Isaiah 37:15

NOBILITY AND SECURITY

Isa_33:15-16. He that walketh righteously, &c.

Those were terrible times in Jerusalem. The Assyrian power was exceedingly formidable; it was as ferocious as it was strong. The Assyrian had come up into the land, yet God had given a promise to His people that they should be preserved (chap. Isa_37:33-34). Some in the city rested con tent with the promise of God, and went about their daily business feeling perfectly safe. But there were few such. A great number were afraid they would be destroyed—they were sure of it. Who was to save them, or what power could stand in the way of Sennacherib? These were the sinners and hypocrites, and the time of trial developed them. They could not live, they said; the land was smoking, for the Assyrian had set everything on fire. Some who dwell among God’s people are sinners and not saints, hypocrites and not believers. When all goes well with the Church of God you cannot detect the difference. But when the time of trial comes, the hypocrites and sinners will be discovered by their own fear. Let us not be satisfied with being in Zion—in the Church; let us not rest till we are quite sure we are not sinners or hypocrites in it. If our religion is worth anything, it is worth most in the hour of trial; and if it does not stand us in good stead in the time of temptation and sorrow, what is the use of it?

I. THE CHARACTER OF GOD’S PEOPLE. They are partly described in the words of our text, but I am obliged to go a little farther afield for one part of their character. Those who in the time of danger will be kept and comforted are a people who have a humble, patient, present faith in God. I am sure these are such, for they are described—they describe themselves—in the second verse of the chapter before us. They are a humble people, who dare not trust themselves, but trust in God. They are a praying people, who make their appeal to God under a sense of need. Their appeal is to His free grace. They are a waiting people. If at once they have not comfort and joy, they tarry and are perfectly content to abide His time, for it is sure to be best. They have a present faith in God, for “Be Thou their arm every morning” is their prayer. They did not trust in God years ago and get saved, and think they can live without faith, but they believe “the just shall live by faith.” They look for everything to their God: “Thou art our salvation in the time of trouble.”

Our text gives a description of these people by their various features. It describes how they walk: “He that walketh righteously.” Faith has an elevating, ennobling effect upon our entire manhood. The promise belongs only to the people who come under the description; see to it that you do not take the comfort, if you do not come under the character! Study the description of the daily walk and conversation of this blessed man who is to dwell on high.

The first feature which is described is his tongue. “He speaketh uprightly.” If you drew a portrait of a man, you could not paint his tongue; but if you give a description of a man’s character, you cannot omit his speech. A man that lies, talks obscenely, &c., is no child of God. The grace of God very speedily sweetens a man’s tongue. A doctor says, “Put out your tongue,” and he judges the symptoms of health or disease thereby; and surely there is no better test of character than the condition of the tongue.

Next, the heart. “He that despiseth the gain of oppression.” Not only does he not oppress any man, nor wish to gain anything by extortion, or by any act of unrighteousness, but he looks upon it as contemptible and despises it. He likes gain if it comes cleanly to him, and it is as welcome to him as to another, but he will not have a thing he cannot pray over.

Next comes the ear. “That stoppeth his ears from hearing of blood.” Men of war and those who delight in war will tell to one another what they did in battle and whom they slew; and in those old times there were tales of bloodshed that would have made our ears to tingle, but the good men in Jerusalem would not hear them; they could not endure it. It is not the hearing of blood alone we must avoid, but the hearing of anything tainted. The genuine Christian feels he has mischief enough in his own heart without adding to it.

Again, “He shutteth his eyes from seeing evil.” He cannot help seeing it as he goes his pilgrimage through life, but as far as possible he tries to avoid it. He does not go and find an evening’s amusement gazing upon it. It were better to be blind, deaf, and dumb than to see, and hear, and speak in some places. The true believer is a man who has himself well in hand. He has a bit in the mouths of all the horses that draw the chariot of life, and he holds them in, and will not let his ear, eye, tongue, foot, or hand carry him away. He will have nothing to do with evil: “He shaketh his hand from holding of bribes.”

