The Wall, The Weeping, and The Will of God Text: Isaiah 38:1-3
Introduction: Decrees and Desperation
We live in an age that is deeply confused about the nature of God's sovereignty and the role of human prayer. On the one hand, you have a sentimental, therapeutic deism where God is a cosmic butler, waiting to be summoned by our earnest wishes. On the other hand, you have a cold, hyper-Calvinistic fatalism where prayer is, at best, a pious formality, seeing as everything is already "locked in." Both are profound distortions of the living God revealed in Scripture. Both render prayer either a magical incantation or a pointless exercise. And both are shattered by what we see here in the life of Hezekiah.
This passage brings us to one of the sharpest intersections of divine decree and desperate petition in all the Bible. God, through his accredited prophet Isaiah, delivers a message that is as unambiguous as it gets: "Set your house in order, for you shall die and not live." This is not a weather forecast; it is a death sentence from the throne of the universe. And yet, what follows is not quiet resignation. It is not a stoic acceptance of "the inevitable." What follows is a man turning his face to the wall, weeping bitterly, and wrestling with God in prayer. And the astonishing thing is that God changes His mind. Or, to speak more precisely, God brings about His ultimate will through the very means of Hezekiah's prayer, a prayer He Himself ordained.
This is a story that forces us to think biblically, not philosophically. God is not a static principle, but a living person. He interacts with His people. Our prayers are not simply us talking to ourselves; they are genuine transactions in the courts of heaven. They are appointed means to appointed ends. God did not just decree that Hezekiah would live another fifteen years; He decreed that Hezekiah would pray, and that through that prayer, He would grant him another fifteen years.
This account is therefore intensely practical. It teaches us what to do when the doctor's report is grim, when the bank account is empty, when the world seems to be crashing down. It teaches us what to do when God Himself seems to have spoken a final, terrible word against us. The answer is not to despair, and it is not to pretend. The answer is to turn to the wall and pray.
The Text
In those days Hezekiah became ill to the point of death. And Isaiah the prophet the son of Amoz came to him and said to him, “Thus says Yahweh, ‘Set your house in order, for you shall die and not live.’ ”
Then Hezekiah turned his face to the wall and prayed to Yahweh
and said, “Remember now, O Yahweh, I beseech You, how I have walked before You in truth and with a whole heart and have done what is good in Your sight.” And Hezekiah wept greatly.
(Isaiah 38:1-3 LSB)
The Unvarnished Verdict (v. 1)
We begin with the stark reality of Hezekiah's situation.
"In those days Hezekiah became ill to the point of death. And Isaiah the prophet the son of Amoz came to him and said to him, “Thus says Yahweh, ‘Set your house in order, for you shall die and not live.’ ”" (Isaiah 38:1)
The phrase "in those days" places us in a crucial historical context. This is likely happening around the time of the great Assyrian crisis, when Sennacherib was threatening Jerusalem. Hezekiah was a good king, a reformer who had torn down the high places and restored the worship of Yahweh. He had led his people in trusting God for a miraculous deliverance from the Assyrian hordes. And now, in the midst of this national triumph of faith, he is struck down personally. This is a reminder that covenant faithfulness does not grant us immunity from the harsh realities of a fallen world. Sickness and death come to kings and commoners, to the righteous and the wicked.
Isaiah the prophet, who had been his counselor and ally against the Assyrians, now comes with a message not of comfort, but of finality. "Thus says Yahweh." This is not Isaiah's opinion or a medical prognosis. This is a divine oracle. The command is twofold: a practical instruction and a stark pronouncement. "Set your house in order" means to get your affairs settled, name your successor, and prepare for the end. The reason is given with brutal clarity: "for you shall die and not live." The Hebrew is emphatic. It is a settled matter. From a human perspective, the case is closed. God has spoken.
This is what we might call the revealed will of God, or His will of command. It was a true statement of what was about to happen, barring any other intervening factor. But we must distinguish this from God's decretive will, His ultimate plan from all eternity. This passage wonderfully illustrates that God's decrees often include the free, contingent, and desperate actions of His people. God's declaration here is designed to provoke a response. It is a test. Will Hezekiah roll over and die, or will he take his case to the supreme court of heaven?
The Turn to the Wall (v. 2)
Hezekiah's reaction is immediate and instructive.
"Then Hezekiah turned his face to the wall and prayed to Yahweh" (Isaiah 38:2 LSB)
This is a profound gesture. Turning his face to the wall was an act of shutting out everything else. He turned his back on the prophet, on his courtiers, on his royal duties, and on the grim reality of his sickness. It was an act of intense, focused, and private desperation. In that moment, there was only him and his God. He was not putting on a show. His piety was not for public consumption. When the sentence of death was pronounced, his immediate, gut-level instinct was to get alone with God.
