The reading for today blends the accounts from 2 Chronicles, 2 Kings, and Isaiah to tell the complete story.  It makes it so much easier to understand. 

When Hezekiah paid tribute to the king of Assyria, he apologizes to him for doing wrong.  He hadn't done wrong, he just needed to depend on God.  

Hezekiah became king around 725 BC. As recorded in 2 Kings 18, he rebelled against the king of Assyria and defeated the Philistines. This was around 721 BC. Then around 701 BC he paid extortion money to the king of Assyria, using the gold and silver in the temple and the treasuries of the royal palace after Sennacherib attacked and captured the fortified cities of Judah.  What happened in those intervening 20 or so years?  

The Assyrians were not successful in taking Judah into captivity.  God had reserved that capture for the Babylonians.

 

Around 711 BC Isaiah demonstrated the humiliation of Egypt and Cush by going naked. Then shortly after that we have a record of the people of Judah rejecting God’s truth. Is it that the people, led by King Hezekiah began drifting from God? We aren’t told that the people returned to pagan gods, high places, and sacred stones, but they did back away from God. They began trusting in themselves and what they could accomplish apart from God.  They were depending on their own strength instead of God's strength.

Hezekiah tries to rely on the past and reminds God of all the good things he had done earlier. He bargained with God for 15 more years. Hezekiah asked for a sign that God would heal him.  Isaiah responds by calling on the Lord to make a shadow go back ten steps from the sundial.  This doesn't mean that God turned the sun back, only that the shadow turned back. Could it have been that another light source made a shadow of its own?  Like maybe a supernova or a comet or asteroid, or could it have been the Shekinah glory of God?

God granted Hezekiah's request, but pride got hold of Hezekiah again. However, to his credit, he did repent, only to have pride resurface with the envoys of Babylon as he bragged about his storehouse treasures. BIG mistake! 

Isaiah once more reminds Hezekiah that the treasures will be carried off to Babylon.  Hezekiah's response tells us that he didn't really care about what happened to his descendants, only that God had promised him peace and security in his lifetime. Shortly after this God left Hezekiah.  

Satan was certainly speaking through the Assyrian field commander when he discouraged Hezekiah from listening to Isaiah.  The things he said were blasphemy against God.  God certainly took care of them! 

A couple of Satan-led attributes have surfaced in today's reading, self-reliance apart from God and pride.  Pride…what a successful tool that Satan uses, an attribute of which he is very familiar and something that we as Believers must guard against.

We can learn a few lessons from Hezekiah and from his son Manasseh.  A single person can change a nation - either for the good or the bad.  The further away from God we go - the closer to His discipline we get. 

2 Kings 19:30

Once more a remnant of the house of Judah will take root below and bear fruit above.

To be that single person to change a nation for good, we must take root from His Word.  This is how we bear fruit for the Kingdom.