Texts: 2 Chron. 21; 34-35
We live in a day
when people ask, “Is the Bible relevant to modern life? To my life?” When you pick
up the Bible, the life it describes seems, at first glance, so different from
life today. No electrical power or even steam power can be found in scripture. These
things weren’t known to men from Adam to the 1800’s, over 5800 years! Until
then, men relied on horses, wagons, and sailboats for transport, so life was
little different in, say, 1850 as it was in 2000 B.C. My point is that the
Bible was written for all men in all ages, and despite the technology that we
have today, we have the same moral problems that the ancients have, just with
different technology at our disposal. Don’t let the devil trick you into
thinking that the Bible is outdated. It is certainly the most relevant,
up-to-date book that you own.
Now you may be
thinking, “But the Bible is for old people. I’m young and just getting started
in life. It may be relevant for today, but I can always read it later.” Another
mistake: if the Bible is the most relevant, up-to-date book you own, wouldn’t
it make sense to get familiar with it as early in life as possible? Two of the
wisest men who ever lived, next to Jesus Christ, said these things:
- Remember now thy Creator in the
days of thy youth, while the evil days come not… (Eccl. 12:1)
- So teach us to number our
days, that we may apply our hearts unto wisdom (Ps. 90:12).
Furthermore, how do
you know that you will live long? Many people die before they even reach
adulthood. One of my four sisters, who was born 11 years before me, died of
leukemia before she was a year old. So youth is definitely NOT the time to put off seeking the Lord, but rather to
seek him with your whole heart and
lay a good foundation for the rest of your life, however much God may give you.
There’s a principle
in the Bible and life that what you sow, you will reap (Job 4:8; Gal. 6:7). You
reap the consequences of your decisions, because you are accountable to God for
your actions. Now seeds, for the most
part, take a good while to sprout and produce fruit. The seeds that you sow in
youth will bear fruit later in life, so it only makes sense to be sowing good
seed now while you can.
I’d like to look at the
lives of two young men in the old testament with you this morning. The OT was
written for our learning today, according to the apostle Paul (Rom. 15:4). Both
of these men were kings of the same country, Judah, and both were direct
descendants of King David. Both of them died at 40 or less, one in honour, the
other in disgrace. Let’s compare how they spent their youth and the fruits of
that later in life. For one it’s more obvious how he spent his youth, and the
fruit is more predictable; for the other, there’s less detail about his youth,
but the fruit in his later years speaks loudly of what was in his heart while
he was young. The two men’s names: Jehoram, the son of Jehoshaphat; and Josiah,
his descendant ten generations later.
1. Jehoram
(Joram), son of Jehoshaphat (2 Chron. 21)
In my opinion, this
chapter, which covers Jehoram’s entire life, could be called, “The Diary of a
Wasted Life.” It’s tragic from start to finish. Jehoram has a lot going for him
at first, but he makes some bad decisions once he becomes king at age 32, and
even though God graciously intervenes and tries to correct him, he refuses to
be corrected and meets a tragic end at age 40. Victor Hugo, the French author
who wrote Les Miserables and The Hunchback of Notre Dame, said that
“Forty is the old age of youth, and fifty is the youth of old age,” so Jehoram
was still young when he died. But let’s look at his youth and see what advantages
he had, critical choices that he made, how God dealt with him, and the outcome
of his life. We’ll do the same for his distant descendant, Josiah, in a little
while.
Advantages
- He was born into the God-fearing tribes of Israel
(Judah and Benjamin). When the kingdom was divided after Solomon’s death,
ten tribes followed his servant Jeroboam, but two stuck with Solomon’s
foolish son, Rehoboam: Judah and Benjamin. Jeroboam was born into the
tribe of Judah, the largest and most powerful of all the twelve tribes.
- Both his father, Jehoshaphat, and grandfather,
Asa, were righteous kings, some of the best that even Judah produced.
Every one of Jehoshaphat’s seven sons had God’s name in their name; that’s
the sort of heritage Jehoram had.
- His father provided well for his sons, including
wealth and military strength, but wisely split them up and gave them each
his own land to avoid contention. Since Jehoram was his heir, this was a
favour to his him, so there wouldn’t be fighting over who would become
king.
