Judah Delivered from Sennacherib

191 And on hearing it, King Hezekiah took off his robe, and put on haircloth, and went into the house of the Lord. 2 And he sent Eliakim, who was over the house, and Shebna the scribe, and the chief priests, dressed in haircloth, to Isaiah the prophet, the son of Amoz. 3 And they said to him, Hezekiah says, This day is a day of trouble and punishment and shame; for the children are ready to come to birth, but there is no strength to give birth to them. 4 It may be that the Lord your God will give ear to the words of the Rab-shakeh, whom the king of Assyria, his master, sent to say evil things against the living God, and will make his words come to nothing: so then make your prayer for the rest of the people. 5 So the servants of King Hezekiah came to Isaiah. 6 And Isaiah said to them, This is what you are to say to your master: The Lord says, Be not troubled by the words which the servants of the king of Assyria have said against me in your hearing. 7 See, I will put a spirit into him, and bad news will come to his ears, and he will go back to his land; and there I will have him put to death by the sword.

8 So the Rab-shakeh went back, and when he got there the king of Assyria was making war against Libnah, for it had come to his ears that he had gone away from Lachish. 9 And when news came to him that Tirhakah, king of Ethiopia, had made an attack on him, he sent representatives to Hezekiah again, saying, 10 This is what you are to say to Hezekiah, king of Judah: Let not your God, in whom is your faith, give you a false hope, saying, Jerusalem will not be given into the hands of the king of Assyria. 11 No doubt the story has come to your ears of what the kings of Assyria have done to all lands, putting them to the curse; and will you be kept safe? 12 Did the gods of the nations keep safe those on whom my fathers sent destruction, Gozan and Haran and Rezeph and the children of Eden who were in Telassar? 13 Where is the king of Hamath, and the king of Arpad, and the king of the town of Sepharvaim, of Hena and of Ivvah? 14 And Hezekiah took the letter from the hands of those who had come with it; and after reading it, Hezekiah went up to the house of the Lord, opening the letter there before the Lord. 15 And Hezekiah made his prayer to the Lord, saying, O Lord, the God of Israel, seated between the winged ones, you only are the God of all the kingdoms of the earth; you have made heaven and earth. 16 Let your ear be turned to us, O Lord, and let your eyes be open, O Lord, and see; take note of all the words of Sennacherib who has sent men to say evil against the living God. 17 Truly, O Lord, the kings of Assyria have made waste the nations and their lands, 18 And have given their gods to the fire; for they were no gods, but wood and stone, the work of men's hands; so they have given them to destruction. 19 But now, O Lord our God, give us salvation from his hands, so that it may be clear to all the kingdoms of the earth that you and only you, O Lord, are God.

20 Then Isaiah, the son of Amoz, sent to Hezekiah, saying, The Lord, the God of Israel, says, The prayer which you have made to me against Sennacherib, king of Assyria, has come to my ears. 21 This is the word which the Lord has said about him: In the eyes of the virgin daughter of Zion you are shamed and laughed at; the daughter of Jerusalem has made sport of you. 22 Against whom have you said evil and bitter things? against whom has your voice been loud and your eyes lifted up? even against the Holy One of Israel. 23 You have sent your servants with evil words against the Lord, and have said, With all my war-carriages I have come up to the top of the mountains, to the inmost parts of Lebanon; its tall cedars will be cut down, and the best trees of its woods; I will come up into his highest places, into his thick woods. 24 I have made water-holes and taken their waters, and with my foot I have made all the rivers of Egypt dry. 25 Has it not come to your ears how I did it long before, purposing it in times long past? Now I have given effect to my design, so that by you strong towns might be turned into masses of broken walls. 26 This is why their townsmen had no power, they were broken and put to shame; they were like the grass of the field and the green plant, like grass on the house-tops. 27 But I have knowledge of your getting up and your resting, of your going out and your coming in. 28 Because your wrath against me and your words of pride have come up to my ears, I will put my hook in your nose and my cord in your lips, and I will make you go back by the way you came. 29 And this will be the sign to you: you will get your food this year from what comes up of itself; and in the second year from the produce of the same; and in the third year you will put in your seed and get in the grain and make vine-gardens and take of their fruit. 30 And those of Judah who are still living will again take root in the earth and give fruit. 31 For from Jerusalem those who have been kept safe will go out, and those who are still living will go out of Mount Zion: by the fixed purpose of the Lord of armies this will be done. 32 For this cause the Lord says about the king of Assyria, He will not come into this town, or send an arrow against it; he will not come before it with arms, or put up an earthwork against it; 33 By the way he came he will go back, and he will not get into this town, says the Lord. 34 For I will keep this town safe, for my honour, and for the honour of my servant David.

