Can I pray for you in any way? Send any prayer requests to faithhopegodlove@aol.com In Christ, Mark
The scriptures. May God bless the reading of His holy word.
Now Ahimaaz son of Zadok said, "Let me run and take the news to the king that the Lord has delivered him from the hand of his enemies."
"You are not the one to take the news today," Joab told him. "You may take the news another time, but you must not do so today, because the king's son is dead."
Then Joab said to a Cushite, "Go, tell the king what you have seen." The Cushite bowed down before Joab and ran off.
Ahimaaz son of Zadok again said to Joab, "Come what may, please let me run behind the Cushite." But Joab replied, "My son, why do you want to go? You don't have any news that will bring you a reward." He said, "Come what may, I want to run." So Joab said, "Run!" Then Ahimaaz ran by way of the plain and outran the Cushite.
While David was sitting between the inner and outer gates, the watchman went up to the roof of the gateway by the wall. As he looked out, he saw a man running alone. The watchman called out to the king and reported it. The king said, "If he is alone, he must have good news." And the man came closer and closer.
Then the watchman saw another man running, and he called down to the gatekeeper, "Look, another man running alone!" The king said, "He must be bringing good news, too."
The watchman said, "It seems to me that the first one runs like Ahimaaz son of Zadok."
"He's a good man," the king said. "He comes with good news."
Then Ahimaaz called out to the king, "All is well!" He bowed down before the king with his face to the ground and said, "Praise be to the Lord your God! He has delivered up the men who lifted their hands against my lord the king."
The king asked, "Is the young man Absalom safe?"
Ahimaaz answered, "I saw great confusion just as Joab was about to send the king's servant and me, your servant, but I don't know what it was."
The king said, "Stand aside and wait here." So he stepped aside and stood there.
Then the Cushite arrived and said, "My lord the king, hear the good news! The Lord has delivered you today from all who rose up against you."
The king asked the Cushite, "Is the young man Absalom safe?"
The Cushite replied, "May the enemies of my lord the king and all who rise up to harm you be like that young man."
The king was shaken. He went up to the room over the gateway and wept. As he went, he said: "O my son Absalom! My son, my son Absalom! If only I had died instead of you—O Absalom, my son, my son!"
Joab was told, "The king is weeping and mourning for Absalom." And for the whole army the victory that day was turned into mourning, because on that day the troops heard it said, "The king is grieving for his son." The men stole into the city that day as men steal in who are ashamed when they flee from battle. The king covered his face and cried aloud, "O my son Absalom! O Absalom, my son, my son!"
Then Joab went into the house to the king and said, "Today you have humiliated all your men, who have just saved your life and the lives of your sons and daughters and the lives of your wives and concubines. You love those who hate you and hate those who love you. You have made it clear today that the commanders and their men mean nothing to you. I see that you would be pleased if Absalom were alive today and all of us were dead. Now go out and encourage your men. I swear by the Lord that if you don't go out, not a man will be left with you by nightfall. This will be worse for you than all the calamities that have come upon you from your youth till now."
So the king got up and took his seat in the gateway. When the men were told, "The king is sitting in the gateway," they all came before him.
2 Samuel 18:19-33, 19:1-8
This ends this reading from God's holy word. Thanks be to God.
The battle had ended but word still had not made it back to David as he waited in Mahanaim. As Chapter 18 ends, we see him informed of what had happened to include the death of his son, Absalom.
So who would deliver the word to the king?
Well, we read where Zadok’s son, Ahimaaz, went to Joab, the army commander, asking him to “Let me run and take the news to the king that the Lord has delivered him from the hand of his enemies” but Joab rejected him saying, “You are not the one to take the news today” while adding, “You may take the news another time, but you must not do so today, because the king's son is dead."
Instead, Joab turned to another man, a Cushite, and told him to "Go, tell the king what you have seen" and with that, the “Cushite bowed down before Joab and ran off”.
Ahimaaz, passed over for the Cushite, wasn’t about to give up. Instead, he asked Joab, “Come what may, please let me run behind the Cushite." Joab still questioned why Ahimaaz wanted to go, citing that there would be no reward for giving the news to the king, but then allowed Ahimaaz to go after Joab saw he wouldn’t take no for an answer. And so Ahimaaz took off, going “by way of the plain” and eventually outrunning the Cushite.
Well in Mahanaim, we read where “David was sitting between the inner and outer gates” while the “watchman went up to the roof of the gateway by the wall”. And as the watchman peered out across the landscape, he “saw a man running alone” and reported this to David who relied, “If he is alone, he must have good news."
Well, as the first man who the watchman said seemed to run like Ahimaaz came closer and closer, the watchman noticed a second man running alone and reported this to David who said, “He must be bringing good news, too." David also added that Ahimaaz was a good man and thus must be coming with good news.
Notice David’s hopeful attitude in this passage…a hopeful attitude that fully expected good news to come…a man who expected to hear that his son Absalom had been treated gently as he had ordered.
So with this expectation in place, David is approached by Ahimaaz who tells him that “All is well!” before bowing down “with his face to the ground” while saying, “Praise be to the Lord your God! He has delivered up the men who lifted their hands against my lord the king." Note how Ahimaaz gives the Lord credit, praising Him and Him alone for delivering and defeating the king’s enemies.
