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Amen. Good morning, south. As Alex mentioned, my name is Nathan. I have the pleasure of working here with the students, which means that most Sundays. I take the middle schoolers out during this time down to the student center. So as he mentioned, I’m used to distractions, so don’t worry if you have any kids.
They are welcome here. Now, before we get too far into today’s service, let me pray for us again. Jesus, would you speak during this time? Would you open our hearts to your word? I thank you for your presence. I thank you for this season. Would you meet us here in this moment? In Jesus’ name, amen. How many of you, show of hands are familiar with the game show deal or no deal?
Yeah. It’s a good amount, right? It turns out it’s, they stopped running that show in 2010. I didn’t realize it’s that old. But if you don’t know what deal or no deal is, it’s a game show where there’s a contestant like every other game show, and this contestant is shown 26 different briefcases each with a number on them, 1, 2, 3, all the way up to 26.
And inside of those briefcases is another number. This time ranging from 1 cent to a million dollars. The goal for the contestant is to walk away with the million dollar briefcase. And so what they’ll do is they’ll pick a briefcase, say briefcase number 10, and they don’t get to open it. They just get to hold it, and that briefcase is their briefcase and they don’t know what numbers inside of there, but they’ll start to get rid of all these other briefcases.
Briefcase number 12, briefcase number 18, number 22. And as they get rid of these briefcases, they’ll reveal what number was inside of those briefcases. So maybe briefcase 12 had $10 in it. Briefcase 18, $200. Briefcase 2275 grand. And the contestant during this time is oh, I don’t wanna lose that much money, but they want the million dollars.
So after they get rid of a few briefcases, the bank will then call, not first bank down the road, but the bank within the game show. And they’ll call and say, Hey, you can keep playing and go for the million dollars, or if you leave now, we’ll give you. $86,000. They’ll figure out some sort of mathematical equation to come to a number, and they’re asked this question, do you take the deal, take the $86,000 and walk, and you go home?
Or do you stay for a chance? It’s something greater deal or no deal? And they’re asked this question repeatedly throughout the game, deal or no deal. Our subject today is King Hezekiah, and he is faced with a similar deal, but instead of a million dollars on the line, it’s the lives of his people. So if you have your Bibles, we’re gonna be in Isaiah chapter 36, but before we jump into the text.
Let me give you a little bit of historical background. Whenever I teach a narrative with an Old Testament history, I like to use this timeline. I find it to be pretty helpful. So here in the beginning, you’ll see in the book of Genesis, God calls Abraham to be this blessing for this people, and that he’s gonna have a nation that stems out of him later.
You see that nation, the nation of Israel, in the Book of Exodus. Stuck in Egypt and Moses leads them out of Egypt in the book of Exodus later as they form their own nation. King David reigns in about the year a thousand, and shortly after David, his son Solomon, is reigning, and shortly after Solomon, there is a civil war and the nation is split into a northern kingdom and a southern kingdom.
And if it feels like you just heard this, that’s because you did the last couple weeks we’ve been in the book of Isaiah and Dan and Peter and Jessica and Alex have referred to this separation. And so each nation had a list of kings, and you’ll notice there’s either a minus or a plus next to each king.
Which notes if that king was a good king that followed God or a bad king that did not follow God? And you’ll probably notice the Nation of Israel, the Northern Kingdom had a generational run of bad king after bad king, including ziri, who lasted seven days. That’s brutal. But the nation of Israel, they’ve been wiped out.
They’re gone. Hohaia is the last king in 7 22. They are wiped out by the nation of Assyria, who is on. The march. And so today’s story exists seven years after the exile of Israel during the reign of King Hezekiah. So a couple weeks ago, Dan used this verse, Isaiah chapter one, verse one, to give a little bit of background on all the kings that Isaiah was prophesying during.
It says, these are the visions that Isaiah’s son of Amos saw concerning Judah and Jerusalem. He saw these visions during the years when Siah. Johan, Ahaz and Hezekiah were kings of Judah. Three out of the four being good kings, Ahaz being the odd duckling there. And so today we’re talking about King Hezekiah and he wasn’t just a good king like some of the others.
