The High Cost of a Deaf Ear Text: 2 Kings 18:9-12
Introduction: The Unraveling of a Nation
History, as it is taught in our secular schools, is little more than a catalog of dates, kings, and battles. It is a flat, two-dimensional story of cause and effect, where empires rise and fall based on economics, military might, and political maneuvering. But the Bible presents history in three dimensions. It has depth. It has a plot. There is a Director behind the scenes, and His name is Yahweh. What we see in our passage today is not simply the tragic end of the northern kingdom of Israel. It is the final invoice coming due for centuries of spiritual adultery. It is the inevitable fulfillment of covenant curses that were laid out in black and white from the very beginning.
God does not do things arbitrarily. He is not capricious. He operates according to His own revealed character and His own sworn word. When He established His covenant with Israel at Sinai, it was a solemn bond, sovereignly administered, with attendant blessings and curses. He told them plainly: if you walk in my statutes and keep my commandments, you will have rain, fruitful harvests, peace in the land, and victory over your enemies. But if you despise my statutes, if your soul abhors my rules, if you break my covenant, then I will set my face against you. You will be struck down before your enemies; those who hate you shall rule over you. I will bring a sword upon you that shall execute vengeance for the covenant (Lev. 26). This was the deal. This was the contract they signed.
For over two hundred years, the northern kingdom of Israel had systematically and enthusiastically broken every clause of that contract. From the moment Jeroboam set up the golden calves at Dan and Bethel, they embarked on a disastrous project of syncretism, idolatry, and rebellion. God, in His immense patience, did not sit silently by. He sent prophet after prophet, Elijah, Elisha, Amos, Hosea, men who came with the very word of God in their mouths. They warned, they pleaded, they rebuked, they performed signs. They were God's emissaries, His ambassadors, calling the nation to repent and return. But Israel's response was a collective and defiant, "I will not hear." They stopped their ears. They hardened their hearts. And a nation that will not listen to the voice of God will eventually have to listen to the sound of the battering ram at the gate.
What we are reading here is the final act of that tragedy. It is God handing His people over to the consequences they themselves had chosen. The Assyrians were not some random geopolitical force. They were the rod of God's anger, the club of His wrath, sent against a godless nation (Is. 10:5). This is a hard lesson, but it is a necessary one. God is not a celestial guidance counselor, offering gentle suggestions. He is the King of Heaven and earth, and His covenant has teeth.
The Text
Now in the fourth year of King Hezekiah, which was the seventh year of Hoshea son of Elah king of Israel, Shalmaneser king of Assyria came up against Samaria and besieged it.
And at the end of three years they captured it; in the sixth year of Hezekiah, which was the ninth year of Hoshea king of Israel, Samaria was captured.
Then the king of Assyria took Israel away into exile to Assyria, and put them in Halah and on the Habor, the river of Gozan, and in the cities of the Medes,
because they did not listen to the voice of Yahweh their God, but trespassed against His covenant, even all that Moses the servant of Yahweh commanded; they would neither listen nor do it.
(2 Kings 18:9-12 LSB)
The Siege and the Timetable (v. 9-10)
The account begins with the cold, hard facts of the historical event.
"Now in the fourth year of King Hezekiah, which was the seventh year of Hoshea son of Elah king of Israel, Shalmaneser king of Assyria came up against Samaria and besieged it. And at the end of three years they captured it; in the sixth year of Hezekiah, which was the ninth year of Hoshea king of Israel, Samaria was captured." (2 Kings 18:9-10)
The Holy Spirit is very particular about the timeline here. This is not a fairy tale; it is rooted in real-world history. The fall of Samaria is synchronized with the reign of Hezekiah in the southern kingdom of Judah. This is a deliberate juxtaposition. While the apostate north is being liquidated, the reforming south under Hezekiah is, for a time, experiencing God's blessing. This serves as a stark, flashing warning sign to Judah: this is what happens when a nation abandons the covenant. This is your future if you follow the same path.
The siege of Samaria lasted three years. This tells us two things. First, Samaria was a well-fortified city. It was not a pushover. This was not a minor skirmish. This was a brutal, grinding war of attrition. But second, and more importantly, it tells us that the strength of walls and fortifications is utterly meaningless when God has decreed a judgment. Their defenses held out for three years, but they could not hold out against the determined will of God. When God brings His judgment, He may use human instruments, and in this case, the relentless Assyrian war machine was His chosen tool. The strength of Samaria's walls could not stand against the strength of Israel's sin.
For three years, the people of Samaria would have endured starvation, disease, and the constant terror of the enemy outside their walls. This was not a quick end. It was a slow, agonizing death, a visible manifestation of the slow, agonizing spiritual death they had been cultivating for centuries. This was the covenant curse of Deuteronomy 28 coming to life: "He will besiege you in all your towns, until your high and fortified walls, in which you trusted, come down" (Deut. 28:52).