35 And that night the angel of the Lord went out and put to death in the army of the Assyrians a hundred and eighty-five thousand men; and when the people got up early in the morning, there was nothing to be seen but dead bodies. 36 So Sennacherib, king of Assyria, went back to his place at Nineveh. 37 And it came about, when he was worshipping in the house of Nisroch his god, that his sons Adrammelech and Sharezer put him to death with the sword; and they went in flight into the land of Ararat. And Esar-haddon his son became king in his place.

Hezekiah's Sickness

201 In those days Hezekiah was ill and near death. And Isaiah the prophet, the son of Amoz, came to him, and said to him, The Lord says, Put your house in order, for your death is near. 2 Then, turning his face to the wall, he made his prayer to the Lord, saying, 3 O Lord, keep in mind how I have been true to you with all my heart, and have done what is good in your eyes. And Hezekiah gave way to bitter weeping. 4 Now before Isaiah had gone out of the middle of the town, the word of the Lord came to him, saying, 5 Go back and say to Hezekiah, the ruler of my people, The Lord, the God of David your father, says, Your prayer has come to my ears, and I have seen your weeping; see, I will make you well: on the third day you will go up to the house of the Lord. 6 I will give you fifteen more years of life; and I will keep you and this town safe from the hands of the king of Assyria; I will keep this town safe, for my honour, and for the honour of my servant David. 7 Then Isaiah said, Take a cake of figs. So they took it and put it on his wound, and he got better. 8 And Hezekiah said to Isaiah, What is to be the sign that the Lord will make me well, and that I will go up to the house of the Lord on the third day? 9 And Isaiah said, This is the sign the Lord will give you, that he will do what he has said; will the shade go forward ten degrees or back? 10 And Hezekiah said in answer, It is a simple thing for the shade to go forward; but let it go back ten degrees. 11 Then Isaiah the prophet made prayer to the Lord, and he made the shade go back ten degrees from its position on the steps of Ahaz.

Hezekiah Receives Envoys from Babylon

12 At that time, Merodach-baladan, the son of Baladan, king of Babylon, sent letters with an offering to Hezekiah, because he had news that Hezekiah had been ill. 13 And Hezekiah was glad at their coming and let them see all his store of wealth, the silver and the gold and the spices and the oil of great price, and the house of his arms, and everything there was in his stores; there was nothing in all his house or his kingdom which Hezekiah did not let them see. 14 Then Isaiah the prophet came to King Hezekiah and said to him, What did these men say and where did they come from? And Hezekiah said, They came from a far country, even from Babylon. 15 And he said, What have they seen in your house? And Hezekiah said in answer, They saw everything in my house: there is nothing among my stores which I did not let them see. 16 And Isaiah said to Hezekiah, Give ear to the word of the Lord. 17 Truly, days are coming when everything in your house, and whatever your fathers have put in store till this day, will be taken away to Babylon: all will be gone, says the Lord. 18 And your sons, the offspring of your body, they will take away to be unsexed servants in the house of the king of Babylon. 19 Then Hezekiah said to Isaiah, Good is the word of the Lord which you have said. Then he said, ... if in my time there is peace and righteousness?

The Death of Hezekiah

20 Now the rest of the acts of Hezekiah, and his power, and how he made the pool and the stream, to take water into the town, are they not recorded in the book of the history of the kings of Judah? 21 And Hezekiah went to rest with his fathers; and Manasseh his son became king in his place.

The Reign of Manasseh

211 Manasseh was twelve years old when he became king; for fifty-five years he was ruling in Jerusalem; and his mother's name was Hephzi-bah. 2 He did evil in the eyes of the Lord, copying the disgusting ways of those nations whom the Lord had sent out before the children of Israel. 3 He put up again the high places which had been pulled down by Hezekiah his father; he made altars for Baal, and an Asherah, as Ahab, king of Israel, had done; he was a worshipper and servant of all the stars of heaven. 4 And he put up altars in the house of the Lord, of which the Lord had said, In Jerusalem will I put my name. 5 And he put up altars for all the stars of heaven in the two outer squares of the house of the Lord. 6 And he made his son go through the fire, and made use of secret arts and signs for reading the future; he gave positions to those who had control of spirits and to wonder-workers; he did much evil in the eyes of the Lord, moving him to wrath. 7 He put the image of Asherah which he had made in the house of which the Lord had said to David and to Solomon his son, In this house, and in Jerusalem, the town which I have made mine out of all the tribes of Israel, I will put my name for ever. 8 And never again will I send the feet of Israel wandering from the land which I gave to their fathers; if only they will take care to do all my orders, and keep all the law which my servant Moses gave them. 9 But they did not give ear; and Manasseh made them do more evil than those nations did, whom the Lord gave up to destruction before the children of Israel.

