A bit of background, Absalom, David's son, Absalom
had revolted against his father, taken over Jerusalem,
taken over the palace, taken over David's wives,
taken over his counselors and part of the
army.
And there's a battle going to be fought
now and the battle is fought out at
Mount Ephraim.
David was a couple of three miles away
at a city called Mahanaim waiting for the
results.
And you remember from your Sunday school reading
the story how that Absalom got his head
caught in a tree and a man came
along and killed him and they buried him
and of course the last thing that David
had said to his men when they went
out to fight was deal gently with the
young man, Absalom.
Absalom was a spoiled brat.
David had pampered him and his pampering of
Absalom almost led to David losing his kingdom.
So Absalom is dead and somebody has to
tell the king what happened.
That day there was both good news and
bad news.
Let's read what happens.
Verse 19, Then said Ahime as the son
of Zadok, let me now run and bear
the king tidings how the Lord hath avenged
him of his enemies.
Joab said unto him, thou shalt not bear
tidings this day, but thou shalt bear tidings
another day.
But this day thou shalt bear no tidings
because the king's son is dead.
Then said Joab to the Cushite, go tell
the king what thou hast seen.
And the Cushite bowed himself unto Joab and
ran.
Then said Ahime as the son of Zadok
yet again to Joab, but come what may
let me I pray thee also run after
the Cushite.
And Joab said why wilt thou run my
son seeing that thou hast no tidings ready?
But come what may said he, let me
run.
And he said unto him, run.
Then Ahime as ran by the way of
the plain and out ran the Cushite.
And David sat between the two gates and
the watchman went up to the roof over
the gate under the wall and lifted up
his eyes and looked and behold a man
running alone.
And the watchman cried and told the king
and the king said if he be alone
there are tidings in his mouth.
And he came apace and drew near.
And the watchman saw another man running and
the watchman called him to the porter and
said behold another man runneth alone.
And the king said he also bringeth tidings.
And the watchman said I think the running
of the foremost is like the running of
Ahime as the son of Zadok.
And the king said he is a good
man and cometh with good tidings.
And Ahime as called and said unto the
king all is well.
That's the Hebrew word shalom, peace.
And he fell down to the earth upon
his face before the king and said blessed
be the Lord thy God who hath delivered
up the men that lifted up their hand
against my Lord the king.
And the king said is the young man
Absalom safe?
And Ahime as answered when Joab sent the
king's servant and me thy servant I saw
a great tumult but I knew not what
it was.
And the king said unto him turn aside
and stand here.
And he turned aside and stood still.
And behold the Cushite came and the Cushite
said tidings my Lord the king for the
Lord hath avenged thee this day of all
them who rose up against thee.
And the king said unto the Cushite is
the young man Absalom safe?
And the Cushite answered the enemies of my
Lord the king and all who rise against
thee to do thee harm be as that
young man is.
And the king was much moved and went
up to the chamber over the gate and
wept.
And as he went thus he said oh
my son Absalom my son my son Absalom
would God I had died for thee oh
Absalom my son my son.
Methods of communication have certainly changed over the
years.
None of us can remember those great days
of yesteryear when people communicated with drums, smoke
signals.
Perhaps you saw the cartoon in New Yorker
magazine when the atomic bomb went off, the
first one out in Arizona.
It showed an American Indian sitting on a
hill and he sees this mushroom cloud coming
up and he's saying to himself I wish
I had said that.
Well you can't use smoke signals today because
the air is so polluted nobody could read
what you were trying to say.
They used to use flags, used to use
mirrors flashing back and forth, they used dogs
to carry messages, birds to carry messages.
Then of course electricity came along and we
had telegraph and telephone and now television.
We have improved means of communication.
I'm not so sure the message has improved
any.
Mr. Thoreau said we have improved means to
unimproved ends and I think he was correct.
Today you can bounce a message off of
a satellite, bounce a telephone call off of
a satellite in just a few seconds, be
communicating.
It's a marvelous thing providing you're communicating the
correct thing.
But you know behind every piece of equipment,
whether it's a computer or a telephone or
a telegraph or a television camera or whatever
it may be, behind every piece of equipment
has to be a person.
