Sermon: Unmourned (2 Chr 21:4-20)

THE MONARCH NO ONE MOURNED
(2 Chr 21:4-20)

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Dr. Paul Manuel—2015

It is a testimony to a person’s popularity when people want to spend time with him even when he is no longer available.

Jim decided that a haunted house would be a good fund-raising project for his local service organization, and a funeral home agreed to lend him a casket to enhance the desired effect. Not having a truck, Jim hauled the coffin in a boat on a trailer. When he stopped for gas, the station attendant was fascinated by the peculiar sight. Jim explained: “The old boy enjoyed fishing so much, I thought I’d take him one more time.”

It is a testimony to a person’s popularity when people want to spend time with him even when he is no longer available. It is a testimony to a person’s unpopularity when people want nothing to do with him when he is no longer available and are, in fact, glad to see him go. That was certainly the case with The Monarch No One Mourned.

God made the descendants of Abraham central to His plan and has retained His commitment to them despite a mixed record of their commitment to Him.

2 Chr 21:7 [B]ecause of the covenant the LORD had made with David, the LORD was not willing to destroy the house of David. He had promised to maintain a lamp for him and his descendants forever.

With this statement, God expresses His reluctance to withdraw support for Israel, even when the ruler in office is unfaithful, like Jehoram, the subject of this chapter. Different cultures have different customs to mark the passing of someone from this life. Often these customs reflect religious beliefs about the disposition of the dead: where they go, what their needs may be, whether or not they have continued contact with the living. Those who remain behind in this life also mark death variously.¹ We may place a notice in the newspaper giving certain details about that person—the dates of his birth and death, his education and his vocation, the members of his family—facts that give people who may not have known him a picture of his sojourn “on this terrestrial ball.”² There is often a funeral or wake, providing survivors opportunity to remember him and to celebrate his life. If there is a cemetery marker, it may include some details from the obituary, as well as a term of endearment by those who knew him best (e.g., “loving husband and father”). What line would you like on your marker?

People in the Bible also had different customs to indicate the passing of someone from this life. There may have been a funeral procession to accompany the deceased to his final resting place, complete with mourners to lament his passing. The grave site may have been marked or unmarked, elaborate or plain, depending on the stature of the deceased.³ Royalty occupied a special place in society, and their tombs were often prominent landmarks.

After Solomon, the nation he had ruled divided into north and south, with each division having its own government, including a king. The kings of Israel, in the north, were all unrighteous, overseeing a people that had primarily abandoned the Lord.⁴ The kings of Judah, in the south, were mixed in their devotion to God, with some being righteous and others unrighteous, overseeing a people that was also mixed in its devotion.⁵ Jehoram was one of the unrighteous kings in the south:⁶

2 Chr 21:4 When Jehoram established himself firmly over his father’s kingdom, he put all his brothers to the sword along with some of the princes of Israel. 5 Jehoram was thirty-two years old when he became king, and he reigned in Jerusalem eight years. 6 He walked in the ways of the kings of Israel, as the house of Ahab had done, for he married a daughter of Ahab. He did evil in the eyes of the LORD…. 7 Nevertheless, because of the covenant the LORD had made with David, the LORD was not willing to destroy the house of David. He had promised to maintain a lamp for him and his descendants forever. 8 In the time of Jehoram, Edom rebelled against Judah and set up its own king. 9 So Jehoram went there with his officers and all his chariots. The Edomites surrounded him and his chariot commanders, but he rose up and broke through by night. 10 To this day Edom has been in rebellion against Judah. Libnah revolted at the same time, because Jehoram had forsaken the LORD, the God of his fathers.

I. The king committed fratricide (vv. 4-10).

When Jehoram came to the throne in the southern kingdom of Judah, he was as old as many of the new kings before him,⁷ so the problems he encountered were probably not the result of youth and inexperience. Externally, he faced a continuing conflict with the northern kingdom of Israel,⁸ and there was additional pressure from the east, as Edom, once a vassal state, and from the west as Libnah, once an independent city-state with its own king, both revolted. Jehoram attempted to put down the rebellion in Edom, but his forces barely escaped annihilation, and the turmoil continued unresolved throughout his reign.⁹ To make matters worse,

2 Chr 21:16 The LORD aroused against Jehoram the hostility of the Philistines [also to the west] and of the Arabs who lived near the Cushites [to the south]. 17 They attacked Judah, invaded it and carried off all the goods found in the king’s palace, together with his sons and wives. Not a son was left to him except Ahaziah, the youngest [who would follow Jehoram as king].

