¹Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus through the  ²will of God, and Timothy the brother,

To the  ¹saints in Colossae and faithful brothers in Christ: Grace to you and peace from God our Father.

We give thanks to God, the  ¹Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, praying always concerning you,

Because we have heard of your faith in Christ Jesus and the  ¹love which you have unto all the saints

Because of the  ¹hope  ²laid up for you in the heavens, of which you heard before in the word of the  ³truth of the gospel,

Which has come to you, even as it is also in all the world, bearing fruit and growing, as also in you, since the day you heard and knew the  ¹grace of God in  ²truth;

Even as you learned from Epaphras, our beloved fellow slave, who is a faithful  ¹minister of Christ on your behalf,

Who also has made known to us your love in the Spirit.

Therefore we also, since the day we heard of it, do not cease praying and asking on your behalf that you may be filled with the full knowledge of  ¹His will in all  ²spiritual wisdom and understanding,

To  ¹walk worthily of the Lord to please Him  ²in all things,  ³bearing fruit in every good work and growing by the full  ⁴knowledge of God,

Being empowered with all  ¹power, according to the  ²might of His glory, unto all endurance and long-suffering with joy,

Giving thanks to the Father, who has  ¹qualified you for a share of the  ²allotted portion of the saints in the  ³light;

Who  ¹delivered us out of the authority of  ²darkness and transferred us into the kingdom of the  ³Son of His love,

In whom we have  ¹redemption, the  ²forgiveness of sins;

In the fourteenth year of King  ¹Hezekiah, Sennacherib the king of Assyria went up against all the fortified cities of Judah and took them.

And the king of Assyria sent the Rab-shakeh from Lachish to Jerusalem to King Hezekiah with a great force. And he stood at the conduit of the upper pool, on the road to the Fuller's Field.

Then Eliakim the son of Hilkiah, who was over the household, and Shebna the scribe and Joah the son of Asaph, the recorder, came out to him.

And the Rab-shakeh said to them, Say now to Hezekiah, Thus says the great king, the king of Assyria, What is this confidence in which you trust?

I say, It is but a vain word that you say, There is counsel and strength for war. Now in whom do you trust, that you rebel against me?

You now have put your trust in the staff of this broken reed, in Egypt, which, if a man should lean on it, will go into his hand and pierce it, for so is Pharaoh, the king of Egypt, to all who trust in him.

And if you say to me, We trust in Jehovah our God; is it not He whose high places and altars Hezekiah has taken away and has said to Judah and Jerusalem, You shall worship only before this altar?

Now therefore give pledges to my master, the king of Assyria, and I will give you two thousand horses, if indeed you are able to set riders on them.

How then can you refuse one official of the least of my master's servants and put your trust in Egypt for chariots and horsemen?

And have I now come up apart from Jehovah against this land to destroy it? Jehovah said to me, Go up against this land and destroy it.

And Eliakim and Shebna and Joah said to the Rab-shakeh, Please speak to your servants in Aramaic, because we understand it; and do not speak to us in the Jews' language, in the ears of the people upon the wall.

But the Rab-shakeh said, 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, that they may eat their own dung and drink their own urine with you?

Then the Rab-shakeh stood and cried out with a loud voice in the Jews' language, and said, Listen to the words of the great king, the king of Assyria:

Thus says the king, Do not let Hezekiah deceive you, because he is not able to deliver you;

Neither let Hezekiah cause you to trust in Jehovah, saying, Jehovah 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 let each eat from his own vine and each from his own fig tree, and let each drink the waters of his own cistern;

Until I come and take you away to a land like your land, a land of grain and new wine, a land of bread and vineyards.

Be careful lest Hezekiah persuade you, saying, Jehovah will deliver us. Have any of the gods of the nations delivered their land out of the hand of the king of Assyria?

Where are the gods of Hamath and Arpad? Where are the gods of Sepharvaim? And have they delivered Samaria out of my hand?

Who among all the gods of these lands have delivered their land out of my hand, that Jehovah should deliver Jerusalem out of my hand?