Second Kings describes him this way. Hezekiah did what was right in the eyes of the Lord just as his father David had done. He removed the high places, smashed the sacred stones, and cut down the ASRA poles. He broke into pieces. The bronze snake Moses had made for, up to that time, the Israelites had been burning incense to it.
It was called Neish Tan. Hezekiah trusted in the Lord, the God of Israel. There was no one like him among all the kings of Judah, either before him or after him. He held fast to the Lord and did not stop following him. He kept the commands. The Lord had given Moses and the Lord was with him. He was successful in whatever he undertook.
So Hakki is not just a good king. There was no one like him among all the kings of Judah, either before him or after him. He is like the best king that the southern nation of Judah has. But he’s not the only king around. Sin is the king of Assyria, which is this big yellow glob. And they’re on the march.
They’re growing nation after nation. They’re wiping out, they’re destroying. And just to give you a little bit of a size, picture the little red splotch next to Judah, that’s the southern nation of Judah. All of the yellow is Assyria. Not really a fair fight, not really a similar sized nation.
And so starting in Isaiah chapter 36. It says this, in the 14th year of King Hezekiah’s Reign, Rab King of Assyria attacked all the fortified cities of Judah and captured them bit by bit, city by city. He’s going in and he’s taking over and he’s wiping them out. Then the king of ass Syria sent his field commander with a large army from Laic to King Hezekiah at Jerusalem.
When the commander stopped at the aqueduct of the upper pool on the road to the launderers field, Elia Kim, son of Hil Kayah, the palace administrator, Shena the secretary, and Joe asked son of Asaf, the recorder went out to him, the field commander said to them, tell Hezekiah this is what the great king, the king of Asser, as.
On what are you basing this confidence of yours? You say you have counsel and might for war, but you speak only empty words. On whom are you depending that you rebel against me. Look, I know you are depending on Egypt, that splintered read of a staff, which pierces the hand of anyone who leans on it. Such is Pharaoh, king of Egypt to all who depend on him.
But if you say to me, we are depending on the Lord our God. Isn’t he the one whose high places and altars Hezekiah removed, saying to Judah and Jerusalem, you must worship before this altar. He points out that Hezekiah got rid of the high places and the altars, and you would think that’s probably a bad thing.
But in this covenant relationship that God had with the nation of Judah, with the nation of Israel, they were commanded to worship God in the temple at Jerusalem. Now, we don’t live under that same covenant today, but for that nation that was important. And so when the people made all these other places to worship, that was not what God had called them to.
And sometimes they didn’t even worship what they were supposed to in those places. As two kings mentioned, they would burn incense to other gods in some of these places. So Sinna Herb has this message that he’s giving to Hezekiah. He says destruction is coming. Egypt won’t help and God won’t stop.
Assyria. Essentially, he’s saying, I’m on the way and you’re screwed. You’re not winning this fight. Then the commander stood and called out in Hebrew. Here are the words of the Great King, the king of Assyria. This is what the king says. Do not let Hezekiah deceive you. He cannot deliver you. Do not let Hezekiah persuade you to trust in the Lord.
When he says, the Lord will surely deliver us, this city will not be given into the hand of the King of Assyria. Do not listen to Hezekiah. This is what the King of Assyria says. Make peace with me and come out to me. Then each of you will eat fruit from your own vine and fig tree, and drink water from your own cistern.
Until I come and take you to a land like your own, a land of grain and new wine, a land of bread and vineyards. Do not let Hezekiah mislead you when he says the Lord will deliver us. Have the gods of any nations ever delivered their lands from the hands of the King of Assyria. Where are the gods of Hamath and our pad?
Where are the gods of Sr Vame? Have they rescued Samaria from my hand? Who of all the gods of these countries have been able to save their lands from me? How then can the Lord deliver Jerusalem from my hand? So Hezeki presented with this offer. It says, if we go back to verse 16, make peace with me and come out to me.
Then each of you will eat fruit from your own vine and fig tree and drink water from your own cistern. But notice until I come and take you to a land like your own. The offer is make peace with sin and get relocated. This is the option that he’s sitting with. You can make peace with Soaker and get relocated, which seems odd.
