He was riding fast through the forest when his hair caught in the branches.
📖Based on 2 Samuel 18:9
He was the most praised man in Israel.
From the sole of his foot to the crown of his head, there was no blemish in him.
His hair was his most famous feature.
He cut it once a year because it grew so heavy. When he weighed it, it was two hundred shekels by the king's weight.
He had used that beauty. Used it to stand at the gate and steal the hearts of the men of Israel from his father David.
Used it to raise a rebellion. To sit in his father's seat while his father fled Jerusalem barefoot and weeping.
The battle came to the forest of Ephraim.
The forest devoured more people that day than the sword.
Absalom was riding on a mule through the woods.
The mule went under the boughs of a great oak.
His head — that famous head, that famous hair — caught in the oak.
And the mule went on from under him.
He was suspended in the air.
Between the ground and the branches.
His mule gone.
Unable to free himself.
A man saw it and reported it to Joab.
Joab asked why the man hadn't killed him.
The man said: Even if I had felt a thousand shekels of silver in my hand, I would not put out my hand against the king's son.
Joab took three javelins and thrust them through Absalom's heart.
The thing that had been his pride, his defining feature, the most celebrated part of him —
Was the thing that caught him.
He hung between heaven and earth by his own glory.
And never came down alive.
Scripture — 2 Samuel 18:9
"And Absalom met the servants of David. And Absalom rode upon a mule, and the mule went under the thick boughs of a great oak, and his head caught hold of the oak, and he was taken up between the heaven and the earth; and the mule that was under him went away."
Reflection
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He was caught by the very thing he was most proud of. The symbol of his beauty became the instrument of his end.
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He hung between heaven and earth — held by his own ambition in a place he couldn't get down from.