2 Kings 19:14-37

English Standard Version

Hezekiah's Prayer

¹⁴Hezekiah received ^(A)the letter from the hand of the messengers and read it; and Hezekiah went up to the house of the Lord and spread it before the Lord. ¹⁵And Hezekiah prayed before the Lord and said: “O Lord, the God of Israel, ^(B)enthroned above the cherubim, ^(C)you are the God, you alone, of all the kingdoms of the earth; you have made heaven and earth. ¹⁶^(D)Incline your ear, O Lord, and hear; ^(E)open your eyes, O Lord, and see; and hear the words of Sennacherib, which he has sent ^(F)to mock the living God. ¹⁷Truly, O Lord, the kings of Assyria have laid waste the nations and their lands ¹⁸and have cast their gods into the fire, for they were not gods, ^(G)but the work of men's hands, wood and stone. Therefore they were destroyed. ¹⁹So now, O Lord our God, save us, please, from his hand, ^(H)that all the kingdoms of the earth may know that ^(I)you, O Lord, are God alone.”

Isaiah Prophesies Sennacherib's Fall

²⁰Then Isaiah the son of Amoz sent to Hezekiah, saying, “Thus says the Lord, the God of Israel: Your prayer to me about Sennacherib king of Assyria ^(J)I have heard. ²¹This is the word that the Lord has spoken concerning him:

“She despises you, she scorns you—
^(K)the virgin daughter of Zion;
she ^(L)wags her head behind you—
the daughter of Jerusalem.

²²“Whom have you ^(M)mocked and ^(N)reviled?
    Against whom have you raised your voice
and lifted your eyes to the heights?
    Against ^(O)the Holy One of Israel!
²³^(P)By your messengers you have mocked the Lord,
    and you have said, ^(Q)‘With my many chariots
I have gone up the heights of the mountains,
    to the far recesses of ^(R)Lebanon;
I felled its tallest cedars,
    its choicest cypresses;
I entered its farthest lodging place,
    its most ^(S)fruitful forest.
²⁴I dug wells
    and drank foreign waters,
and I dried up with the sole of my foot
    all the streams ^(T)of Egypt.’

²⁵“Have you not heard
    that ^(U)I determined it long ago?
I planned from days of old
    what ^(V)now I bring to pass,
that you should turn fortified cities
    into heaps of ruins,
²⁶while their inhabitants, shorn of strength,
    are dismayed and confounded,
and have become ^(W)like plants of the field
    and like tender grass,
like grass on the housetops,
    blighted before it is grown.

²⁷“But I know your sitting down
    ^(X)and your going out and coming in,
    and your raging against me.
²⁸Because you have raged against me
    and your complacency has come into my ears,
I will ^(Y)put my hook in your nose
    and my bit in your mouth,
and ^(Z)I will turn you back on the way
    by which you came.

²⁹“And this shall be ^(AA)the sign for you: this year eat what grows of itself, and in the second year what springs of the same. Then in the third year sow and reap and plant vineyards, and eat their fruit. ³⁰^(AB)And the surviving remnant of the house of Judah shall again take root downward and bear fruit upward. ³¹For out of Jerusalem shall go a remnant, and out of Mount Zion ^(AC)a band of survivors. ^(AD)The zeal of the Lord will do this.

³²“Therefore thus says the Lord concerning the king of Assyria: He shall not come into this city or shoot an arrow there, or come before it with a shield or ^(AE)cast up a siege mound against it. ³³^(AF)By the way that he came, by the same he shall return, and he shall not come into this city, declares the Lord. ³⁴^(AG)For I will defend this city to save it, for my own sake ^(AH)and for the sake of my servant David.”

³⁵And that night ^(AI)the angel of the Lord went out and struck down 185,000 in the camp of the Assyrians. And when people arose early in the morning, behold, these were all dead bodies. ³⁶Then Sennacherib king of Assyria departed and went home and lived at ^(AJ)Nineveh. ³⁷And as he was worshiping in the house of Nisroch his god, ^(AK)Adrammelech and Sharezer, his sons, struck him down with the sword and escaped into the land of Ararat. And Esarhaddon his son reigned in his place.

Read full chapter

Psalm 76:8-12

English Standard Version

⁸From the heavens you uttered judgment;
^(A)the earth feared and was still,
⁹when God ^(B)arose to establish judgment,
to save all the humble of the earth. Selah

¹⁰Surely ^(C)the wrath of man shall praise you;
    the remnant^[a] of wrath you will put on like a belt.
¹¹^(D)Make your vows to the Lord your God and perform them;
    let all around him ^(E)bring gifts
    to him who ^(F)is to be feared,
¹²who ^(G)cuts off the spirit of princes,
    who ^(H)is to be feared by the kings of the earth.

Read full chapter

Footnotes

Psalm 76:10 Or extremity

Acts 7:44-53

English Standard Version

⁴⁴“Our fathers had ^(A)the tent of witness in the wilderness, just as he who spoke to Moses ^(B)directed him to make it, according to the pattern that he had seen. ⁴⁵Our fathers in turn ^(C)brought it in with Joshua when they ^(D)dispossessed the nations ^(E)that God drove out before our fathers. So it was ^(F)until the days of David, ⁴⁶^(G)who found favor in the sight of God and ^(H)asked to find a dwelling place for ^(I)the God of Jacob.^[a] ⁴⁷But it was ^(J)Solomon who built a house for him. ⁴⁸^(K)Yet the Most High does not dwell ^(L)in houses made by hands, as the prophet says,

⁴⁹^(M)“‘Heaven is my throne,
^(N)and the earth is my footstool.
What kind of house will you build for me, says the Lord,
or what is the place of my rest?
⁵⁰Did not my hand make all these things?’

⁵¹^(O)“You stiff-necked people, ^(P)uncircumcised in heart and ears, you always resist the Holy Spirit. ^(Q)As your fathers did, so do you. ⁵²^(R)Which of the prophets did your fathers not persecute? And they killed those who announced beforehand the coming of ^(S)the Righteous One, ^(T)whom you have now betrayed and murdered, ⁵³you who received the law ^(U)as delivered by angels and ^(V)did not keep it.”