|
1st
Samuel 25:14-44 “But
one of the young men told Abigail, Nabal’s wife, saying, Behold, David sent messengers out of the wilderness to
salute our master; and he railed on them. 15
But the men were very good unto
us, and we were not hurt, neither missed we any thing, as long as we were
conversant with them, when we were in the fields: 16
they were a wall unto us both by night
and day, all the while we were with them keeping the sheep. 17
Now therefore know and consider what
thou wilt do; for evil is determined against our master, and against all his
household: for he is such a son
of Belial, that a man cannot speak to him. 18
Then Abigail made haste, and took two
hundred loaves, and two bottles of wine, and five sheep ready dressed, and five
measures of parched corn, and an hundred clusters of raisins, and two
hundred cakes of figs, and laid them on asses. 19
And she said unto her servants, Go on
before me; behold, I come after you. But
she told not her husband Nabal. 20
And it was so, as she rode on the
ass, that she came down by the covert of the hill, and, behold, David and his
men came down against her; and she met them. 21
Now David had said, Surely in vain have
I kept all that this fellow hath in the wilderness, so that nothing was
missed of all that pertained unto him:
and he hath requited me evil for good. 22
So and more also do God unto the enemies
of David, if I leave of all that pertain to him by the morning light any
that pisseth against the wall. 23 And
when Abigail saw David, she hasted, and lighted off the ass, and fell before
David on her face, and bowed herself to the ground. 24
And she fell at his feet, and said, Upon
me, my lord, upon me let this iniquity be: and let thine handmaid, I pray thee, speak in
thine audience, and hear the words of thine handmaid. 25
Let not my lord, I pray thee, regard
this man of Belial, even Nabal:
for as his name is, so is he; Nabal is his name,
and folly is with him: but I
thine handmaid saw not the young men of my lord, whom thou didst send. 26
Now therefore, my lord, as the LORD
liveth, and as thy soul liveth, seeing the LORD
hath withholden thee from coming to shed blood, and from avenging
thyself with thine own hand, now let thine enemies, and they that seek evil to
my lord, be as Nabal. 27 And
now this blessing which thine handmaid hath brought unto my lord, let it even
be given unto the young men that follow my lord. 28
I pray thee, forgive the trespass of
thine handmaid: for the LORD
will certainly make my lord a sure house; because my lord fighteth the battles
of the LORD,
and evil hath not been found in thee all thy days. 29
Yet a man is risen to pursue thee, and
to seek thy soul: but the soul of my
lord shall be bound in the bundle of life with the LORD
thy God; and the souls of thine enemies, them shall he sling out, as out of
the middle of a sling. 30 And
it shall come to pass, when the LORD
shall have done to my lord according to
all the good that he hath spoken concerning thee, and shall have appointed thee
ruler over Israel; 31 that
this shall be no grief unto thee, nor offence of heart unto my lord, either
that thou hast shed blood causeless, or that my lord hath avenged himself: but when the LORD
shall have dealt well with my lord, then remember thine handmaid. 32
And David said to Abigail, Blessed be
the LORD
God of Israel, which sent thee this day to meet me: 33
and blessed be thy advice, and
blessed be thou, which hast kept me this day from coming to shed
blood, and from avenging myself with mine own hand. 34
For in very deed, as the LORD
God of Israel liveth, which hath kept me back from hurting thee, except thou
hadst hasted to come to meet me, surely there had not been left unto Nabal by
the morning light any that pisseth against the wall. 35
So David received of her hand that
which she had brought him, and said unto her, Go up in peace to thine house;
see, I have hearkened to thy voice, and have accepted thy person. 36
And Abigail came to Nabal; and, behold,
he held a feast in his house, like the feast of a king; and Nabal’s heart was
merry within him, for he was very drunken: wherefore she told him nothing, less or more,
until the morning light. 37 But
it came to pass in the morning, when the wine was gone out of Nabal, and his wife
had told him these things, that his heart died within him, and he became as
a stone. 38 And
it came to pass about ten days after, that the LORD
smote Nabal, that he died. 39 And
when David heard that Nabal was dead, he said, Blessed be the LORD,
that hath pleaded the cause of my reproach from the hand of Nabal, and hath
kept his servant from evil: for the LORD
hath returned the wickedness of Nabal upon his own head. And David sent and communed with Abigail, to
take her to him to wife. 40
And when the servants of David were come to Abigail to Carmel, they spake unto
her, saying, David sent us unto thee, to take thee to him to wife. 41
And she arose, and bowed herself on her
face to the earth, and said, Behold, let thine handmaid be a
servant to wash the feet of the servants of my lord.
