Sermon Tone Analysis

The Bad News

Isaiah 38:1-

Isaiah is a book of warnings and fulfilled prophecies.

A Historic Interlude: Isaiah 36–39

In these chapters of historical narrative Isaiah told of an Assyrian invasion of Judah that swept up to the very walls of Jerusalem.

But Judah had a godly king, Hezekiah, who appealed immediately to God.

God responded to Hezekiah’s prayer.

He struck the Assyrian army before it could reach Jerusalem.

The city was saved, and during the life of Hezekiah, Judah knew peace.

Isaiah is the prophet that God gave the assignment to deliver the news to Hezekiah that he was going to die.

Isaiah is the prophet that God gave the assignment to deliver the news to Hezekiah that he was going to die.

It cannot be certainly determined what was the nature of Hezekiah’s sickness.

Many have inferred from הַשְּׁחִין ver.

21; 2 Kings 20:7, that he had the plague, and have associated this with the plague in the Assyrian camp.

But we do know that Hezekiah is sick unto death.

Hezekiah has been extremely sick and perhaps waiting and trying to recover from the sickness.

But God sends a warning to get his house in order.

He was told that he would die and not live.

Perhaps this a an answer to prayers that he had been praying.

I can only imagine that this was not the news he was expecting.

I’m sure he was praying and believing that God would heal him and he would recover.

We’ve focused on what was told to Hezekiah but I want to focus tonight on what he didn’t do.

He was told to set his house in order.

We could interpret that to mean make arrangement as to the succession to the throne; for he had then no son; and as to thy other concerns.

For it was his responsibility to select and choose a qualified man to fill his position as king.

It also had spiritual significance.

Make everything right between you and I.

This would be the time to confess, repent, and assure that nothing stands between you and God.

Nothing is covered, nothing that is unresolved.

Hezekiah turned his face to the wall and prayed unto the Lord.

Notice what he said, “Remember now, O LORD, I beseech thee, how I have walked before thee in truth and with a perfect heart, and have done that which is good in thy sight.

Reminding the Lord of his faithful deeds, the king pled for his life.

The Lord decided to give Hezekiah fifteen more years of life and also promised He would protect Jerusalem from the Assyrians.

In response to Hezekiah’s request for a confirming sign, the Lord refracted the sun’s rays so that the shadow they cast was reversed.

Jak Harbor, WA: Logos Research Systems, Inc.

I have walked in truth

The Holy Bible: King James Version.

(2009).

(Electronic Edition of the 1900 Authorized Version., ).

Bellingham, WA: Logos Research Systems, Inc.

With a perfect heart

That which is good in thy sight

Then he wept.

In other words, I have been faithful.

I have walked before you in truth.

Walk meaning to journey with God as a follower.

We notice

Gene

I have been truthful to you.

I ruled in truth, I operated in truth, I handle business in truth, I lived in truth.

I did it with a perfect heart.

perfect—sincere; not absolutely perfect, but aiming towards it (Mt 5:45); single-minded in walking as in the presence of God (Ge 17:1).The letter of the Old Testament legal righteousness was, however, a standard very much below the spirit of the law as unfolded by Christ (Mt 5:20–48; 2 Co 3:6, 14, 17).

A higher standard

wept sore—JOSEPHUS says, the reason why he wept so sorely was that being childless, he was leaving the kingdom without a successor.

How often our wishes, when gratified, prove curses!

Hezekiah lived to have a son; that son was the idolater Manasseh, the chief cause of God’s wrath against Judah, and of the overthrow of the kingdom (2 Ki 23:26, 27).

4. In 2 Ki 20:4, the quickness of God’s answer to the prayer is marked, “afore Isaiah had gone out into the middle court, the word of the LORD came to him”; that is, before he had left Hezekiah, or at least when he had just left him, and Hezekiah was in the act of praying after having heard God’s message by Isaiah (compare Is 65:24; Ps 32:5; Da 9:21).

5. God of David thy father—God remembers the covenant with the father to the children (Ex 20:5; Ps 89:28, 29).

Notice he didn’t have any apologies to make, no confessions, nothing to repent.

He had no unfinished work to do.

In response to the Lord’s merciful deliverance, Hezekiah offered a song of thanksgiving, in which he recalled his time of need, acknowledged the Lord’s intervention, and promised to praise Him all his days.

This account has a twofold purpose.

First, Hezekiah serves as an example to God’s people of dependence on the Lord in the midst of a crisis.

Second, Hezekiah’s recovery was representative of the nation’s future.

Just as the Lord healed Hezekiah and granted him additional years, so He would give Judah and Jerusalem a new lease on life by miraculously removing the Assyrian threat.

Nevertheless, like Hezekiah’s briefly extended life, so Judah’s and Jerusalem’s days remained numbered.

Every man dies.

Not every man really lives.

~Braveheart

Dream as if you'll live forever.

Live as if you'll die today.

~James Dean

As you grow older, you'll find the only things you regret are the things you didn't do.~Zachary

Scott

♦ And in the end, it's not the years in your life that count.

It's the life in your years.~Abraham

Lincoln

Do it now!

Don’t put off til tomorrow what you can do today.

You may delay, but time will not.

~Benjamin Franklin