Somebody has to make it, somebody has to
service it, somebody has to run the thing.
Even our so-called electronic automatic equipment needs
somebody there to make sure it's running properly.
God still has to use hands and lips
and ears and feet and other parts of
the body to get the communication system working
as it ought to work.
Now we as Christians are basically communicators.
That's why we're here.
We aren't salesmen trying to peddle some product.
We're communicators.
Through our words and through our actions, our
homes, our individual lives, what we are, what
we do, we are seeking to communicate a
message and that's the message of God's love.
We're messengers.
This is why I've chosen this passage in
2 Samuel because it talks to us about
a couple of messengers.
As you meditate on this passage you see
Ahimeaz, the one runner, he's so anxious to
run.
You see the Cushite, he just waits.
As you meditate on this passage you pick
up some spiritual truths.
Let me put it this way.
Everybody here tonight who is saved, I'm sure,
wants to be a communicator.
At your work, wherever you may be, you
want to be able to communicate the love
of God and the message of the gospel.
The big question is are you qualified?
Am I qualified?
That's a big question.
Not trained, not educated, qualified.
God has different ways of training his messengers.
Qualified.
And so as we read this account, I
think we can derive from it several tests
that we can apply to our own lives
to see whether or not we're qualified to
run.
Now there's a message.
The message we have, thank God, is good
news, not bad news.
It's the good news that a son did
die.
David said, Oh, would God I have died
for you.
But my message is praise God.
He died for us.
Absalom was on a tree because he was
a rebellious sinner.
Jesus was on a tree because he was
a surrendered servant.
And when Absalom died, he died for his
own sin and he was buried and that
was the end of it.
When Jesus died, he died for our sins
and he was buried and came forth from
the grave victorious and he has won the
battle.
We have marvelous news to share.
Marvelous news to share.
Did you ever notice in the four Gospels
that often when Jesus healed somebody, he said,
don't tell anybody.
And they went out and told everybody.
He tells us, tell everybody.
We don't tell anybody.
Now are you and I qualified to be
messengers?
God's looking for messengers.
Test number one is the motive test.
Why do you want to run?
Now here's Joab, that master general.
Joab sometimes did some dirty, underhanded things, but
he was a master at military strategy and
he sees that the battle is over.
He sees that the enemy has been defeated.
He calls over the Cushite.
Now there are some translations that change this
to Cushite.
That's his actual name, his given name, Cushite.
There are others who tell us that this
phrase Cushite means he was a black man.
I don't know, but God calls through Joab
and says to this Cushite, you carry the
message.
And Ahimeaz comes running up and says, I
want to do it.
I want to do it.
Ever met anybody like that?
Why do you want to run?
If you'd been up there with your tape
recorder getting a program for CBS or someone,
you'd say, now I'd like to interview you.
Why is it you want to run?
Motive has a lot to do with it.
We don't know what Cushite's motive was, the
Cushite.
I think it was just simply obedience.
But as I read this passage and kind
of meditate on this fellow Ahimeaz, I get
the suggestion, I will not judge him, but
I get the suggestion he wanted to be
important.
He wanted to be the one to carry
the message to the king.
I wonder if he were carrying the message
to somebody else if he'd been that anxious.
And you notice what he says?
Let me now run and bear the king
tidings how the Lord has avenged him of
his enemies.
That's the only part he saw.
The Lord avenged him of the enemy.
The motive test.
Now some people have bad motives.
Pride, envy, rivalry, competition.
Let nothing be done through strife or vain
glory, said Paul.
But in lowliness of mind, let each esteem
other more important than themselves.
Some people have mixed motives.
I suppose most of us at some time
or another have mixed motives.
We can't honestly say, Lord, my motives are
very pure because we're sinful people.
But the best we know how we want
our motive to be obedience to God for
his glory.
That's all we're concerned about.
Some people have right motives, pure motives, holy
motives.
I think Ahimeaz's motives were just a little
bit mixed.
He wanted to be important.
He wanted to be able to say in
later years, I carried the message from Mount
Ephraim to Mahanaim and I told the king.
Why do you want to run?
Now you can apply this to any area
of ministry.
Why do you want to teach?