II. THE SECURITY OF SUCH A MAN. Notice it first, as it is pictorially described: “He shall dwell on high.” The Assyrians were attacking the country, and in times of invasion men always went to the highest parts of the country to escape from the enemy. Well, this man shall have a quiet resting-place on the heights, so high up that his enemies cannot get at him. They may plunder all round, but cannot plunder him. The sentinel on the crags of inaccessible rock shall, standing out in the sunlight gleaming calmly and brightly, bid defiance to every foe. He shall dwell on the heights, out of reach of the arrows. “His place of defence shall be the munitions of rock;” not one rock, but rocks; mass upon mass of mountain shall stand between him and the foe, and there shall he dwell in perfect security. “Oh,” but says one, “they will starve him out. There will be nothing for the people to eat, and they will open the doors and say, ‘Come in! only give us bread.’ ” “Bread shall be given him,” and as he could not be driven out, so he shall not be starved out, for the bread of Heaven shall be given him, if it come from nowhere else. “But even,” says one, “if there may be bread brought into the city, they will run short of water, and must eventually capitulate through thirst.” No, says the promise, “his water shall be sure.” There shall be springs that never can be dried up within the castle itself, and they shall drink and drink as much as they will, and yet the supplies shall never be exhausted. “Now,” says one, “this is poetry.” Just so: it is a poetical description, but it is all founded on facts.

Look at the positive facts in the actual experience of the child of God. First, it is a matter of fact that the man who believes in the Lord Jesus Christ, and lives as a Christian should live, lives on high. His mind is elevated above the common cares, trials, and sorrows of life (H. E. I. 1080–1084, 4162, 4163). Many of you know how secure and immutable your defence is, for you have God’s promise, “I will never leave nor forsake thee.” “No good thing will I withhold from him that walketh uprightly.” What munitions of rocks can be compared with these things in which it is impossible for God to lie? You are dwelling where you must be safe; for, first, you were chosen before the foundation of the world, and God will not lose His chosen, nor shall His decree be frustrated. Next, you have been bought with the precious blood of the Son of God Himself, and He will never lose what He has so dearly bought. You have also been quickened by the Holy Ghost and made to live unto God, and that life cannot die. You have been taken into the family of God and made His child, and your name shall never be taken out of the family register. You are joined unto Christ in one spirit; you are a member of His body, of His flesh, and of His bones; and shall Christ be dismembered, the Son of God be rent in twain? I feel I stand where all the devils of hell cannot reach me, where the angels of God might envy me, and where I can say, “Who shall separate me from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord?” and challenge earth and hell and heaven alike—if so it please them—to assail me, for who can harm me, if my confidence be in the living God?

The poetic utterance, “Thy bread shall be given thee,” is also literally true. You have sometimes had very little, but have always had enough. When God multiplied the meal and the oil of the widow of Zarephath, I do believe that every day Elijah lived with her she had to scrape the bottom of the barrel. We are not told it filled up at once. Just so, you may often have to reach the bottom of the barrel, and the oil may seem to come a drop at a time: this is about as much as you want, and if you get as much as you can eat at one meal, it is all the fresher, and does not breed worms like the manna in the wilderness. It is the heavenly bread we have sometimes to be anxious about; but if ministers do not feed you, God will Himself.

As for the living waters, they shall always flow both in summer and winter. They shall be within thee a well of living water springing up into eternal life. But words cannot tell the privileges of the man who dwells with God. He need not wish to change places with the Archangels.

Friend, if you are not a Christian, do not profess to be one; do not hope by mere empty profession to win the blessedness of God’s people. Confess your sins, and seek the righteousness of God. Fain would I drop into your mouths that prayer, “O Lord, be gracious unto us.”

As for you that are really striving to do that which is right and true, at the same time trusting alone in Jesus for your salvation, I would say to you, What a happy people we ought to be! We ought every one of us to have a shining face (H. E. I. 756–762, 3037–3039). I do not know where the Queen is just now, but if I were a dove and could fly in the air, I would soon find her, for I should see the royal flag flying on the flag-staff. Wherever the monarch is, there will the streamer be found flying. Is the King with you to-day? If so, keep the flag flying. Let the banner fly to the breeze, and let the world know that there are no people so happy, none so much to be envied, as believers in Jesus Christ.—C. H. Spurgeon.

A KING’S PRAYER

Isa_37:15-20. And Hezekiah prayed, &c.