10 And the Lord said, by his servants the prophets, 11 Because Manasseh, king of Judah, has done these disgusting things, doing more evil than all the Amorites before him, and making Judah do evil with his false gods, 12 For this cause, says the Lord, the God of Israel, I will send such evil on Jerusalem and Judah that the ears of all to whom the news comes will be burning. 13 And over Jerusalem will be stretched the line of Samaria and the weight of Ahab; Jerusalem will be washed clean as a plate is washed, and turned over on its face. 14 And I will put away from me the rest of my heritage, and give them up into the hands of their haters, who will take their property and their goods for themselves; 15 Because they have done evil in my eyes, moving me to wrath, from the day when their fathers came out of Egypt till this day. 16 More than this, Manasseh took the lives of upright men, till Jerusalem from one end to the other was full of blood; in addition to his sin in making Judah do evil in the eyes of the Lord. 17 Now the rest of the acts of Manasseh, and all he did, and his sins, are they not recorded in the book of the history of the kings of Judah? 18 So Manasseh went to rest with his fathers, and was put into the earth in the garden of his house, in the garden of Uzza; and Amon his son became king in his place.

The Reign of Amon

19 Amon was twenty-two years old when he became king, ruling in Jerusalem for two years; his mother's name was Meshullemeth, the daughter of Haruz of Jotbah. 20 He did evil in the eyes of the Lord, as Manasseh his father had done. 21 He went in all the ways of his father, being a servant and worshipper of the false gods to which his father had been a servant; 22 Turning away from the Lord, the God of his fathers, and not walking in his ways. 23 And the servants of Amon made a secret design against him, and put the king to death in his house. 24 But the people of the land put to death all those who had taken part in the design against the king, and made Josiah his son king in his place. 25 Now the rest of the acts which Amon did, are they not recorded in the book of the history of the kings of Judah? 26 He was put in his last resting-place in the garden of Uzza, and Josiah his son became king in his place.

Jesus and the Woman of Samaria

41 Now when it was clear to the Lord that word had come to the ears of the Pharisees that Jesus was making more disciples than John and was giving them baptism 2 (Though, in fact, it was his disciples who gave baptism, not Jesus himself), 3 He went out of Judaea into Galilee again.

4 And it was necessary for him to go through Samaria. 5 So he came to a town of Samaria which was named Sychar, near to the bit of land which Jacob gave to his son Joseph: 6 Now Jacob's fountain was there. Jesus, being tired after his journey, was resting by the fountain. It was about the sixth hour. 7 A woman of Samaria came to get water, and Jesus said to her, Give me some water. 8 For his disciples had gone to the town to get food. 9 The woman of Samaria said to him, Why do you, a Jew, make a request for water to me, a woman of Samaria? She said this because Jews have nothing to do with the people of Samaria. 10 In answer Jesus said, If you had knowledge of what God gives freely and who it is who says to you, Give me water, you would make your prayer to him, and he would give you living water. 11 The woman said to him, Sir, you have no vessel and the fountain is deep; from where will you get the living water? 12 Are you greater than our father Jacob who gave us the fountain and took the water of it himself, with his children and his cattle? 13 Jesus said to her, Everyone who takes this water will be in need of it again: 14 But whoever takes the water I give him will never be in need of drink again; for the water I give him will become in him a fountain of eternal life. 15 The woman said to him, Sir, give me this water, so that I may not be in need again of drink and will not have to come all this way for it. 16 Jesus said to her, Go, get your husband and come back here with him. 17 In answer, the woman said, I have no husband. Jesus said to her, You have said rightly, I have no husband: 18 You have had five husbands, and the man you have now is not your husband: that was truly said. 19 The woman said to him, Sir, I see that you are a prophet. 20 Our fathers gave worship on this mountain, but you Jews say that the right place for worship is in Jerusalem. 21 Jesus said to her, Woman, take my word for this; the time is coming when you will not give worship to the Father on this mountain or in Jerusalem. 22 You give worship, but without knowledge of what you are worshipping: we give worship to what we have knowledge of: for salvation comes from the Jews. 23 But the time is coming, and is even now here, when the true worshippers will give worship to the Father in the true way of the spirit, for these are the worshippers desired by the Father. 24 God is Spirit: then let his worshippers give him worship in the true way of the spirit. 25 The woman said to him, I am certain that the Messiah, who is named Christ, is coming; when he comes he will make all things clear to us. 26 Jesus said to her, I, who am talking to you, am he.

27 At that point the disciples came back, and they were surprised to see him talking to a woman; but not one of them said to him, What is your purpose? or, Why are you talking to her? 28 Then the woman put down her water-pot and went into the town, and said to the people, 29 Come and see a man who has been talking to me of everything I ever did! Is it possible that this is the Christ? 30 So they went out of the town and came to him.

Matthew Henry's Commentary on John 4:1-30

Commentary on John 4:1-3

(Read John 4:1-3)

Jesus applied himself more to preaching, which was the more excellent, 1 Corinthians 1:17, than to baptism. He would put honour upon his disciples, by employing them to baptize. He teaches us that the benefit of sacraments depends not on the hand that administers them.