Why do you want to preach or sing
or do anything for God?
Why do you want to run?
The motive test.
Now the second test I want to call
the obedience test.
Okay, you want to run.
Can you obey orders?
Most important thing about a messenger is just
to obey orders.
A messenger's job is not to invent a
message.
A messenger's job is to deliver a message.
I feel sorry for those preachers who haven't
learned that.
There are lots of preachers in this country
who die every week trying to think up
something to say, and I feel sorry for
them.
They read Time magazine, they scan all the
newspapers looking for some great thing to come
up with.
That must be like giving birth to barbed
wire.
Every week trying to come up with something
like that.
Why?
I just opened my Bible and there's a
message.
In fact, my problem is not what message
am I going to preach.
Can I find one?
My problem is there's so much there you'll
never have enough time in one lifetime to
use it all.
The obedience test.
Can you obey orders?
Now Joab was in charge.
You say, but Joab wasn't really a spiritual
man.
No, but he was in charge.
Even if you can't respect the man, you've
got to respect the office.
Joab was in charge.
Now, Joab knew what happened.
He knew all the details of the battle.
He was in charge.
Joab knew his runners.
He knew Ahimeaz, who was the son of
a priest, and he knew the Cushite, and
Joab knew David.
Joab knew David as few other people knew
David.
In fact, Joab knew some things about David
some other people didn't know.
Now, you put that all together.
Joab knew the events that happened.
He knew his runners.
He knew his king.
Wasn't he the logical man to decide who's
supposed to run with the message?
I say to myself, the Holy Spirit knows
what's going on in this world, and the
Holy Spirit knows me, and the Holy Spirit
knows the people he wants me to communicate
the message to, and the Holy Spirit puts
them together.
The obedience test.
Can you obey orders?
You know what Ahimeaz did?
He argued and debated for the privilege of
running.
Don't ever do that.
Don't ever get a crowbar and push your
way in.
The Bible says a man's gift shall make
room for him.
If you've got a gift and you've got
a calling, God will see to it that
you'll use it.
God will never permit you to put your
light under a bushel.
If he has to, he'll burn the bushel
up.
But he argued his way in.
Now, if you're writing things down, write this
down and don't forget it.
In doing God's work, it takes more than
permission.
It takes submission.
God may say to you, okay, go ahead,
it's the worst thing that ever happened to
you.
God may say, fine, go right ahead.
Joab finally said to Ahimeaz, Ron, you take
the consequences.
The obedience test.
I've asked myself the question, I'm not sure
I can answer it, but I've asked myself
the question, why did Joab not want Ahimeaz
to run?
There could be several reasons for this.
One, he knew his motive was wrong.
You know, leaders, I tell no secrets when
I say this, leaders don't like to be
pushed.
And Joab was running that affair and Ahimeaz
came up and tried to push just a
little bit.
But you know, I think the real reason
Joab would not let Ahimeaz run was because
he loved him too much.
He knew it was not an easy responsibility.
Do I have to remind you that when
a messenger came up one day, years before,
and told David that Saul was dead, and
he admitted he had had a part in
it, David killed him.
When Nathan came to David to face David
with David's sins, when Nathan had to preach
a sermon about sin and robbery and adultery,
and he had to point to the king
and say, you're the man, Nathan was taking
his life in his hands.
I just wonder if Joab wasn't showing his
love for Ahimeaz.
You know, you may be anxious to run.
There may be something you just think you
ought to do for God, and circumstances or
people or events have hindered this.
Now maybe it's of the devil, I don't
know, but it may be the love of
God in sparing you from something.
It's worth praying about.
The obedience test.
The Cushite just stepped up, said yes sir,
away he went.
There's a third test that we need to
ask ourselves to see if we are really
qualified to run.
Why do you want to run?
What's your motive?
The obedience test, can you really obey orders?
The third test is the message test.
Have you got anything to say?
Now quite frankly, as Ahimeaz ran, and he
took the longer but the easier route.
When you check the map, you find that
Ahimeaz ran from the woods of Ephraim around
to Mahanaim in the easier but the longer
route.
The Cushite took the direct route, it was
harder, up and down and through some difficult
terrain.