I. Hezekiah prayed to Jehovah as the God of his nation. “O Lord God of Israel.”

1. The nation bore the name of one of its progenitors, who “as a prince had prevailed with God.” The name Israel had been more generally applied to the northern kingdom, which had already been overthrown, but Hezekiah claims it for the remnant that was left. When he uttered that name, did he wish to remind himself of Jacob’s power in prayer, or of God’s special interest in His nation? Perhaps both. God had chosen, defended, saved it. Names which recall Divine deliverance may encourage us in prayer.

2. His nation was Jehovah’s peculiar dwelling-place: “Which dwelleth between the cherubim.” The Shekinah, symbol of the Divine presence, shone forth from between those weird figures on either side of the mercy-seat. Hezekiah’s reference to this peculiar Divine manifestation was intended to suggest that God would protect His own dwelling-place. This is true. God’s dwelling-place is always safe, whether it be a nation—a man—a church (H. E. I. 1246–1251).

II. In his prayer Hezekiah recognises the sole supremacy of Jehovah. “Thou art the God,” &c., “and have cast their gods into the fire,” &c. Polytheism prevailed in the nations surrounding Judæa. Sennacherib had spoken of Jehovah as if He were the God merely of the Jews, and in his ignorance supposed that Hezekiah had offended Him by removing the “high places.” Hezekiah asserted—

1. That Jehovah was the only true God.

2. That He exercised supreme control over all the kingdoms of the earth.

III. He appealed to Jehovah as the Maker of heaven and earth. In the sublime acknowledgment these truths are involved:—

1. That He is eternal (H. E. I. 2253; P. D. 1492, 1518).

2. That He is separate from, all His works. He is immanent in them, but independent of them (P. D. 1519).

3. That He is omnipotent. He who made the universe must be almighty (H. E. I. 2270; P. D. 1509).

4. That He has all things under His control (H. E. I. 4023). This conception of God afforded solid ground for Hezekiah’s faith. Before the greatness of Jehovah the might of His enemies sank into nothingness. Large conceptions of God will ever give large expectations in prayer. The more we widen our views of God, the more confidence we shall have in Him in trouble.

IV. Hezekiah prayed with great earnestness. “Lord, bow down Thine ear,” &c. “Now, therefore, O Lord, our God, I beseech Thee.” Fervent desires lead invariably to ardent expressions. Cold prayers are no prayers. Earnestness is needed, not to lead God to observe our condition, nor to create in Him a disposition to help us, but—

1. That the strength of our desires may be revealed.

2. That we may be raised from the low condition of formal devotion.

3. That we may have all the spiritual culture which the outcries of real need may impart.

4. That we may be prepared to receive deliverances thankfully (H. E. I. 3831–3838, 3893).

V. Hezekiah recognised the greatness of the deliverance which he sought. “Of a truth, Lord,” &c. Other kingdoms had fallen; why not his? Only that his hope was in God. No human ingenuity or might could deliver him. Men must be brought to see that their need of deliverance is great. Sometimes they are brought to see this by temporal emergencies. Such crises teach us more of God than years of ordinary living (H. E. I. 117–121). Spiritual deliverances must come from God alone. The soul is a besieged city. The forces of Diabolus are around Mansoul. Its Sennacherib is mighty. The deliverance which it needs is great. To recognise the greatness of the deliverance we need will—

1. Deepen our sense of our own helplessness.

2. Stimulate the exercise of great faith.

3. Prepare us for the manifestation of God’s great delivering hand.

VI. Hezekiah associated the glory of Jehovah with the deliverance which he sought. The reproaches that had been cast upon him had been cast upon God. The deliverance of Jerusalem would manifest God’s sole supremacy in the earth—“that all the kingdoms,” &c. No prayers are so powerful as those which seek God’s glory, for that is the real and ultimate good of humanity. Many prayers will not bear this test; they are earthly, narrow, selfish (P. D. 2842).

Hezekiah’s prayer prevailed. The besieging army was destroyed; whether, as Kingsley suggests, “by a stream of poisonous vapours such as often comes forth out of the ground during earthquakes and eruptions of burning mountains, and kills all men and animals that breathe it,” or by a pestilence, or by the simoom, we cannot tell. But it was God’s delivering hand put forth in answer to Hezekiah’s faith and prayer—

1. That His people might learn to put their trust in Him; and

2. That all the earth might know that none can defy His power and prosper.—W. Osborne Lilley: The Homiletic Quarterly, vol. i. pp. 521–524.

