Let's open our Bibles tonight to 2nd Kings chapter 18. Begin reading with verse 17. 2nd Kings 18 verse 17. And the king of Assyria sent Tartan and Rabsarus and Rabshaka from Lachish to King Hezekiah with a great host against Jerusalem. And they went up and came to Jerusalem. And when they were come up, they came and stood by the conduit of the upper pool, which is in the highway of the fuller's field. And when they had called to the king, there came out of them Eliakim, the son of Hilkiah, which was over the household, and Shebna, the scribe, and Joash, the son of Asaph, the recorder. And Rabshakeh said unto them, Speak ye now to Hezekiah, the king, that is, thus saith the great king, the king of Assyria. What confidence is this wherein ye have trusted? Thou sayest, that they are but vain words, I have counsel and strength for war. Now, on whom dost thou trust that thou rebellest against me? Now, behold, thou trustest upon the staff of this bruised reed, even upon Egypt. Hezekiah, Egypt was a great nation. Many countries, when they got in trouble, would hire Egypt to come up and fight on their behalf. So Rabshakeh says, oh, are you gonna trust on this bruised reed? You know, a reed is not very strong. A reed is not gonna take any pressure, and a bruised reed will break and crumble, and that's who you're trusting to deliver you? It will go into his hand and pierce it. So is Pharaoh, king of Egypt, unto all that trust on him. But if you say unto me, we trust in the Lord our God, is not that he whose high places and whose altars Hezekiah hath taken away, and hath said to Judah in Jerusalem, Ye shall worship before this altar in Jerusalem. King Hezekiah had torn down all the false idols, cut down all the false groves, destroyed the idol worship that Israel had, and so now Rabshakeh comes along and says, you put your trust in God? Hezekiah destroyed all of your gods. Rav Shaka didn't know the one true God, as we'll see later on. Now therefore, I pray thee, give pledges to my Lord, the King of Assyria, and I will deliver thee 2,000 horses if thou be able on thy part to set riders upon them. How then wilt thou turn away the face of one captain? Now the army had many, many captains. Each captain was over so many thousand men. He said, even if I gave you 2,000 horses and you were able to find men to ride those horses and fight against us, you would not be able to even fight one captain, much less many, many captains. Verse 25, am I now come up without the Lord against this place? Notice, Lord is all capitals. That is the true God, the great God, the Jehovah God. That is the God of creation. That is the God of all worship. Am I now come up without the Lord against this place to destroy it? The Lord said to me, go up against this land and destroy it. Then said Eliakim, the son of Hilkiah, and Shebna and Joah unto Rabshakeh, speak, I pray thee, to thy servants in the Syrian language, for we understand it, and talk not with us in the Jews' language in the ears of the people that are on the wall. But Rabshakeh said unto them, Hath my master sent me to thy master, and to thee to speak these words? Hath he not sent me to the men which sit on the wall, that they may eat their own dung, and drink their own piss with you? them Rabshakeh stood and cried with a loud voice in the Jews' language and spake, saying, Hear the word of the great king, the king of Assyria." We're going to stop there because we could read the whole rest of the chapter and even the rest of chapter 19 to get the entire story, but I think you'll see enough to learn what we need to learn from Rabshakhan. As I said this morning, he is not the kind of guy that you would want living next door. We'll look at some of his characteristics. You would not want him living in your subdivision. You would not want him living in your entire community. He was not a good man. He was not a moral man. He was not a man that even had a little respect for God and the Word of God. So let's look at a few things about him. Look at a few things about his actions, and then we'll close with how do you handle bad people? How do you deal with bad people where we used to live? We had a neighbor, great guy. He and I became friends before we moved. And he was, gotta be careful because we're live streaming. He was very, very, very, very, very pro-America. very pro-America, and he resented anybody that did anything to try to bring America down. He was an American patriot all every cell in his body. And I remember when there had been an attack somewhere on Americans, and I asked him, I said, What are you gonna do when they come marching down our street? And you had to know him. He said, they will probably kill me, but I'm gonna take as many of them with me as I can before they get me. How do you deal with bad people? His solution, And he had an actual gun that was actually built back in the 1800s. And he had had it. It's a very historic rifle. You can't even buy them today. But his solution is, if anybody comes down the street to hurt America, I'm going to fight them