The Devil's Microphone
Introduction: A War of Words
We have a tendency to think of spiritual warfare in terms that are frankly a bit spooky and medieval. We think of spinning heads, dark shadows, and things that go bump in the night. But the Bible shows us that the primary battlefield for spiritual warfare is not in a haunted house, but rather between your ears. The battle is a battle for the mind, and the chief weapon of the enemy is not raw power, but propaganda. The devil is a liar, and the father of lies. His primary strategy is demoralization, and his chosen instrument is the spoken word, the persuasive argument, the well-crafted lie that sounds ninety percent true.
In our text today, we see this principle displayed with terrifying clarity. The Assyrian war machine, the ISIS of its day, is parked outside the gates of Jerusalem. They are the undisputed superpower, having laid waste to every nation and every god that stood in their path. But the first assault is not with siege ramps and battering rams. The first assault is verbal. The king of Assyria sends his chief propagandist, the Rabshakeh, to the wall of Jerusalem to preach a sermon. It is a masterclass in psychological warfare, a sermon of despair from the devil's own hymnal, broadcast through the devil's microphone. And the arguments he uses are the very same arguments leveled against the people of God in every generation, including our own.
This is not just a historical account of a geopolitical squabble. This is a paradigm for the church under siege. We are looking at a clash of two worldviews, two faiths, two kings, and two gods. And the central question is the one that confronts every believer when the enemy is at the gates: whose report will you believe?
The Text
Then the king of Assyria sent Tartan and Rab-saris and Rabshakeh from Lachish to King Hezekiah with a heavy military force to Jerusalem. So they went up and came to Jerusalem. And when they went up, they came and stood by the conduit of the upper pool, which is on the highway of the fuller’s field. Then they called to the king, and Eliakim the son of Hilkiah, who was over the household, and Shebnah the scribe and Joah the son of Asaph the recorder, came out to them.
Then Rabshakeh said to them, “Say now to Hezekiah, ‘Thus says the great king, the king of Assyria, “What is this trust that you have? You say (but they are only empty words), ‘I have counsel and might for the war.’ Now on whom do you trust, that you have rebelled against me? Now behold, you trust in the staff of this crushed reed, even on Egypt; on which if a man leans, it will go into his hand and pierce it. So is Pharaoh king of Egypt to all who trust in him. But if you say to me, ‘We trust in Yahweh our God,’ is it not He whose high places and whose altars Hezekiah has taken away, and has said to Judah and to Jerusalem, ‘You shall worship before this altar in Jerusalem’? So now, come, make a bargain with my master the king of Assyria, and I will give you two thousand horses, if you are able on your part to give riders for them. How then can you turn away one official of the least of my master’s servants, and trust in Egypt for chariots and for horsemen? So now, have I come up without the approval of Yahweh against this place to make it a ruin? Yahweh said to me, ‘Go up against this land and make it a ruin.’ ” ’ ”
Then Eliakim the son of Hilkiah, and Shebnah and Joah, said to Rabshakeh, “Speak now to your servants in Aramaic, for we understand it; and do not speak with us in Judean in the hearing of the people who are on the wall.” But Rabshakeh said to them, “Has my master sent me only to your master and to you to speak these words, and not to the men who sit on the wall, doomed to eat their own dung and drink their own urine with you?”