But David showed he was less concerned with the victory that he was about his son and asked Ahimaaz, “Is the young man Absalom safe?" In reply, Ahimaaz tells David, “I saw great confusion just as Joab was about to send the king's servant and me, your servant, but I don't know what it was." Ahimaaz had not witnessed Joab’s execution of Absalom as he dangled by his hair in the branches of the oak tree and so he could not answer David’s question. And so David, turned to the second man…the Cushite…after asking Ahimaaz to “stand aside”.
Well, we read where the Cushite approaches David and exclaims, “My lord the king, hear the good news! The Lord has delivered you today from all who rose up against you." Again, note how the Cushite attributes the victory to the Lord…the same Lord who had delivered Israel from their enemies for generations. And again, we see where David was less interested in the overall victory than he was with the welfare of his son.
So he asked the Cushite, "Is the young man Absalom safe?" And the reply hit David hard as the Cushite coldly replied, “May the enemies of my lord the king and all who rise up to harm you be like that young man." With those spoken words, David knew Absalom had died. How he died wasn’t so important to him. No matter what happened, his son was dead and David was left shaken by the news. Scripture tells us he “went up to the room over the gateway and wept” while saying, “O my son Absalom! My son, my son Absalom! If only I had died instead of you — O Absalom, my son, my son!" Indeed, David’s grief was deep.
Well, Joab and his men followed Ahimaaz and the Cushite in returning to Mahanaim and when they got there Joab was told, “The king is weeping and mourning for Absalom." This news crept out to the whole army who instead of receiving rousing praise from their king for fighting so boldly and victoriously for him got no words of praise because David was in mourning…a mourning that also befell his army as they returned feeling unappreciated and acting like men who would steal into the city because they were ashamed about fleeing from battle. Truly, David’s men deserved a better welcome home than this!
This was Joab’s thought exactly as he went to David and admonished him saying:
“Today you have humiliated all your men, who have just saved your life and the lives of your sons and daughters and the lives of your wives and concubines. You love those who hate you and hate those who love you. You have made it clear today that the commanders and their men mean nothing to you. I see that you would be pleased if Absalom were alive today and all of us were dead. Now go out and encourage your men. I swear by the Lord that if you don't go out, not a man will be left with you by nightfall. This will be worse for you than all the calamities that have come upon you from your youth till now."
It’s not that David’s mourning was inappropriate. It was just ill timed given that his brave fighting men had just returned from laying their lives and would have liked to at least receive some gratitude from their supreme leader…and in doing so made his men feel like they meant nothing to him…like he would have been happier if his entire army had perished but Absalom survived.
So Joab advises David that the time was now to make a move toward mending his relationship with his men or risk losing them by nightfall…a calamitous event that would be worse than any that come upon him from his youth. And we read where David follows Joab’s advice, taking a seat in the gateway and all his men joined him there. A disaster had been averted.
You might be asking yourself about what this scripture passage might be teaching us today.
I’m convinced that one of the things it seeks to show us is that we can never allow death to overshadow victory.
For David, he was so caught up in hoping that his son might survive the fierce battle that he ended up distracted from the main goal at hand…defeating Absalom and restoring David to power as king of all Israel. We know this because his only focus as Ahimaaz and the Cushite came to him was on whether or not Absalom had survived. There was no concern for how many of his commander or own men had made it through. No…David was firmly focused on Absalom alone.
And so when Absalom perished in the battle, David was unable to see anything else except his death and his mourning kept him there…shielded from rejoicing in the overall battle victory which had a very adverse effect on his men as they returned home feeling unappreciated and humiliated by David’s actions.
Note in all this where David doesn’t turn to the Lord at all to see what he should do. If he had, the Lord would have prepared him for what was to come and would have instructed him as to what he was to do after the news came to him that his son had died. David tried to take all this on by himself and in doing so, nearly messed the whole matter up…because that’s what happens when we try to take control of anything in our life outside of the Lord’s guidance and lead.
Instead, David wallowed in his sorrow and nearly lost the loyalty and respect of the men who had so valiantly fought on his behalf. In his grief, he lost sight of the victory gained.
In my ministry years, I have seen many Christians make the same mistake as David, allowing death to overshadow victory. For they are so attached and focused on a Christian loved one while they are alive that they are not ready to respond properly after that loved one dies. Like David, they regress into a vigil of mourning that is so deep that they forget about the victory…a victory that is far more important than the death to focus on.
For what did Christ Jesus die for anyways as He hung and bled and died on Calvary’s cross?
Did He not suffer and die to bring us the victory…victory from our sins and victory over death if we only just believe and trust in Him as Savior?
Friends, Christ died and rose again to give us hope not despair…victory not defeat. Death is not to be a dark and sad time unless the one who died did not know Jesus. That…and only that…is reason to mourn excessantly after someone dies for they have chosen to forfeit their chance at eternal life. Death is the end for them. But for those in Christ, death is never the end but just the beginning of an awesome life eternal with the God the Father and His Son Jesus…a life eternal free from pain and suffering and affliction and sin. Jesus brought those who believe and trust in Him victory over death…rejoicing over mourning…celebration over defeat. And we should live like we know it and appreciate all He did to make it a possibility.
As I close today, I pray that we all will approach death with the proper perspective for those who die in Christ Jesus…a perspective that allows us to fully acknowledge and celebrate the victory that Jesus gave all who believe in Him as He died and rose from the tomb ascending to sit at His Father’s right hand as He awaits His return to gather us with Him.
And if you don’t know Jesus in your life and you’re reading this, please don’t delay in accepting Him into your heart as Savior…so your death doesn’t have to be a sorrowful end but instead a celebration of new life that will never end…a life that claims victory over death. Amen.
In Christ,
Mark
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