2 Kings 20
Modern English Version
Hezekiah’s Life Extended(A)
20 In those days Hezekiah became ill and was near death. The prophet Isaiah son of Amoz came to him, and said to him, “Thus says the Lord: Set your house in order, for you shall die and not live.”
2 Then he turned his face toward the wall and prayed to the Lord, saying, 3 “Please, O Lord, remember how I have walked before You faithfully and with an undivided heart and have done what is good in Your sight.” And Hezekiah wept bitterly.
4 Now before Isaiah had come out of the middle courtyard, the word of the Lord came to him, saying, 5 “Turn back and say to Hezekiah the leader of My people: Thus says the Lord, the God of David your father: I have heard your prayer; I have seen your tears. I will heal you. On the third day you shall go up to the house of the Lord. 6 I will add to your days fifteen years, and I will deliver you and this city from the hand of the king of Assyria. I will defend this city for My own sake and for the sake of David My servant.”
7 Then Isaiah said, “Take a cake of figs.” So they took it and laid it on the boil, and he recovered.
8 Hezekiah said to Isaiah, “What will be the sign that the Lord will heal me, and that I should go up to the house of the Lord on the third day?”
9 Isaiah said, “This is the sign to you from the Lord, that the Lord will do the thing that He has spoken: Should the shadow walk forward ten steps or go back ten steps?”
10 And Hezekiah answered, “It is an easy thing for the shadow to stretch ten steps, so let it go back ten steps.”
11 Isaiah the prophet called to the Lord, and He made the shadow go back ten steps on the stairs of Ahaz.
Envoys From Babylon(B)
12 At that time Marduk-Baladan son of Baladan, king of Babylon, sent letters and a gift to Hezekiah, for he had heard that Hezekiah had been ill. 13 Hezekiah welcomed them and showed them all the treasure house, the silver, the gold, the spices, the fine oil, all the armory, and all that was found in his storehouses. There was nothing in his house nor in all his dominion that Hezekiah did not show them.
14 Then Isaiah the prophet came to King Hezekiah and said to him, “What did these men say? From where did they come to you?”
Hezekiah said, “They came from a distant land, from Babylon.”
15 He said, “What have they seen in your house?”
Hezekiah said, “They have seen everything in my house. There is nothing in my storehouses that I did not show them.”
16 Isaiah said to Hezekiah, “Hear the word of the Lord: 17 The days are coming when everything that is in your house and that your fathers have stored up until this day will be carried off to Babylon. Nothing will be left, says the Lord. 18 Some of your sons who go out from you, who will be born to you, will be taken away. They will be eunuchs in the palace of the king of Babylon.”
19 Then Hezekiah said to Isaiah, “The word of the Lord that you have spoken is good.” And he said, “Why not, if there is peace and security in my days?”
The Death of Hezekiah
20 The rest of the deeds of Hezekiah, all his power, how he made a pool and a conduit and brought water into the city, are they not written in the book of the annals of the kings of Judah? 21 Hezekiah slept with his fathers, and Manasseh his son reigned in his place.
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Isaiah 37:21-38
Modern English Version
The Fall of Sennacherib(A)
21 Then Isaiah the son of Amoz sent to Hezekiah, saying, “Thus says the Lord God of Israel: Because you have prayed to Me about Sennacherib king of Assyria, 22 this is the word which the Lord has spoken against him:
The virgin daughter of Zion
has despised you and mocked you;
the daughter of Jerusalem
has shaken her head at you.
23 Whom have you reproached and blasphemed?
And against whom have you raised your voice,
and lifted up your eyes haughtily?
Against the Holy One of Israel!
24 Through your servants
you have reproached the Lord
and have said,
‘With my many chariots
I have come up to the heights of the mountains,
to the remotest parts of Lebanon;
and I cut down its tall cedars,
and its choice fir trees;
and I will go to its highest peak,
its thickest forest.
25 I have dug wells
and drunk water,
and with the sole of my feet
I have dried up all the rivers of Egypt.’
26 “Have you not heard?
Long ago I have done it,
from ancient times I have formed it.
Now I have brought it to pass,
that you should turn fortified cities
into ruinous heaps.
27 Therefore, their inhabitants were short of strength;
they were dismayed and humiliated;
they were as the grass of the field
and as the green herb,
as the grass on the housetops
is scorched before it is grown up.
28 “But I know your abode,
and your going out and your coming in,
and your rage against Me.
29 Because your rage against Me
and your tumult have come up into My ears,
therefore I will put My hook in your nose,
and My bridle in your lips,
and I will turn you back
on the way by which you came.
30 “This shall be a sign to you:
You shall eat this year what grows of itself,
and the second year what springs from the same,
and in the third year sow and reap
and plant vineyards, and eat their fruit.
31 The surviving remnant of the house of Judah
shall again take root downward and bear fruit upward.
32 For from Jerusalem shall go out a remnant,
and those who escape out of Mount Zion.
The zeal of the Lord of Hosts
shall do this.
33 “Therefore, thus says the Lord concerning the king of Assyria:
He shall not come into this city,
nor shoot an arrow there,
nor come before it with shields,
nor build a siege ramp against it.
34 By the way that he came, by the same shall he return,
and shall not come into this city,
says the Lord.
35 For I will defend this city to save it
for My own sake and for the sake of My servant David.”
36 Then the angel of the Lord went out and struck one hundred eighty-five thousand in the camp of the Assyrians. When others woke up early in the morning, these were all dead bodies. 37 So Sennacherib king of Assyria departed and returned home and lived in Nineveh.
38 It came to pass as he was worshipping in the house of Nisrok, his god, that Adrammelek and Sharezer, his sons, struck him with the sword, and they escaped into the land of Ararat. And Esarhaddon his son reigned in his stead.
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Isaiah 38:1-8
Modern English Version
Hezekiah’s Illness(A)
38 In those days Hezekiah was mortally ill. And Isaiah the prophet, the son of Amoz, came to him and said to him, “Thus says the Lord: Set your house in order, for you shall die, and not live.”
2 Then Hezekiah turned his face toward the wall, and prayed to the Lord, 3 and said, “Remember now, O Lord, I beseech You, how I have walked before You in truth and with a perfect heart, and have done what is good in Your sight.” And Hezekiah wept bitterly.
4 Then the word of the Lord came to Isaiah, saying: 5 “Go, and say to Hezekiah, Thus says the Lord, the God of David your father: I have heard your prayer, I have seen your tears. Surely I will add to your days fifteen years. 6 I will deliver you and this city out of the hand of the king of Assyria, and I will defend this city.
7 “This shall be a sign to you from the Lord, that the Lord will do this thing that He has spoken: 8 I will cause the shadow on the sundial, which has gone down with the sun on the sundial of Ahaz, to go back ten steps.” So the sun’s shadow returned ten steps on the sundial by which it had gone down.
Read full chapterThe Holy Bible, Modern English Version. Copyright © 2014 by Military Bible Association. Published and distributed by Charisma House.