Just five days ago, the media reported that the terrorist group Isis had unwittingly revealed a biblical site. In July 2014, Isis had taken over the Iraqi city of Mosul, which is the same city as the biblical Nineveh. As part of their destruction of anything not supportive of radical Wahabi Islam, they demolished a Mosque that was supposedly the tomb of the prophet Jonah. But now that Mosul has been taken back from Isis, Iraqi archaeologists went to that site. What they found is that underneath that destroyed mosque was the remains of one of the palaces of the Assyrian king Sennacherib, whom we meet in 3 books of the Bible: 2 Kings, 2 Chronicles and Isaiah, each telling the same story.

There’s a reason the Bible repeats that story of Sennacherib coming against Hezekiah. Like the account of Nebuchadnezzar being humbled, the story of a proud, boastful Assyrian king being devastated by God teaches very clearly that God is all-powerful and God is sovereign.

Sennacherib was indeed a king similar to Nebuchadnezzar. He lived from around 740 B.C. To 681 B.C., and ruled the Assyrian empire for 26 years. Before the time of Nebuchadnezzar, Assyria spread its power over most of Mesopotamia, waging war with Egypt, and Judah often getting caught in the cross-fire.

Sennacherib was known for his massive building programs. In Nineveh, he created what was called, ‘The Palace Without Rival.” We know about this palace because of the many, many descriptions that Sennacherib left of its construction, and its eventual description.

“Palaces of gold, silver, bronze, alabaster, ivory, cedar, pine for my royal residence I constructed. Beams of cedar and cypress, whose scent is pleasant and which come from the snow-capped Amanus Mountain, I placed there. Doors of cedar, cypress and pine I covered with silver and copper, and I set them up to frame the doorways. I, Sennacherib, the chief of all princes, who has knowledge of all crafts, made great pillars of bronze and colossal lions, open at the knees, such as no earlier king had made. Colossal bronze bulls covered with gold and colossal alabaster bulls I set up to frame the doorways.”

He piped in water through a stone aqueduct 80 km away, one of the wonders of the world. His palace, built on an artificial platform, covered 8 acres and was surrounded by parks and orchards stocked with exotic plants and animals. This enormous palace with 80 rooms was discovered in 1847, but another part of it or a separate complex was discovered and reported on just 4 days ago. Sadly, ISIS had already gone into the palace and had looted it of the many artifacts that were inside, no doubt to sell them on the black market.

But Sennacherib was not just a fabulously wealthy king. He was also a ruthless destroyer in battle. He called himself “the flame that consumes those who will not submit.” He wrote about conquering the city of Babylon: “Its inhabitants, young and old, I did not spare, and with their corpses I filled the streets of the city.”

It was this king that came up against the godly king Hezekiah. Hezekiah was a great reformer, restoring biblical worship, tearing down idolatrous places, and generally being one of the best kings Judah ever had. He actually restored some of Judah’s lost military power.

But perhaps his greatest trial came when Sennacherib came to claim ownership over all of Judah. Best we can tell, Sennacherib heard that a few cities close to or near Judah had formed a league with Egypt, so he went out to subjugate and punish them.

2 Chronicles 32:1 After these deeds of faithfulness, Sennacherib king of Assyria came and entered Judah; he encamped against the fortified cities, thinking to win them over to himself.

According to the Assyrian inscriptions found, Sennacherib captured 46 fortified towns. Now as Hezekiah saw this destruction of the cities leading up to Jerusalem, at first, he gave in to expediency.

Then Hezekiah king of Judah sent to the king of Assyria at Lachish, saying, “I have done wrong; turn away from me; whatever you impose on me I will pay.” And the king of Assyria assessed Hezekiah king of Judah three hundred talents of silver and thirty talents of gold.

So Hezekiah gave him all the silver that was found in the house of the LORD and in the treasuries of the king’s house.

At that time Hezekiah stripped the gold from the doors of the temple of the LORD, and from the pillars which Hezekiah king of Judah had overlaid, and gave it to the king of Assyria. (2 Ki. 18:14-16)

Lachish was a Philistine city to the west of Jerusalem which Sennacherib had chosen to conquer first. Hezekiah sends this tribute money, but it soon became clear that this was not going to completely appease Sennacherib, and he was still going to face the same treatment as the other Judean cities.

