Can God be Trusted in the Darkest Situation? (Isaiah 37)

1. In the fourteenth year of King Hezekiah’s reign, King Sennacherib of Assyria marched up against all the fortified cities of Judah and captured them.
2. The king of Assyria sent his chief adviser from Lachish to King Hezekiah in Jerusalem, along with a large army.
    
   The chief adviser stood at the conduit of the upper pool which is located on the road to the field where they wash and dry cloth.
3. Eliakim son of Hilkiah, the palace supervisor, accompanied by Shebna the scribe and Joah son of Asaph, the secretary, went out to meet him.
4. The chief adviser said to them, “Tell Hezekiah: ‘This is what the great king, the king of Assyria, says: “What is your source of confidence?
5. Your claim to have a strategy and military strength is just empty talk. In whom are you trusting, that you would dare to rebel against me?
6. Look, you must be trusting in Egypt, that splintered reed staff. If someone leans on it for support, it punctures his hand and wounds him. That is what Pharaoh king of Egypt does to all who trust in him!
7. Perhaps you will tell me, ‘We are trusting in the LORD our God.’ But Hezekiah is the one who eliminated his high places and altars and then told the people of Judah and Jerusalem, ‘You must worship at this altar.’
8. Now make a deal with my master the king of Assyria, and I will give you two thousand horses, provided you can find enough riders for them.
9. Certainly you will not refuse one of my master’s minor officials and trust in Egypt for chariots and horsemen.
10. Furthermore it was by the command of the LORD that I marched up against this land to destroy it. The LORD told me, ‘March up against this land and destroy it!’”’”
     
11. Eliakim, Shebna, and Joah said to the chief adviser, “Speak to your servants in Aramaic, for we understand it. Don’t speak with us in the Judahite dialect in the hearing of the people who are on the wall.”
     
12. But the chief adviser said, “My master did not send me to speak these words only to your master and to you. His message is also for the men who sit on the wall, for they will eat their own excrement and drink their own urine along with you!”
13. The chief adviser then stood there and called out loudly in the Judahite dialect, “Listen to the message of the great king, the king of Assyria.
14. This is what the king says: ‘Don’t let Hezekiah mislead you, for he is not able to rescue you!
15. Don’t let Hezekiah talk you into trusting in the LORD by saying, “The LORD will certainly rescue us; this city will not be handed over to the king of Assyria.”
16. Don’t listen to Hezekiah!’ For this is what the king of Assyria says, ‘Send me a token of your submission and surrender to me. Then each of you may eat from his own vine and fig tree and drink water from his own cistern,
17. until I come and take you to a land just like your own — a land of grain and new wine, a land of bread and vineyards.
     
18. Hezekiah is misleading you when he says, “The LORD will rescue us.” Has any of the gods of the nations rescued his land from the power of the king of Assyria?
19. Where are the gods of Hamath and Arpad? Where are the gods of Sepharvaim? Indeed, did any gods rescue Samaria from my power?
20. Who among all the gods of these lands have rescued their lands from my power? So how can the LORD rescue Jerusalem from my power?’ ”
     
21. They were silent and did not respond, for the king had ordered, “Don’t respond to him.”
22. Eliakim son of Hilkiah, the palace supervisor, accompanied by Shebna the scribe and Joah son of Asaph, the secretary, went to Hezekiah with their clothes torn in grief and reported to him what the chief adviser had said.

NET Bible, plus revisions by AMF

1. When King Hezekiah heard this, he tore his clothes, put on sackcloth, and went to the LORD’s temple.
2. Eliakim the palace supervisor, Shebna the scribe, and the leading priests, clothed in sackcloth, sent this message to the prophet Isaiah son of Amoz:
3. “This is what Hezekiah says: ‘This is a day of distress, insults, and humiliation, as when a baby is ready to leave the birth canal, but the mother lacks the strength to push it through.
4. Perhaps the LORD your God will hear all these things the chief adviser has spoken on behalf of his master, the king of Assyria, who sent him to taunt the living God. When the LORD your God hears, perhaps he will punish him for the things he has said. So pray for this remnant that remains.’”
    
