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2 Chronicles 21:18-21 – A Wasted Life
A Wasted Life
How would you describe a wasted life? Could you succinctly say it in a few words on a tombstone? If you could sum up your epitaph, what would it be? If people etched on our tombstone what they said about us while we were alive, what would be engraved in stone for all to see?
Could I suggest that how we are treated when we die is often an indication of how we treated others when we were alive? Let’s consider Jehoram (Joram) king of Judah, son of Jehoshaphat:
Jehoram’s Life:
2 Chronicles 21:4 NASB Now when Jehoram had taken over the kingdom of his father and made himself secure, he killed all his brothers with the sword, and some of the rulers of Israel also.
Jehoram’s Death:
2 Chronicles 21:19-20 NASB (19) Now it came about in the course of time, at the end of two years, that his bowels came out because of his sickness and he died in great pain. And his people made no fire for him like the fire for his fathers. (20) He was thirty-two years old when he became king, and he reigned in Jerusalem eight years; and he departed with no one’s regret, and they buried him in the city of David, but not in the tombs of the kings.
No memorial fire. No tomb of the kings. No regret. People treated Jehoram in death as he treated others in life. If there was an epitaph, it could have read “What a wasted life….”
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