And when Hezekiah saw that Sennacherib had come, and that his purpose was to make war against Jerusalem, he consulted with his leaders and commanders to stop the water from the springs which were outside the city; and they helped him. Thus many people gathered together who stopped all the springs and the brook that ran through the land, saying, “Why should the kings of Assyria come and find much water?”

Jerusalem had a system of water catchment to collect water from the nearby spring of Gihon. An upper pool lay outside the city walls, which then fed through an aqueduct a lower reservoir within the city. But that upper pool would only serve as a handy drinking trough for a besieging army, so Hezekiah had it cut off. In fact, Hezekiah dug an underground tunnel 553 metres long from the Gihon spring that delivers water from the Gihon spring straight into the city to the pool of Siloam. That tunnel still exists today.

He made other preparations.

And he strengthened himself, built up all the wall that was broken, raised it up to the towers, and built another wall outside; also he repaired the Millo in the City of David, and made weapons and shields in abundance. Then he set military captains over the people, gathered them together to him in the open square of the city gate, and gave them encouragement, saying,

“Be strong and courageous; do not be afraid nor dismayed before the king of Assyria, nor before all the multitude that is with him; for there are more with us than with him. With him is an arm of flesh; but with us is the LORD our God, to help us and to fight our battles.” And the people were strengthened by the words of Hezekiah king of Judah.

Hezekiah prepared for siege and for battle. The Millo was probably a strong tower with fortified buildings, which he strengthened, he built up the defences, he armed and equipped his people.

But when all this was done, the sheer numbers of the Assyrian army made this futile. Defeat was inevitable. Somewhere along the line, their faith begins to shift from the arm of the flesh to God Himself. Hezekiah stood before his people as a spiritual leader, reminding them that with Yahweh as their God, they had the majority.

Finally, the day of doom arrived. An army of not less than 185,000 men arrived, and as Hezekiah had cleverly planned, they arrived at the north-west of the city, where the upper pool was now dry.

As would often happen in ancient siege warfare, embassies from both sides would meet outside the city besieged. According to the two other accounts, the Assyrian commander-in-chief, chief of the eunuchs, and chief captain who the ones who negotiated. They were met by three men from Israel, Shebna, Eliakim, and Joab.

After this Sennacherib king of Assyria sent his servants to Jerusalem (but he and all the forces with him laid siege against Lachish), to Hezekiah king of Judah, and to all Judah who were in Jerusalem, saying,

“Thus says Sennacherib king of Assyria: ‘In what do you trust, that you remain under siege in Jerusalem?

Does not Hezekiah persuade you to give yourselves over to die by famine and by thirst, saying, “The LORD our God will deliver us from the hand of the king of Assyria”?”

Has not the same Hezekiah taken away His high places and His altars, and commanded Judah and Jerusalem, saying, “You shall worship before one altar and burn incense on it”?

Do you not know what I and my fathers have done to all the peoples of other lands?

Were the gods of the nations of those lands in any way able to deliver their lands out of my hand?

Who was there among all the gods of those nations that my fathers utterly destroyed that could deliver his people from my hand, that your God should be able to deliver you from my hand?

Now therefore, do not let Hezekiah deceive you or persuade you like this, and do not believe him; for no god of any nation or kingdom was able to deliver his people from my hand or the hand of my fathers. How much less will your God deliver you from my hand?’

Furthermore, his servants spoke against the LORD God and against His servant Hezekiah.

He also wrote letters to revile the LORD God of Israel, and to speak against Him, saying, “As the gods of the nations of other lands have not delivered their people from my hand, so the God of Hezekiah will not deliver His people from my hand.”

Then they called out with a loud voice in Hebrew to the people of Jerusalem who were on the wall, to frighten them and trouble them, that they might take the city.

And they spoke against the God of Jerusalem, as against the gods of the people of the earth– the work of men’s hands.

In this speech, the Assyrians tried several strategies. First, being ignorant of God’s law, they thought that Hezekiah’s religious reforms were actually insulting to God. They did not understand that the high places and altars were an abomination to God, and that He only wanted corporate worship at the Temple. And so their first strategy was to say loudly in Hebrew, so that the men on the wall could hear: you are relying on Yahweh, but Hezekiah has already insulted and offended Yahweh.

Now of course, any Hebrew who understood the law knew that this was just a sign of the Assyrians ignorance about the Law.