- Finally, one of the greatest of Israel’s prophets
was alive during Jehoram’s reign and could have been his counselor, even
after his righteous father was gone.
- So Jehoram has a lot going for him as a young
man, but when you examine his actions as king, you see that very bad seed
was sown in his youth that bore rotten fruit in the eight years he was
king and brought an end to his life while still young.
Critical Choices
- He did not follow his father. It’s one thing to choose not to follow a
sinful, wicked father, but another to choose not to follow a saintly one
like Jehoshaphat. When Judah was attacked by a huge army of her enemies in
2 Chron. 20, Jehoshaphat humbles himself and cries out to God, and the
Lord miraculously delivers Judah. So his father was a humble, prayerful
man who feared God and regarded his word. Jehoram was none of these
things, but goes directly opposite to his father’s ways, as we’ll see.
- He was ungrateful. Instead of being grateful for this father’s
wise preparations and provisions for him, he wickedly murders his brothers
and eliminates them as “competitors,” claiming everything for himself.
- He married outside the faith. Paul tells us in 2 Cor. 6:14 that we should not
be “unequally yoked together with
unbelievers,” and one application of that is that a believer should
only marry another believer. Jehoram marries someone outside the faith
who’s an evil influence on him. And that’s what you can expect from an
unsaved partner, young people. They don’t know God and will pull you away
from God: it’s their nature to do so. They don’t have the Spirit of God in
them drawing to the Lord like you do, so that’s what you can expect from
them: bad influence.
How God Dealt with Him
- God allows neighboring kingdoms to revolt against
him. I believe that this was God’s first attempt to get his attention. It
didn’t work. He fights with the Edomites and apparently beats them, but
not into submission, and the Libnites also revolt. God’s hand in this is confirmed at the
end of v. 10, “…because he had forsaken the LORD God of his fathers.”
- Instead of repenting over these revolts, he
practices idolatry and forces his subjects to do the same (v. 11). So he’s
on a really bad track, but God continues to be gracious to him, for his
forefather David’s sake, I believe (v. 7).
- Next God sends him a warning from Elijah the
prophet, basically pronouncing his doom (vv. 12-15). But there’s not a
word about him being bothered by that at all. He stubbornly keeps doing
things “his way,” and the Lord tries to get his attention one more time.
- This time, instead of a revolt, the Lord allows
his enemies to invade Judah and carry off everything dear to him except
for his youngest son, whom God preserves to be king after him. Does he
turn to God now? No; sadly no.
Outcomes
- God is a merciful God, but eventually his mercy
runs out for a sinner if that sinner will not repent. Paul tells us in
Rom. 2:4-5 that if we will not respond to God’s “goodness, and forbearance, and longsuffering” by repenting and
receiving Jesus Christ as our Saviour, we’ll end up getting God’s wrath
forever. Jehoram refuses to respond to God’s best, most merciful efforts
to correct him, and he ends of dying a horrible death.
- His reign as king was so dishonourable that his
own people will not bury him with the kings, though they graciously bury
him in the royal part of Jerusalem, since he was a descendant of David.
Sort of like saying he wasn’t fit to be a king nor acted like one, even a
second-class one.
- Perhaps the saddest thing about this young man’s
life, besides his horrible conduct and dishonourable death, was that he
“departed without being desired.” In other words, nobody was sad that he
was gone and desired him to still be alive. That’s why we cry at funerals:
we don’t want to see that friend or loved one go. But when Jehoram died,
at the young age of 40, no one was sorry about it. That to me is just
horrible. His life didn’t make a
positive impression on anyone. So you see why I call it, “The Diary of a
Wasted Life”: he helped no one but himself, and so helped no one,
including himself.
2. Josiah, son
of Amon (2 Chron. 34-35)
Advantages
- Compared with Jehoram, Josiah had very few
advantages. That’s one of those ironies of life that magnifies the grace
of God, that often those with the most advantages turn out worse than
those without them. It all comes down to what’s in your heart, no matter
what your background is.
- Josiah was born into the tribe of Judah, but that
tribe was at its lowest point, spiritually, ever. Both Josiah’s father and
grandfather were evil men, his grandfather so wicked (until the end of his
life) that God decided to banish Judah unconditionally. Instead of
providing for his son, Amon leaves him an apostate, dying nation on the
brink of collapse.
