Roger Lewis - The Crisis of Hezekiah - Class 4 - The Writing and The Psalter

Automatically transcribed. Accuracy is good but not perfect, and words are sometimes wrong. Trust the audio over the text.

1. 0:13

   Brothers and sisters, we’re ready to start our third class. Our speaker is Brother Rodger Lewis. The theme of Brother Lewis’s classes this week is The Crisis of Hezekiah. Today’s class is entitled The Writing and the Psalter for the Roger.

2. 0:43

   Well, thank you, brother Chairman, and good morning, my dear brothers and sisters in our Lord Jesus Christ. Back to his A car. So in our last study, you’ll remember that we found his A car. I always need to make this adjustment just before we begin. We found his A car in his royal bedchamber.

3. 1:06

   He was in despair with his face towards the wall. He was trying to accept the devastating message that had been brought to him by Isaiah The prophet set thine house in order for thou shalt not live. And that prospect, you remember, of premature death left him regretting all the things that he’d wished he’d done and lamenting the fact that he would be unable to complete them. But his prayer at that vital moment of destiny gave an amazing demonstration of his total surrender to Yahweh in that spirit of resignation, in accepting whatever the divine will might have had in store for him. And that prayer which so pleased his God was answered in dramatic fashion, as we saw as the prophet, running from the Middle court, burst into his chamber again to announce with breathless excitement that his life was to be spared. And with the writing of the shadow on the staircase, Hezekiah was given the ultimate reassurance that he would indeed recover and go up yet again into the House of God. Well, that brings us to our study this morning then, as we take up the narrative of the prophecy of Isaiah again, and this time to the theme of the writing and the Psalter. Because do you notice in Isaiah 38 and verse 9, as we concluded our study yesterday in verse 8, verse 9 will now say the writing of Hezekiah, king of Judah, when he had been sick and was recovered of his sickness.

4. 2:42

   Now, incidentally, in the writing that follows, it’s written in lines of poetry. And I think that what that tells us is that what he wrote, what he did write in this next section of Isaiah 38, was in fact the Psalm. This is Hezekiah’s Psalm to commemorate the stirring events that had brought him back from certain death to promised life.

5. 3:04

   And I think that that tells us something else as well, is that this was not intended to be kept as a private reflection of the king. No, no, no. He wanted this to be a public expression not only of his things, but of what lessons might be learned from the story. He wanted the nation to understand the hand of Providence in this matter, which was at work not just in the life of the king, but in the life of the nation, as we shall see by and by in our studies. And what’s interesting, brothers and sisters, is that this entire section from verse 9 to verse 20 in Isaiah chapter 38 is utterly unique to Isaiah.

6. 3:43

   This is not in the historical records of his account. Neither in the Kings nor Chronicles will we find this Psalm only in the book of Isaiah. It’s something to do with what he wrote about, and he was obviously anxious to record. And one thing I think we can be certain confident of that Isaiah was anxious that we know about was this. You see, if we were to say what’s the theme of this writing, one of the key ideas is that it’s about the matter of sickness and recovery.

7. 4:16

   Isaiah 38, verse 9 where we start, says the writing of Hezekiah, king of Judah, when he’d been sick and was recovered of his sickness. And that word recover. Here is the Hebrew word higher to live higher. It’s a basic word for life. But again in verse 16 of this chapter it will say, O Yahweh, by these things men live, so wilt thou recover me, kholam, to bind together again and make me to live. And again in chapter 38, verse 21, Isaiah said, let them take a lump of figs, lay it for a plaster on the boil, and he shall recover to live.

8. 4:54

   And in Isaiah 39, verse one, when this writing is finished, it says Meredek Baladdin sent letters and a present to Hezekiah, for he’d heard that he’d been sick and was recovered. Khazak to be strong. Now why? That’s interesting. Or let me just show you some other keywords here. Do you notice this? He had been sick verse 9.

9. 5:13

   He had been sick, chapter 39, verse 1, and was recovered. Now this is the corresponding passage in Second Kings 20, verse 12, corresponding to chapter 39, verse one. The king of Babylon sent letters in a present unto Hezekiah, for he had heard that Hezekiah had been sick only Isaiah tells us, but he was recovered for some reason.