The Preacher's Complete Homiletical Commentary (gen. ed. Joseph S. Exell; Funk & Wagnalls, c. 1892) — public domain (pre-1929). A full-Bible homiletical/sermon-outline anthology covering 65 of 66 books (2 John is absent from the source module). Text from a community e-Sword module.

Verse 15. Unto the Lord - "Before JEHOVAH"] That is, in the sanctuary. For אל el, the Syriac, Chaldee, and the other copy, 2Kg 19:15, read לפני liphney, "before the face."

Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible (1810–1826) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

Incline thine ear, O Lord, and hear,.... The prayer which Hezekiah was now presenting to him, as also the reproach of the enemy:

open thine eyes, O Lord, and see; the letter he spread before him, and take notice of the blasphemies in it; and punish for them. Both these clauses are to be understood after the manner of men, and in a way becoming the being and perfections of God, to whom ears and eyes are not properly to be ascribed, and so likewise the bowing of the one, and the opening of the other; but both denote the gracious condescension of God, to take notice of things on earth, and vindicate the cause of his people, which is his own:

and hear all the words of Sennacherib, which he hath sent to reproach the living God; the Septuagint, Vulgate Latin, and Arabic versions, understand it of the words which Sennacherib sent in the letter to reproach the Lord; but in Kg2 19:16, it is, "which hath sent him"; the messenger, Rabshakeh, or whoever was the person that brought the letter to Hezekiah. The Targum paraphrases the latter part thus,

"to reproach the people of the living God;''

both God and his people were reproached, and both carry in them arguments with the Lord to hear and avenge himself and them; and the king prays that he would "hear", take notice of and observe all the words and give a proper answer, by inflicting just punishment.

John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

“And Hezekiah prayed to Jehovah, saying “(what follows in the next verse). Gill quaintly says that, instead of answering the letter himself, he prays the Lord to answer it. Instead of ‘to’, the parallel passage (2Ki 19:15) has ‘before Jehovah’.

Joseph Addison Alexander, The Prophecies of Isaiah (1846–1847; New York: Scribner, 1870–1878) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Isaiah

THE TRIUMPH OF FAITH

Isa 37:14 - Isa 37:21, Isa 37:33 - Isa 37:38.

Is trust in Jehovah folly or wisdom? That was the question raised by Sennacherib’s invasion. A glance at the preceding chapters will show how the high military official, ‘the rabshakeh,’ or chief of the officers, shaped all his insolent and yet skilful mixture of threats and promises so as to demonstrate the vanity of trust in Egypt or in Jehovah, or in any but ‘the great king.’ Isaiah had been labouring to lift his countrymen to the height of reliance on Jehovah alone, and now the crucial test of the truth of his contention had come. On the one hand were Sennacherib and his host, flushed with victory, and sure of crushing this puny kinglet Hezekiah and his obstinate little city, perched on its rock. On the other was nothing but a prophet’s word. Where is the stronger force? And does political prudence dictate reliance on the Unseen or on the visible? The moment is the crisis of Isaiah’s work, and this narrative has been placed, with true insight into its importance, at the close of the first half of this book.

To grasp the significance of the text the preceding events have to be remembered. Hezekiah’s kingdom had been overrun, and tribute exacted from him. The rabshakeh had been sent from the main body of the Assyrian army, which was down at Lachish in the Philistine low country on the road to Egypt, in order to try to secure Jerusalem by promises and threats, since it was too important a post to leave in the rear, if Egypt was to be invaded. That attempt having failed, and the Egyptian forces being in motion, this new effort was made to induce Hezekiah to surrender. A letter was sent, whether accompanied by any considerable armed force or no does not appear. At this point the narrative begins. It may be best studied as an illustration of the trial of faith, its refuge, its pleading, and its deliverance.

