Isaiah 38 :: Christian Standard Bible (CSB)

In those days Hezekiah became terminally ill. The prophet Isaiah son of Amoz came and said to him, “This is what the LORD says: ‘Set your house in order, for you are about to die; you will not recover.’ ”[fn]

Then Hezekiah turned his face to the wall and prayed to the LORD.

He said, “Please, LORD, remember how I have walked before you faithfully and wholeheartedly, and have done what pleases you.” And Hezekiah wept bitterly.

Then the word of the LORD came to Isaiah:

“Go and tell Hezekiah, ‘This is what the LORD God of your ancestor David says: I have heard your prayer; I have seen your tears. Look, I am going to add fifteen years to your life.[fn]

“And I will rescue you and this city from the grasp of the king of Assyria; I will defend this city.

“This is the sign to you from the LORD that he will do what he has promised:

“I am going to make the sun’s shadow that goes down on the stairway of Ahaz go back by ten steps.’ ” So the sun’s shadow[fn] went back the ten steps it had descended.

A poem by King Hezekiah of Judah after he had been sick and had recovered from his illness:

I said: In the prime[fn] of my life

I must go to the gates of Sheol;

I am deprived of the rest of my years.

I said: I will never see the LORD,

the LORD in the land of the living;

I will not look on humanity any longer

with the inhabitants of what is passing away.[fn]

My dwelling is plucked up and removed from me

like a shepherd’s tent.

I have rolled up my life like a weaver;

he cuts me off from the loom.

By nightfall[fn] you make an end of me.

I thought until the morning:

He will break all my bones like a lion.

By nightfall you make an end of me.

I chirp like a swallow or a crane;

I moan like a dove.

My eyes grow weak looking upward.

Lord, I am oppressed; support me.

What can I say?

He has spoken to me,

and he himself has done it.

I walk along slowly all my years

because of the bitterness of my soul.

Lord, by such things people live,

and in every one of them my spirit finds life;

you have restored me to health

and let me live.

Indeed, it was for my own well-being

that I had such intense bitterness;

but your love has delivered me

from the Pit of destruction,

for you have thrown all my sins behind your back.

For Sheol cannot thank you;

Death cannot praise you.

Those who go down to the Pit

cannot hope for your faithfulness.

The living, only the living can thank you,

as I do today;

a father will make your faithfulness known to children.

The LORD is ready to save me;

we will play stringed instruments

all the days of our lives

at the house of the LORD.

Now Isaiah had said, “Let them take a lump of pressed figs and apply it to his infected skin, so that he may recover.”

And Hezekiah had asked, “What is the sign that I will go up to the LORD’s temple? ”