Crime and murder in our streets. Unimaginable levels of debt, both personal and public. A crippling shortage of all kinds of skilled workers. The need for prayer has seldom been more obvious. But how should we pray in times like these, when we are clearly in way over our heads? The answer seems to be equally obvious – “God, get me out of this! God, do what I cannot do! God, solve my problems!”

But that’s not how Hezekiah prayed. Oh, when the mighty Assyrian war machine had smashed into his country and laid siege to his capital city, he did indeed ask God to deliver his people from the invading army (Isaiah 37:20). But that was at the end of his prayer, not the beginning.

No, Hezekiah began his desperate prayer in verse 16 with effusive praise for God, the God Who is enthroned above the cherubim, the God Who made heaven and earth. Hezekiah’s prayer began with a confession of faith: that the Lord is the only true God of all the kingdoms of the earth, regardless of any of their beliefs to the contrary. His prayer included the amazing recognition that this all-powerful God was nevertheless at the same time the personal God of the people of Israel, the God Who had made a covenant with them and had chosen them to be His own.

And it was only with such a God-centered perspective in mind that Hezekiah was then able to make his plea for help. But even his requests continued to be focused on God, and not only on his own needs. For the first thing Hezekiah asked God to do was to attend to His own reputation, noticing how the Assyrians had insulted Him. After all, they had claimed that the Lord could no more defend the Israelites than the gods of all the other nations could keep the Assyrians from conquering their peoples. But Hezekiah knew the truth: that all those gods of all the other nations weren’t real at all. They were just the ”work of men’s hands, wood and stone” (Isaiah 37:19).

So, yes, Hezekiah wanted God to deliver Jerusalem from the hands of the Assyrians, but for a God-centered reason: so that “all the kingdoms of the earth,” all those peoples who went on worshipping the things they had made with their hands, would be able to see and know that God is the Only True God, the only One Who is truly able to protect His people and set them free.

What if we were to pray with that kind of confidence? What if we were to pray with equal fervor that God would get the glory for the way He brings an end to pestilence and violence and injustice? God gave Hezekiah what he asked for. Might He do the same for us?

Isaiah 37:14-20 (NASB)

14 And Hezekiah received the letter from the hand of the messengers, and read it: and Hezekiah went up unto the house of the LORD, and spread it before the LORD.
15 And Hezekiah prayed unto the LORD, saying,
16 O LORD of hosts, God of Israel, that dwellest between the cherubims, thou art the God, even thou alone, of all the kingdoms of the earth: thou hast made heaven and earth.
17 Incline thine ear, O LORD, and hear; open thine eyes, O LORD, and see: and hear all the words of Sennacherib, which hath sent to reproach the living God.
18 Of a truth, LORD, the kings of Assyria have laid waste all the nations, and their countries,
19 And have cast their gods into the fire: for they were no gods, but the work of men’s hands, wood and stone: therefore they have destroyed them.
20 Now therefore, O LORD our God, save us from his hand, that all the kingdoms of the earth may know that thou art the LORD, even thou only.