I. Note the trial of faith. Rabshakeh had derided the obstinate confidence in Jehovah, which kept these starving men on the walls grimly silent in spite of his coaxing. The letter of Sennacherib harps on the same string. It is written in a tone of assumed friendly remonstrance, and lays out with speciousness the apparent grounds for calling trust in Jehovah absurdity. There are no threats in it. It is all an appeal to common sense and political prudence. It marshals undeniable facts. Experience has shown the irresistible power of Assyria. There have been plenty of other little nations which have trusted in their local deities, and what has become of them? Barbarous names are flourished in Hezekiah’s face, and their wasted dominions are pointed to as warnings against his committing a parallel folly. There is nothing in the letter which might not have been said by a friend, and nothing which was not said by the Jews who had lost their faith in their God. It was but the putting into plain words of what ‘common-sense’ and faint faith had often whispered to Hezekiah. The very absence of temper or demand in the letter gives it an aspect of that ‘sweet reasonableness’ so dear to sense-bound souls.

Mutatis mutandis, the letter may stand for a specimen of the arguments which worldly prudence brings to shake faith, in all ages. We, too, are assailed by much that sounds most forcible from the point of view of mere earthly calculation. Sennacherib does not lie in boasting of his victories. He and his shoals of soldiers are very real and potent. It does seem madness for one little kingdom to stand out, and all the more so because its king is cooped up in his city, as the cuneiform inscription proudly tells, ‘like a bird in a cage,’ and all the rest of his land is in the conqueror’s grip. They who look only at the things seen cannot but think the men of faith mad. They who look at the things unseen cannot but know that the men of sense are fools. The latter elaborately prove that the former are impotent, but they have left out one factor in their calculations, and that is God. One man and God at his back are stronger than Sennacherib and all his mercenaries.

II. Note the refuge of tempted faith. What was Hezekiah to do with the crafty missive? It was hoped that he would listen to reason, and come down from his perch. But he neither yielded nor took counsel with his servants, but, like a devout man, went into the house of the Lord, and spread the letter before the Lord. It would have gone hard with him if he had not been to the house of the Lord many a time before. It is not easy to find our way thither for the first time, when our eyes are blinded by tears or our way darkened by calamities. But faith instinctively turns to God when anything goes wrong, because it has been accustomed to turn to Him when all was right, according to the world’s estimate of right and wrong. Whither should the burdened heart betake itself but to Him who daily bears our burdens? The impulse to tell God all troubles is as truly a mark of the faithful soul as the impulse to tell everything to the beloved is the life-breath of love.

The act of spreading the letter before the Lord is an eloquent symbol, which some prosaic and learned commentators have been dull enough to call gross, and to compare to Buddhist praying-mills! Its meaning is expressed in the prayer which follows. It is faith’s appeal to His knowledge. It is faith’s casting of its burden on the Lord. Our faith is of little power to bless, unless it impels us to take God into confidence in regard to everything which troubles us. If the letter is not grave enough to be spread before Him, it is too small to annoy us. If we truly live in fellowship with God, we shall find ourselves in His house, with the cause of our trouble in our hands, before we have time to think. Instinct acts more quickly than reason, and, if our faith be vital, it will not need to be argued into speaking to God of all that weighs upon us.

III. Note the pleading of faith. Hezekiah’s address to God is no mere formal recapitulation of divine names, but is the effort of faith to grasp firmly the truths which the enemy denies, and on which it builds. So considered, the accumulation of titles in Isa 37:16 is very instructive, and shows how a trustful soul puts forth the energy of its faith in summoning to mind the great aspects of the divine name as bulwarks against suggested fears, and bases of supplication. Hezekiah appeals to ‘the God of Hosts,’ the Ruler of all the embattled forces of the universe, as well as of the armies of angels. What is Sennacherib’s array compared with these? He appeals to the ‘God of Israel,’ as pleading the ancient relationship, which binds the unchangeable Guardian of the people to be still what He has been, and casts the responsibility of Israel’s preservation upon Him. He appeals to Him ‘who sits between the cherubim,’ as thence defending and filling the threatened city. He grasps the thought that Jehovah is ‘God alone’ with a vividness which is partly due no doubt to Isaiah’s teaching, but is also the indignant recoil of faith from the assumption of the letter, that Jehovah was but as the beaten deities of Gozan and the rest. Faith clings the more tenaciously to truths denied, as a dog will hold on to the stick that one tries to pull from it.

