The Story Series If we claim to be without sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will “The Beginning of the end…” forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness. 2 Kings 17-20, -32 & 1 John 1:8-9 (NIV)

The Lord warned Israel and Judah through all his prophets and When the enemy is at your door: seers: “Turn from your evil ways. Observe my commands and decrees, in accordance with the entire Law that I commanded “Be strong and courageous. Do not be afraid or discouraged your ancestors to obey and that I delivered to you through my because of the king of and the vast army with him, for servants the prophets.” there is a greater power with us than with him. With him is only But they would not listen and were as stiff-necked as their the arm of flesh, but with us is the Lord our God to help us and to ancestors, who did not trust in the Lord their God. fight our battles.” And the people gained confidence from what 2 Kings 17:13-14 (NIV) the king of Judah said. 2 Chronicles 32:7-8 (NIV) The Israelites persisted in all the sins of Jeroboam and did not turn away from them until the Lord removed them from his “Do you not know what I and my predecessors have done to all presence, as he had warned through all his servants the prophets. the peoples of the other lands? Were the gods of those nations So the people of Israel were taken from their homeland into exile ever able to deliver their land from my hand? Who of all the gods in Assyria, and they are still there. of these nations that my predecessors destroyed has been able to 2 Kings 17:22-23 (NIV) save his people from me? How then can your god deliver you from my hand? Now do not let Hezekiah deceive you and mislead you Before the enemy is at your door: like this. Do not believe him, for no god of any nation or kingdom has been able to deliver his people from my hand or the hand of Hezekiah’s commitment to Purity. my predecessors. How much less will your god deliver you from my hand!” In the first month of the first year of his reign, he opened the doors 2 Chronicles 32:13-15 (NIV) 4 of the temple of the Lord and repaired them. He brought in the priests and the Levites, assembled them in the square on the east 5 Hezekiah’s commitment to Prayer. side and said: “Listen to me, Levites! Consecrate yourselves now and consecrate the temple of the Lord, the God of your ancestors. King Hezekiah and the prophet Isaiah son of Amoz cried out in Remove all defilement from the sanctuary. 6 Our parents were prayer to heaven about this. unfaithful; they did evil in the eyes of the Lord our God and 2 Chronicles 32:20 (NIV) forsook him. They turned their faces away from the Lord’s dwelling place and turned their backs on him. And the Lord sent an angel, who annihilated all the fighting men and the commanders and officers in the camp of the Assyrian …When they had assembled their fellow Levites and consecrated king. So he withdrew to his own land in disgrace. 2 Chronicles 32:21a (NIV) themselves, they went in to purify the temple of the Lord, as the 16 king had ordered, following the word of the Lord. The priests In those days Hezekiah became ill and was at the point of death. went into the sanctuary of the Lord to purify it. They brought out to He prayed to the Lord, who answered him and gave him a the courtyard of the Lord’s temple everything unclean that they miraculous sign. found in the temple of the Lord. The Levites took it and carried it 2 Chronicles 32:24 (NIV) out to the Kidron Valley 2 Chronicles 29:3-6, 15-16(NIV)

Then Hezekiah repented of the pride of his heart, as did the Growth Group Questions people of ; therefore the Lord’s wrath did not come on (Questions and Scriptures for further study) them during the days of Hezekiah. 2 Chronicles 32:26 (NIV) 1. What is your favorite sports movie? Why?

SO WHAT? 2. If you played sports or watch a favorite sports team, tell about Surely the arm of the Lord is not too short to save, a time when it looked like it was over, but the team that seemed nor his ear too dull to hear. defeated made an amazing comeback. But your iniquities have separated you from your God; your sins have hidden his face from you, so that he will not hear. 3. Tell of a time in your life where you or someone you loved Isaiah 59:1-2 (NIV) faced an overwhelming enemy and it seemed there was no way to win. How did that affect your faith? Who has believed our message

and to whom has the arm of the Lord been revealed?

He grew up before him like a tender shoot,

and like a root out of dry ground. 4. Read 2 Kings 17:1-14. God allowed a foreign army to invade He had no beauty or majesty to attract us to him, and defeat Israel (the Northern Kingdom). Why did God bring this nothing in his appearance that we should desire him. judgment on his own people and what do you learn from Gods He was despised and rejected by mankind, response to the behavior of Israel? a man of suffering, and familiar with pain.

Like one from whom people hide their faces

he was despised, and we held him in low esteem.

Surely he took up our pain 5. Read 2 Chronicles 29:1-16. Hezekiah pleased God when he and bore our suffering, spiritually cleaned house, got rid of idols, and smashed and cut yet we considered him punished by God, down all the signs of spiritual compromise in the land. When you stricken by him, and afflicted. look at your spiritual life, what could you clean out, cut down, But he was pierced for our transgressions, smash so that you can walk more closely with God? he was crushed for our iniquities; the punishment that brought us peace was on him,

and by his wounds we are healed. 6. Have you ever experienced a time when life was tough and We all, like sheep, have gone astray, you were so desperate for God that it was ‘as natural to pray as it each of us has turned to our own way; was to breathe’? and the Lord has laid on him

the iniquity of us all. What brought on that season? Isaiah 53:1-6 (NIV)

If that feeling has faded, why did it fade away? The Story continues… 7. What are you facing today that seems too big, overwhelming, or even hopeless, and how can your group members join you in prayer?