2 Kings 19–21
1 When King Hezekiah heard it, he tore his clothes, covered himself with sackcloth, and entered the house of the Lord. 2 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 They said to him, “Thus says Hezekiah: This day is a day of distress, chastisement, and disgrace, for children have come to the mouth of the womb, but there is no strength to birth them. 4 Perhaps the Lord your God will hear all the words of the Rabshakeh, whom the king of Assyria, his master, has sent to taunt the living God and will rebuke the words that the Lord your God has heard, and you might lift up a prayer for the remnant that are left.”
5 When the servants of King Hezekiah came to Isaiah, 6 Isaiah said to them, “Thus shall you say to your master, ‘Thus says the Lord: Do not be afraid of the words that you have heard, with which the servants of the king of Assyria have blasphemed Me. 7 I am putting a spirit in him, and he will hear a report and return to his own land. Then 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 had heard that he had departed from Lachish.
9 When the king heard concerning Tirhakah king of Cush, “He has come out to fight against you,” he 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 will not be given into the hand of the king of Assyria. 11 You have heard what the kings of Assyria have done to all lands by annihilating them. Will you be delivered? 12 Have the gods of the nations delivered them, the nations that my fathers destroyed, Gozan, Harran, Rezeph, and the sons of Eden who were in Tel Assar? 13 Where is the king of Hamath, the king of Arpad, the king of the city of Sepharvaim, of Hena, and Ivvah?”
14 Hezekiah received the letter from the hand of the messengers and read it. Then 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, who sits on the cherubim, You alone are God over all the kingdoms of the earth. You have made the sky and the earth. 16 Incline, O Lord, Your ear and hear. Open, O Lord, Your eyes and see. Hear the words of Sennacherib, which he sent to taunt the living God.
17 “Surely, O Lord, the kings of Assyria have annihilated the nations and their lands 18 and have put their gods in the fire, for they were no gods but the work of men’s hands, wood and stone; thus they have been destroyed. 19 So now, O Lord our God, save us from his hand, that all the kingdoms of the earth may know that You, O Lord, are God alone.”
20 Then Isaiah son of Amoz sent word to Hezekiah, saying, “Thus says the Lord God of Israel: That which you have prayed to Me concerning Sennacherib king of Assyria I have heard. 21 This is the word that the Lord has spoken concerning him:
She despises you, she ridicules you—
virgin daughter of Zion.
Behind you, she shakes her head—
daughter of Jerusalem.
22 Whom have you taunted and blasphemed?
And against whom have you raised a voice
and lifted your eyes upward?
Against the Holy One of Israel.
23 By your messengers
you have taunted the Lord,
and have said,
‘With my many chariots
I have gone up the height of the mountains,
to farthest reaches of Lebanon,
and I will cut down its tallest cedars,
its choicest junipers.
I will enter its most remote canopies of night,
its dense forest.
24 I have dug wells
and drunk foreign waters,
and I dried up with the sole of my foot
all the streams of Egypt.’
25 “Have you not heard?
Long ago I arranged it,
in ancient times I formed it;
now I bring it to pass,
that you will turn impregnable cities
into desolate heaps of stones.
26 Their inhabitants are powerless;
they are terrified and ashamed.
They are like grass of the field
and new vegetation,
grass on the roof tops,
scorched before it stands.
27 “But I know your dwelling place,
your going out and your coming in,
and your raging against Me.
28 Because you have raged against Me,
and your self-assuredness has come up to My ears,
I will put My hook in your nose
and My bridle on your lips,
and I will turn you back
on the way by which you came.
29 “This will be the sign to you:
This year you will eat what grows itself,
and in the second year the same.
Then in the third year sow, reap,
and plant vineyards, and eat their fruits.
30 The spared of the house of Judah who remain
will again take root below, and bear fruit above.
31 For from Jerusalem a remnant will go forth,
and escapees 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 will not enter this city,
shoot an arrow there,
approach it with shield,
or heap up a siege ramp against it.
33 By the way that he came, he will return;
he will not enter this city,
declares the Lord.
34 For I will protect this city to save it,
for My own sake and for the sake of David My servant.”
35 On that night the angel of the Lord went out and struck one hundred and eighty-five thousand in the camp of the Assyrians. When others woke up early in the morning, these were all dead bodies. 36 So Sennacherib king of Assyria departed and stayed in Nineveh.