Thus, having heartened himself and pled with God by all these names, Hezekiah comes to his petition. It is but translating into words the symbol of spreading the letter before God. He asks God to behold and to hear the defiant words. Prayer tells God what it knows that He knows already, for it relieves the burdened heart to tell Him. It asks Him to see and hear what it knows that He does see and hear. But the prayer is not for mere observance followed by no divine act, but for taking knowledge as the precursor of the appropriate help. Of such seeing and hearing by God, believing prayer is the appointed condition. ‘Your Father knoweth what things ye have need of, before ye ask Him’; but that is not a reason for silence, but for supplication.

Hezekiah rightly regarded Sennacherib’s words as meant to reproach the living God, for the point of the letter was to dissuade from trust in Him, as no more powerful than the petty deities of already conquered cities. The prayer, therefore, pleads that God would take care of His own honour, and by delivering Jerusalem, show His sole sovereignty. It is a high and wonderful level for faith to reach, when it regards personal deliverance mainly in its aspect as vindicating God and warranting faith. We may too easily conclude that God’s honour is involved in our deliverance, and it is well to be on our guard against that.

But it is possible to die to self so fully as to feel that our cause is His, because His is so entirely ours; and then we may come to that heroic faith which seeks even personal good more for God’s sake than for our own. It was noble that this man should have no word to say about self but ‘Save us, that all the kingdoms of the earth may know that Thou art God alone.’ Like him, we may each feel that our defence is more God’s affair than ours, in proportion as we feel we are His rather than our own. That siege of Jerusalem was indeed as a duel between faith and unbelief on the one hand, and between Jehovah and the gods who were ‘no gods’ on the other. Sennacherib’s letter was a defiant challenge to Jehovah to do His best for this people, and when faith repeated in prayer the insolence of unbelief only one result was possible. It came.

IV. Note the deliverance of faith. Isaiah’s grand prophecy tempts us to linger over its many beauties and magnificent roll of triumphant scorn, but it falls outside our purpose. As for the catastrophe, it should be noted that its place and time are not definitely stated, and that probably the notion that the Assyrian army was annihilated before Jerusalem is a mistake. Sennacherib and his troops were at Libnah, on their way to meet the Egyptian forces. If there were any of them before Jerusalem, they would at most be a small detachment, sufficient to invest it. Probably the course of events was that, at some time not specified, soon after the dismissal of the messengers who brought the letter, the awful destruction fell, and that, when the news of the disaster reached the detachment at Jerusalem, as the psalm which throbs with the echoes of the triumph says, ‘They were troubled, and hasted away.’

How complete was the crushing blow the lame record of this campaign in the inscriptions shows, in which the failure of the attempt to capture the city is covered up by vapouring about tribute and the like. If it had not failed, however, the success would certainly have been told, as all similar cases are told, with abundant boasting. The other fact is also to be remembered, that Sennacherib tried no more conclusions with Jerusalem and Jehovah, and though he lived for some twenty years afterwards, never again ventured on to the soil where that mighty God fought for His people.

The appended notice of Sennacherib’s death has been added by some narrator, since it probably occurred after Isaiah’s martyrdom. ‘All they that take the sword shall perish with the sword.’ Such a career as his could not but give taste for violence and bloodshed, and dimmish regard for human life. Retribution comes slowly, for twenty years intervened between the catastrophe to the army and the murder of the king. Its penalties increase as its fall delays; for first came the blotting out of the army, and then, when that had no effect, at last the sword in his own heart. ‘He that being often reproved hardeneth his neck shall suddenly be destroyed, and that without remedy.’

But the great lesson of that death is the same as that of the other king’s deliverance. Hezekiah ‘went unto the house of the Lord,’ and found Him a very present help in trouble. Sennacherib was slain in the house of his god. The two pictures of the worshippers and their fates are symbolic of the meaning of the whole story. Sennacherib had dared Jehovah to try His strength against him and his deities. The challenge was accepted, and that bloody corpse before the idol that could not help preaches a ghastly sermon on the text, ‘They that make them are like unto them; so is every one that trusteth in them. O Israel, trust thou in the Lord: He is their help and their shield.’

Alexander MacLaren, Expositions of Holy Scripture (1904–1910) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.