2 Kings 19:8-19
"8 The Rabshakeh returned, and found the king of Assyria fighting against Libnah, for he heard that the king had left Lachish. 9 Now the king heard concerning Tirhakah king of Cush, “Behold, he has set out to fight against you.” So he sent messengers again to Hezekiah, saying, 10 “Thus shall you speak to Hezekiah king of Judah: ‘Do not let your God in whom you trust deceive you by promising that Jerusalem will not be given into the hand of the king of Assyria. 11 Behold, you have heard what the kings of Assyria have done to all lands, devoting them to destruction. And shall you be delivered?12 Have the gods of the nations delivered them, the nations that my fathers destroyed, Gozan, Haran, Rezeph, and the people of Eden who were in Telassar? 13 Where is the king of Hamath, the king of Arpad, the king of the city of Sepharvaim, the king of Hena, or the king of Ivvah?’”
14 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 And Hezekiah prayed before the Lord and said: “O Lord, the God of Israel, enthroned above the cherubim, you are the 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 mock the living God. 17 Truly, O 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 were destroyed. 19 So now, O Lordour God, save us, please, from his hand, that all the kingdoms of the earth may know that you, O Lord, are God alone.”"
This was the final act in the great drama and it brought the Lord's deliverance to Judah. The insolence of Rabshakeh's earlier approach (18:27) was repeated - how true it is in the spiritual battle that the mere repetition of attacks, without any intensification of them, exhausts and desolates the soul! - and Hezekiah brings his urgent cry to the temple and spreads it before the Lord. His prayer is a noble utterance and has much to teach us. Pressing though his need was, he did not rush into God's holy presence with his requests in an importunate self-preoccupation. He worshipped. He took time to dwell upon the greatness and majesty of God before making his requests. This is both good psychology and spiritual wisdom, and is characteristic of Biblical prayers in general, as witness the apostolic pattern in Acts 4:24ff. To remind oneself of what God is, and Who He is, is to put everything, crisis included, in its proper perspective, and to begin to see the possibility of an answer. Hezekiah brought to the forefront of his mind the fact that the God to Whom he was praying was the God of all the kingdoms of the earth, Assyria included, and that fact alone must have begotten in his heart a confidence that his God was well able to turn his trial into triumph. This is one of the hall- marks of true prayer, and it should never be absent from ours. It is possible to allow our cares so to overwhelm us in kneeling at the throne of grace that we never catch sight of God. When this happens, we are not praying; we are moping, and this dishonours God.