- As in the days of Jehoram, there is a prophet in
the land, the great Jeremiah, and the prophetess Huldah, both of which
give Josiah good counsel; unlike Jehoram, who never consults with Elijah,
as far as we know.
Critical Choices
- He sought God while he was young. He took the throne when he was eight, and when
he was sixteen, he began “to seek
after the God of David his father” (2 Chron. 34:3). Someone must have
told him about how God blessed David for his obedience, and I think that
Josiah compared that with the outcome of his father and grandfather’s
disobedience, and took it to heart. So, in a way, he did follow his father
(David), unlike Jeroboam.
- He separated himself and his people from evil. Just the opposite of Jehoram, who attached
himself to an unbeliever. Josiah not only destroys all of the idols, but
he goes to the root of the problem and kills all of the pagan priests. He
knew it wouldn’t be enough just to get rid of the idols; he had to get rid
of the priests too.
- He humbles himself at God’s word. In the process of repairing the temple, the
scriptures are found and read to him, warning of judgment to come. Instead
of despairing or rebelling, like Jehoram did, he humbles himself, tears
his clothes, and weeps in sorrow. The Bible says that “God resisteth the proud, but giveth grace to the humble” (1 Peter
5:5b), and God graciously postpones his wrath on Judah until after
Josiah’s death.
- He leads his people into fellowship with God. He gathers the people to make a covenant with
God to be his people and he restores proper worship in the temple to keep
the people in communion with God. Probably the two greatest things you can
do for someone in this life are leading them to become a child of God by
receiving Christ, then showing them how to have daily, personal fellowship
with God. It’s good to separate from evil, like Josiah did earlier, but we
separate from evil so that he can separate ourselves to God, not so that
we can look righteous. That was the Pharisees’ problem: they thought that
by not doing certain things, they were righteous. Christ told them,
however, that God was looking for more than that: he wanted a relationship
with them, not just for them to avoid certain sins.
Outcomes
- God is very merciful to this young man. He puts
off his wrath for 31 years and allows Josiah to turn his people back to
God. In some ways, the Jews were more obedient to God during Josiah’s
reign than ever before.
- He’s honoured in death and mourned by everyone
(35:24b-25). He is buried with the kings, unlike Jehoram, “[a]nd all Judah and Jerusalem mourned
for Josiah.” Even Jeremiah mourns for him deeply (“lamented”).
- He leaves a positive legacy for all
generations. The mourning for him
continues long after his death (the Chronicles are written decades after
he’s gone), his memory is so precious.
All of his reformations may have seemed hopeless, but our labours
for God are never in vain (1 Cor. 15:58).
His people love him long after he’s gone, and most importantly, God
honours him forever. Let’s close
with 2 Kings 23:25, one of my favourite verses in the Bible. This is what God has to say about him to
all generations, “And like unto him
was there no king before him, that turned to the LORD with all his heart,
and with all his soul, and with all his might, according to all the law of
Moses; neither after him arose there any like him.” Wow, what a
legacy! No one before him (David, Solomon, Jehoshaphat) or after him
(Zerubbabel, Ezra, Nehemiah) obeyed God as thoroughly as he did. And you better believe God noticed that,
if no one else did. Let it be a
comfort to you that if no one notices the good that you’re doing, God does,
and he will reward you, in this life and, more importantly, in the
next.
Conclusion
- How will you use your youth? All of us have some
advantages; will be thankful for them and honour God with them? And all of
us have and will make critical choices. There’s no way to avoid that. You
will choose, and some choices in life are critical because they affect the
rest of your life. Like how you treat your parents, your attitude toward
God’s word, and how you deal with the world.
- But the most critical choice you make in life is
one that you can and should make while you’re still young, and that is
receiving the Lord Jesus Christ as your personal Saviour. Paul said that
Christ “loved me and gave himself
for me” (Gal. 2:20). If you were the only person who ever lived and
sinned, he would’ve come and died for you. It’s not enough to believe that
Jesus is the Saviour. It’s time
to receive him as your Saviour, and I hope that, if you’ve never done that
before, you’ll do it today, and spend your youth and the rest of your life
fellowshipping with him, serving him, and leaving a legacy of good works
that you’ll be rewarded for for ever.
