The Book Of Isaiah. Day 156, The Assyrian Threat, Part Four

The field commander of the king of Assyria is standing outside the gates of Jerusalem speaking with the three top officials of King Hezekiah of Judah. This man is speaking in Hebrew as he threatens to lay siege to the city, as he threatens to cause so much hardship and deprivation for the citizens that they will be forced to eat and drink their own excrement for lack of food and water. Hezekiah's officials begged him to speak to them in Aramaic, not Hebrew, so the citizens of Jerusalem would not understand his threats and be demoralized by them. Instead he takes it up a notch, shouting very loudly up to the people in Hebrew.

"Then the commander stood and called out in Hebrew, 'Hear the words of the great king, the king of Assyria! This is what the king says: Do not let Hezekiah deceive you. He cannot deliver you! Do not let Hezekiah persuade you to trust in the Lord when he says, 'The Lord will surely deliver us; this city will not be given into the hand of the king of Assyria.'" (Isaiah 36:13-15) For the second time in our chapter he refers to his master as "the great king". The Lord has made King Hezekiah great, to be sure, for our study of the kings informed us that the Lord granted him a great deal of success because Hezekiah was faithful to him. But at this time in history the kingdom of Assyria is the most powerful kingdom on earth and the field commander considers his king to be the "king of kings", if you will. But he doesn't know that the Lord---the true King of kings---is on the side of the people of Jerusalem.

This man wants the people within the sound of his voice to rebel against their king. He wants them to rush the gates and force them open, coming out with their hands up and waving white flags. That way he can take the city without a siege and without a fight. "Do not listen to Hezekiah. This is what the king of Assyria says: Make peace with me and come out to me. Then each of you will eat fruit from your own vine and fig tree and drink water from your own cistern, until I come and take you to a land like your own---a land of grain and new wine, a land of bread and vineyards." (Isaiah 36:16-17)

The Assyrians and many other ancient nations engaged in forced resettlement. They would deport the citizens of a land they conquered and they would resettle the land with conquered people from other cultures. They did this to break the spirits of conquered people and to cause them to assimilate into the culture of the land in which they were resettled. Also, settling lands with a mix of races and languages helped to prevent the people from successfully banding together well enough to mount a rebellion; they had difficulty understanding and trusting each other.

Forced resettlement should have been a horrifying prospect to any people, but especially to the people descended from Jacob. The Lord Himself gave them the land of Canaan---the land of milk and honey---and under no circumstances should they be willing to simply hand it over. But King Sennacherib wants to make it sound like an attractive prospect. He's saying, "Yes, you will have to leave your land but it really won't be a hardship and a sacrifice for you. I will move you to a land that is just as prosperous. You will always have plenty to eat and drink there. Why, it's pretty much identical to where you're living now!''

This is a lie, for he has no intention of allowing them to live in prosperity anywhere. No matter how nice the land may be where they end up, they will not be free to enjoy it. They will be under the authority of a foreign king, a pagan king, a cruel king. It will be much like the conditions their ancestors endured in the land of Egypt when the Egyptians decided to enslave them.

The words of King Sennacherib, which are relayed to the people by his field commander, are the same type of words Satan speaks to us. He asks us to surrender without a fight. He promises us that giving up what the Lord has promised us really won't be any sacrifice at all. Satan claims he's going to give us something just as good, if not better, by tempting us with worldly pleasures in order to weaken our resolve. We must not listen to his lies anymore than King Hezekiah intends to listen to his lies. Hezekiah is going to do what we all need to do when confronted by the enemy: he is going to take his case to God.