God Vindicates His Honor over an Arrogant Foe

Isaiah 37

I will defend this city and rescue it for my sake and for the sake of my servant David. (Isa 37:35)

Main Idea: The battle between God and the king of Assyria comes to a head, and God wins effortlessly, symbolizing also Christ’s defeat of our eternal enemies.

1. Hezekiah’s Humility: Disgraced, Humbled, Seeking Answers (37:1-4)
   1. God’s zeal for his own glory
   2. God’s zeal for the purification of his people
2. God’s First Answer: Fear Not, the Blasphemer Will Die (37:5-7).
   1. An immediate answer from God
   2. The blasphemer will die.
3. The King of Assyria’s Blasphemy: “Your ‘God’ Is No Different!” (37:8-13)
   1. The arrogance of the king of Assyria
   2. “God is lying to you!”
4. Hezekiah’s Prayer: “Defend Your Glorious Name, O Lord!” (37:14-20)
   1. Hezekiah prays based on God’s glory.
   2. Hezekiah prays based on God’s covenant with Israel.
5. The Verdict Comes Down from the King of the Universe (37:21-38).
   1. God’s mighty words
   2. God’s mighty deeds

Hezekiah’s Humility: Disgraced, Humbled, Seeking Answers

Isaiah 37:1-4

For many unbelievers, the most powerful force for shaping world history is military might. History has been shaped by one world-­dominating empire after the next: Egypt, Assyria, Babylon, Medo-Persia, Greece, Rome, etc. It seems nothing can stop a conqueror at the head of an army sweeping across the earth to add to his realm. But the Bible reveals there is a power infinitely greater: God’s zeal for his own glory. In Isaiah 37 these two forces come face to face, and God’s effortless victory stands as a timeless lesson to the human race.

At the center of this victory is God’s determination to purify his people from their sins so that they will glorify God alone. Despite Isaiah’s many warnings, the people of Judah have persisted in many patterns of sin, and Hezekiah has continued to seek deliverance from Egypt instead of relying on God alone. Now at last, with the Assyrian army having conquered everything in Judah but Jerusalem, with the royal spokesman having proclaimed the intimidating speech recorded in Isaiah 36, with Hezekiah’s delegation having returned with their clothes torn, Hezekiah has nowhere left to turn.

He begins by putting on sackcloth as a sign of humiliation before the Lord and going into the temple to seek the Lord. He also seeks answers from Isaiah the prophet. He urges Isaiah to pray to the Lord on behalf of the remnant that still survives, acknowledging that these actions are a just punishment from the Lord for the sins of the nation (v. 3). He also shows his one last shred of hope in this exceedingly dark situation: the words of blasphemy spoken by the royal spokesman. He is humble about this, for he knows that God doesn’t always immediately act to vindicate his glory in a world of blasphemy, so he says, “Perhaps the Lord your God will hear . . . and will rebuke him” (emphasis added). Hezekiah represents the godliest response we can have in a time of humbling chastisement from the Lord.

God’s First Answer: Fear Not, the Blasphemer Will Die

Isaiah 37:5-7

Through Isaiah, God gives an initial answer to King Hezekiah’s inquiries. God commands Hezekiah and the remnant not to be afraid because God has heard the blasphemous words of the underlings of the king of Assyria. God rules over mighty nations as powerfully as he rules over sparrows, and he is able to move kings to do his will: “I am about to put a spirit in him and he will hear a rumor and return to his own land, where I will cause him to fall by the sword” (v. 7). With ease, God will move the heart of this king for his own destruction (Prov 21:1).

The King of Assyria’s Blasphemy: “Your ‘God’ Is No Different!”

Isaiah 37:8-13

Verses 8-13 represent the final warning of Sennacherib to Hezekiah. Judah’s purchased “ally,” Egypt, has marched out to fight Assyria. Lest Hezekiah should gain any confidence from this, Sennacherib sends the letter recorded in the text. The letter reiterates the royal spokesman’s blasphemies against the power of the Lord. But the letter gets far more insulting than the royal spokesman did. It basically says, “Do not let the God you are trusting in lie to you when he says he will deliver you from my hand.” Shocking blasphemy! Not only does Sennacherib say that the God of Judah is impotent to stop him but that God is a liar and a deceiver when he says he will deliver them. The bottom line: “Your God is no different than the gods of any other nation.”

