Here is high praise: “after him was none like him among all the kings of Judah, nor…before him” (2 Ki 18:5).
Six years before Israel fell to the Assyrians, “Hezekiah the son of Ahaz, king of Judah, began to reign. He was twenty-five years old when he became king, and he reigned twenty-nine years in Jerusalem” (2 Ki 18:1-2). With a collective sigh of relief, we read the words, “And he did what was right in the sight of the Lord” (v 3). But wait; there’s more! “He removed the high places,” something other good kings seldom did, “and broke the sacred pillars, cut down the wooden image and broke in pieces the bronze serpent that Moses had made; for until those days the children of Israel burned incense to it, and called it Nehushtan” (v 4). Imagine that! If they couldn’t have a gold cow, they would worship a bronze snake. Nehushtan means “It’s just a piece of bronze.” And there’s still more! “He trusted in the Lord God of Israel, so that after him was none like him among all the kings of Judah, nor who were before him. For he held fast to the Lord; he did not depart from following Him, but kept His commandments, which the Lord had commanded Moses” (vv 5-6). What a good checklist: “he did what was right…trusted in the Lord…held fast to the Lord…kept His commandments…” By this point, you sense the inspiring Spirit is enjoying telling us this. And He goes on: “The Lord was with him; he prospered wherever he went” (v 7). Hezekiah, meaning “strengthened by Jehovah,” repulsed the Assyrians and “subdued the Philistines” (v 8). But “in the fourteenth year of King Hezekiah, Sennacherib king of Assyria came up against all the fortified cities of Judah and took them” (v 13). In an attempt at peace, Hezekiah sent the Assyrian king all the silver and gold he had. But we can’t pay off our enemy that easily. He’s never satisfied until he lays us low. He’ll be back!