with everything I've got. And that may be necessary. But that's another subject for another night. Notice his position. He was a very high-ranking man in the Assyrian army. Now, there was the Assyrian army, and there was the Syrian army. Syria, Assyria, different countries, different armies, different things, everything different. But the Assyrian army was the strongest army of that day. When they went to fight, nobody up to this point had been able to withstand them. Nobody up to now had been able to even fight them. They were a great host. They had already conquered many of the cities and countries, you know, that surrounded Judah and even the northern areas. Some of the countries they fought were very poor. And so when they fought these countries, even if they won, They didn't get very many spoils for the war. But Judah was considered rich. And so when they went against Judah, it was not just to conquer, but it was to take all of their gold, to take all of their silver, to take all of their wealth, to take everything to make up for those countries that they didn't get anything. Now, in this mighty army, Rabshakeh was the head of the Assyrian army. He was the top brass. He was the main guy. He was the man in charge. And so being the man in charge, he became the point man, the spokesman. Because he was the head of a mighty army, it was a very high position, but it was also a very powerful position. He had direct access to the king. If he didn't like you, it's like, hey, soldier, cut off her head. Cut out her tongue. His word, what he said, was immediately done. As I thought about him, I began thinking about people that I've known, and I bet some that you have known, that when they get a little power, they become arrogant, lifted up in pride, and they begin to feel that they are almost invincible. You remember the guy in Esther who decided to kill the Jews? Y'all remember him, don't you? Okay. He was second to the king. He thought, I am important. Everybody will bow down and worship me when I walk past. except Mordecai. And he began to make plans to kill Mordecai. Then he went even farther and made plans to kill the entire Jewish nation. A little power made him so arrogant that he thought the whole world revolved around him. And when Mordecai did not bow down, he vowed to kill Mordecai because nobody, nobody defies me. That's how Rabshakeff felt. I'm the second, I'm the head man in charge of the army. I have direct access to the king. And I can do pretty much whatever I want to do. Now, that attitude is dangerous when you're in charge of the government. That attitude is dangerous when you look at your spouse that way. That attitude is dangerous within the confines of a church, when one person begins to think they are Almighty God and the world revolves around them, you've got a problem. Whether it's marriage, whether it's in the community, whether it's in church, whether it's in politics, you've got a problem. And so Rabshakeh was an arrogant, egotistical man who thought, I'm the boss. I'll tell you what to do. Such power often makes men do some very foolish things. Notice his plan of attack. He had already defeated many, many smaller nations. He became so confident that he could defeat Judah and Jerusalem that he became careless. He became not only careless, but he became overconfident. in his own abilities. Anytime anybody begins to think, I have conquered this country, I conquered that country, I conquered that country, I can do anything, watch out. Watch out. They will do anything. He begins, he surrounds Jerusalem, and he tries to get them to surrender before he actually makes the attack. Such a large army would automatically put fear into the hearts and minds of the people of Judah and Jerusalem. Let's face it, we've got some great police officers, some great deputy sheriffs, They still believe in religious liberty. They still believe in the freedom to worship. They still believe that churches have a vital role in the community. I asked one of them, actually I've asked several of them, what would you do if the president ordered every law enforcement officer to break down the door of every house and search for guns, knives, and confiscate anything you find. And almost every one of them, well, every one that answered said, I would disobey the president. I would not follow the president's order. But just suppose for a moment, over the next month or two, every sermon, every sermon is anti-LGBTQ. Every sermon is anti-transgender. Every sermon is against the immorality of that section. And in a few weeks, after it becomes very well known, I'm invited to speak on Fox News, I'm questioned by some of the great men, and everybody knows I am anti-gays. Let me rephrase that. I'm not against them. I'm against their lifestyle. But I'm anti-LGBTQ. I'm anti-transgender. I'm anti-mutilating five and six-year-old kids to transgender them. And we come Sunday morning, and there's about a thousand LGBTQ people lined up outside of our building. How many of you would come in church, walk through