Tony Evans - Praying to Change God's Mind
God tells Hezekiah in 2 Kings 20, "It's time to say goodbye". Through the prophet Isaiah, he comes and he says, "God told me to tell you, 'Set your house in order or get your affairs settled. Make sure your will is intact. Make sure your family understands that it's terminal. There will be no coming back from this illness. You're going to die.'" Nothing is more painful than to run into a terminal situation, a situation that offers no solution. Now, here it was a physical illness, but terminal situations can show up in all kinds of shapes and sizes. Maybe there's a terminal relationship. Maybe there's a terminal hope, all hope is gone. Maybe it's the economics are terminal, you don't see any way out, and it throws you to tears, to discouragement, and to hopelessness.
Nobody you know, no place you can go, and nothing that you can do can fix it. It's a terminal situation. When a situation gets that bad and you can't see your way out and you look down the train tracks, and the only light you see is an oncoming train, because it looks hopeless, no way out. And you're stuck with getting your house in order, because it's over. It is in this context that we read that Hezekiah turned his face to the wall and prayed to the Lord. He was looking at Isaiah, but now when he heard the news from the prophet, he turned his face to the wall and the Bible says he wept bitterly. He wept and cried like a baby to hear the bad news that there is no solution, and there really is no solution if God said you're gonna die. This came from God. God said, "It's over". God said, "It's get your affairs in order".
What am I gonna do if God says it? Well, the only thing you can do is go to the God who said it. It says he turned his face to the wall and he went to God, who decreed that it was over. So, today I'm talking to folk who think it's over. Whatever over means for you. And if you're not in an over situation, keep living. You're gonna hit an over situation, a situation where it appears to be terminal, hopeless, no solution, and God is right in the mix. We're told Hezekiah prayed, and when Hezekiah prayed in verses 3 and 4, mainly verse 3, he says, "I walked before you, I was truthful, I gave you my whole heart, and I did what was good". You know what he gave God? A credit report. He says, "God, don't you remember that I hung in there when other folk quit on you? That I followed you when other folk ran away from you? That I stuck to the truth and didn't buy a lie? Don't you remember? Look at my credit report".
Now, when he asked God to remember, God does not have a memory issue. In chapter 32 of 2 Chronicles, verses 24 to 26, we're told that he had some issues, issue of pride. And that pride got him sick. And God says, "This is it". But even though he had a flaw in his credit report, when you looked over the whole of his walk, there was spiritual consistency without being perfect. Let me ask you a question. If you were in a terminal situation and you showed God your spiritual credit report, how would it read? "You tell me you're gonna spend time with me, you tell me you're gonna get to know me, you tell me you're gonna feast on my Word, you tell me you're gonna be faithful in your giving, you tell me you're gonna give some of your time for service, but I'm", click, click, click, click, click, "checking your report, and I don't see consistency here. I know you're not perfect, but I don't even see consistency".
On that day when you're going to be in a terminal situation, what's your credit report look like? He gives him a credit report. And he says, "I have followed you, I have hung out with you, I have stuck with your truth". He turns to pray, why? Because God will put us in situations where he is our only way out, where there's no person you can talk to, no deal you can cut. It says he wept bitterly, but he matched his weeping with his credit report. A lot of times we go to God with our tears without a good report, and we wonder why he's not responding. No, he had a great credit report, but he was in a terminal situation. So, he prays and he cries out to God. One day, if it has not come yet, you're going to be, I'm going to be, we're going to be in a terminal situation. In other words, a situation we can't fix and nobody else can help us, and the only out is God.
You cannot decide on that day to change your credit report. You have to have built that up along the way, because you're gonna need to cash it in on that day. Hezekiah cries out to God and says, "This is my report," and he's crying for mercy. God then tells Isaiah, who had gone out into the middle of the court, the Word of the Lord came to him, saying, verse 5, "Return and say to Hezekiah, the leader of my people, 'Thus saith the Lord God, your Father. "I have heard your prayer, and I have seen your tears".'" No, you didn't. "'"I have heard your prayers and I have seen your tears".'"
So, the first thing is he prayed. He gave something, he gave God something to hear, and it included his credit report. Says, "I've heard your prayer, but I've also seen your tears. I've heard what you said, prayer, but I've also seen how you feel. I've heard your words, but I've also read your heart. I've heard your speech, but I've also felt the depth of your pain," because he's a feeling kind of God. And he says, "I've heard your words, but I've also felt your pain". What the Bible says about Jesus is he came to sympathize with our hurts. That's a feeling thing. He says, "I will heal you. On the third day you're gonna go up to the house of the Lord," meaning you're gonna get your praise on. "You crying today, but I'm gonna give you a reason to shout three days from now. I'm gonna heal you".