37 As he was worshipping in the house of Nisrok his god, Adrammelek and Sharezer his sons struck him with the sword, and they escaped into the land of Ararat. Esarhaddon his son reigned in his place.
Chapter 20
1 In those days Hezekiah became ill and was near death. The prophet Isaiah son of Amoz came 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 “Please, O Lord, remember how I have walked before You faithfully and with an undivided heart and have done what is good in Your sight.” And Hezekiah wept bitterly.
4 Now before Isaiah had come out of the middle courtyard, the word of the Lord came to him, saying, 5 “Turn back and say to 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. I will heal you. On the third day you shall go up to the house of the Lord. 6 I will add to your days fifteen years, and I will deliver you and this city from the hand of the king of Assyria. I will defend this city for My own sake and for the sake of David My servant.”
7 Then Isaiah said, “Take a cake of figs.” So they took it and laid it on the boil, and he recovered.
8 Hezekiah said to Isaiah, “What will be the sign that the Lord will heal me, and that I should go up to the house of the Lord on the third day?”
9 Isaiah said, “This is the sign to you from the Lord, that the Lord will do the thing that He has spoken: Should the shadow walk forward ten steps or go back ten steps?”
10 And Hezekiah answered, “It is an easy thing for the shadow to stretch ten steps, so let it go back ten steps.”
11 Isaiah the prophet called to the Lord, and He made the shadow go back ten steps on the stairs of Ahaz.
12 At that time Marduk-Baladan son of Baladan, king of Babylon, sent letters and a gift to Hezekiah, for he had heard that Hezekiah had been ill. 13 Hezekiah welcomed them and showed them all the treasure house, the silver, the gold, the spices, the fine oil, all the armory, and all that was found in his storehouses. There was nothing in his house nor in all his dominion that Hezekiah did not show them.
14 Then Isaiah the prophet came to King Hezekiah and said to him, “What did these men say? From where did they come to you?”
Hezekiah said, “They came from a distant land, from Babylon.”
15 He said, “What have they seen in your house?”
Hezekiah said, “They have seen everything in my house. There is nothing in my storehouses that I did not show them.”
16 Isaiah said to Hezekiah, “Hear the word of the Lord: 17 The days are coming when everything that is in your house and that your fathers have stored up until this day will be carried off to Babylon. Nothing will be left, says the Lord. 18 Some of your sons who go out from you, who will be born to you, will be taken away. They will be eunuchs in the palace of the king of Babylon.”
19 Then Hezekiah said to Isaiah, “The word of the Lord that you have spoken is good.” And he said, “Why not, if there is peace and security in my days?”
20 The rest of the deeds of Hezekiah, all his power, how he made a pool and a conduit and brought water into the city, are they not written in the book of the annals of the kings of Judah? 21 Hezekiah slept with his fathers, and Manasseh his son reigned in his place.
Chapter 21
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 He did evil in the sight of the Lord, according to the abominations of the nations whom the Lord dispossessed before the children of Israel. 3 He went back and rebuilt the high places that Hezekiah his father had destroyed. He erected altars for Baal, made an Asherah pole as Ahab king of Israel had done, and worshipped all the host of heaven and served them. 4 He built altars in the house of the Lord, of which the Lord had said, “In Jerusalem I will put My name.” 5 He built altars for all the host of heaven in the two courts of the house of the Lord. 6 He made his son pass through the fire, was conjuring and seeking omens, and dealt with mediums and soothsayers. He did much evil in the sight of the Lord, provoking Him to anger.
7 He put a carved image of Asherah that he had made in the house of which the Lord said to David and to Solomon his son, “In this house and in Jerusalem, which I have chosen out of all tribes of Israel, I will put My name forever. 8 I will not make the feet of Israel to wander homeless from the land that I gave to their fathers, if only they will be 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 did not listen. Manasseh led them to do more evil than the nations whom the Lord had destroyed before the children of Israel.
