2 Kings 19:5-21, 32-37

That’s the message King Hezekiah’s servants delivered to Isaiah. Isaiah answered them, “Tell your master, ‘GOD’s word: Don’t be at all concerned about what you’ve heard from the king of Assyria’s bootlicking errand boys—these outrageous blasphemies. Here’s what I’m going to do: Afflict him with self-doubt. He’s going to hear a rumor and, frightened for his life, retreat to his own country. Once there, I’ll see to it that he gets killed.’” The Rabshakeh left and found that the king of Assyria had pulled up stakes from Lachish and was now fighting against Libnah. Then Sennacherib heard that Tirhakah king of Cush was on his way to fight against him. So he sent another envoy with orders to deliver this message to Hezekiah king of Judah: “Don’t let that god that you think so much of keep stringing you along with the line, ‘Jerusalem will never fall to the king of Assyria.’ That’s a barefaced lie. You know the track record of the kings of Assyria—country after country laid waste, devastated. And what makes you think you’ll be an exception? Take a good look at these wasted nations, destroyed by my ancestors; did their gods do them any good? Look at Gozan, Haran, Rezeph, the people of Eden at Tel Assar. Ruins. And what’s left of the king of Hamath, the king of Arpad, the king of Sepharvaim, of Hena, of Ivvah? Bones.” Hezekiah took the letter from the envoy and read it. He went to The Temple of GOD and spread it out before GOD. And Hezekiah prayed—oh, how he prayed! GOD, God of Israel, seated in majesty on the cherubim-throne. You are the one and only God, sovereign over all kingdoms on earth, Maker of heaven, maker of earth. Open your ears, GOD, and listen, open your eyes and look. Look at this letter Sennacherib has sent, a brazen insult to the living God! The facts are true, O GOD: The kings of Assyria have laid waste countries and kingdoms. Huge bonfires they made of their gods, their no-gods hand-made from wood and stone. But now O GOD, our God, save us from raw Assyrian power; Make all the kingdoms on earth know that you are GOD, the one and only God. It wasn’t long before Isaiah son of Amoz sent word to Hezekiah

To sum up, this is what GOD says regarding the king of Assyria: He won’t enter this city, nor shoot so much as a single arrow there; Won’t brandish a shield, won’t even begin to set siege; He’ll go home by the same road he came; he won’t enter this city. GOD’s word! I’ll shield this city, I’ll save this city, for my sake and for David’s sake. And it so happened that that very night an angel of GOD came and massacred 185,000 Assyrians. When the people of Jerusalem got up next morning, there it was—a whole camp of corpses! Sennacherib king of Assyria got out of there fast, headed straight home for Nineveh, and stayed put. One day when he was worshiping in the temple of his god Nisroch, his sons Adrammelech and Sharezer murdered him and then escaped to the land of Ararat. His son Esarhaddon became the next king.