Then Rabshakeh stood and cried with a loud voice in Judean, saying, “Hear the word of the great king, the king of Assyria. Thus says the king, ‘Do not let Hezekiah deceive you, for he will not be able to deliver you from his hand; and do not let Hezekiah make you trust in Yahweh, saying, “Yahweh will surely deliver us, and this city will not be given into the hand of the king of Assyria.” Do not listen to Hezekiah, for thus says the king of Assyria, “Make your peace with me and come out to me, and eat each of his vine and each of his fig tree and drink each of the waters of his own cistern, until I come and take you away to a land like your own land, a land of grain and new wine, a land of bread and vineyards, a land of olive oil and honey, that you may live and not die.” But do not listen to Hezekiah when he misleads you, saying, “Yahweh will deliver us.” Has any one of the gods of the nations delivered his land from the hand of the king of Assyria? Where are the gods of Hamath and Arpad? Where are the gods of Sepharvaim, Hena, and Ivvah? When have they delivered Samaria from my hand? Who among all the gods of the lands have delivered their land from my hand, that Yahweh would deliver Jerusalem from my hand?’ ”
But the people were silent and answered him not a word, for the king’s commandment was, “Do not answer him.” Then Eliakim the son of Hilkiah, who was over the household, and Shebna the scribe and Joah the son of Asaph, the recorder, came to Hezekiah with their clothes torn and told him the words of Rabshakeh.
(2 Kings 18:17-37 LSB)
The Anatomy of a Demonic Sermon
Rabshakeh is a masterful rhetorician. He doesn't just shout threats; he builds a careful, systematic case designed to dismantle every possible foundation of Judah's hope. His sermon has four main points, and they are as relevant today as they were then.
First, he attacks their political confidence.
"What is this trust that you have? ... Now behold, you trust in the staff of this crushed reed, even on Egypt; on which if a man leans, it will go into his hand and pierce it." (vv. 19, 21)
The enemy always begins by pointing out the folly of our misplaced trust. And often, his diagnosis is correct. Hezekiah had made an alliance with Egypt, and Rabshakeh rightly identifies Egypt as a worthless ally, a "crushed reed." The devil is a shrewd observer of geopolitics. He knows our political saviors are frauds. He knows the candidates we trust in will fail us. He knows the cultural institutions we hope will save us are rotten to the core. He points to our pathetic little Egypts and laughs, and he is right to do so. His goal is to show us that our earthly hopes are futile, so that we will conclude that our heavenly hope is also futile. He uses a correct diagnosis to prescribe a deadly cure.
Second, and most cunningly, he attacks their religious reformation.
"But if you say to me, 'We trust in Yahweh our God,' is it not He whose high places and whose altars Hezekiah has taken away...?" (v. 22)
This is a lie of breathtaking genius. Hezekiah had been a great reformer. He had obeyed God's law by tearing down the idolatrous high places and centralizing worship in Jerusalem, as commanded in Deuteronomy. He did exactly what God told him to do. Rabshakeh takes this act of righteous obedience and twists it into an act of blasphemy. He says to the common soldier on the wall, "See? Your king has offended your God! He has torn down God's own shrines. How can you expect a God you have so insulted to save you?"
This is precisely the argument the world uses against the faithful church today. When we stand for biblical sexual morality, they say we are being hateful and unloving, thereby offending our "God of love." When we exercise church discipline, they say we are being judgmental and pharisaical. When we insist on the exclusive claims of Christ, they say we are being arrogant and intolerant. The enemy's favorite tactic is to take our obedience to God's Word and rebrand it as a sin. He seeks to make us ashamed of our faithfulness.
Third, he attacks with a blasphemous theology.
"So now, have I come up without the approval of Yahweh against this place to make it a ruin? Yahweh said to me, 'Go up against this land and make it a ruin.' ... Has any one of the gods of the nations delivered his land from the hand of the king of Assyria? ... Who among all the gods of the lands have delivered their land from my hand, that Yahweh would deliver Jerusalem from my hand?" (vv. 25, 33, 35)
Here Rabshakeh makes two theological claims. The first is that Yahweh is on Assyria's side. This is a clever half-truth. God was indeed using Assyria as a rod of His anger to judge the nations (Isaiah 10:5). But the rod is not the one who wields it. The devil loves to quote God's providence back at us, stripped of its covenantal context, to make us believe that God has abandoned us to our enemies.