5. When King Hezekiah’s servants came to Isaiah,
6. Isaiah said to them, “Tell your master this: ‘This is what the LORD says: “Don’t be afraid because of the things you have heard — these insults the king of Assyria’s servants have hurled against me.
7. Look, I will take control of his mind; he will receive a report and return to his own land. I will cut him down with a sword in his own land.” ’ ”
    
8. When the chief adviser heard the king of Assyria had departed from Lachish, he left and went to Libnah, where the king was campaigning.

NET Bible, plus revisions by AMF

9. The king heard that King Tirhakah of Ethiopia was marching out to fight him. He again sent messengers to Hezekiah, ordering them:
   10. “Tell King Hezekiah of Judah this: ‘Don’t let your God in whom you trust mislead you when he says, “Jerusalem will not be handed over to the king of Assyria.”
   11. Certainly you have heard how the kings of Assyria have annihilated all lands. Do you really think you will be rescued?
   12. Were the nations whom my predecessors destroyed — the nations of Gozan, Haran, Rezeph, and the people of Eden in Telassar — rescued by their gods?
   13. Where are the king of Hamath, the king of Arpad, and the kings of Lair, Sepharvaim, Hena, and Ivvah?’”
        
14. Hezekiah took the letter from the messengers and read it. Then Hezekiah went up to the LORD’s temple and spread it out before the LORD.
15. Hezekiah prayed before the LORD:
    
    16. “O LORD who commands armies, O God of Israel, who is enthroned on the cherubim! You alone are God over all the kingdoms of the earth. You made the sky and the earth.
    17. Pay attention, LORD, and hear! Open your eyes, LORD, and observe! Listen to this entire message Sennacherib sent and how he taunts the living God!
    18. It is true, LORD, that the kings of Assyria have destroyed all the nations and their lands.
    19. They have burned the gods of the nations, for they are not really gods, but only the product of human hands manufactured from wood and stone. That is why the Assyrians could destroy them.
    20. Now, O LORD our God, rescue us from his power, so all the kingdoms of the earth may know that you alone are the LORD.”

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21. Isaiah son of Amoz sent this message to Hezekiah: “This is what the LORD God of Israel says: ‘Because you prayed to me concerning King Sennacherib of Assyria,
22. this is what the LORD says about him:
     
    “She despises you, she laughs at you,
          does the virgin daughter Zion
    She shakes her head behind your back
          does the daughter Jerusalem
    23. Whom have you taunted and hurled insults at?
              At whom have you shouted
        and looked so arrogantly?
              At the Holy One of Israel!
    24. Through your messengers you taunted the sovereign master,
    …
    28. I know where you live
              and everything you do
                    and how you rage against me.
    29. Because you rage against me
              and the uproar you create has reached my ears,
        I will put my hook in your nose,
              and my bridle between your lips,
        and I will lead you back
              the way you came.”

NET Bible, plus revisions by AMF

30. “This will be a reminder to you that I have spoken the truth:
          This year you will eat what grows wild,
          and next year what grows on its own.
          But the year after that you will plant seed and harvest crops;
          you will plant vines and consume their produce.
31. Those who remain in Judah will take root in the ground and bear fruit.
32. “For a remnant will leave Jerusalem;
          survivors will come out of Mount Zion.
                The faithful love of the LORD who commands armies will accomplish this.
     
33. So this is what the LORD says about the king of Assyria:
    ‘He will not enter this city,
          nor will he shoot an arrow here.
    He will not attack it with his shielded warriors,
          nor will he build siege works against it.
34. He will go back the way he came —
          he will not enter this city,‘says the LORD.
35. I will shield this city and rescue it
          for the sake of my reputation
                and because of my promise to David my servant.”’”
     
36. The LORD’s angel went out and killed 185,000 troops in the Assyrian camp. When they got up early the next morning, there were all the corpses!
37. So King Sennacherib of Assyria broke camp and went on his way. He went home and stayed in Nineveh.
38. One day, as he was worshiping in the temple of his god Nisroch, his sons Adrammelech and Sharezer struck him down with the sword. They ran away to the land of Ararat; his son Esarhaddon replaced him as king.

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