So there was this guy, Sennacherib. Nasty fellow. Vile and cruel and most of all arrogant. To the core this guy loved himself. He was the leader of the Assyrian Empire at the height of its power and he LOVED it. Every second of it.

If he set his sights on a kingdom or a city, it was toast. All he had to do was give the order and KAPOW, no more kingdom.

So this guy took one look at Jerusalem and thought “I can take it.” And little by little he marched his army toward its gates. He conquered city after city of Judea before finally arriving at Jerusalem’s edge.

And you know what this guy did? He bragged!

BEFORE the victory, he bragged.

 Thus shall ye speak to Hezekiah king of Judah, saying, Let not thy God, in whom thou trustest, deceive thee, saying, Jerusalem shall not be given into the hand of the king of Assyria.
Behold, thou hast heard what the kings of Assyria have done to all lands by destroying them utterly; and shalt thou be delivered?
Have the gods of the nations delivered them which my fathers have destroyed, as Gozan, and Haran, and Rezeph, and the children of Eden which were in Telassar?
Where is the king of Hamath, and the king of Arphad, and the king of the city of Sepharvaim, Hena, and Ivah?

Isaiah 37:10-13

He sends a message to Judah’s king and says “Don’t be a fool and trust in that God of yours.” He says “look at all the gods of all these other nations. They all were prayed to and they all failed to protect their lands. Your ‘God’ will be no different.”

His arrogance was his undoing.  He thought that being the conqueror of countless gods that he was more than capable of defeating one solitary God of Judah. The problem was, the one solitary God of Judah is the one TRUE God of the universe.

And Sennacherib had just spat in His face.

Do you know what happened to that army? Assyria’s history records that Sennacherib had the king of Judah shut up like a bird in a cage. Assyrian history doesn’t record what happened next. Why?

Because what happened next was a smackdown…

Then the angel of the LORD went forth, and smote in the camp of the Assyrians a hundred and fourscore and five thousand: and when they arose early in the morning, behold, they were all dead corpses.
So Sennacherib king of Assyria departed, and went and returned, and dwelt at Nineveh.
And it came to pass, as he was worshipping in the house of Nisroch his god, that Adrammelech and Sharezer his sons smote him with the sword; and they escaped into the land of Armenia: and Esarhaddon his son reigned in his stead.

Isaiah 37:36-38

God didn’t even bother to get up off His throne. He sent one little angel to wipe out his entire army, leading to Sennacherib defeat, embarrassment, and ultimate murder at the hands of his sons.

 

Lesson learned: temper your arrogance and don’t forget that God is in charge.