But then they took it to the next level. Strategy number two was to issue a direct challenge to the God of Israel. “Every other nation has had its national deity. Every other nation had a god they cried out to. And every other nation has been fodder for our armies. As much as those countries prayed to their gods, we conquered them. They were just as devout as you. They prayed just as much as you. But did their gods deliver them? Not a single god of all these nations has delivered their countries out of the mighty hand of Sennacherib. So do not think that Yahweh is special, or that it will be any different with Yahweh.”

Now at that moment, Assyria made the crucial misstep. In their arrogance and pride, they thought they were simply intimidating all the Hebrews who could hear them. But their words had in fact become a direct challenge to God Himself. They had thrown down the gauntlet at the foot of God’s throne, they had poked a bony finger into the chest of God Almighty. They had made this into something far greater than Judah vs Assyria. They had made this into Yahweh vs all other gods.

Does the God of Israel have any more power than any other God? Does He have any more control than any other god?

Well, what does the Bible teach about the God Hezekiah was relying on?

Jeremiah 32:17

‘Ah, Lord GOD! Behold, You have made the heavens and the earth by Your great power and outstretched arm. There is nothing too hard for You.’

Luke 1:37

“For with God nothing will be impossible.”

The Bible teaches that just as God is infinite in regard to space, infinite in regard to time, and infinite in regard to knowledge, so God is infinite in regard to power. He can do everything He desires. We read last week of Job’s humbled response to God when he said

Job 42:1-2

“I know that You can do everything, And that no purpose of Yours can be withheld from You.”

At the Great Commission, Jesus said to His disciples “All power in Heaven and on Earth has been given to Me”.

Fifty-seven times in Scripture, God is called Almighty – El Shaddai in Hebrew.

Scripture describes God as the one whose power created the universe and sustains it, who flooded the Earth and saved Noah, who rescued Israel, who does what is impossible with men by saving them, who raised Christ from the dead, and raises men from the dead, who could deliver His people from fiery furnaces and ferocious giants, who opened barren wombs, and blind eyes, effortlessly calm storms and walk on water, heal every disease and cast out the most ferocious of demons, who can pull down the walls of Jericho and make the sun go backwards.

He has all power – the Anglo-Saxon word was ælmihtig, and the Latin was omnipotent. What it means to be Almighty is that God can do anything as easily as anything else. He expends no energy doing one thing over another, nor does He have to recover. Since His own being is infinite and self-sufficient, He has all the power to be sufficient for Himself. Having no needs, nothing needs to come from outside of Him, and so nothing outside of Him is greater in power or difficulty for Him.

Now of course, omnipotence does not mean God can do anything we can think of. For example, Scripture is clear that God cannot lie, God cannot deny Himself. God cannot sin. God can do all that a Holy God wants to do. A Holy God does not want to, and so cannot sin. A Holy God does not want to, and so cannot do the absurd.

But growing immediately out of this attribute of all-mightiness is the attribute of sovereignty, or lordship. If God has all power to do all that He wants to do, the next question is, what does God get to do?

The answer is, God gets to do all He desires. Some have called this attribute of sovereignty, God’s freedom.

Psalm 115:3

But our God is in heaven; He does whatever He pleases.

Isaiah 46:10

Declaring the end from the beginning, And from ancient times things that are not yet done, Saying, ‘My counsel shall stand, And I will do all My pleasure.’

This means God is the freest being in the universe. No one can hinder Him. He is never frustrated, never hindered, never struggling with a problem. Indeed, while He has permitted many things that grieve Him, and allowed many things that He hates, there is nothing He has not permitted. Nothing exists which has not passed through the preceptive or permissive will of God.

Ephesians 1:11

In Him also we have obtained an inheritance, being predestined according to the purpose of Him who works all things according to the counsel of His will,

Proverbs 16:4

The LORD has made all for Himself, Yes, even the wicked for the day of doom.

Revelation 19:6

And I heard, as it were, the voice of a great multitude, as the sound of many waters and as the sound of mighty thunderings, saying, “Alleluia! For the Lord God Omnipotent reigns!