them, walk through them, come in church to worship? Do what? But how many people would? They would look at the sheer numbers and say, it's not worth dying for. The sheer number of the army was intended to put fear into the hearts and minds of the people of Jerusalem. I remember when we were in Texas, I was the primary chaplain for the hospital. We got out of church one night, and one of the members came up, said there was a gang fight, just actually one street over from our church. There had been multiple stabbings, and they said, I'm sure the hospital probably wants you there. So I jump in my car. It was only a couple miles from the hospital. I pull in, and there's this gang here and this gang here, and the police are the only thing separating them. And I walk through them, get inside, And I did my thing. I dealt with the, you know, what I could do. The head nurse who was over the hospital at night shift, she came up to me and she said, I really thank you for coming. Would you do anything different if you had it to do over? And I said, yes, I would. She said, what would you do different? I said, I would have let the police escort me in, rather than walking through those gangs by myself. I would have let the police escort me. The sheer number, they had their knives, they had their, you know, they were ready for war. The sheer number of them should have scared me, but I didn't have enough sense at that time. Numbers sometimes are nothing more than scare tactics to get you afraid and to get you to throw down your weapons before you even start because you don't stand a chance. And so he was trying to scare them by his sheer numbers. Then he gets into a verbal exchange with the representatives of King Hezekiah. In verses 20, 21, 22, he challenges their trust in God. Who are you trusting? We're trusting God. No, you're not. Hezekiah tore down your gods. Hezekiah tore down your idols. So he begins to try to get the people to question their faith and trust in God. Then he tries to turn the people against the king. You know what? You're following Hezekiah. Let me tell you about Hezekiah. He begins to run down and question Hezekiah's motives. He begins to question Hezekiah's frame of mind. He begins to question in front of all of these people to get them to turn against Hezekiah by putting doubts in their mind about his motives and his ability to lead. You haven't lived until somebody in the church you pastor. tries to turn everybody in the church against you. You haven't lived until you don't know who you can trust. The man that you thought stood with you is the one who put the knife in your back. The family that you thought would back you begins to have doubts. You know, what if Rabshakeh is telling the truth? What if the king really does have ulterior motives? What if the king really is just trying to get us killed? And if you can plant doubt in people's minds, they're gonna be very hesitant to follow you in the battle. So he tried to turn them against God. Then he tried to turn them against the king. Then he tries to tell them, your only hope of survival is trusting me. God can't deliver you. Hezekiah can't deliver you. If you want to live, you surrender, throw down your weapons, put your faith and trust in me, and you have a chance of living. Anytime somebody tells me, trust me, I, no, no. I trust God. I trust God's word. But when somebody tries to tear down God's word and tells me to trust them, not in my present frame of mind. In verse 26, Hezekiah's men knowing what he's trying to do. He's trying to put fear into the hearts and minds of all the people that were sitting up on top of the wall listening to this. And so the three men from Hezekiah said, talk to us in the Syrian language. We understand And they don't need to be hearing all of this. Talk to us in the Syrian language. And he's the kind of guy, oh, You don't want them to hear, you don't want them to know what's going on. So then he turns and begins specifically to address the men and women that are sitting on top of the wall, listening to this conversation. In verses 28 to 35, he calls Hezekiah a liar. He's lying to you. Again, his purpose is to put fear and doubt into the minds and hearts of the people that are listening. Let me tell you, I have seen it. I have experienced it. When Satan comes in and begins to make you question the leader that God has put there, begins to make you doubt his truthfulness, begins to make you doubt his motives and his intentions, stop and look who's doing the talking. He's the captain of the host for the king of Assyria. He's only looking out for Assyria. He couldn't care less about the Jews. He's only saying this to put fear and doubt so that they will surrender And he doesn't actually have to go to battle. Well, God redirects him. He's got this mighty host. He's got Jerusalem surrounded. Jerusalem humanly doesn't stand a chance. They don't have a chance of winning. What are you gonna do? God calls the king of Assyria to get involved in another war, and he has to send for Rabshakeh. Come help