045. Prayer Of Hezekiah In Sickness.
Prayer Of Hezekiah In Sickness.
“How full of dread, how full of hope, loometh inevitable death, Of dread, for all have sinned; The dread is drowned in joy, the hope is filled with immortality.” The Prayer as recorded.—2 Kings 20:1-3. The Lord’s Answer.—2 Kings 20:4-6.
Prostrate on a bed of languishing and pain lies Hezekiah, the man who had walked before God in uprightness of heart, and used his influence to promote his worship during many years of a useful life
Death is hovering over his dwelling, and “sickness sits caverned in his hollow eye.” And what are the thoughts of this good man in view of the approach of the “king of terrors.” The son of Amoz had come with the message of the Lord, for him to “set his house in order,” for his death was inevitable, to make without delay a full and final settlement of domestic and civil affairs, and prepare for that event which must come to all—
“The knell, the shroud, the mattock, and the grave, The deep, damp vault, the darkness, and the worm.” As if to shut out the world, Hezekiah turns his face to the wall of his chamber, and prays not for composure to meet the last great adversary—no! for the “king of terrors would be to him the prince of peace”—but he “wraps the drapery of his couch around him,” and, in communion with the Almighty One, who holds in his hand the keys of life and death, prays for life. Hezekiah had lived “in deeds, not years, in thoughts, not breaths, in feelings, not in figures on a dial;” and his reluctance to die must be ascribed to the state of his nation and family, for whose interests he had labored in the love and fear of God.
It will be remembered at the time of Hezekiah’s sickness he had no son; Manasseh was not born till three years after; by his death, therefore, this branch of David’s family would have become extinct. He therefore desired restoration to life and health, that he might work a little longer for the sake of true religion; and his prayer is to this effect. Tears flow freely with his words; each drop of sorrow is itself a prayer, and God gathers them into his treasury, as he asks for “the life of heart and life of soul mingled with life for the body.”