When the Message Transforms the Messenger

Then said Ahimaaz the son of Zadok, Let me now run, and bear the king tidings, how that the LORD hath avenged him of his enemies.  And 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. (2Samuel 18: 19, 20)

I want us to look at a messenger and what impact a message can have on him.

This young man was so eager to take a message to the king that he did not care enough to know the implications of the same message.

It is interesting that he pleaded to still run with a message he did not have (v 22)

Yet I am sure he was so confident that he had a real message to take or else he wouldn’t have pleaded so.

Yet do you realize that at the end of the day he had no message to deliver though he overtook the actual messenger who was sent?

Could his zeal to help have messed up with the message that he was taking? Could the implications of the message have messed up his memory when he ought to have delivered it?

What does this have to do with zeal?

Young people commit their all to what they believe. They do not think beyond the cause they stand for.

That is what defines youth.

I responded to Christ’s call in my teenage.

There is something I heard older people saying as they talked about the zeal we had.

The closest translation I can make is that the salvation of a young person is akin to a fire from stubble.

By this they meant that we will burn very brightly but for a very short time.

This of course implied that we will take a short time to burn out or be extinguished.

Sadly, that happens for very many young people. Very few continue in that zeal beyond a short season. In fact, very few who connect in school continue beyond the school fence. I remember one classmate I met in the city puffing shortly after we cleared school and he almost fainted on seeing me.

Yet despite the fact that there is some truth in that ancient saying about the salvation of the youth, one fact is always ignored; the fact of God.

Stubble in the hands of God can burn forever. That explains why some of us are still burning with zeal for Christ and His word in our old age.

What does this have to do with our title?

I believe that the absence of clarity in the message could be the reason many fall back. In other words someone without a clear message could easily get confused if they get another message, even a contrary one.

This explains why a minister can proudly abandon the faith with no remorse. It also explains how a person who has ministered for long finally go open on being homosexual and think that as a feather on their cap instead of the abomination God’s word calls it. To imagine that he thinks hiding an abomination is a worse evil than owning it.

Like the young man in our story, they started running before getting the message. They therefore get confused midway. Remember as a child being sent to the shop then you start running even before you hear what you were being sent to buy?

And this explains for the most part the music industry, especially what is called Gospel, as the vast majority of them are just as Ahimaaz. Again their fruit is evident. There is no continuity and many times the messages in the songs give them away. Plus of course the kinds of life they lead.

A clear message is sustainable. Remember this?

And ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free. (John 8:32)

It makes you free by transforming you first. You understand it and allow it to shape your whole life. Then you slowly start becoming like it. And because its source is the creator of the universe it frees you to enjoy the same universe He created within the boundaries of that truth that has freed you.

Look at this analogy.

A policeman can go anywhere, especially if he is armed. But he doesn’t just go anywhere. That gun has rules and regulations that must be observed. Even in his own person he does not just go. That is the reason they are strenuously and thoroughly trained.

That is what God’s word does to the one who reads and accepts to be led by it.

The Ahimaazes of ‘Gospel Music’ and preaching and other ministry will just run because they have the energy and freedom to do so. And so they get burnt up and out in the process.

Many assume that they are so anointed that their bodily fleshy cravings were killed by the anointing. Only to discover when it is too late that they are still human beings, worse, youth with ‘boiling’ blood looking for whatever outlet to explode.

A girl confessed to me that she does not know how she became pregnant. And I do not doubt her.  And there are many like her. Chances are that she was blinded by her anointing to the point that she overlooked some critical things especially with boys. Like Ahimaaz, she ran without getting a clear message.

Reading the Bible is critical. The process of discipleship makes the Bible even easier to understand as one compares what they learnt with others.

And that is what gives young zeal longevity.

A Biblical example is in order here.

Saul was very humble before he was made king. He was humble his early days as king. Then gradually power got to his head and he became entitled. So much that he felt God had to speak to him to the point that he visited a medium yet he had attempted to rid Israel of the same. He easily became the centre of the universe with everybody becoming his servant, even God.

Contrast that with David.

As last born (probably tenth born or later as we only know of two sisters and in his army were nephews who were probably older than him), he had no choice but be humble.

Anyway, he was humble.

But then he is anointed as king and he still continues being humble.

He starts playing music to the king and he is still humble.

He kills the giant and he is still humble. Imagine the king had to scheme to convince him to marry his daughter as a snare.

The king becomes his enemy and he is still humble. Imagine he cannot kill that enemy even when God places him under his feet, twice!

He finally becomes king and is still humble. And that is clearly seen through his always looking for counsel from God.

Two clear incidences of that humility are when God plagues Israel and when the ark moves to Jerusalem.

Why was he that way?

Thy word have I hid in mine heart, that I might not sin against thee. (Psalm 119:11)

That is the only antidote to entitlement and pride that are produced by fame or the pretense of the same. And it will not matter whether it is God or people who have taken you there.

How committed are you to God’s word?