me out up here. We'll go back and get Jerusalem later, but right now, I need you up here helping me. Boy, weren't they lucky that he got involved in another war. Wow, they were lucky. Surely you all know by now there's no such thing as luck. So Rabshakeh takes his army, leaves Jerusalem, goes up to help his king fight in this new war But before he leaves, he writes a letter to Hezekiah. And he said, don't you think for one minute that we won't be back and we will conquer you. And he goes, what did Hezekiah do? And this is what you and I need to do. He received the letter and read it. Well, he should have just thrown the letter away. He should have never read it. You don't know what the enemy's plotting unless you read and study what the enemy is doing. So he received the letter, he read it, and then he took the letter, went to the temple, laid the letter out before God and said, God, we need your help. We cannot do it. And so he laid the letter there before God and presented the case to God and said, God, You take charge. You take control. We used to sing a song that said, take your burdens to the Lord and bring them back with you. Anybody remember that song? I thought, wow, I got you, yeah. No, we sung, take your burdens to the Lord and leave them there. Once you've given it to God, take your hands off of it, leave it alone. It's in God's hands and God will always do a better job than anything you and I can do. What's bothering you? What's going on in your life? What enemy is attacking you? What armies are surrounding you? What insults are being hurled at you? What people are threatening you? You know what, 30, let's see, how old am I? Forty years ago, I might have been able to whip my way out of a wet paper bag with a double-side machete. Now, I couldn't even whip my way out of anything. That's one of the disadvantages when God has to put you down. I can't even run anymore. Somebody said, if somebody attacks you, run. I can't even run. What's troubling you? What is it? Who is it that's attacking you? You are no match for Satan. He outnumbers you. He doesn't outnumber God, but He outnumbers you. And He is a master. He has conquered thousands, millions of men and women and brought them down to the ash heaps of destruction. That's what He wants to do to you. So what are you going to do about it? We take it to God. And I don't mean Lord, I'm giving it to you, but I'm going to stand here and keep my hands on it in case. No, Lord. My hands are tied. There's nothing I can do. I it is hopeless. I am helpless. I'm gonna give it to you. Somebody once said that God is omnipresent. He's everywhere. He never sleeps. So there's no need in both of us staying awake. I'm going to bed and go to sleep. He's not going to sleep. He doesn't need sleep. He's watching He's got his guardian angel over me, protecting me. So if I give it to God, why do I continue to carry it? You know, when Hezekiah gave it to God, and I want you to turn over, I'm almost done. Chapter 19, verse 35. If you've never seen this, Every time I read it, I find it hilarious. And it came to pass that night, still talking about Rabshakeh and the army, that the angel of the Lord went out and smote, or killed, in the camp of the Assyrians 104 score and 5,000. and 85,000 soldiers. One angel did that. We sing the song he could have called 10,000 angels. He could have called one angel. One angel killed 185,000 Assyrian soldiers in one night, but here's the part I love. And when they arose early in the morning, behold, they were all dead corpses. When you give it to God, God can do things that you can never ever dream of. God can move mountains that you and I would find impossible. 185,000 trained soldiers. God killed them with just one angel. Sometimes God has to literally tie our hands to force us to depend on Him and let Him handle it. Sometimes God has to bring us to the end of our rope until it is absolutely beyond our control. Who would have ever dreamed that God would kill 185,000 officers, or not officers, one just walked in, I'm sorry about that. Sorry about that. Who would have imagined God would have killed 185,000 soldiers. Beyond human comprehension. But when you give it to God, God knows how to handle it. Now, what was it, Wednesday? I was telling someone this morning, we had a storm here. You've heard of raining drops of rain. This was raining buckets of rain. Now imagine, I called Dr. Shearer next door, and I say, bring all of your staff outside. I'm going to stop the rain. I call sports of all sorts, bring everybody over. I'm gonna stop the rain. And I go outside. Rain! Stop! How many of you believe the rain would stop? Because I said so. Certainly not me. I can't change the weather. And I can't defeat the devil, but God can. And God will when we let him have it. I close with one verse, Ephesians 3.20. Now unto him that is able to do exceedingly abundantly above all that we ask or think. When we let God have it, our mind is not even capable of imagining what God can do. Father, we come tonight Lord, there are bad people.