Readings for today: Isaiah 36-37, 2 Kings 18:9-37, 19, 2 Chronicles 32:1-23, Psalms 76
Standing on the top of the ancient citadel in Amman, Jordan is eye-opening. The history of the site can be traced back to the Bronze Age (3300-1200BC) and has been conquered several times. The Persians, Greeks, Nabateans, Romans, Byzantines, Umayyads, Abbasids, Fatimids, Ayyubids, Mamelukes, and Ottomans all had their day. Every time a new empire would sweep in, they would often raze the city to the ground and rebuild on top of it. They would establish their dominance by repurposing important, often sacred structures like churches, as storage rooms or stables or trash dumps. It’s fascinating to walk through the ancient streets and think about all the different tribes and nations that called this place their home.
It also gives you a sense of the threat Hezekiah was facing when the Assyrian army invaded. They had just wiped out Israel to the north. Now they were moving south with designs to end up in Egypt. Assyria seemed unstoppable. They had crushed nation after nation. Forcibly uprooting the populace and sending them into exile. Their war machine was brutal. They left nothing but complete destruction in their wake. They believed they were following a sacred call. Destroying god after god to demonstrate the supremacy of their own god, Nisroch. Not only that but Judah was weak. She could barely seat an army of a couple of thousand. She had no chance against an army that was almost 100 times her size. Resistance seemed futile. Their fate sealed. All hope lost. But Hezekiah turned to the Lord. He called on God to hear the mockery of the Assyrians. He called on God for deliverance and salvation. He called on God to make His name known by destroying the most powerful nation on earth at the time. And God hears Hezekiah’s prayers. God responds to Hezekiah’s cries. He sends His avenging angel to strike down the Assyrians. He sent Sennacherib back home in disgrace where he is assassinated by his own children.
The Lord makes all human threats empty. No empire - no matter how mighty and strong - can defeat Him. No weapon that is fashioned against Him shall stand. No king or emperor can aspire to ascend His throne. God will brook no rivals. God will allow no pretenders. God will not be mocked. Not by any human being, great or small. Listen to how God Himself describes it in Isaiah 37:23-29, “Whom have you mocked and reviled? Against whom have you raised your voice and lifted your eyes to the heights? Against the Holy One of Israel! By your servants you have mocked the Lord, and you have said, With my many chariots I have gone up the heights of the mountains, to the far recesses of Lebanon, to cut down its tallest cedars, its choicest cypresses, to come to its remotest height, its most fruitful forest. I dug wells and drank waters, to dry up with the sole of my foot all the streams of Egypt. Have you not heard that I determined it long ago? I planned from days of old what now I bring to pass, that you should make fortified cities crash into heaps of ruins, while their inhabitants, shorn of strength, are dismayed and confounded, and have become like plants of the field and like tender grass, like grass on the housetops, blighted before it is grown. I know your sitting down and your going out and coming in, and your raging against me. Because you have raged against me and your complacency has come to my ears, I will put my hook in your nose and my bit in your mouth, and I will turn you back on the way by which you came.”
Friends, greater is He that lives in you than is in the world. With God at your side, you can stand against a legion. You can leap over a wall. The next time you feel anxious or afraid. The next time you feel isolated and alone. The next time you start to doubt the provision and protection and power and promise of God, read Psalms 18. Claim David’s words as your own. Let them fill you with peace and a deep sense of security. God is on your side!
Readings for tomorrow: None