Internally, he may have faced competition for the throne from within his own family. Transitions of power in the north were not always smooth,¹⁰ and Jehoram may have been uncertain about his own position. Although there is no record that either of Jehoram’s immediate predecessors, Rehoboam or Jehoshaphat, faced challenges to their position from sibling rivals, Jehoram was obviously concerned that his situation might be different. It was, perhaps, with this in mind that he decided to eliminate potential political rivals by executing his brothers. To make matters worse, at least morally, Jehoram secured a political alliance with the northern Kingdom of Israel by marrying a daughter of the wicked King Ahab.¹¹

Jehoram was the most powerful man in Judah, yet all his efforts to secure his position on the throne did nothing to secure his position before God. On the contrary, Jehoram’s poor moral decisions—killing his brothers, marrying an idolater—left him bereft if any positive spiritual standing. You may not have killed your siblings or married an idolater, but the decisions you make may still affect your position before “the judge of all the earth” (Gen 18:25). When you stand in God’s presence at last, will He welcome you as a “good and faithful servant” (Matt 25:21, 23), as one who made choices not because you thought they would benefit you but because you knew they would please Him?

Jehoram made bad choices early in his reign, especially his support for false gods.

II. The king condoned idolatry (vv. 11-13).

2 Chr 21:11 He had also built high places on the hills of Judah and had caused the people of Jerusalem to prostitute themselves and had led Judah astray. 12 Jehoram received a letter from Elijah the prophet, which said: “This is what the LORD, the God of your father David, says: ‘You have not walked in the ways of your father Jehoshaphat or of Asa king of Judah. 13 But you have walked in the ways of the kings of Israel, and you have led Judah and the people of Jerusalem to prostitute themselves, just as the house of Ahab did. You have also murdered your own brothers, members of your father’s house, men who were better than you.

“High places” were local shrines, dedicated to the worship of pagan gods, a practice left over from the previous residents of Canaan.¹² Frequenting those areas was a persistent temptation for Israelites and would remain so for years to come.¹³ The author mentions four individuals who influenced positively this state of affairs:

• Elijah was a spokesman for God who ministered during several Judean administrations, complementing or condemning officials according to their performance, whether righteous or unrighteous.
• David was Judah’s first king, who had a reputation as “a man after [God’s] own heart” (1 Sam 13:14) and was the exemplar for later kings.¹⁴
• Asa and Jehoshaphat were both righteous kings, who promoted worship of the true God.¹⁵

The biblical author cites these four individuals to show that the corruption of Jehoram’s administration was not because he had only poor role models. He had both positive and negative leaders in his background, but Jehoram chose to emulate the negative leaders.¹⁶ Jehoram’s less admirable predecessors, however, Rehoboam and Abijah, were the ones he chose to follow as he “led Judah astray” (v. 11).¹⁷

This episode illustrates the potentially negative influence of (generational) peer pressure and the importance of good role models. Paul writes: “Bad company corrupts good character” (1 Cor 15:33b). The opposite is also true: Good company promotes good character.¹⁸ Whose counsel do you seek? Find people whose opinions you value and consult them. Find people whose lifestyle you admire and imitate them. Your journey through life will be smoother if you take advantage of the resources God has placed at your disposal.

Jehoram made bad choices early in his reign, including his support for idolatry, and he suffered terribly later in his reign.

III. The king contracted cancer (vv. 14-15, 18-19).

2 Chr 21:14 So now the LORD is about to strike your people, your sons, your wives and everything that is yours, with a heavy blow. 15 You yourself will be very ill with a lingering disease of the bowels, until the disease causes your bowels to come out.’”…18 After all this, the LORD afflicted Jehoram with an incurable disease of the bowels. 19 In the course of time, at the end of the second year, his bowels came out because of the disease, and he died in great pain. His people made no fire in his honor, as they had for his fathers.

Notice that the biblical author says the king’s disease is divine judgment for the king’s depravity. Whether or not it is actually cancer, it is certainly a debilitating illness.¹⁹

There are several instances of disease in scripture that have no clear (stated) connection to judgment for sin as their cause.²⁰

• The preeminent example is Job:

Job 2:3 The LORD said to Satan… “There is no one on earth like him; he is blameless and upright, a man who fears God and shuns evil.” …7 Satan …afflicted Job with painful sores from the soles of his feet to the top of his head.

• Especially the many Jesus healed:²¹

Matt 4:24 [P]eople brought to him all who were ill with various diseases, those suffering severe pain, the demon-possessed, those having seizures, and the paralyzed… and [Jesus] healed them.

