Attitude Is Important...Always Look For the Positive

Isaiah 39:6-7 The time is coming when everything you have -- all the treasures stored up by your ancestors -- will be carried off to Babylon. Nothing will be left, says the LORD.  Some of your own descendants will be taken away into exile. They will become eunuchs who will serve in the palace of Babylon's king."

 

Hezekiah had been a little too prideful with his material wealth.  He bragged to the Assyrian ambassador’s one too many times. He wasn’t even all that upset when Isaiah told he was going to lose everything…even some family.  He just thought to himself that the peace he had been granted was enough to make him happy.

 

I had to read some commentaries to really process this one…cause my brain was saying what??? He was happy that he was losing everything…and that included some of his family.  Gill’s Exposition Of The Word says this… “Hezekiah was at once convinced of his sin, acknowledged it and repented of it, and owned that the sentence pronounced was but just and right; and that there was a mixture of mercy and goodness in it, in that time was given, and it was not immediately executed:”  And Coffman says this… “The short chapter ends with the submissive resignation of Hezekiah to the fate of his beloved city and the personal rejoicing that he would not live to see the disastrous prophecy fulfilled. Also, he found great comfort in the assured time-lapse before the promised fulfillment of it.”

 

So perhaps the important thing to remember here is not Hezekiah’s attitude…or even the punishment handed down….but rather the quick acceptance of what God had spoken.  He knew that it was futile to pray for change this time…and looked quickly to find the positives in the situation that would keep him moving forward…..not hang in the misery of what was going to happen years into the future.

 

Father…thank you for the reminder that my attitude toward your discipline is just as important as my actions because of it.  Forgive me for the times that I have fought your decisions…and for seeing only the negatives in what happened.  Help me to be more like Hezekiah…and always see the positive.  Help me achieve true serenity by accepting the things I know in my heart are not to be changed….letting you provide the courage for the things I know in my heart to be changed…and always pray for you to tell me the difference.  Amen.