Commentary on John 4:4-26

(Read John 4:4-26)

There was great hatred between the Samaritans and the Jews. Christ's road from Judea to Galilee lay through Samaria. We should not go into places of temptation but when we needs must; and then must not dwell in them, but hasten through them. We have here our Lord Jesus under the common fatigue of travellers. Thus we see that he was truly a man. Toil came in with sin; therefore Christ, having made himself a curse for us, submitted to it. Also, he was a poor man, and went all his journeys on foot. Being wearied, he sat thus on the well; he had no couch to rest upon. He sat thus, as people wearied with travelling sit. Surely, we ought readily to submit to be like the Son of God in such things as these. Christ asked a woman for water. She was surprised because he did not show the anger of his own nation against the Samaritans. Moderate men of all sides are men wondered at. Christ took the occasion to teach her Divine things: he converted this woman, by showing her ignorance and sinfulness, and her need of a Saviour. By this living water is meant the Spirit. Under this comparison the blessing of the Messiah had been promised in the Old Testament. The graces of the Spirit, and his comforts, satisfy the thirsting soul, that knows its own nature and necessity. What Jesus spake figuratively, she took literally. Christ shows that the water of Jacob's well yielded a very short satisfaction. Of whatever waters of comfort we drink, we shall thirst again. But whoever partakes of the Spirit of grace, and the comforts of the gospel, shall never want that which will abundantly satisfy his soul. Carnal hearts look no higher than carnal ends. Give it me, saith she, not that I may have everlasting life, which Christ proposed, but that I come not hither to draw. The carnal mind is very ingenious in shifting off convictions, and keeping them from fastening. But how closely our Lord Jesus brings home the conviction to her conscience! He severely reproved her present state of life. The woman acknowledged Christ to be a prophet. The power of his word in searching the heart, and convincing the conscience of secret things, is a proof of Divine authority. It should cool our contests, to think that the things we are striving about are passing away. The object of worship will continue still the same, God, as a Father; but an end shall be put to all differences about the place of worship. Reason teaches us to consult decency and convenience in the places of our worship; but religion gives no preference to one place above another, in respect of holiness and approval with God. The Jews were certainly in the right. Those who by the Scriptures have obtained some knowledge of God, know whom they worship. The word of salvation was of the Jews. It came to other nations through them. Christ justly preferred the Jewish worship before the Samaritan, yet here he speaks of the former as soon to be done away. God was about to be revealed as the Father of all believers in every nation. The spirit or the soul of man, as influenced by the Holy Spirit, must worship God, and have communion with him. Spiritual affections, as shown in fervent prayers, supplications, and thanksgivings, form the worship of an upright heart, in which God delights and is glorified. The woman was disposed to leave the matter undecided, till the coming of the Messiah. But Christ told her, I that speak to thee, am He. She was an alien and a hostile Samaritan, merely speaking to her was thought to disgrace our Lord Jesus. Yet to this woman did our Lord reveal himself more fully than as yet he had done to any of his disciples. No past sins can bar our acceptance with him, if we humble ourselves before him, believing in him as the Christ, the Saviour of the world.

Commentary on John 4:27-42

(Read John 4:27-42)

The disciples wondered that Christ talked thus with a Samaritan. Yet they knew it was for some good reason, and for some good end. Thus when particular difficulties occur in the word and providence of God, it is good to satisfy ourselves that all is well that Jesus Christ says and does. Two things affected the woman. The extent of his knowledge. Christ knows all the thoughts, words, and actions, of all the children of men. And the power of his word. He told her secret sins with power. She fastened upon that part of Christ's discourse, many would think she would have been most shy of repeating; but the knowledge of Christ, into which we are led by conviction of sin, is most likely to be sound and saving. They came to him: those who would know Christ, must meet him where he records his name. Our Master has left us an example, that we may learn to do the will of God as he did; with diligence, as those that make a business of it; with delight and pleasure in it. Christ compares his work to harvest-work. The harvest is appointed and looked for before it comes; so was the gospel. Harvest-time is busy time; all must be then at work. Harvest-time is a short time, and harvest-work must be done then, or not at all; so the time of the gospel is a season, which if once past, cannot be recalled. God sometimes uses very weak and unlikely instruments for beginning and carrying on a good work. Our Saviour, by teaching one poor woman, spread knowledge to a whole town. Blessed are those who are not offended at Christ. Those taught of God, are truly desirous to learn more. It adds much to the praise of our love to Christ and his word, if it conquers prejudices. Their faith grew. In the matter of it: they believed him to be the Saviour, not only of the Jews but of the world. In the certainty of it: we know that this is indeed the Christ. And in the ground of it, for we have heard him ourselves.