10. 5:43

    It was important that Isaiah make a careful note about the, the, the, the matter of recovery of the king and that’s going to become the framework on which Hezekiah is going to be basis the the writing of the Psalm on this occasion. Now you might remember that when we looked at the speech of Reb Shaker in chapter 36 that it broke into, do you remember 2 sections could 2 quite distinct sections to the speech and that each section had two distinct parts.

11. 6:15

    And that women came to the answer of God in Isaiah 37, that there were two sections to the answer and each section had two parts. Well, you never guess how the writing of Hezekiah breaks up, would you? Surprise, surprise, but it’s going to be the same. And clearly this may be a mark of, of perhaps the way that Hezekiah wrote his story. So I think what we’ve got here in verses 10 to 14 is the first section of his writing.

12. 6:39

    And it says despair at the prospect of death. And as always, there’s crucial little words that become the guide to our thinking. Now here’s the start that tells us the theme. It’s about as previous anguish, I said. I had said. I had thought I had spoken about these things in the past. This first section is about his previous anguish and his despair at the prospect of death. And there are two sections, I think, to that writing verses 11:50 is an elegy of grief for life cut short and the daunting prospect of premature death.

13. 7:20

    That’s what these first verses about opening verses are about. And then the second part of this first section is about a lamentation versus 13 and 14 for an untimely end and a cry for help from oppression. So let’s start the writing, Shall we see, shall we, brothers and sisters? And and see what it is that Hezekiah would bid us to know.

14. 7:44

    Isaiah 38 verse 10 says, I said in the cutting off of my days, I shall go to the gates of the grave. I’m deprived of the residue of my years. And his first thought was one of sorrow that he was to be cut off in the midst of his days. But really by days what he really meant was labours. He’d be cut off in the midst of his work with the nation because it was right now that the nation needed him to inspire them. And I think that’s the thing that upset him the most. His people needed him, and he was going to be taken away. He wasn’t concerned about prolonging life for the sake of prolonging his life.

15. 8:17

    It was for their sake as the Assyrians cast its gloom upon the nation. But now this man who had so desperately wanted to help his nation, well, his own confidence was shattered because his sickness had left him so bewildered and broken as he struggled to understand the will of his God in the matter. We just know how confused Hezekiah must have been at this terrible turn of events.

16. 8:45

    He says. I’ve been taken to the gates of Sheol as a graphic description of death, like a prison house. And I think that he was terrified that he’d be pushed inside. The doors would be locked, bolted, and he’d never come back out.

17. 9:03

    Oh yes, Hezekiah was distressed at the thought of these things. And so he goes on to say in verse 11, I said, I shall not see Yahweh, even Yahweh in the land of the living. I shall behold man no more with the inhabitants of the world. So the first thing he thought about was I’m worried about the people, worried about the nation.

18. 9:25

    And the second thing he thought about, wasn’t it remarkable? Verse 11. I shall not see Yahweh. His second thought was that death would deprive him of his relationship with His God. I won’t be able to come before my God anymore. Unable to help His people. Verse 10. Unable to worship His God. Verse 11. They were the two things that were the entire focus of Hezekiah’s life.

19. 9:56

    It begs the question what we might focus on, doesn’t it, brothers and sisters? But here’s a car is concerned above all all else is that he would miss his guard in the land of the living. That was an amazing spirit of the king. He certainly wasn’t focused really on himself, was he? So verse 12 says my age is departed and removed from me as a shepherd’s tent.

20. 10:17

    Now in those days, incidentally, a shepherd’s tent was a very simple piece of fabric with a pole to sleep under in the open field because it got pretty cold at at at night time out with the flocks. So there was a piece of cloth attached to a pole, and they would jam the pole into the ground and snuggle under the cloth and pull it around them.

21. 10:35

    But the point of the symbol here was that in the morning it would be rolled up and packed away as the flock moved to fresh pasture. So when he says my age is removed like a shepherd’s tent, it was a symbol of just how temporary his life was. Up for the night, down on the day, that’s how long my life is, says Hezekiah.

22. 10:55

    Like a shepherd’s tent. Exactly. He says, I’ve cut off like a weave in my life. And that would cut off actually means together, together and to roll up. And so Hezekiah pictured himself sadly rolling up the cloth of his life, even though it hadn’t been finished. In fact, it says, at least in the authorized version here, he will cut me off with pining sickness. But you might notice the margin.

