“Oh, Grandpa,” begged 5-year-old Sammy, crawling onto Grandpa’s knee, “we like your stories! Please tell us another one.”

“Yes, do!” said Alice, who was ten.

Middle-brother Edward hurried over to listen with the others as Grandpa began, “Here is another tale from the Bible called,

When God Fought the Enemy

(Reference: 2 Kings 18:17-19:36.)

This is a story of Jerusalem, the capitol city of Judah, in the days of King Hezekiah. In the city was a boy I will call Amos, and his sister, Debra. They loved their great strong city, and most of all they loved the temple where they worshiped God with their parents and heard stories of how God had been good to them and helped them in so many ways.

But there came an enemy called Rabshakeh with the great army of Assyrians to conquer Judah. He had already conquered the northern kingdom of Israel, because it had disobeyed and forgotten God.

Amos and Debra were a little bit afraid, but they knew that their king was brave. He had made a tunnel to bring water to the city so they wouldn’t die of thirst if the city was surrounded. They were glad they had a hard-thinking king, but soon they would be glad that they had a hard-praying king.

Rabshakeh soon came with part of the army to camp near Jerusalem. Rabshakeh laughed at the people and said, “Our gods are better than your God is! We have conquered many lands and their gods didn’t help them at all. Why should your God help you?”

Soon some of the leaders of Jerusalem went out to Rabshakeh and asked him to speak quieter so that the people of the city would not hear him, but he only yelled louder, “Your God is not good enough. We are going to beat you, so why don’t you just give up now before we kill you all?”

Amos looked down and saw the great army of enemy soldiers. He worried, for he had never seen so many soldiers—there must be thousands and thousands of them! But Debra said, “Amos, let us pray. God can take care of us.”

In the palace, King Hezekiah was praying, too. “Lord,” he said, “see how this enemy is speaking against You. Defend Your name, for it is not right for him to talk like that!”

Soon God sent them a message from His prophet, Isaiah. The prophet told them not to worry, for the enemy would not be able to even throw a stone at the wall. God promised to send Rabshakeh away so that he would never come back again.

Early in the morning Amos and Debra looked out on the enemy camp. Nothing was happening, and everything was quiet! Some soldiers snuck down to see where the enemy had gone, and found the camp full of dead men! In the night, an angel of the Lord had killed 185,000 enemy soldiers.

“Isn’t our God wonderful?” Amos said, “He is so big that He can do anything!”

Debra smiled, “Yes, God took care of us because we were obeying Him.” They were very glad, for the enemy never came back again.

“Wow!” Edward said when Grandpa had finished. “They didn’t have to do anything at all, and God just took care of those mean Assyrians.”

Sammy looked thoughtful. “They still had to pray, though,” he said to his brother.

“Yes,” Grandpa said, “but what else did they have to do?”

The children thought for awhile before Sammy said, “They were brave and did not be afraid.”

“But that is because they were obeying God,” Grandpa reminded them.

“I see,” said Edward. “If they hadn’t already been obeying God, they probably would have been conquered… like the other kingdom of Israel was.”

“Yes, doesn’t it say in the Bible that God hears people that obey Him?” Alice asked.

Grandpa nodded, “In Psalm 50 it says, ‘Offer unto God thanksgiving; and pay thy vows unto the most High: And call upon me in the day of trouble: I will deliver thee, and thou shalt glorify me.’* (Psalm 50:14-15) When we trust and obey God, we can expect Him to help us in time of trouble.”