That I may Know HIM - A Devotional

Day 42: Jehoram

5.   Jehoram was thirty and two years old when he began to reign...

6.     And he milked in the way of the kings of Israel, like as did the house of Ahab: for he had the daughter of Ahab to wife: and he wrought that which was evil in the eyes of the LORD.

4.   Now when Jehoram was risen up to the kingdom of his father, he strengthened himself, and slew all his brethren with the sword, and divers also of the princes of Is­rael.

 2 Chronicles 21:5, 6, 4.

Driven apparently by a satanic spirit contracted from his wife the daughter of Jezebel and Ahab, Jehoram began his reign on the foundation of the blood of his own brothers, the sons of his father.

Blood always calls for blood. Innocent blood always gets paid   for   by blood.   For six years after his wicked act, he seemed to have been       having peace.    Sud­denly,     how­ever, the shed blood of his brothers began to speak, and we read: 

16        Moreover the LORD stirred up against Jehoram the spirit of the Philistines, and of the Arabians, that were near the Ethiopians:

17        And they came up into Judah, and break into it, and carried away all the substance that was found in the king's house....

 Why would all those be stirred up against one specific man? Well, if the story had ended there, it would still have been bad enough. But that much calamity was merely a prelude.

 The spiritual significance of that invasion is to be found in the rest of verse 17; the invaders also carried away with them "all his sons also, and his wives; so that there was NEVER A SON left him, save Jehoahaz [who was also known as Ahaziah and Azariah - 22:1], the youngest of his sons."  God mercifully pre­served that one son, just to fulfill His promise to David that He would always leave him a son on the throne (1 Chronicles 22:10). Jehoram virtually became 'son-less,’ because of his murder of the sons of his father. What did the invading Arabians do with the sons? They slew them (22:1), as he had slain his own brothers. By also taking away all the wives of Jehoram, they further seemed to have been closing up the way of the murderer from having other sons, even if he had not fallen mortally ill of a shameful painful disease almost thereaf­ter.

Is there in your circumstances something which peculiarly attacks sons? Perhaps death at a par­ticular age; perhaps a peculiar sickness in a cer­tain season? Find out what your Jehoram may have done to the son or sons of another in the past.

Back to Jehoram: below is the obituary speech dedicated to his honour: "And his people made no burning for him, like the burning of his fathers... and [he] departed without being desired" (2. Chroni­cles 21:19, 20). According to the New International Version: "His people made no fire in his honour, as they had for his fathers.... He passed away, to no one's regret, and was buried in the city of David, but not in the tombs of the kings." The Living Bible states that the king "died unmourned,” with "the customary pomp and ceremony... omitted at his funeral."

Yet the judgment did not end there. When Jehoahaz, the surviving son came on the throne, he had his mother Athaliah, the daughter of Jezebel, as his counselor 'to do wickedly"(22:2-3). After a year's reign, he got killed in bat­tle; then his own mother, the daughter of Ahab and Jezebel, killed all except one of her grand­children, Joash (also called Jehoash), who had been stolen away and hidden from the mad queen. She also assassinated all the other princes of Judah, then usurped the throne for seven years, becoming the only woman to have gained access to that throne (22:10). Thus we find blood still speaking, even to the third generation.

Athaliah's wicked slaughter of her own grandchildren suggests that she must have been the one who also instigated her husband to murder the princes, his brothers, thereby bringing upon himself the curse of the circles of bloodshed.

At last Athaliah herself got killed (23:15). That should have sufficed to end the circle of bloods, but Joash the surviving grandson decided to forget the kindness of Jehoiada the priest who was the husband to Jehoshabeath (Jehosheba) his aunt, the sis­ter to his father Ahaziah. She had been the one who had rescued and hidden him, nurtur­ing him up in her own home, under the guardi­anship of her husband the priest. Both of them were instrumental to his eventual installation as king (22:11). At the death of Jehoiada the priest, the new king initiated the murder of the priest's son, his own cousin, because the young prince-priest had rebuked the backslid­ing king (24:20-22). That murder began an­other circle of blood. At last, Joash's “own servants conspired against him for the blood of the sons of Jehoiada the priest, and slew him on his bed, and he died: and they buried him in the city of David... but not in the sepul­chres of the kings" (24:25).

His son Amaziah, who took the throne af­ter him, was a godly man, who was careful not forgive further occasion to the circle of bloodletting.

Alas the consecutive bloody consequences of innocent bloodshed!

THE POWERS OF ONE SINNER      

Does a single sinner, whether king or subject, leader or led, have the power to bring a whole nation of several thousands, or even millions, under divine sentence because of his own sins? Can a whole nation answer to God for the sins of their leader, whether saint or devil? Let's see 2 Chronicles 28:19 for an answer:

And the LORD brought Judah very low because of Ahaz king of Israel; for he made Judah naked and transgressed sore against the Lord

 In 1 Chronicles 21:1-17, one finds another story of how, in his plot against a whole nation, Satan found it easier to seduce its king into sin, thereby dragging the nation with him (in fact, without the king) into the consequences of the king's own error. Seventy thousand persons were already dead in one day, before God began to consider the options of mercy.

 From The Preacher's diary