Why would he relocate the people? But this is very common. The nation of Assyria did this all the time. If you look at the dashed line, the Nation of Israel, the Northern Kingdom was removed from their land. They were sent into exile. They were removed from their land and sent over to Ana way over in the east.
And one of the reasons, there were many reasons they did this, but one of the reasons was it’s hard to revolt, to fight for your homeland if you’re not home. It’s hard to stage some revolution if you don’t even really know where you are, if you have to journey back home. And so they would relocate the different nations, and so he says, make peace with me and I’ll relocate you.
Or option number two, you can resist sin, aura, and get destroyed by Assyria. Neither one really seems like a lot of fun, right? You can make peace with Soaker and get relocated. Or you can resist anak and get destroyed. And sometimes when we read these passages, it’s easy to say, oh, just take option number two, right?
’cause God will bail you out. But in that moment, when the nation of Assyria is wiping out nation after nation, including the northern nation of Israel, it’s a lot harder to believe that. And remember, a bunch of their other cities had already been wiped out. It’s not the nation of Judah anymore. It’s the city of Jerusalem.
And Jerusalem’s army is not remotely powerful enough to stand a chance against the Assyrian army. This is not a fair fight. This is destruction on its way. I played middle school tackle football for a whopping total of one year. Shows you about how well it went for me. Now, I was not really the ideal build for a football player.
That was one of the reasons why it did not go. You can look at me now and be like, okay. He is not really the great build, but it was even worse. The average middle school tackle football player was somewhere around five foot four, maybe five foot five, somewhere from 120 to 150 pounds. I was closer to four foot nine and 70 pounds, so really not like the biggest guy on the team.
I was, in fact, the third smallest kid on the team. And so my coach took the three of us that didn’t really fit in with the others and said, Hey, I know where I’m gonna put you. I’m gonna make you defensive tackles. Now if you know a little bit of how that works, you’ll know that doesn’t make a whole lot of sense.
So let me just explain really briefly what that looks like. You’ll see four gentlemen here on the screen, the man in the back, Lamar Jackson, number eight. He’s the quarterback. And the three people in front are the offensive linemen. You’ll notice these are not small human beings. Their job is to protect number eight.
My job is to go past these three gentlemen and get to number eight. Now, you can probably figure that’s not very easy, but I wanted to illustrate it and make it a little bit easier to see. So I’ve asked Sean and Aaron to help me now. Now, Sean here. Sean’s gonna be my quarterback. The quarterback is the leader of the team, the face of the franchise.
Sean is an excellent leader. And look at his face. He’s perfect for the job, right? And Aaron here, Aaron’s gonna be my offensive lineman because if you look at the two of us standing next to each other, you’ll see there’s a little bit of a size mismatch, right? He’s a little bit taller, right? He’s got longer arms than me, and he is definitely stronger than me.
So it’s similar to how it was. When I played middle school to middle school, tackle football, plus his beard makes him look kinda like Jason Kelsey. So it’s a great fit. So what we’re gonna do here, we’re gonna try really hard not to break anything on stage or any of my bones, but. We’re gonna do a rep, Aaron is gonna snap the ball to Sean and I’m gonna try to get past Aaron and get to Sean and we’re gonna see how well that goes for me.
Let me just, take off anything that could break except for the mic. Hopefully it doesn’t break. Woo. 42. Oh. Alright. Try again. Try again. Try again. Try again. Try again. Snapping fraction. This is my first start. Yeah. We can tell. Set. Cut.
Yeah, that didn’t go very well for me. So as you can tell, that was not very easy for me, and my coach knew that. So he said Nathan, don’t go around. Aaron don’t go around. The offensive lineman. Go through him. Now, this is going to sound ridiculous because it is, but this is legitimately. What he told me to do.
You see when Aaron snaps the ball, his legs are pretty open, and if I’m quick enough, I can get through and go and take the ball away from Sean. And it worked once. There was one time that it worked that I snuck through. I got the ball. I was the hero. I was so stoked. It was my highlight of the season.
Notice how I said once. The other dozens of times a week, hundreds of times over the course of the season, and went a little bit closer to this.
I got sat on and we didn’t break the mic. Let’s go. Thank you, Aaron. Thank you, Sean.