23. 11:21

    The margin says he will cut me off at the thrum. And that’s interesting because the thrum was the fringe of the unwoven ends that were left on the loom when the completed cloth was cut off by the weaver’s shears. So at the end of the completion of the weaving of a cloth, the shears would cut off and just leave the thrum, leave the tangled threads at the end. But you see, for his a car, it was as if the tapestry of his life had been cut away before the cloth was finished, before the pattern was completed.

24. 11:55

    His life was about to finish. The cloth was still not complete, but the weaving was over, and the seers had come. In fact, he says, from day even to night, Wilt thou make an end of me? Seen as if God had determined on His premature death, and the end was so, so close now, so real, that he quailed at the thought. He tried, of course, he tried to compose himself. He says that verse 13 I I reckoned, he says, until the morning.

25. 12:24

    That word reckoned Shava to level. Well, it’s been translated to compose, to adjust, to quiet. It’s the word found in Psalm 131, verse 2, which says I have behaved myself. And I think what we’re being told is that in the night time, he tried to calm and soothe his emotions, hoping for relief to come, that it was all to no avail because the next morning brought no improvement at all.

26. 12:53

    Instead, the agony of his suffering grew worse because in the morning, what he found was that as a lion, so will he break all my bones. And the Hebrew reads in the past tense, he did break all my bones. So such was the physical and mental anguish of his illness that he felt bruised and crushed and shattered by it from day even to night. Wilt thou make an end of me?

27. 13:18

    Isn’t that interesting, that phrase? Because isn’t that what he’s just said? At the end of verse 12, from day even to night, that would make an end of me. And now again, at the end of verse 13, from day even to night, that would make an end of me. You know, one of the things, one of the marks of people under severe stress is that we repeat phrases over and over. Our brains are numbed by the crisis and we lock onto a word or a phrase or an expression and we just, we, we, it comes back and back and back into our mind as if we can’t break free from it.

28. 13:48

    So he uses the same words. He felt his life was going to be all over very soon. Actually, there’s a sort of similar phrase in Job 4 verse 20 that says they are destroyed from morning to evening. And I think that the import of that phrase in Job was that is in the shortest space of possible time in the space or span of just a single day from 1:00 morning to it’s evening, it’s all over.

29. 14:14

    And that’s in his despair, how Hezekiah felt his whole life would soon be finished, and all that was left was the unbearable problem, the pain of his condition and the unannouncerable problem of its meaning.

30. 14:31

    Many of you will know about the stages of grief. It moves from that moment of denial to the moment of emotional angst that it has even occurred, to the question of how it might finally be accepted, and then the question of how you might actually move on from that. Grief’s like a set of stages, isn’t it?

31. 14:54

    It passes through a stage and the early stages of where we struggle to accept even the reality of the thing itself. That’s where Hezekiah was. It’s where we all are, brothers and sisters in such a journey, in such a crisis. Totally understandable that we pass through such stages. In fact, what he says, verse 14, he says like a crane or a swallow. So did I chatter.

32. 15:16

    I did mourn as a dove. Now, the interesting thing about the swallow and the crane is that they’re both noted for their strident cry. And the dove is known for her plaintive sound. So you see these song, these birds didn’t make joyous songs. They all had the cry of anguish and the call of morning. And he said, that’s the birds I’m thinking of at this time. That’s how I feel.

33. 15:40

    He says, the morning cry of these birds, they were the sounds that captured the misery and the tears which Hezekiah felt at this time. In fact, he says, verse 14, mine eyes pale with looking upward. He besought God and pray so much in this trial that he was exhausted from looking up into heaven as he pleaded. But it still seemed that no answer came. And so he says, Oh Yahweh, I am oppressed. Now even in the English we know that the word oppressed carries that idea of pressing down, forcing down, crushing weight, keeping someone in subjection and hardship to press against. And that’s what the Hebrew word means here. Here’s a car felt as if he was under the pressure of a merciless creditor who was demanding the repayment of a debt who could not, he couldn’t pay. And so he cries, Oh Yahweh, I am oppressed, placed undertake for me.

