Tuesday, 14 May

1.   And so it was, when King Hezekiah heard it , that he tore his clothes, covered himself with sackcloth, and went into the house of the LORD. 2.   Then he sent Eliakim, who was over the household, Shebna the scribe, and the elders of the priests, covered with sackcloth, to Isaiah the prophet, the son of Amoz. 3.   And they said to him, "Thus says Hezekiah: ‘This day is a day of trouble, and rebuke, and blasphemy; for the children have come to birth, but there is no strength to bring them forth. 4.   ‘It may be that the LORD your God will hear all the words of the Rabshakeh, whom his master the king of Assyria has sent to reproach the living God, and will rebuke the words which the LORD your God has heard. Therefore lift up your prayer for the remnant that is left.’" 5.   So the servants of King Hezekiah came to Isaiah. 6.   And Isaiah said to them, "Thus you shall say to your master, ‘Thus says the LORD: "Do not be afraid of the words which you have heard, with which the servants of the king of Assyria have blasphemed Me. 7.   "Surely I will send a spirit upon him, and he shall hear a rumor and return to his own land; and I will cause him to fall by the sword in his own land."’" 8.   Then the Rabshakeh returned and found the king of Assyria warring against Libnah, for he heard that he had departed from Lachish. 9.   And the king heard concerning Tirhakah king of Ethiopia, "Look, he has come out to make war with you." So he again sent messengers to Hezekiah, saying, 10.   "Thus you shall speak to Hezekiah king of Judah, saying: ‘Do not let your God in whom you trust deceive you, saying, "Jerusalem shall not be given into the hand of the king of Assyria." 11.   ‘Look! You have heard what the kings of Assyria have done to all lands by utterly destroying them; and shall you be delivered? 12.   ‘Have the gods of the nations delivered those whom my fathers have destroyed, Gozan and Haran and Rezeph, and the people of Eden who were in Telassar? 13.   ‘Where is the king of Hamath, the king of Arpad, and the king of the city of Sepharvaim, Hena, and Ivah?’" 14.   And Hezekiah received 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. 15.   Then Hezekiah prayed before the LORD, and said: "O LORD God of Israel, the One who dwells between the cherubim, You are God, You alone, of all the kingdoms of the earth. You have made heaven and earth. 16.   "Incline Your ear, O LORD, and hear; open Your eyes, O LORD, and see; and hear the words of Sennacherib, which he has sent to reproach the living God. 17.   "Truly, LORD, the kings of Assyria have laid waste the nations and their lands, 18.   "and have cast their gods into the fire; for they were not gods, but the work of men’s hands––wood and stone. Therefore they destroyed them. 19.   "Now therefore, O LORD our God, I pray, save us from his hand, that all the kingdoms of the earth may know that You are the LORD God, You alone." 20.   Then Isaiah the son of Amoz sent to Hezekiah, saying, "Thus says the LORD God of Israel: ‘Because you have prayed to Me against Sennacherib king of Assyria, I have heard.’ 21.   "This is the word which the LORD has spoken concerning him: ‘The virgin, the daughter of Zion, Has despised you, laughed you to scorn; The daughter of Jerusalem Has shaken her head behind your back! 22.   ‘Whom have you reproached and blasphemed? Against whom have you raised your voice, And lifted up your eyes on high? Against the Holy One of Israel. 23.   By your messengers you have reproached the Lord, And said: "By the multitude of my chariots I have come up to the height of the mountains, To the limits of Lebanon; I will cut down its tall cedars And its choice cypress trees; I will enter the extremity of its borders, To its fruitful forest. 24.   I have dug and drunk strange water, And with the soles of my feet I have dried up All the brooks of defense." 25.   ‘Did you not hear long ago How I made it, From ancient times that I formed it? Now I have brought it to pass, That you should be For crushing fortified cities into heaps of ruins. 26.   Therefore their inhabitants had little power; They were dismayed and confounded; They were as the grass of the field And the green herb, As the grass on the housetops And grain blighted before it is grown. 27.   ‘But I know your dwelling place, Your going out and your coming in, And your rage against Me. 28.   Because your rage against Me and your tumult Have come up to My ears, Therefore I will put My hook in your nose And My bridle in your lips, And I will turn you back By the way which you came. 29.   ‘This shall be a sign to you: You shall eat this year such as grows of itself, And in the second year what springs from the same; Also in the third year sow and reap, Plant vineyards and eat the fruit of them. 30.   And the remnant who have escaped of the house of Judah Shall again take root downward, And bear fruit upward. 31.   For out of Jerusalem shall go a remnant, And those who escape from Mount Zion. The zeal of the LORD of hosts will do this.’ 32.   "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 shield, Nor build a siege mound against it. 33.   By the way that he came, By the same shall he return; And he shall not come into this city,’ Says the LORD. 34.   ‘For I will defend this city, to save it For My own sake and for My servant David’s sake.’" 35.   And it came to pass on a certain night that the angel of the LORD went out, and killed in the camp of the Assyrians one hundred and eighty–five thousand; and when people arose early in the morning, there were the corpses––all dead. 36.   So Sennacherib king of Assyria departed and went away, returned home , and remained at Nineveh. 37.   Now it came to pass, as he was worshiping in the temple of Nisroch his god, that his sons Adrammelech and Sharezer struck him down with the sword; and they escaped into the land of Ararat. Then Esarhaddon his son reigned in his place.

