Sermons
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Sermons |
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Sermon preached by John Cooper at Christ Church on 25/8/02. It was on the topic of 'Hezekiah's sickness' and was given at the evening service. The day's Bible reading was from chapter twenty of the book of 2 Kings and reading from verses 1 to 11.
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Reading:
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themes: Perhaps the greatest evangelist of the Twentieth Century was a man who used to say to everybody getting off a boat in Sydney Harbour "If God told you He was going to take your life today what would you say to Him?" Think about it. Would you promise to live a better life? Actually God said exactly that to Hezekiah and we will see how he reacted. So it is a great miracle - Hezekiah has been cured and his life has been extended fifteen years! Imagine if he was in this service tonight. We would all want to hear his story. Come up to the front and give your testimony! But I would want to ask two fundamental questions - why were you healed Hezekiah and how are you going to spend those extra fifteen years you have been granted? After all in medicine we talk of the quality of life as opposed to its quantity. Firstly let us look at why Hezekiah was healed. In the fourteenth year of his reign Hezekiah was only thirty-nine years old (18:2) and the news of his impending death must have been a terrible blow to him (20:1). Hezekiah appeals to God for healing on the basis of what a good chap, he, Hezekiah is. You can see this in verse 3. But why does God heal him? It is in verse 6. It is for God's own sake and for that of His servant David. No mention of Hezekiah! You see none of us are good enough to be rewarded for our goodness by God. When Jerusalem was being besieged by Assyria Hezekiah wanted God to act so that 'all kingdoms on earth may know that You alone, O Lord, are God' (19:19). Then Hezekiah appealed to God's goodness; now it is to his own. That is the ultimate arrogance. My second question to Hezekiah is: how are you going to spend the extra fifteen years you have been given? Are you going to use them to the glory of God to the very end of your life? If we look at what happens the answer is plainly no. Three years after his healing he has a son called Manasseh who was to succeed him as king. Unfortunately Manasseh did many evil things until God stepped in and changed Manasseh. But the harm that he did in his early years was irreparable. The other thing that marked Hezekiah's later years was he showed the Babylonians the wealth of Jerusalem. He was probably showing off. Isaiah warns him that the Babylonians will return and destroy the city. Is Hezekiah upset about what he has done? Not a bit of it! He is pleased that there will be peace and security in what is left of his life (v19). How selfish can you get! Blow my people and blow my God - at least I can have a peaceful old age! God had destroyed the very real threat of Assyria capturing the city but now the show off king was putting the city under threat from a different superpower. So how does this apply to us? Most important of all is Hezekiah's arrogance. Nobody is good enough to change history for the better by themselves. God must bless their work. Time is in God's hands. We cannot say when we are going to die or be struck by some crippling illness. But we are responsible for how we use our time. We must live to the glory of God to the very end of our lives. There is a modern Western preoccupation with youth. But everybody has a role within the church. Personally I am undergoing a change from my Indiana Jones phase to my C.S. Lewis phase - the wise old owl days of my life. C.S. Lewis was very effective in his old age. Another example closer to home would be John Coulson (a one time member of Christ Church). I am standing here tonight very much because of his encouragement and I know of few people who were more ill than he was. The ability of the older person to spend time in prayer and encouraging people is impressive. They can write, if not books then letters (and that is all the Apostle Paul wrote!). They can use the phone. A church that devalues and disenchants its older people does so at its peril. We want peace in our later years just like Hezekiah but God wants us to keep on serving Him. Michelangelo was 60 when he left his beloved city of Florence for the last time. At the age when we are retiring he could have thought that he should be dumbing down. But he had another third of his life to live. He was still to meet the love of his life and discover salvation by faith in Jesus. In addition he still had to paint 'The Last Judgment' and design the dome of St. Peter's in Rome. He kept on working to a couple of days before his death and it gives us great pleasure in seeing the works of his old age. How much do we believe in the power of prayer? When we pray do we truly believe that God can answer our prayers, or do we mentally restrict His capability? Scripture teaches us about men and women who were bold. They were not afraid to ask for what they wanted and they believed God could do it. In the gospels we read of blind Bartimaeus. When Jesus asked, "what do you want Me to do for you" he replied "Rabbi, I want to see" (Mk.10:51). There was never any question of could Jesus do it. The only question was would He. Why does God answer some people's prayers and not others? The answer is that we simply do not know. We just have to accept God's Will in our lives. But if somebody's prayers are not answered they are not more sinful than the rest of us. We must make every effort to avoid implying that their faith is weak and, if they have prayed for someone's healing, that they have not let their loved one down. We need to remember that God is our heavenly Father. We need to talk to Him. God cares about how we feel. Nothing is too small or trivial to bring before Him. We should not be embarrassed to tell Him what is in our hearts - Jesus died so that He could hear from us! So what are we going to say to Hezekiah when he returns fourteen and a half years after his healing. He would be the same age as I am now. Actually he has changed again. In 2 Chronicles we read '...Hezekiah's heart was proud and he did not respond to the kindness shown him [by God]....but then Hezekiah repented...' (v25-6). And that is the testimony I want to hear! ref: 02/6
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Web page last updated 04 Jul 2009 |