His second claim is pure paganism. It is the argument from empirical evidence. "Look around," he says. "We have a perfect track record. We have defeated every nation and every god they serve. What makes you think your god is any different?" He places Yahweh in a pantheon of local, tribal deities and concludes that since all the others failed, Yahweh will fail too. This is the argument of the modern atheist. He lines up Christianity with all the other failed religions of history and declares them all to be delusions. But Yahweh is not in the lineup. He is not one of the gods of the nations. He is the Creator of heaven and earth, the Judge of all nations and all their so-called gods.
Fourth, he attacks the people with a tempting lie.
"Do not listen to Hezekiah, for thus says the king of Assyria, 'Make your peace with me and come out to me, and eat each of his vine and each of his fig tree... until I come and take you away to a land like your own land... that you may live and not die.'" (vv. 31-32)
After deconstructing their hope, he offers them a false one. This is the classic satanic bargain: compromise for comfort. Surrender for security. He bypasses the leadership and appeals directly to the desires of the common man. He offers them peace, food, and water. He promises them a comfortable relocation to a new and better land. It is, of course, a complete lie. Assyrian deportation was a death march. But the lie is dressed in the language of earthly paradise. This is the siren song of secularism. It tells us to abandon the hard, costly demands of our faith in a transcendent God and embrace the immediate comforts of a materialistic world. "Just bow down," it says, "and you can have all the kingdoms of the world." It is the old lie from the garden: "You will not surely die."
The Godly Response
So how do God's people respond to this full-spectrum assault? The text gives us three essential components of a faithful counter-offensive.
"But the people were silent and answered him not a word, for the king’s commandment was, 'Do not answer him.'" (v. 36)
First, they respond with disciplined silence. Hezekiah had given them a command: "Do not answer him." This is profound wisdom. There are times when the most powerful apologetic is to refuse to get into a shouting match with a fool. You do not debate the devil on his own terms. You do not grant his blasphemous premises by engaging them. This silence was not born of fear or ignorance; it was born of obedience and faith. It was a quiet confidence that their king, and their God, had the situation in hand. They refused to give the enemy the satisfaction of a reply. They let his blasphemies hang in the air and dissipate, unanswered and un-honored.
Second, the leaders respond with righteous grief.
"Then Eliakim... and Shebna... and Joah... came to Hezekiah with their clothes torn..." (v. 37)
They did not respond with stoic indifference. They felt the weight and the filth of Rabshakeh's words. Tearing their clothes was an outward sign of inward anguish. They were horrified that the name of their holy God was being profaned and mocked. This is a holy grief. We should never become so calloused that we can hear the name of our God blasphemed without our hearts breaking. This grief is not despair; it is the righteous anger and sorrow of a loyal son who hears his father being slandered.
Third, they respond by reporting to their king.
"... and told him the words of Rabshakeh." (v. 37)
They did not panic. They did not form a committee to draft a response. They did not start a petition. They took the enemy's intelligence report, as it were, and delivered it straight to their God-ordained authority. They laid the problem at the feet of the king. And this is what we are to do. We are to take the blasphemies, the threats, the lies, and the temptations of the world, and we are to bring them in prayer to our great King, the Lord Jesus Christ. We report the situation on the ground, and we await our orders from the throne, confident that He who is in us is greater than he who is in the world.
Conclusion
The chapter ends on a cliffhanger. The enemy has fired his best rhetorical shots. The air is thick with threats and blasphemy. The people are silent on the wall. The leaders are grieving before their king. Everything hangs in the balance.
We live in a day when the Rabshakehs of the world are shouting at us from every platform. From the university, from Hollywood, from Washington D.C., they are broadcasting on the devil's microphone. They tell us our trust is foolish, our obedience is hateful, our God is impotent, and our hope is a lie. They offer us a comfortable, godless peace if we will only surrender.
May God give us the grace to respond as the men of Judah did. With a disciplined silence that refuses to honor blasphemy with a response. With a holy grief that mourns the dishonor done to our God. And with a confident faith that reports for duty to our King, laying the enemy's threats at His feet, knowing that the battle is the Lord's, and the victory is already won.