1.   In those days Hezekiah was sick and near death. And Isaiah the prophet, the son of Amoz, went 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.   "Remember now, O LORD, I pray, how I have walked before You in truth and with a loyal heart, and have done what was good in Your sight." And Hezekiah wept bitterly. 4.   And it happened, before Isaiah had gone out into the middle court, that the word of the LORD came to him, saying, 5.   "Return and tell 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; surely I will heal you. On the third day you shall go up to the house of the LORD. 6.   "And I will add to your days fifteen years. I will deliver you and this city from the hand of the king of Assyria; and I will defend this city for My own sake, and for the sake of My servant David."’" 7.   Then Isaiah said, "Take a lump of figs." So they took and laid it on the boil, and he recovered. 8.   And Hezekiah said to Isaiah, "What is the sign that the LORD will heal me, and that I shall go up to the house of the LORD the third day?" 9.   Then Isaiah said, "This is the sign to you from the LORD, that the LORD will do the thing which He has spoken: shall the shadow go forward ten degrees or go backward ten degrees?" 10.   And Hezekiah answered, "It is an easy thing for the shadow to go down ten degrees; no, but let the shadow go backward ten degrees." 11.   So Isaiah the prophet cried out to the LORD, and He brought the shadow ten degrees backward, by which it had gone down on the sundial of Ahaz. 12.   At that time Berodach–Baladan the son of Baladan, king of Babylon, sent letters and a present to Hezekiah, for he heard that Hezekiah had been sick. 13.   And Hezekiah was attentive to them, and showed them all the house of his treasures––the silver and gold, the spices and precious ointment, and all his armory––all that was found among his treasures. There was nothing in his house or in all his dominion that Hezekiah did not show them. 14.   Then Isaiah the prophet went to King Hezekiah, and said to him, "What did these men say, and from where did they come to you?" So Hezekiah said, "They came from a far country, from Babylon." 15.   And he said, "What have they seen in your house?" So Hezekiah answered, "They have seen all that is in my house; there is nothing among my treasures that I have not shown them." 16.   Then Isaiah said to Hezekiah, "Hear the word of the LORD: 17.   ‘Behold, the days are coming when all that is in your house, and what your fathers have accumulated until this day, shall be carried to Babylon; nothing shall be left,’ says the LORD. 18.   ‘And they shall take away some of your sons who will descend from you, whom you will beget; and they shall be eunuchs in the palace of the king of Babylon.’" 19.   So Hezekiah said to Isaiah, "The word of the LORD which you have spoken is good!" For he said, "Will there not be peace and truth at least in my days?" 20.   Now the rest of the acts of Hezekiah––all his might, and how he made a pool and a tunnel and brought water into the city–– are they not written in the book of the chronicles of the kings of Judah? 21.   So Hezekiah rested with his fathers. Then Manasseh his son reigned in his place.