And Ahimeaz had an easier route, the longer,
and therefore was able to get there a
little sooner.
But when he got there, you know what?
He had nothing to say.
He falls down before the king and says,
Shalom, all is well.
All was not well.
Now he gives glory to the Lord.
Blessed be the Lord thy God who hath
delivered up the men that lifted up their
hand against my Lord the King.
And then he quietly prayed that David wouldn't
ask about Absalom.
And David did ask about Absalom.
Now I don't commend David for this, but
I understand that in the next chapter we
discover that David is in such sorrow and
mourning over the death of Absalom that the
whole government machinery comes to a halt.
And Joab has to come to him and
say to him, I suppose if all of
us had been killed and your son had
lived, that would have been all right.
David snapped out of it and said, you're
right, I'm wrong, but can you blame a
father for weeping over the death of a
son, especially a wayward son?
Can you blame him?
I think not.
David says, is the young man Absalom safe?
And you know what?
Ahimeaz has no message.
The one thing that David wanted to know
and needed to know, the messenger either would
not or could not tell him.
And so I say to you, there's no
substitute for the message.
Ahimeaz could run faster, but he had no
message.
He was more enthusiastic, but he had no
message.
He was devoted to the king, but he
had no message.
A man may be a great orator, but
if he has no message, what good's the
oratory?
A person may be a magnificent singer, but
if there's no message, what good's the music?
The message test.
You want to run?
All right.
Have you got anything to say?
Now, as you read your Bible, you find
all kinds of messengers.
Some have no message at all.
Some have just part of the message.
That's what Ahimeaz's problem was.
He just had part of the message.
He knew that the forces of the king
had defeated the forces of Absalom, but either
he did not or would not find out
about the rest of it.
Apollos was this way.
Apollos showed up in the synagogue one day
and began to preach, but he only had
part of a message.
He knew about the baptism of John the
Baptist.
He didn't know anything about the finished work
of Christ.
He didn't know anything about the coming of
the Holy Spirit, and so two of the
Christians who were sitting there, Priscilla and Aquila,
got him off to one side privately, and
they gave him the whole message.
Lots of preachers today just have half of
a message.
God wants us to take the whole message,
and God has given us a great message
to take.
The battle's been won.
The son has died, but he's been raised
from the dead, and the victory is ours
through faith in Christ.
The message test, have you got anything to
say?
It's really unfortunate that there are a lot
of people in places where they can speak
today, but they have nothing to say.
They say it beautifully.
They sing it beautifully, but they have nothing
to say.
I always appreciate getting back to the Moody
Church to be able to minister the Word
of God and to hear music that says
something.
One of the chores, one of the burdens
you carry when you're out in a conference
ministry is having to listen to people beautifully,
magnificently sing nothing.
No message.
You want to run.
Why do you want to run?
You want to run.
Can you take orders?
You want to be a messenger.
Have you got anything to say?
Now, there's a fourth test that comes to
us.
That's the courage test.
Have you got the courage to face the
consequences?
Messages have consequences.
Stephen brought a message.
They stoned him to death.
Paul brought a message.
He got stoned.
One day, he got arrested.
One day, they cut his head off.
Do you have the courage to face the
consequences?
There is no easy way to do a
hard thing.
If you ever find an easy way to
do a hard thing, write a book about
it.
You'll make a million dollars.
I can never forget one of the hardest
things I ever had to do was to
sit down with a precious 12-year-old
girl and explain to her that her father
was dead and not just dead, but he
had committed suicide.
I want you to know I was wiped
out for the rest of the day.
Before I talked to that girl, I had
prayed.
I had read my Bible.
Part of my staff had prayed with me.
And how do you do it?
And after I talked with her, I just
sat and cried, cried, and cried.
I was wiped out for the rest of
the day.
There's no easy way to do a hard
thing.
The courage test.
If you've got the courage to give the
message, you've got the courage to take the
consequences.
Now, there was good news.
The war had been won.
There was bad news.
The king's son had been slain.
Did you notice that the Cushite had the
courage to give the message?
You notice that?
The Cushite had the courage to give the
message.
A Jaimeas didn't.
Is the young man Absalom safe?
Oh, when Joab sent me, and believe me,
Joab didn't send him.