Jesus’ disciples assumed that sickness was an indication of God’s displeasure, perhaps from passages like this in Chronicles, and when they encountered “a man blind from birth” (John 9:1),

John 9:2 His disciples asked him, “Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?” 3 “Neither this man nor his parents sinned,” said Jesus, “but this happened so that the work of God might be displayed in his life.

While the reason for Jehoram’s malady is clear because scripture explains it, that is not always so, especially today, outside the Bible.

You probably know someone who is struggling with a physical illness, and you would like to offer some assurance that God has not forsaken him, especially when the suffering has been dragging on for some time. It would certainly be helpful if you could present a reason for the suffering. Then it might be a little easier to bear. There are occasions when the cause of suffering is clear, and the specific reasons fall in two main groups:²²

• Suffering may result from opposing God’s will—or—
• Suffering may serve to advance God’s will.

For each of these general groups, there are several particular possibilities. Determining which one applies in any given case requires some additional information, perhaps even the kind of information that is not available to you. If that is the case, then it may be best to follow the example of Job’s friends:

They sat…with him…. No one said a word…because they saw how great his suffering was. (Job 2:13)

Often the greatest comfort you will offer to someone who is suffering is not what you say but what you do, namely the comfort of your presence. So, when scripture is silent, about the cause of some malady, you must not speculate. To do so would imply a degree of knowledge that belongs to God alone.

Jehoram made bad choices early in his reign, and he suffered terribly later in his reign. He contracted a debilitating disease, and eventually…

IV. The king collapsed dead (vv. 14-15, 20).

2 Chr 21:14 So now the LORD is about to strike your people, your sons, your wives and everything that is yours, with a heavy blow. 15 You yourself will be very ill with a lingering disease of the bowels, until the disease causes your bowels to come out.’” …20 Jehoram was thirty-two years old when he became king, and he reigned in Jerusalem eight years. He passed away, to no one’s regret, and was buried in the City of David, but not in the tombs of the kings.

Jehoram did not set any records as king. He was average, even below average among the monarchs of Judah in many ways:

• He was not the youngest descendant of David to take the throne. That distinction belonged to Joash, who was “seven years old” (2 Kgs 11:21). Jehoram was already “thirty-two years old”—older than most.
• He was not the longest reigning monarch. That distinction belonged to Manasseh, who ruled Judah “fifty-five years” (2 Kgs 21:1a). Jehoram ruled Judah just “eight years”—shorter than most.

He was also not the only monarch buried outside the royal cemetery in Jerusalem. Several of Judah’s kings had their own accommodations. In these ways, Jehoram did not stand out among the kings of Judah. He was, however, the only king so disliked by his people that no one mourned his passing. Now there is an accomplishment! Even Manasseh, who promoted pagan worship throughout the land, including the Lord’s temple, practices that led to the Babylonian exile—even that wicked king does not get an epitaph as harsh as Jehoram’s epitaph here. There is probably much more about the evil of his reign than the biblical author records. Suffice it to say that these few verses are damning enough and illustrate the sage’s observation that “the name of the wicked will rot” (Prov 10:7b).

Most kings of Judah, regardless of their moral character, were interred in Jerusalem’s royal tombs. The cemetery did not have a section for righteous kings and another section for unrighteous kings.²³ Nevertheless, Jehoram’s reputation was apparently worse than even his supporters could bear and, although his evil influence was not as bad as that of Manasseh, whose conduct lead to the Babylonian exile, Jehoram’s burial outside the royal cemetery may underscore the (personal?) corruption of his regime.

If you could determine your legacy, what people will remember about your life, and if you had to express it in a single sentence, what would it be? “What line would you like on your marker?” That is probably a decision others will make for you, but if you had a choice, what would it be? Perhaps it is a line from a favorite poem or a pithy saying.²⁴ Many Christians have a life verse, one that expresses and encourages their faith. It may be a passage that impressed you early in your walk with God or that came to your attention later.²⁵ Of course, it should be something you adopted and that has shaped your character or something to which you aspire. Bear in mind that it will be set in stone, so make it good.

Jeroboam was not an individual you would want to associate with in life. Neither was he an individual you would want to be associated with in death. He was The Monarch No One Mourned. Thankfully, he was not the norm among Judah’s kings. While Jehoram was the only Judean king with this particular epitaph, Judah had several evil rulers (12) whom the Chronicler could have described similarly, and their combined administrations lasted 100+ years. Judah also had several good kings (9), whom the Chronicler described favorably, and their combined administrations lasted 250+ years. In other words, good kings had a far greater impact on the nation than did evil kings because their tenure in office and thus their influence lasted longer. Assuming you prefer to be with the good guys, what are you doing to make sure that happens, to make sure you are not that person no one mourns?

For the Bibliography and Endnotes, see the pdf here.