The God Who Sees Me: A First-Person Narrative from Hezekiah

[SPRING: FOUNDATIONS OF FAITHFULNESS]

They called her Abi. The scribes say Abijah—“My Father is Yahweh”—but that was her formal name. To her friends, to those who knew her as more than a name in a scroll, she was Abi. And while the palace halls echoed with the idolatry of my father Ahaz, it was her, my mother, who whispered covenant into my heart.

She would tuck me in with stories from Torah—not just of law, but of a God who walks with His people. A God who came to the garden, who spoke to Abraham, who wrestled with Jacob, who burned in a bush for Moses. I remember her voice trembling the first time she told me, “Hezekiah, Yahweh is not distant. He is a Father. And He sees.”

Those words stayed with me.

So when I took the throne at twenty-five, the house still smelled like incense to other gods. My father had made a mess of things—altars in every corner, child sacrifice in the valley. Judah had a throne but no compass. And I… I had the fire my mother lit inside me.

So I tore down the high places. I reopened the temple. I told the priests, “We don’t need another king who invokes God. We need a people who walk with Him.” We consecrated ourselves. We called the people to worship. I knew our survival depended not on the strength of our armies but on the presence of our God.

And the people came. The smoke of repentance rose again over Jerusalem. The city began to breathe.

[SUMMER: A KING AND HIS GOD]

The letters from Sennacherib arrived like thunderheads on the horizon. Assyria—the empire swallowing nations whole—now stood at our gates.

His messengers mocked our God. They stood in the open court and shouted, “Has any god of any nation delivered his land out of the hand of the king of Assyria?” The people trembled.

But I did not.

I took the letter in my hand—threats scrawled in arrogance and blood—and I walked into the temple. Alone.

I spread it out before the Lord.

No fanfare. No formula. Just a king with a scroll and a covenant.

“O Lord of hosts, God of Israel, enthroned above the cherubim, You alone are God…”

It wasn’t my authority I leaned on. It wasn’t my righteousness. It was His name. His promise.

I prayed until the fear gave way to peace. Until the weight lifted.

That night, I left the scroll on the altar.

And I slept.

And when I woke—there was silence. No clash of swords. No war cries. Just birdsong.

One angel. One act. One night.

185,000 fell without a hand lifted from our side.

And I marveled. Not in surprise. In reverence.

He had answered.

[FALL: FRACTURE IN THE FLESH]

It wasn’t long after that when I started to feel it. It started as weariness. A fatigue I blamed on stress. Then aches. Then fever.

I hid it. Of course I did. I’m a king. Kings don’t limp to meetings. We lead. We decree. We endure.

But the shadows under my eyes deepened. The strength in my hands faded. Food lost its taste. And soon, even sitting upright was a labor.

Isaiah was summoned. I heard his footsteps long before he arrived. Steady. Reluctant. Heavy.

When he entered, he did not smile. He did not bow. He looked at me with the eyes of a man carrying a burden not his own.

He didn’t sit. He didn’t speak gently.

“Set your house in order,” he said, “for you shall die and not live.”

And then he turned.

Just like that.

I watched the back of the prophet as my world cracked open. My lips moved, but no sound came. My breath caught. My body pulsed with heat, and yet I felt frozen.

It wasn’t the illness that broke me.

It was the silence.

The finality.

The absence of appeal.

[WINTER: THE WALL AND THE WEEPING]

I turned my face to the wall.

Not out of ritual.

Out of shame.

Out of grief.

I waved away the servants. “Leave me. All of you.”

They paused at the door, unsure. But I didn’t want their pity. Their platitudes. Their hollow optimism.

I didn’t want to be told God was good.

I didn’t want to be comforted.

Not by servants. Not by priests.

Not by well-meaning phrases I had repeated for others a hundred times.

They say, “He’s near to the brokenhearted.”

But I was broken—and I felt nothing.

They say, “Call upon the Lord and He will answer.”

But I had called—and all I could hear was silence.

They say, “God is faithful.”

But all I could feel was absence.

And deep down, I wondered if what I was feeling was truth.

What if He doesn’t come?

Not because I’ve done something wrong…

But because…

I’m not worth answering?

My life and mission are so insignificant that God has no more need of me…

What if He answered me once when I was strong and confident in His answer,

But now that I’m weak, He’s turned His face?

Maybe it’s my lack of faith for myself. I knew God would move for His people, for the sake of His covenant, to fulfill His promise…

What if He moves for His people… and not for me?

I tried to tell myself that it wasn’t like that. That I still had promises to cling to.

But promises are hard to hold when your strength is gone.

Maybe you’ve been there.

