it won’t bring glory to the
Lord. The king of Assyria knew nothing
of this and so he would fail at what he was attempting. It is my desire to completely trust in the
Lord and draw from His power and strength to accomplish what it is that He has
planned for me to accomplish that will bring glory to Him. “For we are His workmanship, created in
Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand so that we would
walk in them, (Eph. 2:10).
My Steps of
Faith for Today:
1.
Continue to remain or abide in the Lord.
2.
Give myself to the Lord for worship and for service.
3.
Continue to learn contentment.
4.
Remember that the battle is fierce and I am in need
of the spiritual armor.
5.
Psalm 139:23-24.
6.
Proverbs 3:5-6.
6/14/2011 8:07:03 AM
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