34. 16:38

    And that word undertake means to give pledge or to become a guarantor. He says I can’t pay it. Oh God, please become my guarantor. Because the guarantor of course was one who was prepared on behalf of someone else to pay the bond that would release the defendant. Oh, Yahweh, become my security, he says. So death was the creditor asking for immediate payment, and his a car was the debtor who could not pay. O Yahweh, wilt thou act for me and be my security? He’s at his lowest moment at this point in the writing of Hezekiah verse 14.

35. 17:18

    He’s at the bottom. But when all seemed lost, and as I had come and gone with the message that his illness would kill him, the amazing return of the prophet and the miracle of his reprieve had come. And so now we’ve got the second part of the writing because, well, it follows hard on the heels, you see. So if the first section of the writing was about his despair at the prospect of death, then the second-half of the writing is about his delight at the promise of life. Verses 15 to 20.

36. 17:55

    And there’s another little keyword, you see, that marks out the beginning and the change. Or what shall I say? Previously I had said it’s about his previous anguish. Now what shall I say is about his future gladness? This is the moment when the Psalm changes, where the writing alters because the reprieve has come.

37. 18:20

    So he says, verse 15, What shall I say? You see, this is the confession of a man who’d been brought low and then rendered almost speechless by the surprise of his restoration. It was his unexpected deliverance which left him struggling to find words. I don’t know what to say. He says, What shall I say?

38. 18:38

    What can I say to the answer that had come by the mouth of of the prophet Isaiah? In fact, he says at the end of that verse, he hath both. That’s God. Of course. He hath both spoken unto me and Himself hath done it. See, God had promised His deliverance, verse 5. But now he brought it to pass.

39. 19:00

    He’d felt the healing. And so from this point, the writing of Hezekiah would move from the depression that gripped him to the gladness of deliverance. And so he says in verse 15, What shall I say? He hath both spoken unto me and himself have done it. I shall go softly all my years in the bitterness of my soul.

40. 19:22

    See, this was a time for a new commitment before his God, starting right now. So here’s one of the lessons that comes out of the story. Brothers and sisters, we can’t choose our trials, but we can choose whether we will allow them to mark us for good or for evil before our God.

41. 19:53

    You see, with some the effect of trial is to move them further away from God as they brood on the injustice of their own position. And with others, the same trial can have a the effect of drawing them closer to God. As they humble themselves to learn and to change. And here’s a car I chose. He chose to have this experience shape him for the better with regard to his future ServiceNow.

42. 20:20

    Incidentally, most translations. Read that section at the end of verse 15 as follows. I shall go softly all my years because of the bitterness of my soul. He wasn’t going to stay in his bitterness. He was going to walk differently because of his bitterness and how he would permit it to affect him.

43. 20:44

    In fact, you see that word? Go softly there. That word is only found in one other place in Scripture. It’s the word used in Psalm 42, verse 4 when it says this. I had gone with the multitude I went with them to the House of God with the voice of joy and praise with a multitude that kept holy day and in that verse in the Psalm, the words I went with them to the House of God. I went with them is that same word translated goes softly here.

44. 21:16

    So the word refers to the sacred March of those who walked in procession to the temple. Now, here’s a card focused all his life on the House of God and the worship of Yahweh there. And so he vows to use the experience of this crisis to frame his thinking so that he would always behave with the reverence and the humility of one who was ascending to the House of God. He’s making a commitment, brothers and sisters, that he would use the blessing of these next 15 years just as wisely as he could, and always with the truth uppermost in his mind. That was the spirit that he had.

45. 21:53

    It’s a wonderful spirit to have, in other words, translated into ourselves. It’s like we’re going to walk as if we were just coming into the meeting every hour of our lives. We’re just about to enter the meeting hall now. What a good spirit that would be to walk each day as if that’s where we were going. So in the second section, firstly, then a pain of praise in these verses for the thanks that he had for the extension of his life and a decision to walk in reverence for restoration. And then in verses 18 to 20, he’s going to have, he’s going to make a vow of commitment to teach the truth and give a promise that he would renew his praises of his God. So here’s the spirit then of the king. He was going to use this opportunity in just the very best way he could, this extension of life that had been granted unto him.

46. 22:56

    So you see what he says in verse 16. He says, O Yahweh, by these things men live. Now what do you think that means? By what things? Well, I think the context links to verse 15 and the words of promised restoration that God had uttered by these things, the word that God had spoken.