1.   Manasseh was twelve years old when he became king, and he reigned fifty–five years in Jerusalem. His mother’s name was Hephzibah. 2.   And he did evil in the sight of the LORD, according to the abominations of the nations whom the LORD had cast out before the children of Israel. 3.   For he rebuilt the high places which Hezekiah his father had destroyed; he raised up altars for Baal, and made a wooden image, as Ahab king of Israel had done; and he worshiped all the host of heaven and served them. 4.   He also built altars in the house of the LORD, of which the LORD had said, "In Jerusalem I will put My name." 5.   And he built altars for all the host of heaven in the two courts of the house of the LORD. 6.   Also he made his son pass through the fire, practiced soothsaying, used witchcraft, and consulted spiritists and mediums. He did much evil in the sight of the LORD, to provoke Him to anger. 7.   He even set a carved image of Asherah that he had made, in the house of which the LORD had said to David and to Solomon his son, "In this house and in Jerusalem, which I have chosen out of all the tribes of Israel, I will put My name forever; 8.   "and I will not make the feet of Israel wander anymore from the land which I gave their fathers––only if they are careful to do according to all that I have commanded them, and according to all the law that My servant Moses commanded them." 9.   But they paid no attention, and Manasseh seduced them to do more evil than the nations whom the LORD had destroyed before the children of Israel. 10.   And the LORD spoke by His servants the prophets, saying, 11.   "Because Manasseh king of Judah has done these abominations (he has acted more wickedly than all the Amorites who were before him, and has also made Judah sin with his idols), 12.   "therefore thus says the LORD God of Israel: ‘Behold, I am bringing such calamity upon Jerusalem and Judah, that whoever hears of it, both his ears will tingle. 13.   ‘And I will stretch over Jerusalem the measuring line of Samaria and the plummet of the house of Ahab; I will wipe Jerusalem as one wipes a dish, wiping it and turning it upside down. 14.   ‘So I will forsake the remnant of My inheritance and deliver them into the hand of their enemies; and they shall become victims of plunder to all their enemies, 15.   ‘because they have done evil in My sight, and have provoked Me to anger since the day their fathers came out of Egypt, even to this day.’" 16.   Moreover Manasseh shed very much innocent blood, till he had filled Jerusalem from one end to another, besides his sin by which he made Judah sin, in doing evil in the sight of the LORD. 17.   Now the rest of the acts of Manasseh––all that he did, and the sin that he committed–– are they not written in the book of the chronicles of the kings of Judah? 18.   So Manasseh rested with his fathers, and was buried in the garden of his own house, in the garden of Uzza. Then his son Amon reigned in his place. 19.   Amon was twenty–two years old when he became king, and he reigned two years in Jerusalem. His mother’s name was Meshullemeth the daughter of Haruz of Jotbah. 20.   And he did evil in the sight of the LORD, as his father Manasseh had done. 21.   So he walked in all the ways that his father had walked; and he served the idols that his father had served, and worshiped them. 22.   He forsook the LORD God of his fathers, and did not walk in the way of the LORD. 23.   Then the servants of Amon conspired against him, and killed the king in his own house. 24.   But the people of the land executed all those who had conspired against King Amon. Then the people of the land made his son Josiah king in his place. 25.   Now the rest of the acts of Amon which he did, are they not written in the book of the chronicles of the kings of Judah? 26.   And he was buried in his tomb in the garden of Uzza. Then Josiah his son reigned in his place.

1.   Paul, an apostle of Jesus Christ by the will of God, and Timothy our brother, To the church of God which is at Corinth, with all the saints who are in all Achaia: 2.   Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. 3.   Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies and God of all comfort, 4.   who comforts us in all our tribulation, that we may be able to comfort those who are in any trouble, with the comfort with which we ourselves are comforted by God. 5.   For as the sufferings of Christ abound in us, so our consolation also abounds through Christ. 6.   Now if we are afflicted, it is for your consolation and salvation, which is effective for enduring the same sufferings which we also suffer. Or if we are comforted, it is for your consolation and salvation. 7.   And our hope for you is steadfast, because we know that as you are partakers of the sufferings, so also you will partake of the consolation. 8.   For we do not want you to be ignorant, brethren, of our trouble which came to us in Asia: that we were burdened beyond measure, above strength, so that we despaired even of life. 9.   Yes, we had the sentence of death in ourselves, that we should not trust in ourselves but in God who raises the dead, 10.   who delivered us from so great a death, and does deliver us; in whom we trust that He will still deliver us , 11.   you also helping together in prayer for us, that thanks may be given by many persons on our behalf for the gift granted to us through many. 12.   For our boasting is this: the testimony of our conscience that we conducted ourselves in the world in simplicity and godly sincerity, not with fleshly wisdom but by the grace of God, and more abundantly toward you. 13.   For we are not writing any other things to you than what you read or understand. Now I trust you will understand, even to the end 14.   (as also you have understood us in part), that we are your boast as you also are ours, in the day of the Lord Jesus. 15.   And in this confidence I intended to come to you before, that you might have a second benefit–– 16.   to pass by way of you to Macedonia, to come again from Macedonia to you, and be helped by you on my way to Judea. 17.   Therefore, when I was planning this, did I do it lightly? Or the things I plan, do I plan according to the flesh, that with me there should be Yes, Yes, and No, No? 18.   But as God is faithful, our word to you was not Yes and No. 19.   For the Son of God, Jesus Christ, who was preached among you by us––by me, Silvanus, and Timothy––was not Yes and No, but in Him was Yes. 20.   For all the promises of God in Him are Yes, and in Him Amen, to the glory of God through us. 21.   Now He who establishes us with you in Christ and has anointed us is God, 22.   who also has sealed us and given us the Spirit in our hearts as a guarantee. 23.   Moreover I call God as witness against my soul, that to spare you I came no more to Corinth. 24.   Not that we have dominion over your faith, but are fellow workers for your joy; for by faith you stand.