Wait a minute, it's just a couple of verses ago, said, "You're gonna die". But it was just a couple of verses ago, and by the time Isaiah got halfway out in the courtyard, God, watch this now, changed his mind. Ooh, ooh, did you hear that? God changed his mind. Now, this puts us in a theological conundrum. The Bible declares that God does not change. God says, "I am the Lord that changeth not". Jesus is the same yesterday, today, and forever. God cannot change, he says that over and over and over again in Scripture. But we just saw God change. He said, "'You will die,' thus saith the Lord". Couple of minutes later, "'You will not die,' thus saith the Lord". So we went from a terminal situation to a 15-year reprieve. And I was only in the center of a couple of minutes, because Isaiah just walked to the middle of the courtyard. And the only thing that happened between what God said the first time and what God said the second time was a prayer full of emotion. That's the only thing that's happened.
How can a changeless God, his immutability, change? One of the things we need to go deeper in is our knowledge of God. God is more than a theological word. And the way to know God is through his attributes, his characteristics, or his perfections. His characteristics or his perfections. God cannot change his essential nature, but he changed. While God cannot change his nature, he can and does change his action. Let me say that again. God's nature cannot change, but his actions may change. How then does God change his action without changing his nature, since his nature cannot change but his action, as in this case, does change?
In fact, in the book of Exodus 32 Moses is pleading in verses 7 to 14 on behalf of Israel because God is upset with 'em, and God is angry with 'em, and he cries out to God, and the Bible says, "And when God heard Moses's prayer," verse 14, he says, "God changed his mind". God is a God of wrath. Wrath is his just retribution against sin. That's who he is. He can't help it, because it's part of his makeup. However, God is also a God of love, and he can't help that either. That is where God seeks the well-being of the object loved. He's a God of wrath, but he's a God of love. So, depending on which part of his nature you are relating to affects what he does. So, he could be coming in wrath, but he's free to shift to love on the same subject matter.
See, we only have one subject here. He shifted on one subject from you're gonna die to you're gonna live without changing his basic nature. He just had to shift which part of his nature he applied it to. God is a God of justice. He deals with right and wrong, fair and unfair. God is a God of mercy. Depending on how you are relating to him, he can shift dealing with you from justice and switch over to mercy, 'cause he's still being consistent with who he is, he's just relating it to another part of his character. So, the issue is, which part of his character are you relating to that will affect whether he's free to change without changing?
So, if you're on God's bad side and therefore are undergoing the consequences, but you shift to being on God's good side, God can and does shift you to another part of his character, which allows him to change his action without affecting his being. He says in Jonah chapter 3, verses 1 to 10, "Jonah, you go preach, and you tell them in 40 days Nineveh is going to be destroyed. Nineveh is going to be destroyed in 40 days, so mark your calendar, 40 days from now, Nineveh will be no more". But chapter 3 of Jonah says during the 40 days the people of Nineveh repented and got right with God. And then it says, "And when God saw that they repented, he changed his mind".
So, God changes his mind, and he says, "You are going to live, you are not going to die. I'm gonna deliver you," verse 6. "I'm gonna give you 15 years. And when I give you 15 years and deliver you, I will deliver this city from the hand of the king of Assyria and defend the city for my own sake and for the sake of my servant, David". He says, "When I give you this 15 years, it's not just so you can go out and party. I'm giving you this 15 years because I want to use you to deliver my people from the attack of the Assyrians". In other words, "The only reason I'm turning this around is not only to give you life, because I know that's what you're praying for, but I also want to give you purpose, and I want to give you a new opportunity to do something for me".
See, most of the time when we're in a terminal situation, it's only about me, myself, and I, and I want God to do something for me that is in my best interest. And that's okay, but it can't be limited to you. When God gives you a new opportunity, he wants you to be a blessing, not just be blessed. So, if it's only about you, then you missing God's, "I got a bigger plan for you than just you living 15 years. I want to deliver, and I want to deliver the whole city from the Assyrians". So, then he tells Isaiah, "Take a cake of figs," and he took them and laid it on the boil, and he recovered. Okay, so he's dying from an infection, he's got a boil that's going to kill him, which means he has an infection running through his body. God tells the prophet, "Go get a fig cake, put the fig cake on the boil to suck out the infection so that he can live".