He sent himself.
When Joab sent me, there was a confusion.
I don't know what happened.
Stand aside.
Can you imagine the embarrassment of that?
Stand aside.
You know why the Cushite had the courage?
It's very simple.
He was called.
He knew his calling.
He was under orders.
My friend, I don't have to worry about
the consequences if I'm under orders.
He had the calling.
He was under orders, and he had the
message.
He knew what he was talking about.
My friend, if you're under orders, and you've
been called, and you know what you're talking
about, don't be afraid.
I love to read biography, and many of
the people whose lives I have read got
into trouble.
Christian people.
John Wesley got into trouble.
John Wesley got into trouble because he stirred
up the dust that had lain on the
doctrines for so long, and God anointed Wesley,
and God anointed Whitefield, and they weren't allowed
to preach in their own churches, so they
preached out in the fields.
But God had called Wesley, and God gave
him a message.
He said, I'll take the consequences.
You know what the consequence was?
The great Wesleyan revival that saved Great Britain
from revolution.
The same kind of bloodbath that almost wiped
out France could have wiped out Great Britain,
and you can thank Whitefield and Wesley that
it didn't.
Do you ever read the life of Adoniram
Judson?
You ought to read it.
One of the finest biographies of Adoniram Judson
is called To the Golden Shore by a
man named Courtney Anderson.
A marvelous book.
You'd never believe what Adoniram Judson went through
to take the gospel.
What kept him going?
He had a calling, and he knew his
message.
The Cushite comes running up.
Oh, he didn't get there first.
Here's one of the cases in the Bible
where the first was last, and the last
was first.
Oh, if they put down in some future
book of statistics who were the fastest runners,
Ahimeas would get the record.
He would be in the book of records
as the fastest runner.
You know, we're too worried about statistics these
days.
I'm not concerned about miles per hour.
I'm concerned about messages.
You know why the Cushite had the courage
to face this thing and go through with
it?
He was called.
He was a man under orders.
He wasn't responsible for consequences.
He was responsible for faithfulness, and he knew
what he was talking about.
That would eliminate some people today.
That was a fifth test.
We've had the motive test.
Why do you want to run?
The obedience test.
Can you obey orders?
Suppose you aren't supposed to run.
Can you wait?
The message test.
Have you got anything to say?
The courage test.
Can you face the consequences?
Now, here's the hardest test of all, and
this is where Ahimeas flunked.
The compassion test.
Can you give your message with love?
You see, Joab knew David's heart.
Now, I want to be cautious as I
say this, lest someone think I am judging.
I trust God sees my heart and knows
I'm not judging.
But you know, it's not enough to see
a lot of dust and activity.
We've got to know what really happened.
As we read the Bible to get our
message, we not only need to know what
happened, but why it happened and how it
happened.
You see, Joab knew David's heart.
Now, Joab knew his battlefield.
He knew just how the armies came together.
He knew just where Absalom had been caught
in the tree.
He knew just how the man had stabbed
him to death and buried him.
He knew all these facts.
But he also knew that these facts would
come to David with crushing, terrible, heavy, burdensome
pressure, because David loved his son.
Now, Ahimeas didn't have that sensitivity.
You know what's lacking in many messengers today?
Sensitivity.
Love.
We have the same routine, carbon copy, cookie
cutter method of approaching every heart.
And Jesus never did that.
Now, you've got to have some place to
start.
I remember when I first tried to start
leading people to Christ, I didn't know what
to do.
We didn't have courses back in those days
on how to do it.
And I used to meet every Thursday evening
after I became a Christian with a group
of people who were studying God's Word.
I envy you new Christians who have new
Christian courses to go through.
We didn't have that.
You know what my follow-up course was
after I got saved?
Book of Hebrews.
I went to a home Bible study back
in those days.
Yes, we had home Bible studies back in
those days.
It's not a new invention.
And we studied Hebrews.
And I wanted to try to be a
witness.
I got myself a little pocket New Testament.
You know, I wanted to be a witness.
And someone showed me Revelation 320 and said,
now you can use this to lead people
to Christ.
And you stumble a little bit.
I wish someone had said, look, here's a
little system.