Maybe you’ve prayed and heard nothing.

Maybe you’ve believed and still gotten worse.

Maybe you’ve wept like I did—

Not just because you were hurting,

But because you were afraid you were praying to a God

who only answers when it serves His bigger plan—

not when it touches your personal pain.

After all, that’s how prayer began and that’s the center of the covenant, right? It’s about the big picture, not just me…

And I know what it’s like to feel like your prayers are used up.

Like you got your one miracle. Your one breakthrough.

Had I used all my favor on the battlefield?

Had I spent all my prayers on the people?

Did God save the city but pass over the man?

And now, the rest of your days are just living off the memory.

“He moved once—when I needed Him for the kingdom.”

“But this? This is just about me. My pain. My fear. My body.”

And who am I… to bother God of all, with something so small?

I didn’t know if it mattered. I didn’t know if I mattered… Not to God, who has a whole world to think about…

That’s why I turned my face to the wall.

Not because I was brave.

Not because I was spiritual.

But because I didn’t want anyone to see the shame on my face…

The doubt in my eyes…

The fear that this prayer was just… noise.

And with my face in that wall, I broke.

Entirely, irreparably, broken.

And I cried…

Not a tidy, religious cry.

Not a poetic prayer that fit in Scripture.

I didn’t quote Torah. I didn’t compose a psalm.

I just wept. I turned my face to the wall and I wept…

Bitterly. Not neatly, not nobly. I wept as a child weeps.

Guttural, snot-filled, dry-heaving grief.

I wept.

And I prayed.

“God… please…”

I didn’t even finish the sentence.

I don’t even know if it was a prayer or a protest.

“Remember me, God. I walked with You… I tried… I really tried.” No temple. No scroll. No covenantal invocation.

Just the hollow, aching cry of a dying man who wasn’t ready.

I didn’t ask to live.

I just asked to be seen.

I just wanted to know if He was still good to me.

And then… nothing.

The chamber was still.

Even the rats that usually scratched beneath the floorboards seemed subdued by the grief that draped the room like a burial cloth.

[SPRING: A TURN IN THE COURTYARD]

Then I heard it.

Footsteps.

Not frantic. Not hesitant.

Purposeful. Steady. Familiar.

The door creaked.

I prepared to rebuke whatever servant dared enter.

But it wasn’t a servant.

It was him.

Isaiah.

The same prophet who had walked out with death in his mouth now stood with something else in his eyes.

Hope. Joy. Urgency.

He opened his mouth.

“Thus says the Lord, the God of your father David: I have heard your prayer. I have seen your tears. Behold, I will heal you.”

What?

Before he left the courtyard, God turned him around.

The same God who commands angels turned back a prophet.

For me.

Not in spite of the covenant.

But because of it.

He saw me.

Not the king. Not the intercessor. Me.

And He healed me.

[SUMMER: THE LESSON AND THE CALL]

I lived!

I lived another fifteen years.

I stood in the sun again. I ate bread with joy.

I laughed without wincing. I worshiped with tears.

I didn’t deserve it.

I didn’t have perfect faith.

I wept. I doubted. I turned away.

But still—

He saw me.

He heard me.

Not because I prayed the perfect words.

Not because I quoted the right promise.

But because He is a Father.

And that’s what my mother ,Abi, always said when I was small—

“Yahweh is not just the God of nations. He’s the God who sees.”

“He sees, my son. He sees you.”

I never forgot that.

I just stopped believing it was for me.

But when Isaiah walked back in that room…

When he said, “I’ve heard your prayer. I’ve seen your tears,”

It wasn’t just healing.

It was proof.

That the God of the nation still knows the names of individuals.

That He doesn’t just answer great prayers—

He answers honest ones.

And I learned this:

It is easier to believe God will answer for the people than for yourself.

But the covenant was not made only for crowds.

It was made for sons.

For daughters.

For tear-streaked faces turned to stone walls.

So if you find yourself today praying for others with boldness but shrinking in silence when it comes to your own needs…

If you’ve ever felt invisible,

If you’ve ever wondered whether your whisper mattered,

If you’ve ever turned your face to the wall because it felt like nobody cared—

Hear me.

He sees you.

He hears you.

If you’re standing in the shadow of silence today,

Don’t walk away from the God who never walks away from you.

Lay your letter before Him.

Turn your face to the wall.

Cry out.

Not because you have it all together—

But because He does.

Either way—He answers.

Not because you’re perfect.

But because He’s faithful.

And He’s still the God who turns the prophet around before he reaches the gate.

He’s still the God… who answers.

Because He is your Father.

And He sees.