10 The Lord spoke by His servants the prophets, saying, 11 “Because Manasseh king of Judah has done these abominations, things more evil than all that the Amorites did, and has also caused Judah to sin with his idols, 12 therefore thus says the Lord God of Israel: I am bringing evil on Jerusalem and Judah, such evil that the ears of whoever hears about it will tingle. 13 I will stretch over Jerusalem the measuring line of Samaria and the level of the house of Ahab, and I will wipe out Jerusalem as one wipes out a bowl, wiping it and turning it upside down. 14 I will disregard the remnant of My inheritance and give them into the hand of their enemies. They shall become plunder and spoil for 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 innocent blood very much, until he had filled Jerusalem from one end to the other; besides his sin he caused Judah to sin by doing evil in the sight of the Lord.
17 Now the rest of the deeds of Manasseh, all that he did, and his sin that he committed, are they not written in the book of the annals of the kings of Judah? 18 Manasseh slept with his fathers, and was buried in the garden of his house, in the garden of Uzza. Amon his son reigned in his place.
19 Amon was twenty-two years old when he became king. He reigned two years in Jerusalem. His mother’s name was Meshullemeth, daughter of Haruz of Jotbah. 20 He did evil in the sight of the Lord, as his father Manasseh had done. 21 He walked in all the ways that his father walked, served the idols that his father served, and worshipped them. 22 He abandoned the Lord God of his fathers, and he did not walk in the way of the Lord.
23 The servants of Amon conspired against him and killed the king in his house. 24 But the people of the land struck all those who conspired against King Amon, and the people of the land made Josiah his son king in his place.
25 Now the rest of the deeds of Amon that he did, are they not written in the book of the annals of the kings of Judah? 26 And he was buried in his tomb in the garden of Uzza, and Josiah his son reigned in his place.
John 4:1–30
1 Now when the Lord learned that the Pharisees had heard that Jesus was making and baptizing more disciples than John 2 (though Jesus Himself did not baptize, but His disciples), 3 He left Judea and departed again to Galilee.
4 Now it was necessary that He go through Samaria. 5 So He came to a city of Samaria which is called Sychar, near the plot of ground that Jacob gave to his son Joseph. 6 Jacob’s well was there. Jesus, therefore, being exhausted from His journey, sat down by the well. It was about the sixth hour.
7 A woman of Samaria came there to draw water. Jesus said to her, “Give Me a drink.” 8 For His disciples had gone away into the city to buy food.
9 Then the woman of Samaria said to Him, “How is it that You, being a Jew, ask a drink from me, a woman of Samaria?” For Jews have no dealings with Samaritans.
10 Jesus answered her, “If you knew the gift of God, and who it is who is saying to you, ‘Give Me a drink,’ you would have asked Him, and He would have given you living water.”
11 The woman said to Him, “Sir, You have nothing to draw with, and the well is deep. Where then do You get that living water? 12 Are You greater than our father Jacob, who gave us the well and drank from it himself, along with his sons and his livestock?”
13 Jesus said to her, “Everyone who drinks of this water will thirst again, 14 but whoever drinks of the water that I shall give him will never thirst. Indeed, the water that I shall give him will become in him a well of water springing up into eternal life.”
15 The woman said to Him, “Sir, give me this water, so that I will not thirst, nor come here to draw.”
16 Jesus said to her, “Go, call your husband, and come here.”
17 The woman answered, “I have no husband.”
Jesus said to her, “You are right in saying, ‘I have no husband,’ 18 for you have had five husbands, and he whom you now have is not your husband. So you have spoken truthfully.”
19 The woman said to Him, “Sir, I perceive that You are a prophet. 20 Our fathers worshipped on this mountain, but you all say that in Jerusalem is the place where men ought to worship.”
21 Jesus said to her, “Woman, believe Me, the hour is coming when neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem will you worship the Father. 22 You worship what you do not know; we know what we worship, for salvation is of the Jews. 23 Yet the hour is coming, and is now here, when the true worshippers will worship the Father in spirit and truth. For the Father seeks such to worship Him. 24 God is Spirit, and those who worship Him must worship Him in spirit and truth.”
25 The woman said to Him, “I know that Messiah is coming” (who is called Christ). “When He comes, He will tell us all things.”
26 Jesus said to her, “I who speak to you am He.”
27 Then His disciples came. They marveled that He talked with a woman. Yet no one said, “What do You seek?” or, “Why are You talking with her?”
28 The woman then left her water pot, went her way into the city, and said to the men, 29 “Come, see a Man who told me all things that I ever did. Could this be the Christ?” 30 They went out of the city and came to Him.