Hezekiah’s Prayer for Help

¹⁴ Hezekiah took the messages from the couriers, read them, went up to the Lord’s Temple, and laid them out in the presence of the Lord. ¹⁵ Then Hezekiah prayed in the presence of the Lord, “Lord God of Israel! You live between the cherubim! You alone are the God of all the kingdoms of the earth. You have fashioned the heavens and the earth. ¹⁶ Turn^[a] your ear, Lord, and listen! Open your eyes, Lord, and observe! Listen to the message sent by Sennacherib to insult the living God! ¹⁷ Truly, Lord, the kings of Assyria have devastated nations and their territories, ¹⁸ throwing their gods into the fire, since they weren’t gods but rather were the product of men’s handiwork—wood and stone. And so they destroyed them. ¹⁹ Now, Lord our God, I’m praying that you will deliver us from his control, so that all the kingdoms of the earth may know that you alone, Lord, are God!”