Dozens of times a week, hundreds of times a year, I got sat on. It was not a fair fight. It was complete destruction. Jerusalem’s Army is a lot like that. They’re not remotely powerful enough to stand a chance against the Assyrian Army. They’re gonna get sat on dozens of times a week, hundreds of times a year.
They’re going to get. Destroyed. Now, there is that slim chance that you pull one out, right? If you look in the book of judges, Gideon takes an army of hundreds against an army of hundreds of thousands, and God leads them to victory. There’s a chance there’s that one time that I took the ball away that I was the hero.
But the other hundreds of times where you take an army of that size against an army like Assyria. You get sat on, you get destroyed. So he’s faced with these options. Do you make peace with Sakib and get relocated by Assyria or do you resist sin AIB and get destroyed by asy deal or no deal? Do you take the deal and lose your homes or resist and lose your lives?
It’s a hard place to be in. It’s a hard question to wrestle with. So Hezekiah, when he hears this, he tears his clothes and put on sackcloth a sign of mourning, and he goes into the temple of the Lord. He sent Elia Kim, the palace administrator, Shana, the secretary, and the leading priests all wearing sackcloth to the prophet Isaiah, son of Amos.
They told him, this is what Hezekiah says. This day is a day of distress and rebuke and disgrace as when children come to the moment of birth and there is no strength to deliver them. It may be that the Lord your God will hear the words of the field commander whom his master, the King of Assyria, has sent to ridicule the living God and that he will rebuke him for the words the Lord your God has heard.
Therefore, pray for the remnant that still survives. Hezekiah immediately, in this moment of grief, he brings his concern to God. He says, God, this is how I feel. This is what I’m wrestling with. I don’t know what to do. Friends, God wants to hear from you. God wants to hear from you. In the really hard days, in the sad days, in the days of anger and frustration, in the great days, the days of joy and gratitude.
God wants to hear from you today and tomorrow, the day after that, and yesterday, and God wants to hear from you all the time. When King Hezekiah’s officials came to Isaiah, Isaiah said to them, tell your master. This is what the Lord says. Do not be afraid of what you have heard. Those words with which the underlings of the King of Assyria has have blasphemed me.
Listen, when he hears a certain report, I will make him return to his own country. And there I will have him cut down with a sword. So God says to Hezekiah, no deal. Don’t take the deal. Resist him. And instead of attacking Jerusalem sin Arab. Was gonna receive a report that’s gonna make him wanna go home and he’ll go home, and when he goes home, he’s going to die.
He’s not going to attack you. You’re going to be safe. But what God is essentially doing is he’s telling Hezekiah to risk his life in the lives of all of his people and to trust that he will protect them. God wants to hear from you, and he wants you to trust in his response. He wants you to trust in his response.
Now, soaker received a report that tear haka. The King of Kush was marching out to fight against him When he heard it, he sent messengers to Hezekiah with this word, Saya Hezekiah, king of Judah. Do not let the God you depend on deceive you when he says Jerusalem will not be given into the hands of the king of Assyria.
Surely you have heard what the kings of Assyria have done to all the countries devouring them completely. And will you be delivered? Did the gods of the nations that were destroyed by my predecessors deliver them the gods of GOs and ha and Res, and the people of Eden who were in Teles are. Where’s the king of Hamath or the king of our pad?
Where are the kings of lair? Serva. Henna and Eva. Oh, I forgot. Oh, yeah, they’re gone, right? What he’s doing he’s gloating. He’s pointing out, oh yeah. I destroyed all of them because I’m just so much stronger than you. Soaker had this thing called Sinna Herb’s Prison. And it’s a, it’s an object.
And I don’t know why he chose this to be the shape. It’s a weird shape. But he would write on it all of their military successes, and he would write down how Oh, we destroyed them and them, and we took over them. And I’m just so good at this, aren’t I? And he just keeps pointing out all these successes.
And when it comes to Hezekiah, he says this. As for the King of Judah, Hezekiah, who had not submitted to my authority, I besieged and captured 46 of his fortified cities, along with many smaller towns taken in battle with my battering rams. As for Hezekiah, I shut him up like a caged bird in his royal city of Jerusalem.