The Exile and Dispersion (v. 11)
Verse 11 describes the consequence of the fall: the complete dissolution of the nation.
"Then the king of Assyria took Israel away into exile to Assyria, and put them in Halah and on the Habor, the river of Gozan, and in the cities of the Medes." (2 Kings 18:11 LSB)
This was the standard operating procedure for the Assyrian empire. They were masters of deportation. To prevent future rebellions, they would uproot entire populations, scatter them across their vast empire, and resettle their conquered lands with other peoples. This policy was not just militarily strategic; it was a form of cultural genocide. It was designed to destroy a people's identity, their sense of place, their connection to their heritage, and their connection to their gods.
But for Israel, this was more than just a political tragedy. It was a theological catastrophe. The land they were being ripped from was the land God had promised to Abraham. It was the inheritance He had given them. To be removed from the land was to be cut off from the place of God's special presence and blessing. It was the ultimate curse of the covenant. "And the LORD will scatter you among all peoples, from one end of the earth to the other" (Deut. 28:64).
They were sent to obscure places, Halah, Habor, Gozan, the cities of the Medes. They were scattered, absorbed, and, as a distinct people, they vanished from the stage of history. This is where the "ten lost tribes" come from. They were not lost in the sense that God did not know where they were. They were lost in the sense that they were judged, dissolved, and their national identity was erased because they had first erased their covenant identity.
The Reason Why (v. 12)
After detailing the what, the when, and the where, the Holy Spirit gives us the why. And this is the most important verse in the passage. This is the theological foundation for the entire event.
"because they did not listen to the voice of Yahweh their God, but trespassed against His covenant, even all that Moses the servant of Yahweh commanded; they would neither listen nor do it." (2-kings 18:12 LSB)
Here is the indictment, clear and simple. The root of their destruction was not the military superiority of Assyria. The root was their refusal to listen. The Hebrew word for listen, shema, means more than just auditory reception. It means to hear and to obey. It is the first word of Israel's great confession: "Shema, O Israel: The LORD our God, the LORD is one. You shall love the LORD your God..." (Deut. 6:4-5). To refuse to shema is to refuse to submit, to refuse to love, to refuse to worship.
Notice the progression. It begins with not listening to the voice of Yahweh. The preaching of the Word of God is the Word of God. When the prophets spoke, God was speaking. Their refusal to hear the prophets was a refusal to hear God. This deafness of the ear led directly to the transgression of the feet: they "trespassed against His covenant." A trespass is a willful violation of a known boundary. They knew the terms of the covenant. They had the law of Moses. But they crossed the line anyway.
The text emphasizes the totality of their rebellion. It was against "all that Moses the servant of Yahweh commanded." This was not a minor infraction or a momentary lapse. It was a comprehensive, settled rejection of God's entire revealed will. The final phrase drives the point home with the force of a hammer blow: "they would neither listen nor do it." This was not a failure of ability, but a failure of will. It was obstinacy. It was a stiff-necked, hard-hearted rebellion. Their ears were closed, and therefore their hands were disobedient. This is always the pattern. What the heart refuses to hear, the body will refuse to do.
Conclusion: The God Who Still Speaks
It is easy for us to read a passage like this and cluck our tongues at the foolishness of ancient Israel. How could they be so deaf? How could they be so blind? But we must be careful. The apostle Paul warns us that these things "happened to them as an example, but they were written down for our instruction" (1 Cor. 10:11).
The fundamental sin of Israel was their refusal to listen to the voice of God. And God still speaks today. He speaks through His written Word, the Scriptures. And He speaks through the preaching of that Word. When the gospel is proclaimed faithfully, it is not the word of a man; it is the Word of God. And the central message of that Word is no longer simply the covenant of Moses, but the new covenant in the blood of Jesus Christ.
The voice of God now says, "This is my beloved Son; listen to him!" (Mark 9:7). To refuse to listen to Jesus is to commit the same sin as ancient Israel, but on a much grander scale. To hear the gospel of grace, to hear the call to repent and believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, and to stop our ears is to invite a judgment far greater than what Samaria experienced. The curses of the new covenant are more severe precisely because the blessings are infinitely greater (Heb. 10:29).
The story of Samaria is a warning against the great sin of presumption. They were God's chosen people, and they assumed that this status gave them a free pass to live however they pleased. They presumed upon the grace of God. But covenant relationship is a two-way street. It demands faithfulness. They wanted the benefits of the covenant without the obligations of the covenant, and the result was total ruin.
Let us therefore take this to heart. Let us be a people with open ears. When the Word of God is read and preached, let us hear it not as an interesting historical lecture, but as the living voice of our covenant Lord. Let us hear it, and let us do it. For the one who hears the words of Christ and does them is like a wise man who builds his house on the rock. And when the rains fall, and the floods come, and the winds blow and beat on that house, it will not fall, because it is founded on the rock (Matt. 7:24-25).