47. 23:19

    Do you remember Deuteronomy 8 verse three? Man doth not live by bread alone. By every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of Yahweh doth man live. We live by the Word of God. You see, we all live by virtue of the edicts of Yahweh that determines the governance of the world and the declarations of God that outline the workings of His Providence.

48. 23:45

    In these things all men live. But I think Hezekiah had something more unique and personal in mind. He felt a connection with the thought that we live under the sovereign hand of He whose word alone can destroy or create. But in his life it meant this. As he goes on to say in all these things he says is the life of my spirit.

49. 24:06

    So Rotherham says and all together in them is the life of my spirit because you see he had special reason to confess this truth. God had spoken a word to him, verse 15, that promised his recovery from illness that had threatened him by the word of God, men live. But I especially so says Hezekiah.

50. 24:28

    And I wonder whether those 15 years that were granted to the king were counted by Hezekiah as been especially and uniquely now the life of his spirit. You see, he hadn’t he hadn’t just been restored to health. He’d been given a fresh start to repeat his reign. He wanted to use that winding back of the clock of his life just as spiritually as he possibly could. And so he says in verse 16, So wilt thou recover me and make me to live.

51. 25:03

    Actually, most translations render the phrase in the past tense. For thou hast recovered me and made me to live. And I think that past tense as of something already accomplished is highly appropriate here. Because to me, what we’ve already been told in verse 9 at the start of this writing, this was the writing of Hezekiah when he had been sick and was recovered of his sickness. And so the past tense here, I think in verse 16 similarly is appropriate to what Hezekiah has in mind. Behold, he says verse 17 for peace. I had great bitterness.

52. 25:46

    Do you know this is one of those occasions where the Hebrew actually conveys the very opposite idea to the English? Because the sense of the Hebrew is, behold, it was for my peace that I had such bitterness, such bitterness. Because the word bitterness is repeated, it’s doubled in the Hebrew text. It was for my peace that I have had such bitterness, such bitterness.

53. 26:15

    So Hezekiah’s response after his recovery was to see the whole episode as a provision from Yahweh for his spiritual development. This bitterness, he says, has been ultimately for my good and for my peace and the word peace. Shalom, of course, means not just peace, but also safety and welfare. It’s for my good that God’s done this in my life. You see, that’s the response of a godly mind. It’s the Spirit that produces growth in our lives, brothers and sisters, when we recognize that that bitterness that has come upon us, Yahweh’s used it for good in our lives to develop our character before him.

54. 26:51

    And Yahweh had intended the whole experience for his good and for Hezekiah’s benefit. But it’s Hezekiah’s wonderful attitude in accepting that thought that’s so excitational to us as we go through the crises of our own life. In fact, he says in the middle of verse 17, Thou hast and love to my soul delivered it from the pit of corruption.

55. 27:13

    Do you notice the words delivered it and not in the Hebrew? And the margin is better. The margin says, and I think rightly so, thou hast loved my soul from the pit. So this turns love into a verb, doesn’t it? Very much. It’s a very tender expression when you think about it. It’s as if God, having seen his servant slipping into the pit of death, had reached out to embrace him, had bound his cords of love around him, and hauled him back from the edge to safety. He’s loved me out of the pit, he says. And you know, brothers and sisters, before our Lord comes, and if our Lord tarry, there might be many of us who finally are in the pit before the Lord has come. But it is our hope and our prayer that God will love us out of the pit again at the coming of our Lord. And He did that for Hezekiah on this occasion as a dramatic illustration of what we all hope in terms of the reality of death being removed by the blessing of eternal life in times to come. And because God had hauled him back to safety, back from the edge, loved him out of the pit, because God had done that, he felt Hezekiah felt at the end of verse 17 that he had cast all his sins behind his back.

56. 28:29

    He reasoned that his recovery must also signify his forgiveness. And for God to cast all his sins behind his back meant to cast them to a place where they can neither be seen or remembered. God can do what we can’t. Brothers and sisters, we forgive and try to forgive.

57. 29:04

    We find it very hard to forget. God can forgive so completely that it’s as if our sins have been cast behind His back and He truly remembers them no more. It’s an astounding blessing, the forgiveness of God. And that’s how Hezekiah felt right now. So he says, verse 18 For the grave cannot praise thee, death cannot celebrate thee.