Hezekiah’s Prayer: “Defend Your Glorious Name, O Lord!”

Isaiah 37:14-20

Hezekiah’s response to this blasphemous letter is one of the most memorable and faith-filled reactions in Scripture. He takes the actual letter into the temple and spreads it out before the Lord. Then he prays with great faith and passion. He understands the far greater force in the universe than that of tyrant kings: God’s zeal for his own glory. He addresses God in covenant language unique to Israel and Judah: Yahweh, Lord of Armies, is the God who made the universe and rules over every kingdom on the face of the earth, but he is also the God of Israel who is enthroned above the cherubim on the ark of the covenant. Hezekiah links the awesome power of God to the specific fortunes of Judah. As Isaiah will say a few chapters later, “God is enthroned above the circle of the earth; its inhabitants are like grasshoppers” (Isa 40:22). Hezekiah pleads with God to see and hear Sennacherib’s blasphemies. He dismisses the “proof” that the Assyrians have cited that no god can stop them; he realizes that the gods of those other nations are nothing more than mere blocks of wood and stone. Hezekiah finishes by pleading with God for deliverance from the king of Assyria, not only for Judah’s sake, but ultimately so that all the kingdoms of the earth may know that God alone truly is God.

The Verdict Comes Down from the King of the Universe

Isaiah 37:21-38

The verdict now comes down from the Judge of the whole earth; it takes our breath away. It comes in two parts: God’s mighty words (vv. 21-35) and God’s mighty deeds (vv. 36-38). God speaks to Hezekiah first: “Because you prayed to me about King Sennacherib of Assyria . . .” God has not changed his plan because of Hezekiah’s prayer, but rather God uses Hezekiah’s prayer mysteriously to accomplish his preordained ends, and God includes Hezekiah ahead of time in what he’s going to do. There are four parts to God’s answer: (1) God promises to judge the blasphemer (vv. 22-29); (2) God promises to save his remnant (vv. 30-32); (3) God promises to deliver Jerusalem (vv. 33-35); and (4) God makes clear that he does all of this for his own glory (v. 35).

First, God promises to judge the blasphemer. God turns the arrogance of Sennacherib against him (vv. 22-29). Sennacherib, in effect, has said to Hezekiah, “Don’t you know who I am? Don’t you know what I have done to other nations? Why aren’t you afraid of me?” God, in effect, turns the whole thing around: “Don’t you know who I am? Don’t you understand the infinite power at my disposal? Why aren’t you afraid to blaspheme me?”

Next, God discusses the centerpiece of Sennacherib’s argument: his recent history of military conquest. The king of Assyria has made outrageous claims: ascending mountains with his chariots, chopping down the cedars of Lebanon, drying up the Nile by merely stepping in it (vv. 24-25)! Now God pulls the curtain back and reveals the sovereignty of his rule over the nations of the earth: God asserts that all of their military successes have been preordained in his eternal plan (vv. 26-27). It is not only that they won because the gods of the nations are merely idols; they won because the God of the Jews ordained it. God ends by threatening Sennacherib with personal destruction because of his personal blasphemy. Verse 28 says that God tracks every single moment of his life and knows everything he is doing. If Sennacherib heard this prophecy and took it seriously, he should have been thoroughly unnerved. This verse is a clear threat from an omniscient and omnipotent God: God will drag him back to Assyria by the nose and there have him assassinated by his own sons.

God then offers tender words of assurance to Hezekiah and to the remnant of Judah that still survives (vv. 30-32). God promises to provide food for them as agricultural production steadily returns to normal. God’s zeal for the welfare of his people will guarantee their survival.