But they were silent and did not answer him a word, because of the commandment of the king that said, You shall 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 the Rab-shakeh.

And when King Hezekiah heard, he  ¹tore his clothes, and covered himself with sackcloth and went into the house of Jehovah.

And he sent Eliakim, who was over the household, and Shebna the scribe and the elders of the priests, who had covered themselves in sackcloth, to Isaiah the son of Amoz, the prophet.

And they said to him, Thus says Hezekiah, This day is a day of affliction, rebuke, and contempt, for children have come to the point of birth, and there is no strength to bring them forth.

It may be that Jehovah your God will hear the words of the Rab-shakeh, whom his master the king of Assyria sent to reproach the living God, and will reprove the words which Jehovah your God has heard. Therefore lift up a prayer for the remnant which is left.

So the servants of King Hezekiah came to Isaiah.

And Isaiah said to them, Thus you shall say to your master, Thus says Jehovah, Do not be afraid of the words which you have heard, with which the servants of the king of Assyria have blasphemed Me.

Indeed I will put a spirit in him, so that he will hear a report and return to his land. And I will cause him to fall by the sword in his own land.

And the Rab-shakeh returned and found the king of Assyria fighting against Libnah, because he had heard that the king had departed from Lachish.

And he heard a report about Tirhakah the king of Ethiopia which said, He has come forth to make war with you. And when he heard it, he sent messengers to Hezekiah, saying,

In this way you shall speak to Hezekiah the king of Judah, saying, Do not let your God in whom you trust deceive you, saying, Jerusalem will not be delivered into the hand of the king of Assyria.

Indeed you have heard what the kings of Assyria have done to all the lands, destroying them utterly. And will you be delivered?

Have the gods of the nations, whom my fathers destroyed, delivered them: Gozan and Haran and Rezeph and the children of Eden, who were in Telassar?

Where are the king of Hamath and the king of Arpad and the king of the city of Sepharvaim, of Hena and Ivvah?

And Hezekiah took the letter from the hand of the messengers and read it, and Hezekiah went up to the house of Jehovah and spread it before Jehovah.

And Hezekiah prayed to Jehovah, saying,

O Jehovah of hosts, God of Israel, You who are enthroned between the cherubim, You alone are God of all the kingdoms of the earth; You made the heavens and the earth.

Incline Your ear, O Jehovah, and hear; open Your eyes, O Jehovah, and see; and listen to all the words of Sennacherib, who has sent messengers to reproach the living God.

Truly, O Jehovah, the kings of Assyria have laid waste all the countries and their land,

And have cast their gods into the fire, because they were not gods, but the work of men's hands, wood and stone; so they destroyed them.

And now, O Jehovah our God, save us from his hand, that all the kingdoms of the earth may know that You alone are Jehovah.

Then Isaiah the son of Amoz sent a message to Hezekiah, saying, Thus says Jehovah the God of Israel, Because you have prayed to Me concerning Sennacherib the king of Assyria,

This is the word which Jehovah has spoken concerning him:
The virgin daughter of Zion
Has despised you and laughed at you;
The daughter of Jerusalem
Has shaken her head behind you.

Whom have you reproached and reviled?
Against whom have you lifted up your voice
And lifted up your eyes haughtily?
Against the Holy One of Israel.

By your servants you have reproached the Lord,
And you have said, In the multitude of my chariots,
I have come up to the heights of the mountains,
To the sides of Lebanon.
And I will cut down its tall cedars,
And the choicest of its cypresses:
I will enter into its farthest height
And its luxuriant forest.

I have dug;
I have drunk water;
With the sole of my foot I have dried up
All the rivers of  ¹Egypt.

Have you not heard
That long ago I did it;
And from the days of old I had formed it?
Now I have brought it to pass,
That you should destroy fortified cities,
And make them into ruinous heaps.

Therefore their inhabitants were short of strength;
They were dismayed and felt ashamed;
And they were like vegetation of the field
And green shoots of tender grass,
Like grass which grows on the housetops
And  ¹is scorched before it has grown up.

But I know your sitting down,
And your going out and your coming in,
And your raging against Me.