42 And Abigail hasted, and arose, and rode
upon an ass, with five damsels of hers that went after her; and she went after
the messengers of David, and became his wife. 43
David also took Ahinoam of Jezreel; and
they were also both of them his wives. 44
But Saul had given Michal his daughter,
David’s wife, to Phalti the son of Laish, which was of Gallim.” Introduction [Audio
version: https://resources.ccphilly.org/detail.asp?TopicID=&Teaching=WED661] “Chapter
25, we have come I believe as far as about verse 17 [no, actually he had only
come through verse 13], we’ll probably pick up verse 10 just to refresh our
memories. David, God’s anointed king,
not yet on the throne, being pursued by Saul constantly, betrayed by fellow
countrymen, had come to the place where he’s hiding in the caves of Engedi,
Saul was brought by the LORD
into his presence, and David refrained his men from killing Saul, refrained his
own hand from doing that, ‘God forbid I should touch the LORD’s
anointed,’ spoke to Saul with the hem of his
garment in his hand, Saul realized that David had spared his life, and then
Saul again, a man who is back and forth, a man ‘Cleanse your hands you
sinners, purify your hearts you doubleminded.’
Saul was a man with a heart problem, he is in rebellion against
God, he is schizophrenic, and he is up and down, back and forth. And David when he hears that Samuel, his
great mentor has died, it tells us the whole nation mourned and wept. We’re not told whether Saul attended that
funeral, him and Samuel had gone their separate ways after Saul’s rebellion,
back in the 15th chapter. David,
not trusting Saul, maybe thinking Saul would be watching for him there, heads
down into the wilderness of Paran, down near the top of the Sinai
Peninsula. And as he is there, there is
a very wealthy man named Nabal that keeps his flocks there, 3,000 sheep and
1,000 goats. You have to understand, 100
sheep or 100 goats made you wealthy back then, this man has 3,000 sheep and
1,000 goats. And David and his men, as
they are held in the wilderness in Paran watch over this man’s flock, they make
sure none of the raiding or marauding bands of Philistines or nomads had
touched them. And he hears that Nabal is
shearing his sheep, and the tradition, and it was understood in that culture
hospitality is still sacred, that because he had protected the flocks those
many months, now that it was the time of shearing and feasting, that David then
would be repaid to some degree for his care of Nabal’s flock. And David sends word, he says ‘Look,
whatever you feel is right, me and my men have watched over your flock, we hear
it’s a time of blessing and prosperity,’ he sends ten young men, he
says ‘You can repay us in regards to that.’ In verse 10 “And Nabal answered David’s
servants, and said, Who is David? and who is the son of Jesse?” so he knows who David is, “there be many
servants now a days that break away every man from his master.” insulting
David, insinuating he’s fleeing from Saul, ‘I know your story.’ And importantly, listen he says “Shall
I then take my bread, and my water, and my flesh
that I have killed for my shearers, and give it unto men,
whom I know not whence they be?” (verse 11) He has an “I”
“my” “my” problem, you see this here, ‘and from I don’t even know where
these guys are from.’ “So
David’s young men turned their way, and went again, and came and told him all
those sayings.” (verse 12) and no doubt David’s got 600 men with him, and
he sees these ten young guys coming and they have nothing, all of the men must
gather around, and they report, they told David “these sayings,” so David is
humiliated in front of his men. And he
blows his stack, “And David said unto his men, Gird ye on every man his
sword [!]. And they girded on every man
his sword; and David also girded on his sword:
and there went up after David about four hundred men; and two hundred
abode by the stuff.” (verse 13) So
the guys are strapping on their swords, they’re ready to go, ‘Who is
this? the Philistines, the Moabites?’ and
no, they get word, ‘David’s out to kill an old fool, and he’s got 400 guys
to do it.’ And he has just crossed the line. Very interesting to see him with Saul, it’s
almost he’s come to the point, you know, his wife has been taken away, his
position has been taken away, he’s been persecuted without reason, he’s been
ground to powder, he’s been merciful to Saul, he’s gone the extra mile, gone
the extra mile, he’s turned the other cheek, and it just seems he’s come to the
point, ‘That’s it, I’ll be mistreated and persecuted by a king, but it ain’t
gonna happen with some old fool, I can’t take it any more,’ the place where
you and I normally slip up, maybe the important things maybe we restrain
ourselves, we think of the implications.