I then constructed a series of fortresses around him, and I did not allow anyone to come out of the city gates. Notice how he doesn’t say, I wiped out Hezekiah in Jerusalem. He does say, I captured 46 of his fortified cities, which we see in chapter 36 verse one. But he doesn’t say he wiped out Hezekiah.
’cause remember, he had to go home, take care of this report that the King of tear haka was marching out to fight him. And then he is gonna come back and then he is gonna wipe him out. So he sends Hezekiah this warning, Hey, I’ve gotta go take care of this real quick, but I’m coming back and when I do, you’re screwed.
I’m gonna wipe you out. Hezekiah, understandably, when he hears this, he’s not feeling too great. ’cause he is God, I thought you said he was gonna go home and not come back. Now he’s saying he is gonna come back. So 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.
Lord Almighty, the God of Israel, enthroned between the she you alone are God over all the kingdoms of the earth you have made heaven and earth give ear, Lord and ears open your eyes and see you Lord. Listen to all the words sin Arab has sent to ridicule. The living God. It is true, Lord, that the Assyrian kings have laid waste.
All these people on 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, Lord our God, deliver us from his hand so that all the kingdoms of the earth may know that you Lord are the only God Hezeki receives his letter.
And he goes back to God. He doubles down. He says, God, I need deliverance. Will you be here with us? Will you help us? God wants to hear from you. In those moments of doubt, in those moments of questioning, God, I don’t know about this. God wants to hear from you, and he wants you to trust in his response. So let’s see his response.
Therefore, this is what the Lord says concerning the king of Assyria. He will not enter the city or shoot an arrow here. He will not come before it with shield or build this seed ramp against it. By the way, 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.
Hezekiah doubles down, says, God, we need help. We need deliverance. God says, you’re gonna double down. So will I. God doubles down. He says, I will protect you, Hezekiah. You don’t need to be afraid. I will protect you. God wants to hear from you, and he wants you to trust in his response. So let’s see what happened.
Then the angel of the Lord went out and put to death 185,000 in the Assyrian camp. When the people got up the next morning, there were all the dead bodies. So Sinna of 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 godness rock, his son’s Alec and Sharaz air killed him with the sword and they escaped to the land of Ara and ER hadn’t his son succeeded him as king.
A few things that we notice here. God is fiercely protective of his people. God is fiercely protective of his people. Oftentimes, when we read these passages, it’s easy to say, Ooh. I don’t know how I feel about that. Doesn’t this feel a little bit like overkill? Doesn’t this feel like a little bit too much?
But God is fiercely protective of his people. He’s like a mama bear right In this picture. Kind, gentle, cuddly. But if you get in the way of a mama bear in her cub, watch out. That is not going to go well for you. ’cause the mala bear is fiercely protective of her cub. And in the same way God is fiercely protective of his people.
If our expectation of God is that God is gonna be timid and passive and just stand on the sidelines what about in those moments where we need help? What about in those moments where we’re experiencing the oppression, the hurt, the pain? That Hezekiah’s feeling there in the lion, the witch in the wardrobe.
C. S Lewis writes this conversation between Susan and Mr. Beaver’s talking about Alan, this picture of Jesus. And he says, Alan is a lion. The lion, the great lion. Oh, said Susan. I thought he was a man. Is he quite safe? I shall feel rather nervous about meeting a lion safe who said anything about safe.
Of course he isn’t safe, but he’s good. He’s the king. I tell you, if our expectation is that God is safe that’s not the case at all, but he’s good. Our God is good, and our God is fiercely protective of his people. Secondly, we see that God is bigger. He’s larger than whatever it is that we encounter.
He’s bigger than the challenges you face at work, at home, at school. He’s bigger than the hurts that you’ve experienced. He’s bigger than the joys that you have. He’s bigger than all of it. And there may be a song that’s going through your head right now as I say that. And that song is from Veggie Tails.
It’s called, God is Bigger Than the Boogeyman, and in it junior asparagus is sitting in his room, he’s in bed, and while he is laying there, closet door looks a little bit darker than normal. Was that a creek I heard under my bed? Is that a monster hiding in my closet? Kids. You ever been there? I’ve been there.