Because your raging against Me
And your arrogance has come up into My ears,
I will put My hook in your nose
And My bridle in your lips,
And turn you back on the way by which you came.

This shall be the sign to you: This year you shall eat that which grows up of itself, and the second year that which shoots up from the same, and in the third year sow and reap and plant vineyards and eat their fruit.

And the remnant of those who have escaped of the house of Judah will again take root downward and bear fruit upward.

For a remnant will go forth out of Jerusalem, and from Mount Zion those who have escaped. The zeal of Jehovah of hosts will perform this.

Therefore, thus says Jehovah concerning the king of Assyria,
He shall not come to this city,
Nor shoot an arrow there;
Neither shall he come against it with shields,
And build up a mound against it.

By the way on which he came,
By the same shall he return,
And into this city he shall not come,
Declares Jehovah.

And around this city I will put an enclosure
To save it,
For My  ¹own sake
And for the sake of  ¹David, My servant.

Then the angel of Jehovah went out and struck the Assyrians' camp, a hundred and eighty-five thousand; and when they arose early in the morning, all of them were corpses, dead.

Then Sennacherib the king of Assyria departed and went back to dwell in Nineveh.

And when he was worshipping in the house of his god Nisroch, Adrammelech and Sharezer his sons slew him with the sword; and they escaped to the land of Ararat. And Esarhaddon his son reigned in his place.

In those days Hezekiah became mortally ill; and Isaiah the son of Amoz, the prophet, came to him and said to him, Thus says Jehovah, Put your house in order, for you are about to die and will not live.

And Hezekiah turned his face to the wall and prayed to Jehovah,

And said, Now, O Jehovah, please remember how I have walked before You in truth and with a perfect heart and have done that which is good in Your sight. And Hezekiah wept many tears.

Then the word of Jehovah came to Isaiah, saying,

Go and speak to Hezekiah, Thus says Jehovah, the God of David your father, I have heard your prayer, I have seen your tears; I will now add to your life  ¹fifteen years.

And I will deliver you and this city from the hand of the king of Assyria, and I will put an enclosure around this city.

And this will be the sign from Jehovah to you, that Jehovah will do this thing which He has spoken.

Behold, I will cause the shadow on the steps, which has gone down with the sun on the steps of Ahaz, to go back ten steps. So the sun's shadow went back ten steps on the steps on which it had gone down.

The writing of Hezekiah the king of Judah when he had been sick and had recovered from his sickness:

I said, In the middle of my days,
I will go into the gates of Sheol;
I have been deprived of the rest of my years.

I said, I will not see Jah,
Jah in the land of the living;
I will not look on man any longer,
While I am with those who dwell where everything has ceased.

Like a shepherd's tent,
My dwelling has been pulled up and removed from me.
Like a weaver, I have rolled up my life.
He will cut me off  ¹from the loom;
From day until night You make an end of me.

I have stilled myself until the morning;
Like a lion, so He breaks all my bones;
From day until night You make an end of me.

Like a swallow and a crane, so I twitter;
Like a dove, I mourn;
My eyes look languishingly above;
O Lord, I am oppressed; be my surety.

What shall I say? He has both spoken to me,
And He Himself has done it;
I will walk  ¹deliberately all my years,
Because of the bitterness of my soul.

O Lord, upon these things men live;
And in all of these things is the life of my spirit;
Therefore may You restore my strength
And make me live.

Indeed for peace I had bitterness, yes, bitterness;
But You have lovingly delivered my soul from the pit of destruction,
Because You have cast behind Your back
All my sins.

For  ¹Sheol cannot thank You,
And Death cannot praise You;
They that go down to the pit
Cannot hope in Your truth.

The living, the living, he will praise You,
As I do today;
A father shall make known
Your truth to his children.

Jehovah is ready to save me;
Therefore we will sing my songs,
With stringed instruments,
All the days of our life,
In the house of Jehovah.

Then Isaiah said, Let them take a cake of figs and rub it upon the boil, and he will live.

Hezekiah had also said, What is the sign that I shall go up to the house of Jehovah?