2 Kings 19:16-34

16Turn your ear toward me, Lord, and listen. Open your eyes, Lord, and see. Listen to the message that Sennacherib sent to defy the living God.

17It is true, Lord, that the kings of Assyria have leveled nations.

18They have thrown the gods from these countries into fires because these gods aren’t real gods. They’re only wooden and stone statues made by human hands. So the Assyrians have destroyed them.

19Now, Lord our God, rescue us from Assyria’s control so that all the kingdoms on earth will know that you alone are the Lord God.”

20Then Isaiah, son of Amoz, sent a message to Hezekiah, “This is what the Lord God of Israel says: You prayed to me about King Sennacherib of Assyria. I have heard you.

21This is the message that the Lord speaks to him, ‘My dear people in Zion despise you and laugh at you. My people in Jerusalem shake their heads behind your back.

22Whom are you defying and slandering? Against whom are you shouting? Who are you looking at so arrogantly? It is the Holy One of Israel!

23Through your servants  you defy the Lord and say, “With my many chariots I’ll ride up the high mountains, up the slopes of Lebanon. I’ll cut down its tallest cedars and its finest cypresses. I’ll come to its most distant borders and its most fertile forests.

24I’ll dig wells and drink foreign water. I’ll dry up all the streams of Egypt with the trampling of my feet.”

25“ ‘Haven’t you heard? I did this long ago. I planned it in the distant past. Now I make it happen so that you will turn fortified cities into piles of rubble.

26Those who live in these cities are weak, discouraged, and ashamed. They will be like plants in the field, like fresh, green grass on the roofs, scorched before it sprouted.

27I know when you ⌞get up⌟ and sit down, when you go out and come in, and how you rage against me.

28Since you rage against me and your boasting has reached my ears, I will put my hook in your nose and my bridle in your mouth. I will make you go back the way you came.

29“ ‘And this will be a sign for you, Hezekiah: You will eat what grows by itself this year and next year. But in the third year you will plant and harvest, plant vineyards, and eat what is produced.

30Those few people from the nation of Judah who escape will again take root and produce crops.

31Those few people will go out from Jerusalem, and those who escape will go out of Mount Zion. The Lord is determined to do this.’

32“This is what the Lord says about the king of Assyria: He will never come into this city, shoot an arrow here, hold a shield in front of it, or put up dirt ramps to attack it.

33He will go back the way he came, and he won’t come into this city,” declares the Lord of Armies.

34“I will shield this city to rescue it for my sake and for the sake of my servant David.”