As America is experiencing a new surge how are you preparing? The current COVID surge is a reminder that preparation is critical to survival. In the spiritual realm there is a surge coming as well. Will you be prepared for what is to come before the second coming?

<p>As America is experiencing a new surge how are you preparing? The current COVID surge is a reminder that preparation is critical to survival. In the spiritual realm there is a surge coming as well. Will you be prepared for what is to come before the second coming?</p>

<p>Free sharing permitted under the Creative Commons <a rel="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/us/">BY-NC-ND 3.0 (US)</a> license.</p>

Newington Three Angels Church

Eric Walsh

Surviving the Surge

Our scripture reading, as was read so wonderfully, comes from the book of Isaiah, the 40th chapter, Isaiah chapter 40, starting at verse 28.

Hast thou not known, hast thou not heard, that the everlasting God, the Lord, the creator of the ends of the earth, fainteth not.

There is no searching of his understanding.

He gives power to the faint, and to them that have no might, he increases strength.

Even the youths shall be faint and be weary, and the young men shall utterly fail, shall utterly fall.

But they that wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength.

They shall mount up with wings as eagles.

A message this Sabbath is entitled, surviving the surge.

Father God, we thank you for this opportunity to study your word.

Once again, Father, I ask that you make me just a nail upon the wall, a rusty, sorry nail, Lord.

But upon that nail, Lord, I ask that you hang a portrait of Jesus Christ.

I ask in a very special way, Lord, that I am not seen or heard today.

Instead, Father, let us hear a word from the throne room of grace.

This is our prayer in Jesus's precious and holy name.

All right, if you have your Bible, turn with me to 2 Kings chapter 18.

We're gonna go through 1 of my favorite stories in the Bible, and pull out some lessons from the scripture in this story.

2 Kings 18, starting at verse 5, we jump into the story where the Assyrian Empire under King Sennacherib has begun to the final stages of world dominance.

Sennacherib has only really the small parts of Judah left to conquer, and most then of the then-known world would be under his rule.

He would only really have to move south and take Egypt and Ethiopia.

Sennacherib and his fathers have been a fierce and brutal force in the world in conquering.

And the Rabshakeh comes in, and he comes in, and he says, am I now come up without the Lord against this place to destroy it.

The Lord said to me, go up against this land and destroy it.

They are mocking God, Rabshakeh and Sennacherib.

So the people of the children of Israel, of the tribe of Judah, then said Elikaiim, the son of Hilkiah and Shebna and Joah unto Rabshakeh, they beg him, they say, please speak to us, I pray thee, in the Syrian language, For we understand it and talk not with us in the Jews' language, in the ears of the people that are on the wall." So Rabshakeh, as you're about to see, comes against Judah.

He is decrying the God of Judah and proclaiming complete destruction of Judah and Jerusalem.

He's speaking in Aramaic and they're begging him to speak in the Assyrian language because they don't want the people of Judah to be afraid.

Because their king Hezekiah has already told the people of Jerusalem that God is going to take care of them.

And so they don't want an opposing word to be heard.

But Rabbi Sheikha said unto them, Hath my master sent me, that's his master King Sennacherib, to thy master and to thee to speak these words?

Hath he not sent me to the men which sit on the wall.

In other words, am I not going to tell the men who are supposed to protect the city what's going on?

That they may eat their own dung and drink their own urine with you.

Literally what he says is, and this is the King James Version, what he says is, you are being warned that you will eventually be eating your own excrement if you do not come under the power of the king of the Assyrians.

He says, listen, you are in trouble and the men of Judah need to know.

The people of Jerusalem need to be made aware.

And horrible times are in front of them if they listen to Hezekiah.

Then Rabbi Shekhar stood and cried with a loud voice in the Jews language.

He defies them again, speaking Aramaic and spake, saying, hear the word of the great king, the king of Assyria.

Thus said the king, let not Hezekiah deceive you.

Because Hezekiah told him that God would deliver them.

For he shall not be able to deliver you out of his hand.

Neither let Hezekiah make you trust in the Lord, saying, The Lord will surely deliver us, and the city shall not be delivered into the hand of the king of Assyria.

