Man, you gotta read this. Check out 2 Kings 18. In a nut shell, Sennacherib, King of Assyria overthrew and deported most of the people of the northern kingdom, Israel. Then...
13 Now in the fourteenth year of King Hezekiah, Sennacherib king of Assyria came up against all the fortified cities of Judah and seized them.
Not a propitious sign for Hezekiah. Basically he lost his whole territory except for Jerusalem.
14 Then Hezekiah king of Judah sent to the king of Assyria at Lachish, saying, "I have done wrong. Withdraw from me; whatever you impose on me I will bear." So the king of Assyria required of Hezekiah king of Judah three hundred talents of silver (11 tons) and thirty talents of gold.(1 ton) 15 Hezekiah gave him all the silver which was found in the house of the Lord, and in the treasuries of the king's house. 16 At that time Hezekiah cut off the gold from the doors of the temple of the Lord, and from the doorposts which Hezekiah king of Judah had overlaid, and gave it to the king of Assyria.
Whew, that ought to solve the "problem" shouldn't it? Mr. Sennac was not an honorable man. He captured the cities. He collected his bounty. But instead of going back home, he...well read it for yourself.
17 Then the king of Assyria sent Tartan and Rab-saris and Rabshakeh from Lachish to King Hezekiah with a large army to Jerusalem. So they went up and came to Jerusalem. And when they went up, they came and stood by the conduit of the upper pool, which is on the highway of the fuller's field. 18 When they called to the king, Eliakim the son of Hilkiah, who was over the household, and Shebnah the scribe and Joah the son of Asaph the recorder, came out to them.
The King did not come. He sent some of his officials.
19 Then Rabshakeh said to them, "Say now to Hezekiah,"
and he proceeded to demean and disparage Hezekiah and his pitifully feeble efforts to repel the invaders. Then he turned to Judah's God. They mistook Hezekiah's destruction of the idols for his imposing another God on Israel.
"They will all fail to protect you. In fact, your God has sent me here to pound on you." (Loose translation.) And for the coup de gras...
‘Has (have) any of the gods of the nations ever delivered his land from the power of the king of Assyria? 34 Where are the gods of Hamath and Arpad? Where are the gods of Sepharvaim, Hena, and Ivvah? Have they delivered Samaria from my hand? 35 Who among all the gods of the lands has delivered his land from my power? So will the Lord deliver Jerusalem?'"
Oops, you don't know it Rabie, but you just, as we say on the farm, "stepped in it." Turn the page. Chapter 19. Hezekiah sent a messenger to Isaiah pleading for help.
4 "Perhaps Yahweh your God will hear all the words of the Rabshakeh, whom his master the king of Assyria sent to mock the living God, and will rebuke him for the words that Yahweh your God has heard. Therefore, offer a prayer for the surviving remnant."
Please pray for us, he asked. Isaiah answered and...
said to them, "Tell your master this, ‘The Lord says: Don't be afraid because of the words you have heard, that the king of Assyria's attendants have blasphemed Me with. 7 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.'"
(The whole message is in 19:21-28.)
And it happened just as Isaiah had predicted. This murderous horde turned and returned home . Isaiah 37 repeats the Lord's answer to Rabshakeh, and anyone else who challenges the One and Only God. As I opened, you gotta read this.
Verse 34 (2 Kings 19) summarizes the fate of Rabshakeh and of Sennerachib.
"For I will defend this city to save it for My own sake and for My servant David's sake."
And for the record.
35 Then it happened that night that the angel of the Lord went out and struck 185,000 in the camp of the Assyrians; and when men rose early in the morning, behold, all of them were dead. 36 So Sennacherib king of Assyria departed and returned home, and lived at Nineveh. 37 It came about as he was worshiping in the house of Nisroch his god, that Adrammelech and Sharezer killed him with the sword; and they escaped into the land of Ararat. And Esarhaddon his son became king in his place.
The "spirit" in him was evidently abject terror. 185,000 soldiers, dead. No discernable wounds. Just dead. So he hustled back home. His worthless god was soundly defeated and to add insult to injury, Sennacherib was murdered in the house of his god.
You would think that the enemies of God would learn, wouldn't you? Well if God's followers do not "learn" is it too surprising that others fail as well. There is a whole lesson there. (God's Face God's Works. http://reflectionsfromjim.blogspot.com/2017/03/gods-face-gods-works.html )
Unbelievers challenge God all of the time. The famous atheist, Voltaire once predicted that Christianity and thus the Bible would be extinct in 100 years. Fifty years after his death in 1788, the Geneva Bible Society used his press and house to produce stacks of Bibles. And his desk was used by a Pastor as a study to prepare sermons.
God's Word endures forever. (1 Peter 1:21) What a comfort as we read it. The challenges made by anyone are doomed to fail. Have confidence. Have faith.
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