58. 29:31

    They that go down to the pit cannot hope for thy truth. You know, it’s interesting. We shan’t turn them up because we haven’t got time. But if you make a note of Psalm 6 verse 5, Psalm 88 verses 11:50, Psalm 115 verses 17 and 18, Ecclesiastes 9 verses 5 and 10, the similarities between those expressions in those other places in Hezekiah’s words are so marked and so strong that I wonder whether in fact, through the Spirit, he’s quoting from them in his writing.

59. 30:09

    It’s a spirit inspired utterance of Hezekiah drawing on other testimonies about mortality, the fundamental doctrine of the truth that teaches that death is the cessation of existence. Because that’s what Hezekiah believed, as he says in this verse, that in the state of death man cannot think, cannot praise, cannot hope in God. And yet again, verse 11, as verse 11 had said, Hezekiah was the most distressed at the thought that he would lose the privilege of communing with his God. And that’s the thing he rejoices at the most with the promise of this renewed life.

60. 30:46

    It meant for him the chance to come again before his God in praise, the blessing of fellowship with God. But that rank is one of the things we would fear losing. It was for Hezekiah. You see, this was the man whose relationship with his God was so very deep and very strong that he felt that most of all. And so he says with tears of thankfulness, verse 19, the living, the living, He shall praise thee as I do this day. The father to the children shall make known thy truth. Now it’s been observed, and rightly so, that in these 15 years that were added to him, Hezekiah did marry and he did have a child through whom the Davidic line might be continued. But do you notice it’s not child singular here, the father to the child.

61. 31:41

    It’s the father to the children. And here’s a car. I had more children plural than simply the son of his own bells. He was the spiritual father of the nation. And I think that this was his there in this verse, verse 19. This was his vow to continue working with the nation. In fact, He’d already said these words in Isaiah 37, verse 3.

62. 32:04

    The children are come to the birth, he says, and there’s not strength to bring them forth. And now he says, Father to the children shall make no thy truth, because now that he had his strength back again, he had with it the determination to use his time in teaching the truth to those children, the nation he was working with, to spiritually reform them.

63. 32:24

    And that’s his pledge right now, at this moment of recovery, the father to the children shall make no thy truth. We’re going to examine shortly, brothers and sisters, just how completely his Akai fulfilled that commitment that he made. So he says verse 20, Yahweh was ready to save me, therefore we will sing my songs to the stringed instruments all the days of our life in the House of Yahweh.

64. 32:52

    Now did you read that carefully? Yahweh was ready to save me, therefore we will sing my songs all the days of our life. Now who’s the we in the air? Well, I think the answer is the nation that he was teaching, not just a child of his own. He wasn’t just going to sing his songs in the temple with his own family. He wanted to guide the nation and he wanted them to understand the meaning of this deliverance.

65. 33:19

    We’re all in this together, he says. In fact, he wrote this Psalm so that the nation might learn. And he wanted to bring the whole nation on a journey of discovery as to how God had providentially worked in his life, but also in theirs at this moment and at this time of crisis.

66. 33:35

    And so now the writing is ended and his Psalm was complete. There’s two other details about the lump of figs and the sign going up to the house, verses 21 and 22, that actually in the in the King’s record are added much earlier in the story. And so they should come between Isaiah 38 verse 6 and Isaiah 38 verse 7. But because it concerned the matter of recovery, I think Isaiah, at least for one reason, put it at the end of the Psalm, because it was consistent with his theme of pointing out the recovery of the king.

67. 34:11

    So now his Psalm has ended. And that vow that he made. Verse 20. We will sing my songs all the days of our life in the House of Yahweh. They were not empty words. He was going to make good on them. In fact, we have good reason to believe that Hezekiah threw himself into the work of the truth with even more vigor than he’d shown before his illness.

68. 34:33

    He redoubled his efforts, and especially in the work of preserving the truth for the generation that he was guiding. And that there to sing those songs was significant because Hezekiah was going to edit and produce a whole section of the Book of Psalms in commemoration of this one episode in his life and to fulfil the there of verse 20.

69. 35:00

    And that section of Psalms which he wrote in honor of that pledge is of course this section known as the Song of the Degrees.

