Wiped Out!
I have considered until morning— Like a lion, So He breaks all my bones; From day until night You make an end of me. – Isaiah 38:13 NKJV.
The NLT: “I waited patiently all night, but I was torn apart as though by lions. Suddenly, my life was over.”
In the rural area that I lived growing up some neighbors took turns playing I guess you could say “tricks” on each other. One that I saw was when they filled up a small house with small bales of hay while the family was on a vacation. I still can’t believe they did it! Can you imagine coming home from a trip, opening the door and you can’t get in because of the hay?
Well, that is an awful thing to do to anyone, but can you imagine coming home and everything you own is gone? Wiped out! It happened to Johnny Abney who was living in an apartment in Dallas, Texas in the Deep Ellum area. Johnny and his young daughter opened the door to their apartment and absolutely nothing was there! Wiped out! All their furniture, clothes, food, everything down to the shower curtain and their toothbrushes! All gone!
The apartment management had intended to evict the people living in the apartment next door. Management did try to dig what was remaining of their belongings out of the trash dumpsters but most of it had already been picked over by apartment residents and others. Wiped out! What a terrible shock! (The situation appears to now be in the hands of attorneys.) (Multiple news venues including Fox 4 KDFW 08.30.23)
Johnny Abney was wiped out! torn apart! shattered! Hezekiah knew how he felt, but it was even worse for the king. In Isaiah 38:1 we are told, “In those days Hezekiah was sick and near death. And Isaiah the prophet, the son of Amoz, went to him and said to him, ‘Thus says the Lord: ‘Set your house in order, for you shall die and not live.’”
Can you imagine a prophet of God, or a preacher showing up at your door and telling you that “God says you are going to die.” Hezekiah was sick and he described it as being like “a lion, So He breaks all my bones; From day until night You make an end of me.” Or as the NLT says he was being “torn apart.”
What did Hezekiah do? Isaiah 38:2-3 NKJV tells us: “Then Hezekiah turned his face toward the wall, and prayed to the Lord, and said, ‘Remember now, O Lord, I pray, how I have walked before You in truth and with a loyal heart, and have done what is good in Your sight.’ And Hezekiah wept bitterly.” And we know that in answer to Hezekiah’s prayer God extended the life of Hezekiah 15 years (Isaiah 38:5).
I don’t know if Johnny Abney prayed about his situation, but Hezekiah shows us what we should do when we are sometimes “wiped out” by life. Pray as if your life depends upon it! Because it does!