People are happy to hear about God’s omnipotence, but they shift uncomfortably when they hear He is going to exercise that power exactly as He wants. As Spurgeon said,

“Men will allow God to be everywhere except on his throne. They will allow him to be in his workshop to fashion worlds and to make stars. They will allow him to be in his almonry to dispense his alms and bestow his bounties. They will allow him to sustain the earth and bear up the pillars thereof, or light the lamps of heaven, or rule the waves of the ever-moving ocean; but when God ascends his throne, his creatures then gnash their teeth; and when we proclaim an enthroned God, and his right to do as he wills with his own, to dispose of his creatures as he thinks well, without consulting them in the matter, then it is that we are hissed and execrated, and then it is that men turn a deaf ear to us, for God on his throne is not the God they love. They love him anywhere better than they do when he sits with his sceptre in his hand and his crown upon his head. But it is God upon the throne that we love to preach. It is God upon his throne whom we trust.”

It was God on His throne that Hezekiah turned to.

Now because of this King Hezekiah and the prophet Isaiah, the son of Amoz, prayed and cried out to heaven.

I want you to see the content of Hezekiah’s prayer:

And 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.

Then Hezekiah prayed before the LORD, and said:

“O LORD God of Israel, the One who dwells between the cherubim, You are God, You alone, of all the kingdoms of the earth. You have made heaven and earth.

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 reproach the living God.

Truly, LORD, the kings of Assyria have laid waste the nations and their lands, 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 destroyed them.

Now therefore, O LORD our God, I pray, save us from his hand, that all the kingdoms of the earth may know that You are the LORD God, You alone.”

Notice Hezekiah’s approach: God, He has challenged your uniqueness, your omnipotence, your sovereignty. Distinguish yourself, by rescuing us. Prove yourself to be the only true God by dealing with this Assyrian world power.

Then the LORD sent an angel who cut down every mighty man of valor, leader, and captain in the camp of the king of Assyria.

The account in Isaiah and 2 Kings tells us the angel moved at night when the camp was asleep, and the devastation was seen in the morning.

Lord Byron helps us imagine this scene in his poem The Destruction of Sennacherib, where the rhythm of the poem sounds like the charge of galloping horses headed down into battle.

The Assyrian came down like the wolf on the fold,
And his cohorts were gleaming in purple and gold;
And the sheen of their spears was like stars on the sea,
When the blue wave rolls nightly on deep Galilee.
Like the leaves of the forest when Summer is green,
That host with their banners at sunset were seen:
Like the leaves of the forest when Autumn hath blown,
That host on the morrow lay withered and strown.
For the Angel of Death spread his wings on the blast,
And breathed in the face of the foe as he passed;
And the eyes of the sleepers waxed deadly and chill,
And their hearts but once heaved, and for ever grew still!
And there lay the rider distorted and pale,
With the dew on his brow, and the rust on his mail:
And the tents were all silent, the banners alone,
The lances unlifted, the trumpet unblown.
And the widows of Ashur are loud in their wail,
And the idols are broke in the temple of Baal;
And the might of the Gentile, unsmote by the sword,
Hath melted like snow in the glance of the Lord!

So he returned shamefaced to his own land. And when he had gone into the temple of his god, some of his own offspring struck him down with the sword there. Thus the LORD saved Hezekiah and the inhabitants of Jerusalem from the hand of Sennacherib the king of Assyria, and from the hand of all others, and guided them on every side. (2 Chr. 32:21-22)

An army of 1000 was no match for God. An army of 185,000 was no match for God. According to Revelation, the assembled hosts of the whole human race in rebellion, in league with Satan and his cohorts will be no match for God.

However powerful you may be, however strong you may be, the Lord will laugh at your plans for independence. After roving around the city parks and eating grass like an ox, Nebuchadnezzar understood this, and so counselled all who would come after him:

Daniel 4:34-35

“For His dominion is an everlasting dominion, And His kingdom is from generation to generation. All the inhabitants of the earth are reputed as nothing; He does according to His will in the army of heaven And among the inhabitants of the earth. No one can restrain His hand Or say to Him, “What have You done?”

But if you are in God’s family, one of God’s children, there is hardly an attribute of God more comforting than God’s omnipotence and God’s sovereignty. To know that in the most painful circumstances, the most severe troubles, God Almighty has ordained them, and controls them, and overrules them. To know that the hand that guides all things is the loving hand of God our Saviour.

Spurgeon: “There is nothing for which the children of God ought more earnestly to contend than the dominion of their Master over all creation—the kingship of God over all the works of his own hands—the throne of God, and his right to sit upon that throne.”