But it’s always some fool that drives us over the edge. Don’t you point at somebody and call them a
fool, that’s not what I’m saying, it’s a picture here with Nabal. And because, listen, in our culture we say ‘You
fool,’ it means one thing. In the
Old Testament a fool very specifically was a man who said “there is no God,”
Psalm 14, verse 1 [there are a lot of those running around today, now aren’t
there?]. A fool was someone who couldn’t
receive instruction, very different from just our kind of attitude towards
someone today where we can say they’re a fool.
But David now, he loses his cool, and he gets his army, and he’s headed
down, now look, this is really important, remember, not feeding someone was not
a capital crime. It’s very important to
remember that. In the Law of Moses [i.e.
the Law of God], in the Torah, not feeding somebody was not a capital
crime. If he had killed this old fool,
we would have reenforced Saul’s position, telling everybody in the country that
David was dangerous and so forth, and it would have been a stain on his
life. Because the time is going to come
when David will commit adultery and murder, which are both capital crimes. And he will go before the LORD
and say “Sacrifice and offering thou hast not desired,” there was
no sacrifice for adultery, there was no sacrifice for murder, “Sacrifice
and offering thou hast not desired, but a broken and contrite spirit thou wilt
not despise.” You know, David
went before the LORD
and said ‘there is no offering for this, LORD,
I’ve sinned, but a broken and contrite spirit you won’t despise.’ He
would have contradicted that with his own behavior had he slaughtered this
man. David in his anger now rounds up
his men. One
Of The Servants Of Nabal Warns Abigail About What’s About To Happen, And
Abigail Jumps Into Action “But
one of the young men” we’re not told who,
this is one of Nabal’s servants, told Abigail, Behold, David sent messengers
out of the wilderness to salute our master; and he railed on them.” (verse 13)
remember Nabal’s wife now, who is, it says she’s good to look at, and wise,
that’s a great combination. If you
wonder where that phrase came from, it’s right here, from Nabal’s servant, you
ever hear of somebody railing on somebody, there it is, right there. We don’t even know his name to say Thank
You. And by going to Abigail, by the
way, he’s saving his own life, he doesn’t realize it at this point in
time. He goes on to say, “But the men
were very good unto us, and we were not hurt, neither missed we any
thing, as long as we were conversant with them, when we were in the
fields: they were a wall unto us both by
night and day, all the while we were with them keeping the sheep.” (verses
15-16) ‘When we watched the flocks
during the year, we didn’t lose anything, they were there, they were friendly,
they were watching over us, they weren’t ill to us at all.’ “Now therefore know and consider what
thou wilt do; for evil is determined against our master, and against all his
household: for he is such a son
of Belial, that a man cannot speak to him.” (verse 17) and you can
interpret that in English yourself. He
said ‘This guy is such a son of Belial you can’t even talk to him,’ that’s
why he’s talking to Abigail, he’s saying ‘Nabal is so inconsiderate and
unreasonable, that I’m here with you.’ We
had been told that she was a woman of good understanding, and of a beautiful
countenance. “Then Abigail made
haste, and took two hundred loaves, and two bottles of wine, and five sheep
ready dressed, and five measures of parched corn, and an hundred
clusters of raisins, and two hundred cakes of figs, and laid them on
asses.” (verse 18) She didn’t head
for the hills, she didn’t go ‘Ooh, ooh, oh my, oh my, what are we gonna
do!?’ she didn’t flip out, she’s not driven by emotion here, she’s very
deliberate, she’s what it told us, she’s a woman of good understanding, she’s
wise, not freaking out. Abigail made
haste, listen to what it says, she took 200 loaves, 2 bottles of wine, 5 sheep,
already dressed, 5 measures of parched grain, 100 clusters of raisins, and 200
cakes of figs, and she put them on some burros and some asses, now she must
have quite a kitchen. When you have 200
loaves of bread sitting around your kitchen, you got a spread. [Comment:
It may be her kitchen doubled also as the kitchen cooking for all the
ranch hands that took care of 3,000 sheep and 1,000 goats, this ranch itself is
quite a spread.] Now she’s not stealing,
she’s making repayment here, but she knows no doubt that Nabal would be against
this. It tells us he’s a wealthy man,
listen to this, imagine walking into your kitchen, you didn’t have a refrigerator,
you could get 200 loaves of bread, a couple bottles of wine, 5 sheep already
slaughtered and dressed, 5 measures of parched grain, 100 clusters of raisins,
200 cakes of figs, that would last me for awhile, and you lay them on the
asses. “And she said unto her
servants, Go on before me; behold, I come after you. But she told not her husband Nabal.” (verse
19) Sound familiar? I think she
knows the Torah, I think she remembers when Jacob did this, sending ahead of
him his company to his brother Esau, she said ‘You go on before me, I
will come after you,’ “But she told not her husband Nabal.” That’s wisdom too, at this point. “And it was so, as she rode
on the ass, that she came down by the covert of the hill, and, behold, David
and his men came down against her; and she met them.” (verse 20) they ended
up face to face, “and she met them.”
Now David was saying to himself, is the idea, “Now David had said,
Surely in vain have I kept all that this fellow hath in the wilderness,
so that nothing was missed of all that pertained unto him: and he hath requited me evil for good. So and more also do God unto the enemies of
David, if I leave of all that pertain to him by the morning light any
that pisseth against the wall.” (verses 21-22)
I love the King James, this is one of the places it shines, you can
say that in church, because it’s written right here in the King James Bible,
it’s an idiom, it’s speaking about males, ‘I’m gonna kill every last
man,’ and by the way that’s a little side commentary, you probably
don’t need it. But back in the chapter
before that, when Saul was in the cave, he had to lay aside his robe, that
tells you in commentary the other side of what was going on, because here the
other side of that is just you needed a wall, that’s all you needed, so [or a
tree]. David’s saying ‘No more Mr.
Nice Guy, I’ve had enough here.’ Now
he is making no doubt a huge mistake. Listen,
Solomon, his son, who the Bible would say would be the wisest man that ever
lived, tutored by a shepherd, his father, would transgress just about
everything he wrote to us in the Book of Proverbs and warned us about—but no
doubt heard much from his father, I think as Solomon writes ‘Answer not a
fool according to his folly, lest thou also be like unto him,’ I think
David related to Solomon many of the things he had gone through as God was
raising him up. You see, David’s in the
King’s College right now, these are mandatory courses, not electives. And God is making him into the king he’s
anointed him to be, and David’s ready to flip out and kill not only Nabal, but
all of the men of his house. Abigail
Defuses A Ticking Timebomb “And
when Abigail saw David, she hasted, and lighted off the ass, and fell before
David on her face, and bowed herself to the ground, and fell at his feet, and
said, Upon me, my lord, upon me let this iniquity be: and let thine handmaid, I pray thee, speak in
thine audience, and hear the words of thine handmaid.” (verses 23-24) Now listen, we’re going to read through this
dialogue she has with David, she’s going to call David ‘My lord’ 14
times, it tells us she’s a wise woman.
She’s going to call herself ‘the LORD’s
maidservant’ at least a half a dozen times. So in this dialogue she’s calling David ‘my
lord, your maidservant,’ back and forth, it’s very interesting to watch
what she does here. She fell at his
feet, David’s gone to kill Nabal, listen, wives, she doesn’t say ‘You call
yourself a Christian!? You call yourself
a believer!?’ She doesn’t do that,
ok. It says in Proverbs 31 that the
virtuous woman there, ‘she opens her mouth in wisdom, the law of kindness
is on her tongue,’ that means sometimes she keeps it closed. If the law of kindness governs her tongue,
that means there’s definitely times she can’t open her mouth, because what
would come out would not be kind. And
Abigail doesn’t say ‘Who do you think you are, the next king of Israel?