This is a rebuke to much of our modern, shallow spirituality. We are often more concerned with how our prayers sound to others than with the raw honesty of our plea before God. Hezekiah shows us that true prayer, especially in moments of crisis, is not about eloquence, but about earnestness. He shuts out all distractions to give his entire attention to the only one who can possibly help him.
He "prayed to Yahweh." He prayed to the covenant-keeping God of Israel. He did not appeal to some generic deity, but to the God who had made specific promises to His people, to the house of David, and to Hezekiah himself. His prayer was not a shot in the dark; it was an appeal to a known character and a recorded history of faithfulness. This is the foundation of all effective prayer: knowing who you are talking to.
The Covenantal Appeal (v. 3)
Now we come to the content of his prayer, which is often misunderstood by modern evangelicals.
"and said, “Remember now, O Yahweh, I beseech You, how I have walked before You in truth and with a whole heart and have done what is good in Your sight.” And Hezekiah wept greatly." (Isaiah 38:3 LSB)
At first glance, this might sound like a self-righteous appeal to his own works. It sounds like he is saying, "God, I've been so good, you owe me." But that is to read our individualistic, post-enlightenment sensibilities back into an ancient covenantal context. Hezekiah is not attempting to justify himself by works in a Pelagian sense. He is making a covenantal appeal. He is reminding God of the terms of His own covenant.
The Davidic covenant, and the covenant with Israel more broadly, had clear stipulations. Blessings were promised for obedience and curses for disobedience (Deuteronomy 28). Hezekiah is not claiming sinless perfection. Rather, he is claiming that his life has been characterized by covenant faithfulness. "I have walked before You in truth and with a whole heart." This is the language of integrity. His orientation, his fundamental direction, has been toward God. He is saying, in effect, "Lord, I am one of yours. I have kept the terms. My life has been dedicated to your glory. Is this how you treat your faithful covenant sons? Remember your promises."
This is not arrogance; it is the prayer of a son appealing to his father's character. It is the kind of prayer God invites. Hezekiah is taking God at His word. He is leveraging his own God-given faithfulness as a ground for his appeal. We see the same principle in the New Covenant. We are not saved by our works, but we are saved unto good works. And our perseverance in the faith is the means by which God fulfills His electing purpose. Faith is the instrument, and a faith that is alive necessarily produces the fruit of obedience. Hezekiah is pointing to the fruit as evidence of the root.
And then, the appeal dissolves into raw emotion: "And Hezekiah wept greatly." The Hebrew says he wept "a great weeping." This was not a few dignified tears. This was a flood of grief, a full-throated, body-wracking sob. This is the prayer of a man who loves life and does not want to die. It is the honest cry of a creature to his Creator. And our God is not a stoic philosopher who is offended by such emotion. He is a Father who is moved by the tears of His children. As we will see, God's response is immediate: "I have heard your prayer; I have seen your tears" (v. 5). The weeping was part of the prayer.
Conclusion: The God Who Hears
This brief, intense scene is a masterclass in biblical prayer. It confronts us with a God who is utterly sovereign, whose word determines life and death, and yet who has so ordered the world that the prayers and tears of His people matter. They are woven into the very fabric of His eternal decree.
Hezekiah's predicament is our own. We all live under a sentence of death. "It is appointed for man to die once" (Hebrews 9:27). The question is not whether we will face a final crisis, but how. Will we face it with a limp, fatalistic sigh? Or will we, like Hezekiah, turn our face to the wall?
We, of course, have an even greater basis for our appeal. Hezekiah appealed to his own walk, his own faithfulness within the covenant. We appeal to the perfect walk and finished work of another. We have a greater Hezekiah, the Lord Jesus Christ, who walked before the Father in perfect truth and with a whole heart. He did not just get sick; He took our sickness upon Himself. He did not just face death; He exhausted its curse on the cross. He did not just weep; He sweat great drops of blood in the garden, pleading with the Father.
Therefore, when we are brought to the point of death, whether physically, financially, or spiritually, we can turn our faces to the wall. We can weep our great weeping. And we can pray, "Remember now, O Yahweh, not how I have walked, but how your Son walked for me. Remember not my whole heart, but His. Remember His righteousness, which you have credited to my account." Because of Jesus, we can be assured that God will always say, "I have heard your prayer. I have seen your tears." He may not add fifteen years to our earthly life, but He has secured for us an eternity of life, where He Himself will wipe away every tear from our eyes.