Scripture Daily

Context No. 1641 of 4322 · 2 Kings

Context · Reflection

2 Kings 8:20-24: in context

20In his days Edom revolted from under the hand of Judah, and made a king over themselves. 21Then Joram crossed over to Zair, and all his chariots with him; and he rose up by night and struck the Edomites who surrounded him with the captains of the chariots; and the people fled to their tents. 22So Edom revolted from under the hand of Judah to this day. Then Libnah revolted at the same time. 23The rest of the acts of Joram, and all that he did, aren’t they written in the book of the chronicles of the kings of Judah? 24Joram slept with his fathers, and was buried with his fathers in David’s city; and Ahaziah his son reigned in his place.

This brief passage covers the reign of Joram, king of Judah, a king the record judges to have done evil. In his days Edom revolted and threw off Judah's rule, setting up its own king; Joram's attempt to subdue them failed, and Edom stayed free, as did the town of Libnah. And then the reign is summed up and closed: the rest of his acts are in the chronicles; he slept with his fathers and was buried, and his son reigned in his place.

There is a sobering brevity in how this reign is recorded. Joram was king, with all the power and opportunity that office held; and his reign is summed up in a few verses, marked mainly by loss, Edom breaking free, Libnah revolting, the kingdom shrinking under his rule, and then a bare notice of his death and burial. The parallel account adds that he departed with no one's regret. A whole life, a whole reign, and this is what it came to: decline, loss, and an unremarkable end that no one mourned. There is a warning in that thin epitaph. A person can hold power and opportunity, live a whole life, and leave behind only a record of decline, of things lost rather than built, of an office used to no good end. Joram had the chance to do good, to build, to lead his people well; and what his reign amounted to was loss and a burial no one grieved. It is worth asking what our own lives are amounting to, what the summary of our years would be. Not everyone is a king, but everyone is given a life, with its opportunities to build something good or to waste them; and the sobering question is whether ours will amount to more than a record of decline and an end no one much notes. Joram's reign is a reminder that a life, however full of position or opportunity, can come to little if it is not lived well; and it presses us to live so that our years amount to more than Joram's, more than loss and an unmourned end.

What is my life amounting to, and would its summary be a record of good built or, like Joram's, of decline and an unremarkable end, and am I using the opportunities of my years to build something good rather than wasting a life that could come to little?

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