70. 35:16

    Now do you notice the definite article? So the Song of the Degrees is Psalms 120 to 134, and every one of those Psalms bears the same title, a song of the degrees and that word degrees. Therefore, and the use of the definite article indicates that the word degrees had some concrete and specific meaning that was associated with this particular set of psalms. Now the only incident in Scripture that bears any relation to that word is the degrees or the steps or the stairs which figured in the miraculous sign given to Hezekiah.

71. 36:04

    So we’re not surprised to find that the word degrees and every one of those psalms is MA Allah, the same word translated degrees in Isaiah 38 verse 8. And what’s interesting about those psalms is there are why 15 of them, 15 psalms answering to 15 years of additional life that was granted to the king.

72. 36:42

    So when he put them together, he composed 15, set, 15 psalms together, not all his own, but the collection came to 15. And there’s a symmetry to the collection because the very middle Psalm out of those 15 was actually written by Solomon, Psalm 127. But on either side are two sets of seven, and in each of those sets of seven psalms, 120 to 126 and 128 to 134, each of those have got two psalms written by David and the rest probably by Hezekiah.

73. 37:22

    And that 15 psalms are also divided or divisible into five sets of three, which follows a theme of distress and trust and blessing. And we suggest that these are the songs referred to in Isaiah’s, sorry, Hezekiah’s via in Isaiah 38 and verse 20. Now let me show you the structure of those psalms just so you see what I mean, particularly in that last section so that it’s made plain.

74. 37:46

    So five sets. The first set, the second set, the third set, You get the idea. The 4th set, The 5th set, 15 psalms, 5 sets of three. But in each case, the first Psalm in each set is on the theme of distress, and the second Psalm in each set is on the theme of trust.

75. 38:15

    And the third Psalm in each set is on the theme of blessing. You see, these psalms are the story of Hezekiah’s crisis, the threat of the Assyrian invasion, and the prospect of personal death. They’re about as distress, about as trust in God, and about the blessing of deliverance. And Hezekiah said, we’re going to sing these things so that the nation never forgets what we’ve been through together and that we can worship before our God acceptably.

76. 38:49

    So remember I said the middle ones written by Solomon? So there it is. But David wrote one in the first set and one in the second set, and one in the fourth set and one in the 5th set. And we believe that the balance of those psalms were written by Hezekiah. So Hezekiah began the series in Psalm 120, and he’ll end the series. And 134.

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    And if he wrote 2 + 2 + 2 + 2 + 2 sets in five, he wrote Y10 psalms answering to the 10° by which the shadow ascended the stairs. He made good on his pledge. Brothers and sisters, he made good on his pledge. And I think there’s a lesson. You see, In fact, this is the lesson from our study today. It’s wanting to reconnect, which is one of those deeply technological moments which we have to submit to, because until we do, my screen’s frozen just at the deliciously important moment.

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    It adds to the tension. It builds interest. Wait, help is on the way. All right, should we give it a go? Look at that, just like I bought 1. Thank you for your intervention.

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    So our lesson for today. You know, brothers and sisters, it’s very easy to be thankful for deliverance, but our thankfulness may not last for long enough. And I think that we need to show our thankfulness by the faithful service that we offer to God as a result of our deliverance, that we might remember what God has done for us.

80. 41:13

    Now just look at the consistent theme of these passages. And there’s a little keyword again that binds them together. This was the prayer of Hannah at the time of the giving of her son. For this child, I prayed Yahweh’s given my petition, therefore I’ve lent him. This is the words of David. David said that thou has lifted me up, therefore I will give thanks.

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    This is the words of Hezekiah and the Psalm. Yahweh was ready to save me. Therefore, and so the apostle Paul in the 2nd Corinthians 12 verses 9 and 10, he said unto me, My grace is sufficient for thee. Therefore now let me throw a little more color on the screen and you’ll see the point. Yahweh has given my petition, says Hannah. Therefore, in response I’ve lent him. She gave an act of dedication in return. David had been lifted up and therefore he would give thanks. Yahweh was ready to save his a car and he pledged therefore that they would sing his songs.

82. 42:06

    Paul was given the promise of a grace sufficient for his needs. And therefore he said, I will take pleasure in infirmities. So here’s the thing, you see, it’s so easy to be thankful for the deliverance of God. But as time passes while we forget about it, and yet the circumstances of our life and the experiences of our crisis are not intended to leave us the same. They’re intended to change us.

