Year 9, Day 21: Isaiah 37

Theological Commentary: Click Here

It is amazing what a little repentance can do.  Hezekiah sees the Assyrian army take up positions against his city and knows that there is no way out except to come before God and beg.  Hezekiah does just that.  He goes before the Lord and pleads.  He confesses his faith in the Lord and asks Him to intervene.

The Lord listens.  He responds.  He slaughters almost 200,000 Assyrians overnight and sends the Assyrians back to their home with their tails tucked between their legs.  The defeat is so bad that Sennacherib’s own sons come in and kill him.

Look at the difference between humble repentance and self-indulgent pride.  Hezekiah comes before the Lord humbly and the Lord listens and saves Jerusalem.  Sennacherib grows more and more self-indulgent in the pride he has over his growing power and the Lord shows him His wrath.  The difference between humbleness and pride cannot be any greater than we see here in this passage.

The Lord doesn’t need obsequious behavior.  He doesn’t need spineless pathetic people.  That isn’t the point of being humble.  Humble people know from where their power comes and acknowledge it.  The Lord desires that we come forth boldly into His plan, giving Him the glory and the honor for what He has done.  When we make a mistake, He simply asks us to repent of the mistake, owning it and changing so that the mistake doesn’t happen again.  That’s what Hezekiah does here in this chapter.

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