They told him, “This is what King Hezekiah says: Today is a day of trouble, insults, and disgrace. It is like when a child is ready to be born, but the mother has no strength to deliver the baby.
Parallel translations
- WEB They said to him, “Thus says Hezekiah, ‘Today is a day of trouble, and of rebuke, and of rejection; for the children have come to the birth, and there is no strength to give birth.
- KJV And they said unto him, Thus saith Hezekiah, This day is a day of trouble, and of rebuke, and of blasphemy: for the children are come to the birth, and there is not strength to bring forth.
- BSB to tell him, “This is what Hezekiah says: Today is a day of distress, rebuke, and disgrace; for children have come to the point of birth, but there is no strength to deliver them.
- NKJV And they said to him, “Thus says Hezekiah: ‘This day is a day of trouble and rebuke and blasphemy; for the children have come to birth, but there is no strength to bring them forth.
- NASB And they said to him, “This is what Hezekiah says: ‘This day is a day of distress, rebuke, and humiliation; for children have come to the point of birth, and there is no strength to deliver them.
Scripture taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
Scripture quotations taken from the (NASB®) New American Standard Bible®, Copyright © 1960, 1971, 1977, 1995, 2020 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. All rights reserved. lockman.org
Scripture quotations are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.
Quick answer
Hezekiah's officials bring word that Judah faces a crisis as dire as a labor that has no strength to deliver. It shows a king who, in distress, turns to God's prophet rather than to his own resources.
Overview
With Assyria threatening Jerusalem, Hezekiah sends his servants to Isaiah confessing utter helplessness. The vivid image of children come to birth with no strength to deliver portrays a nation at the brink, unable to save itself. This honesty about weakness sets the stage for God to act, illustrating the gospel pattern that God's deliverance meets human need precisely where human strength fails.
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 15
- Isa 66:9Shall I bring to the birth, and not cause to be delivered?” says Yahweh. “Shall I who cause to give birth shut the womb?” says your God.
- Hos 13:13The sorrows of a travailing woman will come on him. He is an unwise son; for when it is time, he doesn’t come to the opening of the womb.
- Isa 26:17–18Like as a woman with child, who draws near the time of her delivery, is in pain and cries out in her pangs; so we have been before you, Yahweh.
- Ps 50:15Call on me in the day of trouble. I will deliver you, and you will honor me.”
- 2 Kgs 19:3They said to him, “Thus says Hezekiah, ‘Today is a day of trouble, of rebuke, and of rejection; for the children have come to the point of birth, and there is no strength to deliver them.
- Isa 33:2Yahweh, be gracious to us. We have waited for you. Be our strength every morning, our salvation also in the time of trouble.
- 2 Chr 15:4But when in their distress they turned to Yahweh, the God of Israel, and sought him, he was found by them.
- Ps 91:15He will call on me, and I will answer him. I will be with him in trouble. I will deliver him, and honor him.
- Ps 95:8Don’t harden your heart, as at Meribah, as in the day of Massah in the wilderness,
- Rev 3:19As many as I love, I reprove and chasten. Be zealous therefore, and repent.
- Hos 5:15I will go and return to my place, until they acknowledge their offense, and seek my face. In their affliction they will seek me earnestly.”
- Isa 22:5For it is a day of confusion, and of treading down, and of perplexity, from the Lord, Yahweh of Armies, in the valley of vision; a breaking down of the walls, and a crying to the mountains.”
- Ps 116:3–4The cords of death surrounded me, the pains of Sheol got a hold of me. I found trouble and sorrow.
- Jer 30:7Alas! for that day is great, so that none is like it. It is even the time of Jacob’s trouble; but he shall be saved out of it.
- Isa 25:8He has swallowed up death forever! The Lord Yahweh will wipe away tears from off all faces. He will take the reproach of his people away from off all the earth, for Yahweh has spoken it.
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Christ at the center
Isaiah sees him most clearly: the virgin's son Immanuel, the child on David's throne, the shoot from Jesse, the light to the nations, and above all the Suffering Servant pierced for our transgressions (ch. 53).
How Isaiah 37:3 points to him is part of the one story that runs through all Scripture — meet Jesus at the heart of the web, or follow a trail that traces him from Genesis to Revelation.
Original language
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