Help!!

My daily walk through the Israelite Kings is always interesting to me. It always starts out telling you how old they were when their reign started and how long they were in power and then most importantly whether they did good or evil in the sight of the Lord. I find myself rooting for this king or that to be a good one if I've just had a run of duds.

One such "good" king was Hezekiah. He was a king for the Israelite southern kingdom of Judah. In fact, the Bible says, "There was no one like him among all the kings of Judah, either before or after him time" 2 Kings 18:5. What I find interesting about him is the subject of my post today and that is his focus. He always kept his eye on the Lord and turned to him as a first reaction and not a last resort.

As what always seems to be the case in the Old Testament there is a great story to illustrate a man or woman's character. For Hezekiah it comes in 2 Kings 19. In Old Testament days, the kings always had to watch their backs since someone was always looking to put a knife in it and for Hezekiah it was no different. He received a letter from an enemy (the Assyrians) that they were going to attack Judah and wipe them off the face of the planet.

Here's where the story gets good. Does Hezekiah panic? Does he run for the hills since the Assyrians had never been defeated? Does he immediately put his army together to get ready for battle? The answer to all these is no. Instead, he heads to the temple by himself and takes the matter before the Lord.

"After Hezekiah receive the letter from the messengers and read it, he went up to the Lord's Temple and spread it out before the Lord. And Hezekiah prayed this prayer before the Lord; 'O Lord, God of Israel, you are enthroned between the might cherubim! You alone are God of all the kingdoms of the earth. You alone created the heavens and the earth. Bend down, O Lord, and listen! Open your eyes, O Lord, and see! Listen to Sennacherib's words of defiance against the living God.' 2 King 19: 14-16

Can't you just see the image and hear the passison in Hezekiah's voice? His relationship with the Lord was so strong that he could pray powerful prayers like this. He was asking him,"Look Lord, can't you see what this bad guy wants to do to your man of God"?

Now as I mention frequently from these OT stories we need to find our application or takeway from these stories since we don't likely have enemies out to kill us (Gosh, I hope not). We need to be men and women of prayer. We need to pray first and then wait for God to act. What eventually happens in our story here is Hezekiah doesn't have to do a thing. God wipes his enemies out while they slept.

Now God might not always solve our problems and issues for us, but we do need to trust Him to give us the answer. It might be for us to act or for step aside while He handles things. I have often had a tendency to do things a little backwards. I would run into a problem, jump in and do something, then ask God to bless it. It didn't usually work out.

I encourage you all to take a look at your prayer life. Is it a first response or a when I get around to it? Is your faith strong that you expect positive answers or are your prayers more like wishes? The Bible says we are to "never stop praying" 1 Thessalonians 5:17. You just memorized a verse by the way. So don't think you have to pray for 30 minutes to an hour at a time. A prayer can be as short as one word, "Help."

When you pray, expect answers. It might not always be yes, it could be no or it might be wait you're not ready for the answer to be yes. This is by far the hardest answer since it requires us to keep praying about the matter.

Have a great weekend and I'll be praying for you.