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    And if our thankfulness is truly in response to God, God’s good hand, then it needs to be seen in a reciprocal pledge of future dedication. That shouldn’t be transient. It shouldn’t be temporary. It should be a permanent commitment to our future life before him. And that’s what Here’s a car I did. So he had a much stronger resolve.

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    He was so thankful for this extension of his life that he pledged to use every bit of it in the service of the truth. Now just read again his words in Isaiah 38 verses 19 and 20 while we’re here. And then let me show you how that story concludes. The grave cannot celebrate thee.

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    Death cannot. Sorry that the grave cannot praise thee. Death cannot celebrate thee. They that go down into the pit cannot hope for thy truth. The living the living. He shall praise thee as I do this day. The father to the children shall make known thy truth. Yahweh was ready to save me. Therefore we will sing my songs to the stringed instruments all the days of our life in the House of Yahweh.

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    And Hezekiah’s pledge of faithful service in thankfulness for the hand of God upon him, I think, was fulfilled perhaps more wonderfully than we might know, because we’ve already seen what he had to do with regard to the songs of degrees. He became involved in the creation of those songs, which incidentally, becomes the basis for book five of the Psalms.

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    In fact, I think Hezekiah’s hand may well have been in the shaping of that entire collection of Psalms, the 5th book in the main. There’s another part of the Psalms that I think Hezekiah was involved in, because we all know about the Psalms of David and the Psalms of the House of Asaph and the Psalms of the sons of Korah.

88. 44:22

    We know about the main psalms. But did you realize that about 50 of the 150 psalms we have have got no author? They’re described as orphan Psalms. Someone who put the book of Psalms together was very anxious that David be given as Jew and Asaph and others, but weren’t worried about their name coming forward and the 50 new ones that were added. And I think that many of those fifty were possibly written by Hezekiah, including Psalm 102, which I think we can be pretty certain about.

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    I think his hand lies upon the book of Psalms in a much more significant way than we might have imagined, because many of those Psalms are about the very threats, the very crisis that Hezekiah himself had experienced. Oh yes, he contributed to the Psalms all right. But he did more than that because you might remember these words in the book of Proverbs, chapter 25, verse one, it says these are also Proverbs of Solomon, which the men of Hezekiah, king of Judah copied out.

90. 45:26

    So what we’re told in the book of Proverbs is there was a whole additional set of proverbs that were added to the Canon of Scripture under the express instruction deja vu and authority of the king. And if if Hezekiah hadn’t done that, we wouldn’t have that particular collection of Solomonic psalms at all. But he made sure that they were put in. He had a hand in the book of Proverbs. And there’s one more thing that tells us just how passionate Hezekiah was in fulfilling is there the fathers of the children shall make know thy truth. This is going to be interesting, isn’t it? Sort of like two things coming to a climax together. We hope the train tracks will allow us to pass each other safely.

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    But here’s the last thought in that brief moment of pleasurable silence. You know, in the Old Testament Canon at the end of the Hebrew manuscripts, every book until Hezekiah’s death ends with a three letter seal.

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    The letters heth sign cough and the pointing of the letters means this is bound. And the meaning of that little of that little cryptic sign is that this book is now authenticated as the genuine copy.

93. 46:53

    And what we’ve been told is that the king was involved with the editorship and approval of every book of the Bible until the day he died. Because kef Zine cough is HZK, and HZK from Kazakh is the short form for the name Hezekiah, and every book of the Old Testament until that man died bears that seal at the bottom of the book to authenticate its validity.

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    The Father to the children shall make that known. Thy truth. He kept that there. He absolutely kept that there. He did more than we might realize, brothers and sisters, in the guardianship of the truth that we might know. The Spirit of God and His mark sits upon the Old Testament record in that strange but interesting way. Let’s show that same spirit of thankfulness in our own lives, brothers and sisters, when we too have experienced the hand of our God upon us for good, as it says in one of our hymns. Oh, render thanks to God above, fountain of eternal love, Whose mercy firm through ages past has stood and shall forever last. Who can as mighty deeds express not only vast, but numberless? What mortal eloquence can raise a tribute equal to His praise? Happier they, and only they, Who from Thy precepts never stray, Who know the right, nor only so,

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    but seek to practice what they know. If you all now stand.