Ambassadors From Babylon
221
“Thou art my hope, O Lord God:
Thou art my trust from my youth.
By Thee have I been holden up.”
“Forsake me not when my strength faileth.”
“O God, be not far from me:
O my God, make haste for my help.”
“O God, forsake me not;
Until I have showed Thy strength unto this
generation,
And Thy power to everyone that is to come.”
Psalm 71:5, 6, 9, 12, 18
.
He whose “compassions fail not,” heard the prayer of His servant.
Lamentations 3:22
. “It came to pass, afore Isaiah was gone out into
the middle court, that the word of the Lord came to him, saying, Turn
again, and tell Hezekiah the captain of My people, Thus saith the Lord,
the God of David thy father, I have heard thy prayer, I have seen thy
tears: behold, I will heal thee: on the third day thou shalt go up unto
the house of the Lord. And I will add unto thy days fifteen years; and
I will deliver thee and this city out of the hand of the king of Assyria;
and I will defend this city for Mine own sake, and for My servant
David’s sake.”
2 Kings 20:4-6
.
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Gladly the prophet returned with the words of assurance and hope.
Directing that a lump of figs be laid upon the diseased part, Isaiah
delivered to the king the message of God’s mercy and protecting care.
Like Moses in the land of Midian, like Gideon in the presence of
the heavenly messenger, like Elisha just before the ascension of his
master, Hezekiah pleaded for some sign that the message was from
heaven. “What shall be the sign,” he inquired of the prophet, “that the
Lord will heal me, and that I shall go up into the house of the Lord the
third day?”
“This sign shalt thou have of the Lord,” the prophet answered,
“that the Lord will do the thing that He hath spoken: shall the shadow
go forward ten degrees, or go back ten degrees?” “It is a light thing,”
Hezekiah replied, “for the shadow to go down ten degrees: nay, but let
the shadow return backward ten degrees.”