Then once you learn that, it's like playing
the basic keys.
Then you can improvise.
You can feel free.
So it's good to have some system to
start with, but don't stay there.
It's got to be you.
It's got to come through you.
When Jesus talked to Nicodemus, he talked about
birth.
He didn't talk about birth to the woman
at the well.
I would have.
She was a Samaritan.
She was born wrong.
He talked about water.
Talked about water.
When he talked to that crowd in the
synagogue at Capernaum, he didn't talk about water.
Talked about bread.
You see, our Lord always adapted the message
to the need, the interest, and the heart
of the person to whom he was speaking.
Now, Ahimaaz, he was thinking only of the
victory.
The Lord has avenged all of your enemies.
That's kind of a negative thing.
Joab was thinking about the heart of the
king.
How is he going to respond to this
message?
And so he said to Ahimaaz, don't you
run.
I don't think you've got what it takes
to share this message in love.
You, Cushite, you know what to do.
And so the Cushite went, and he ran,
and he was able to do what Paul
said in Ephesians 4.15, speak the truth
in love.
Isn't it beautiful the way he did it?
He comes to him and he says, Tidings,
my Lord the king, for the Lord has
avenged thee this day of all them who
rose up against thee.
Now, that word all gave David a hint,
kind of prepared him.
And the king said unto the Cushite, is
the young man Absalom safe?
You know what some people would have said?
That good for nothing rebel is buried under
a pile of rocks.
But it's true.
Oh, but you speak the truth in love.
How many times have you heard me say
truth without love is brutality, and love without
truth is hypocrisy?
He didn't talk like that.
The Cushite answered so quietly, and I'm sure
he was putting all the love into what
he could.
The enemies of my Lord the king and
all who rise against thee to do thee
harm, be as that young man is.
David got the message.
You know why we lose some people?
We don't speak the truth in love.
We use the Bible sometimes to beat them
over the head.
When all the world is looking for today
is just a little bit of love.
Can you give the message in love?
That's what Paul talks about in First Corinthians
13.
You know what was wrong with the Corinthian
church?
They needed love.
That's all.
Paul didn't tell them to throw away their
gifts.
He said just use your gifts in love.
Gifts with love become tools to build with.
Gifts without love become weapons to fight with.
That's why Paul wrote First Corinthians 13.
He says now look, if I speak with
the tongues of men and of angels, oh
that'd be worth listening to, and have not
love, I'm just a lot of noise.
And some messengers are just a lot of
noise.
Our Lord Jesus spoke the truth in love.
Sometimes the truth hurts.
The truth hurt David, not because the truth
was wrong, but because David was wrong.
David's heart was wrong.
He had pampered his son.
He'd sinned against his son.
He'd sinned against God.
He knew it.
That's why he said, oh I wish I
had died.
The motive test.
Why do you want to run?
To be somebody important?
To be recognized?
To be seen?
The obedience test.
Can you obey?
Can you get a crowbar and force your
way in?
The message test.
If you do run, have you got something
to say?
The courage test.
Can you face the consequences?
And most important, the compassion test.
Can you speak the truth in love?
Now God needs messengers today.
God still needs messengers, and he comes to
me tonight and says, do you qualify?
As I prepared this message, I had to
get off by myself and look it over
and say, now Lord, do I qualify?
That's what you're going to want to do,
because you want to be communicators.
You want to be messengers.
So just take these five simple tests.
Get alone with the Lord and say, Lord,
do I qualify?
The messenger is not held accountable for the
consequences.
He's held accountable for one thing, faithfully to
deliver the message.
That's all he asks.
Do we qualify?
Gracious Father, we have such good news to
tell, and we've shared other kinds of good
news with people.
Help us to share the good news of
the victory won, of sins debt paid.
I pray, Father, you'll help us to be
good messengers.
Send us where you want to send us.
When you want us to wait, tell us.
Help us, Father, to be obedient.
I pray for any here tonight who have
never responded to your message, that even tonight
they might trust Jesus Christ who died on
the tree for them.
Deliver us, Lord, from being careless or proud
or self-appointed messengers.
We'll wait for your call, your time, your
preparation for your glory.
In Jesus' name, amen.