Turning back the Sun

Isn't it amazing that just about the time you think you have seen it all, just about the time you think God has done something that is the biggest He could do; He goes and takes it higher. In Isaiah 38 Hezekiah prayed to God concerning his life when Isaiah told him he would die, God heard his prayer and saw his heart and promised to extend his life.

Here is what is amazing, the writing was on the wall, God had sent His prophet to deliver the message of Hezekiah's death, everything seemed to be decided. God was not done, Hezekiah fell before the Lord and God, being the amazing God He is, never wanting to just do something but always wanting to do it with an amazing, undeniable sign -- God turned back the sun!

I was talking with a new friend yesterday and he was sharing how there are times when he is working on a project and it comes to completion, he just sits back and says "how in the world did I do that" to which he simply looks to the heavens and thanks God for doing through him what he knew he was not capable of doing himself.

Hezekiah would live the next fifteen years of his life knowing that he was not living by his own strength, but by the will and grace of the Lord. He was quite literally living on borrowed time, as we all are, but in his case he knew it. Hezekiah writes after he receives his news that the dead cannot praise God but the living sure can. This is what Hezekiah would do from that day on even more than before.

Praising God is what it is all about when God moves the sun for us. Recognizing that the story of Hezekiah was not recorded just to put words on a page, it was recorded so that I could read it and be reminded that even though it may appear at times as though my fate is determined, my mistakes have finally caught up with me, or maybe that my "luck" has run out...I serve a God that is ready to move the sun if I will praise Him.

I realize this morning as Hezekiah did that the only reason I am alive today is to praise God for how awesome He is and for all He has already done in my life. I know that if I want to see the sun turned back in my life I need to be silent and hear the voice of God again saying: "I am ready to do something great in your midst so that the whole world will know that I am God and all I need you to do is just get out of my way!"