Next, God makes his verdict clear concerning the Assyrian army and Jerusalem. In the original language five of the clauses in verses 33-34 emphasize what Sennacherib will not do: He will not enter this city; he will not shoot an arrow here; he will not come against the city with shield; he will not build a siege ramp against it; I repeat, he will not enter this city. Instead, he will return by the way he came. The sovereign God will defend this city by himself. Often God raises up his own people—mighty warriors—to win great victories. Or sometimes God causes confusion among the enemy so that they destroy themselves. Sometimes God raises up other nations to fight the people threatening his own people. But here God does it all by himself, as he said he would do: “Then Assyria will fall, but not by human sword” (Isa 31:8).

So this is the end of the Assyrian threat. For all the terrifying power of the seemingly undefeatable army of Assyria, God’s simple word overrules all things. On the scales of human history, all the nations are like tiny weights: some weighing a gram, some weighing a tenth of a gram, some weighing a kilogram. But God weighs a trillion grams (and more!), and whatever side of the scales he comes down on, that side will win.

Finally, God reveals the motive behind all this: his own glory. Verse 35 makes plain that he will defend the city of Jerusalem for his own name’s sake. He mentions David at this point as a foretaste of the Son of David, Jesus Christ. Because of the plan he has to redeem the world through Christ, he must defend Jerusalem from the Assyrians.

The mighty words of God lead to the mighty deeds of God. The angel of the Lord is dispatched, and in one night he slaughters 185,000 Assyrian troops. This staggering slaughter is approximately the total number of troops that fought on both sides of the battle of Gettysburg! It is quite possible that God used a quick-acting plague, a fever that burned up these warriors, as Isaiah 10:16 seems to indicate. But whatever the means were, the end was clear: death. The angel of the Lord in the Old Testament is frequently the preincarnate Christ (Gen 22:11; Exod 3:2). Here it is not so clear that it was Christ, but it seems to fit with the significance of this moment. Just as Jesus would one day return in glory to destroy the antichrist in Revelation 19 and rescue his people, so he does here.

The epilogue is stunning. Not only the macro-scale (185,000 Assyrian troops dead) but so also the micro-scale: a single blasphemer cut down. God’s arm is immeasurably long; there is not a single square inch on this planet that God doesn’t rule. He moves in Sennacherib’s sons to assassinate their father while he is worshiping in the temple of his “god” Nisroch. This is the justice of God to Sennacherib: “You said I don’t have power to save my people from you; the fact is, your ‘god’ doesn’t have power to save you from me, not even on his own turf!”

Applications: Timeless Lessons from a Miraculous Slaughter

Let us list some of the timeless lessons of this chapter:

• God’s glory is uppermost in his own affections.
• Therefore, God’s actions are first for his name, and second for human salvation.
• God’s power and knowledge are awesome.
• God is sovereign over the nations.
• God rules over the hearts of kings.
• The human heart is arrogant.
• God opposes the proud but gives grace to the humble.
• God answers humble prayer.
• God’s wrath is terrifying.
• God’s mercy to sinners is amazing.

Each of these deserves a full sermon!

A final word: The true tyrant threatening the people of God is sin ruling in death (Rom 5:21). God dispatches his only begotten Son, Jesus Christ, who defeats this terrifying foe, not by killing but by dying. To him alone be the glory.

Reflect and Discuss

1. How does this chapter show God’s zeal for his own glory?
2. How would it affect our lives if we lived more consistently zealous for God’s glory rather than concerned about human themes?
3. Why is it important to put the highest motive as God’s glory rather than human salvation?
4. In what ways is God’s awesome power on display in Isaiah 37?
5. Why is God’s sovereignty over nations vital to his control of human history in general? How does this doctrine bring us great comfort?
6. How do the boasts of the Assyrian king show that he is really worshiping himself as a god? Why is it true that this same temptation to pride is in each of us as well?
7. “God resists the proud, but gives grace to the humble” (Jas 4:6; 1 Pet 5:5). What does it mean that God “resists” the proud? How is that seen in Isaiah 37?
8. How is Hezekiah’s prayer an example for all believers to follow? What are some attributes of that prayer that we can learn from?
9. History shows that Sennacherib didn’t die until more than twenty years later. How does this put the amazing patience of God on display? How are Romans 2:4-5 and Romans 9:22 explanations for God’s amazing patience toward the wicked?
10. How does this chapter display the amazing grace of God to us in Christ?