And he starts singing the song. He says, you can sing it with me. Now. God is bigger than the boogy man. He’s bigger than Godzilla or the monsters on tv. God is bigger than the boogie man, and he’s watching out for you and me. Well done. And later in the song, junior asparagus is having this conversation with Bob the tomato and Bob says, so are you frightened?
No, not really. Are you worried? Not a bit. I know whatever’s gonna happen that God can handle it. God is bigger than whatever it is that we face, and he’s watching out for you and me. God is bigger than the boogeyman. He’s bigger than whatever it is that we experience and He’s watching out for you and me.
Thirdly. We see that God is trustworthy. God is trustworthy. He told Hezekiah twice, I’m going to sense an RB home, and when I do, he’s not going to attack you. He’s going to die. You will be safe. And God did what he said he’s gonna do. Our God is faithful. Our God is trustworthy. He’s not going to lie.
Friends, God wants to hear from you. And he wants you to trust in his response. But here’s the thing, how do we hear it? So often as we struggle with this idea of hearing God’s response, we question, is there even a response? So I have a few tips that come from Hezekiah’s story. So how do we hear God’s response?
First, we have to seek it. Look at what Hezekiah does. When Hezekiah heard this, he tore his clothes and put on sackcloth and went into the temple of the Lord. The first thing he does, he says, God, I need to hear from you. If we want to hear from God, but we’re not seeking his response, how badly do we really want to hear him?
Hezekiah seeks his response. Secondly, we have to remove distractions. Shortly after he sent Elia Kim, the palace administrator, Sheb to the secretary, and the leading priests all wearing sackcloth to the prophet Isaiah, son of Amos. Now, he sent them on a mission. He wasn’t just saying, Hey, you guys are a problem for me.
Get outta my sight. That’s not what he was doing. He was sending them on a mission, but notice it’s just him and God. He’s removed distractions. We face. A lot of different distractions. One of which, and I would say the chief prince of which is this, my phone is a major distraction and it’s so easy.
I’m having quiet time with God. God, I want to hear from you. What’s the score of the Broncos game? God, I want to hear from you. Oh, they text me. Let me respond real quick. Oh God. I want to hear from you. Oh wait, let me just check my email really quick. We have to remove distractions. Thirdly, we have to remain persistent.
Hezekiah receives this communication from sin Arab, not just once, but twice, and so he goes back to God again. He receives 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. He remains persistent. He says, God, I need to hear from you again.
And again. It’s not just God, I need to hear from you. Oh, three minutes has passed and I haven’t heard anything. Let me move on. He remains persistent. He comes back to it over and over. We have to remain persistent. And fourthly, silence is a response. That’s one that we often look past.
And we say, God, why don’t I feel you speaking to me? But sometimes he is through the silence. Silence is a response. If we come back to this timeline, you’ll notice that I made a little red rectangle thing here, and the purpose of that is that there’s 400 years, you’ll see about 500 in the picture, and there’s a few prophets that appear after the exiles returned to the land.
But after that, there’s 400 years of silence. There’s no prophets, no message from God, nothing new. ’cause he already told them what he needed to tell them. He already told them that Jesus was coming. He already told them what Jesus was gonna do. He didn’t need to bring a new message. Silence is a response and oftentimes.
When we hear the silence of God, it’s ’cause he’s already pointed us where he needs us to go. God wants to hear from you and he wants you to trust in his response, even if that response is silence. So what do you want to tell him? As I invite the worship band back up, they’re gonna play a song called Come As You Are.
And this song is an invitation to bring whatever emotion, whatever thought. That is on your mind and to bring it to God. And so I encourage you during this time, tell God whatever it is on your heart, the good, the bad, the ugly. Bring it to him this week. Bring it to him over and over. Say, God, I need you to hear me, and I need to hear from you if you’d like.
I believe there will be a couple of prayer team members darted around the room. If you can’t find them, find Alex. And so I’d encourage you to talk with a prayer team member, talk with Alex, who’s, I guess also on the prayer team, talk with whoever the Lord is leading you to listen. To God, bring all that you are to him.
’cause God wants to hear from you and he wants you to trust in his response.