you’re acting like an idiot,’ there’s none of that here. She “fell at his feet,” she said,
notice, “Upon me, my lord, upon me let this iniquity be: and let thine handmaid I pray thee, speak
in thine audience, and hear the words of thine handmaid. Let not my lord, I pray thee, regard this man
of Belial,” she’s talking about her husband, “even Nabal: for as his name is, so is he;” his
name means “fool,” “Nabal is his name, and folly is with
him: but I thine handmaid saw not the
young men of my lord, whom thou didst send.” (verses 24-25) ‘I didn’t realize this had taken
place.’ “Now therefore, my lord, as
the LORD
liveth, and as thy soul liveth, seeing the LORD
hath withholden thee from coming to shed blood, and from avenging
thyself with thine own hand, now let thine enemies, and they that seek evil to
my lord, be as Nabal.” (verse 26) she says ‘It’s
the LORD
that’s kept you this far from shedding blood, don’t let this fool ruin your
reputation.’ You
know, she’s going to tell him, ‘I believe you’re headed towards the
throne.’ When David finally
speaks to her, he says ‘You’ve spoken right, the LORD
has kept me, he’s used you to do that.’ And how many times, listen, has God used some
Abigail in our lives, to slow us down, to cool us off, to speak reason to us? How many times when we’re ready to freak out,
you know, it says again in the Book of Proverbs, “A soft answer turneth
away wrath,” I’m not good at that.
I know it’s there. I have my own
philosophy, ‘When yelled at, yell back.’
That’s not what it says, it says “A soft answer turneth away
wrath,” that’s hard to do sometimes.
This woman is remarkable. And
she’s saying ‘David, you’re more than this, this man’s a fool,’ it’s
his surname, no doubt his parents didn’t name him ‘Little fool’ when he
was born. She says ‘as his name
is, so is he, and folly is the thing that characterizes his life.’ She’s saying ‘David, you’re
right and he’s wrong,’ please listen, because so many times we want to
fight every battle in that context. In
the Kingdom of God, there are things that are higher than right and wrong. And in the Kingdom of God, there are times,
when right and wrong is important, but there are times when you may be right,
and someone else may be wrong, and for Christ’s sake you’re not going to lash
back, you’re not going to knock somebody’s teeth down their throat, you’re
going to restrain yourself, because there are larger issues relative to his
Kingdom that are at stake. And if all
you can do is fight your battles on the basis of right and wrong, that’s a
miserable way to go through life. There
is a time to take a deep breath and say ‘Man, this guy stabbed me in the
back, and I know a soft answer turns away wrath,’ there is a time to say ‘Lord,
help me with this, because my natural inclination is to do something right now
that’s not Christian.’ So she says ‘David,
you’re right, he’s wrong, don’t ruin your reputation over this issue.’ ’ “Now
therefore, my lord, as the LORD
liveth, and as thy soul liveth, seeing the LORD
hath withholden thee from coming to shed blood, and from avenging
thyself with thine own hand, now let thine enemies, and they that seek evil to
my lord, be as Nabal. And now this
blessing which thine handmaid hath brought unto my lord, let it even be given
unto the young men that follow my lord.
I pray thee, forgive the trespass of thine handmaid: for the LORD
will certainly make my lord a sure house; because my lord fighteth the battles
of the LORD,
and evil hath not been found in thee all thy days.” (verses 26-28) Even though she didn’t do it, she’s entering
here to make peace. Listen to what she
says, “for the LORD
will certainly make my lord a sure house; because my lord fighteth the battles
of the LORD,
and evil hath not been found in thee all thy days.” She’s saying ‘David, this is not
fighting the battles of the LORD.’ “and
evil hath not been found in thee all thy days.” ‘David, your reputation will be ruined
if you do this.’ She knows who
David is, and she’s acknowledging ‘you’re the next king of Israel.’ Look in the next verse, she says “Yet a
man is risen to pursue thee, and to seek thy soul: but the soul of my lord shall be bound in the
bundle of life with the LORD
thy God; and the souls of thine enemies, them shall he sling out, as out
of the middle of a sling.” (verse 29)
she knows who Saul is too. We know that,
remember, because Nabal had said ‘Hey, there’s many run away slaves these
days,’ they had heard, they knew what was going on, they knew Saul was
pursuing David, they ever heard it down in Paran, in that area. And she said ‘David, God has raised you
up, your house is going to be a sure house, there has been no evil found in
you, think what you’re doing.’ “Yet a man is risen to pursue thee, and to
seek thy soul: but the soul of my lord
shall be bound” listen to how beautiful this is, “in the bundle of life
with the LORD
thy God; and the souls of thine enemies, them shall he sling out, as out
of the middle of a sling.” this is a smart cookie,
I’m telling you that. She’s saying ‘David,
you killed a giant with a sling and a stone, now you need 400 men to kill an
old fool? David, God will sling out your
enemies, just like the stone went out the sling, you don’t have to do this.’ And David’s standing there with 400 guys
listening to her, and wisdom is just pouring forth from her, and I think, you
know, he’s having a flashback right now.
