Imagine with me a courtroom scene. The witness is sworn in, agreeing to tell “the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth.” He takes his seat in the witness stand, and the questioning begins.

“Where were you on the night of the crime?”

“At home.”

“What were you doing?”

“I was in bed asleep.”

“Did you see anything unusual?”

“No.”

“Hear anything?”

“No, I slept right through the whole thing.”

“And you’re a witness?”

At this point the “witness” is sent out of the courtroom, right?

There’s an interesting story in the Old Testament about a witness who had nothing to tell. Absalom had been working to take over the kingdom of his father David. There had been a battle, and in the heat of the battle Absalom’s mule went under a low-hanging branch, and Absalom was hanged by his hair! A man named Cushi was a witness and was instructed to go tell King David what he had seen.

But another man also wanted to run. His name was Ahimaaz. He went to the officer in charge and said, “Let me run too.”

The officer replied, “Why do you want to run? You haven’t any news to report.”

But Ahimaaz insisted. And ran well, in spite of his lack of information! In fact, he ran so well that he overtook the real witness, Cushi, and arrived before he did. He fell on his face before the king and said, “All is well”–which it wasn’t. But when David pressed him for details concerning Absalom, all he could reply was,

“I saw a great tumult, but I knew not what it was.” 2 Samuel 18:29.

Many people within the Christian faith have run with Ahimaaz! Their zeal has been great, but their message is feeble. In order to be an effective witness, you have to have something to witness to!

“Without a living faith in Christ as a personal Saviour it is impossible to make our influence felt in a skeptical world. We cannot give to others that which we do not ourselves possess. It is in proportion to our own devotion and consecration to Christ that we exert an influence for the blessing and uplifting of mankind. If there is no actual service, no genuine love, no reality of experience, there is no power to help.” – Thoughts From the Mount of Blessing, p. 37.

The first step in becoming a witness for Christ is to have an experience with Him for yourself.

It’s not enough to have seen a change in the lives of others, or to have sensed the power and excitement of the gospel. The Christian witness must always be based on the first-person. No one is going to be impressed by a witness to Christianity who can only say, “I saw a great tumult, but I knew not what it was.”

The witness for which the world is waiting today is the testimony that Jesus commissioned the restored demoniacs of Gadara to present. He said,

“Go home to thy friends, and tell them how great things the Lord hath done for thee, and hath had compassion on thee.” Mark 5:19.