He says, listen, don't listen to Hezekiah.

It's almost as if they had spies, because if we went back a chapter, this is literally what Hezekiah said to the people.

But what I want you to get is that the devil does the same thing today.

I want you to understand that the devil will send people into your life to tell you things that go contrary to the promises of God.

To try and convince you, and we'll see that it's not just people in your life that you know, but this comes from above us in the mass media and in the entertainment industry.

There are those at work to convince you that God is not trustworthy, that God cannot deliver you.

He says, hearken not to Hezekiah, for thus said the king of Assyria, make an agreement with me by a present and come out to me.

And then eat ye every man of his own vine, and every 1 of his fig tree, and drink ye every 1 the waters of his cistern, until I come and take you away to a land like your own land, a land of corn and wine, a land of bread and vineyards, a land of oil, olive, and of honey, that ye may live and not die.

And hearken not unto Hezekiah, when he persuades you, saying, The Lord will deliver us.

Now I want you to understand that the way that the Assyrians worked is they took people captive, and then they brought them and scattered them all over other parts of the empire.

And then they took people from other parts of the empire and repopulated the land that they scattered the first group of people from.

It was a way to control people and to keep them from rebelling against the empire.

So he's saying, look, if you just listen to what we're saying, bring a present and give it to the king Sennacherib, we'll make sure that you have food and wine and olive oil and honey.

We'll make sure there's water for you to drink will set you up.

He said but do not listen to hezekiah And let me tell you something that's how the devil works he often makes you promises To take care of you when he has only the intention to destroy you.

I say this when I give my testimony, I always say the devil does not just use failure against us, he will use success against you.

He will give you what you want, if giving you what you want will allow him to gain your soul.

And that's what Rabshakeh is promising here.

Then he goes into this tirade about how the other gods couldn't help their people.

Verse 33 says, Have any of the gods of the nations delivered at all his land out of the hand of the king of Assyria?

Arpah where the gods of Seth are Vayin henna I've have they delivered Samaria out of my hand and this was a direct knock against the people of God because Samaria was supposed to be, the northern kingdom of Israel was supposed to be protected by God.

And they're saying, listen, these other gods couldn't protect their people.

Your God couldn't protect your brothers in Israel.

Then he says in verse 35, Rabbi Sheikha says, who are they among all the gods of the countries that have delivered their country out of mine hand that the Lord should deliver Jerusalem out of my hand?

He is blatantly mocking and blaspheming the God of heaven.

And he thinks that his previous success is reason to do so.

So when the messengers get back to King Hezekiah, who was a noble king, the Bible speaks very highly of Hezekiah, and he says here, and it came to pass when Hezekiah heard it, look at what Hezekiah does, the Bible says he rinses, he rips his clothes, He covers himself with sackcloth, and I want you to see this, Hezekiah goes directly to the house of the Lord.

Hezekiah does not play when he gets the bad news.

He goes into an immediate place of sackcloth and of mourning and he goes into the house of God.

Then he takes Eliakim, which was over the household, and Shebna the scribe, and the elders of the priests, covered with sackcloth, and he sends them to Isaiah the prophet.

So he takes his messengers who were with Rapshachecha and now he sends them to Isaiah.

And they said to Isaiah, this is what Hezekiah says, This day is a day of trouble, and of rebuke and blasphemy.

For the children are come to the birth, and there is not enough strength to bring forth.

They say we are in trouble like a woman who is in labor, like a woman who is pregnant and she has gone into labor.

It's time for her to deliver, but there is not enough strength in the body of the woman to deliver the child.

Remember that a woman represents the church.

What they are saying is that we, the people of God, are in trouble.

However, there's not enough strength in us to be delivered.

That's how it sometimes looks when you look at the condition of the church today.

When you look at the forces against the house of God, it seems sometimes like we will not have the strength to be able to survive what we are up against.

Verse 4, it may be, they say to Isaiah, the Lord thy God will hear all the words of Rapshachecha, whom the king of Assyria, his master, had sent to reproach the living God, and will reprove the words which the Lord thy God hath heard.

Wherefore, lift up your prayer for the remnant that are left.

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Surviving the Surge

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