So, God gives Isaiah, not the doctor, a medical solution. Isaiah's the king, so he can get any doctor he wants, but because this was a spiritual issue and not merely a medical issue, God comes up with a whole 'nother plan to heal him apart from the plan that the professionals would use, because if the professionals could have used it, he wouldn't be terminally ill in the first place. God is not against medicine. In fact, all the medicine you use is birthed from something God has already made, so any doctor who's using any medicine has got to depend on something God has already made to produce the medicine that we take for our illnesses. It's nothing wrong with using medicine. It's everything wrong with using medicine without God. See, it started with God. He got right with God. God said, "I'm gonna heal you," then the medicine worked.
So, he hears a word from God, Isaiah does, to help a sick king. Let me put it another way. He gets a rhema word. The Bible is the graphe, it is that which is recorded. When you don't open it, it's still the Bible. If it's sitting on your coffee table, it's still the Word of God. If it's sitting up on a bookshelf, it's the Bible because of what is written. That's the graphe, the writing. Then there is the logos. The logos is what is said and meant by what is written. So, the logos is the word understood, it's the word revealed. If you walked in here with your Bible or the Bible on your device that you use, you walked in here with the graphe. Right now, you and I are discussing the logos. I'm trying to explain the content and the meaning of what's been recorded in the graphe. So, if you have a Bible, you've got the graphe, and now in the explanation of the Bible we are addressing the logos. But when you're in a terminal situation, you need a rhema.
Now, the word rhema in the Greek means a specific utterance related to a specific situation from God. And rhema word is a personal word for you. I don't know everybody's personal situation this morning, so all I can give you is the logos. But the Holy Spirit knows your personal situation, and it's his job to turn it, if he wants to, into a rhema. The prophets in the Bible brought rhema words. Those were words directly related to a particular person in a particular place about a particular thing that God wanted to see addressed. That's a rhema word. That's the job of the Holy Spirit. So, if you are a Christian here, you have the Holy Spirit, and if you are in fellowship with God, he gives you rhema words, because the doctors didn't come up with a fig cake on a boil. That came from a prophet, not a medical expert, as to address this problem supernaturally.
So, you want a rhema relationship with God so you just don't go to Bible study and you just don't go to church. You hear the voice of God for yourself and how it applies to your specific situation. And so, he puts the fig cake on him, it sucks out the infection, and now he's healed. But old Hezekiah has a question. He says, "What shall be the sign," verse 8, "that the Lord will heal me"? Now, he was just told the Lord gonna heal him, okay? But every now and again you need to see something. "Okay, I heard what you said, Prophet Isaiah. I heard what you said, Preacher. And I, like, kind of believe it. But part of me is from Missouri. You got to show me something". Signs in the Bible were designed to confirm the Word of God, to give you something you could grab.
So, Isaiah says in the last couple verses, he says, "God told me to tell you this would be the sign and you get to choose. Do you want the sun to move forward ten steps, or do you want the sun to go back ten steps"? Translation, this is the first daylight saving times in history. "Do you want to spring forward or fall back"? God offers him a daylight saving time. He says, "I'll speed up the time or I'll slow down the time, you choose". Hezekiah says, "Well, speeding up the time, I'm not sure I'm gonna buy that, because that one looks too easy". That's what he says. He says, "Let me take the harder one. Let's see you back up the time". Now, they didn't have watches and clocks like we do. They had more sundials, and Ahab's Step was a sundial. So, as the afternoon went on, the sun would roll up down the steps, and it would expand as the sun got brighter, so when he asked for the sun to go back, he's asking for a regression of time. He's asking for the sun to do opposite to what the sun does. He says, "Because that's the harder thing".
Now, here's the question. Why did God give him that sign? I mean, he could have said, "I'll just show you a sign," or he could have given, but he used the sun for the sign. Well, you remember now that the issue is Assyria is going to attack. The name of the Assyrian god is Assur, A-S-S-U-R. That's the Assyrian god, and he's the god of the sun. So, he gives him a sign tied to the ministry that he wants him to perform once he's healed. In other words, it's not just any old sign, it's a relevant sign, because "I'm gonna show you in the sign I give you about your healing that the job I'm getting ready to give you, to take care of the Assyrians".
God has you for a greater kingdom purpose, and he wants to use you, even if he allows a terminal situation, a situation that looks hopeless. So, I want to challenge you as we wind down. Here's my challenge. Change your credit report. 'Cause when that time comes, you wanna be able to say to God, "God, look at my credit report. I haven't been perfect, I have failed, but, Lord, I have picked up and I have decided to surrender to you, to pursue a relationship with you, to love the Lord my God with all my heart, my mind, my might, and soul, to serve you and to serve others. God, I am yours. I am yours". And the good thing about a credit report is that they will allow you to let it change. They'll allow bad credit to become medium credit to become awesome credit, so no matter how bad your credit report used to be, change your credit, so that when terminal day comes, you can offer God something he can respond to.