“of thine enemies, them shall he sling out, as out of the
middle of a sling. And it shall come to
pass, when the LORD
shall have done to my lord” you David, “according
to all the good that he hath spoken concerning thee, and shall have appointed
thee ruler over Israel; that this shall be no grief unto thee, nor offense of
heart unto my lord, either that thou hast shed blood causeless, or that my lord
hath avenged himself: but when the LORD
shall have dealt well with my lord, then remember thine handmaid.” (verses
29c-31) ‘You
don’t want to be sitting on the throne thinking The one stupid thing I did,’
and how many of us can look back and say ‘Man, if I had only, I could give
my right hand if I could turn back the clock, if I only hadn’t done this
thing.’ Look, in Christ of course,
the wonderful thing is, if we confess our sins he’s faithful and just to
forgive us [that doesn’t mean the other person will, been there, done that],
and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness, to justify us, just as if those
things had never taken place, he removes our sins as far as the East is from
the West. But she says ‘David,
when you take the throne, this thing is not going to be a grief to you, it’s
not going to be an offense of heart to you, neither that thou hast shed blood
in a causeless way, or that my lord hath avenged himself, you don’t have to
avenge yourself.’ “and
when the LORD
shall have dealt well with my lord, then remember thine handmaid.” (verse 31c)
‘David, just remember me when you come to the throne.’ I’m not sure, exactly, what she’s perceiving
as she asks that. But David’s realizing ‘You
know, I’m nothing in and of myself, I killed a lion, I killed a bear, I killed
the giant, I’ve dealt with Saul, and all the while LORD,
it was you, it had nothing to do with me, LORD,
in and of myself.’ And
she’s bringing all that to the fore, incredible woman. Attitude
Speaks More Loudly Than Content Listen
to David now, “And David said to Abigail, Blessed be the LORD
God of Israel, which sent thee this day to meet me:” (verse 32)
changing his tune, ‘Dear Abbey, I am glad that you are here.’ “and blessed be thy advice, and
blessed be thou, which hast kept me this day from avenging myself with
mine own hand.” (verse 33) listen again, Proverbs will say this, and I
think, again, I wonder how much of this flowed from David to Solomon, to the
page. The Book of Proverbs
says “The ear that heareth the reproof of life abideth among the wise, he
that refuseth instruction despiseth his own soul, but he that heareth reproof
gaineth understanding. The fear of the LORD
is the beginning of the instruction of wisdom, and before honour there is
humility.” And David remarkably in front of 400 of his
armed men now is listening to the reproof of this woman. Without getting angry, it speaks volumes to
us of who the man is, and he says ‘Blessed be the LORD
that has sent you my way to meet me.’ “and
blessed be thy advice, and blessed be thou, which hast kept me
this day from avenging myself with mine own hand. For in very deed, as the LORD
God of Israel liveth, which hath kept me back from hurting thee, except thou
hadst hasted and come to meet me, surely there had not been left unto Nabal by
the morning light any that pisseth against the wall.” (verses 33-34) there
it is again, very clear, very affirming of what we had heard before. “So David received of her hand that
which she had brought him, and said unto her, Go up in peace to thine house;
see, I have hearkened to thy voice, and have accepted thy person.” (verse 35) Remarkable,
her attitude. Look, attitude speaks more
loudly than content, please understand,
husbands, wives. If my wife says to me,
well let me do it the other way, if she offends me (she never has, but I’m
saying this to help the rest of you), and I’m walking out the door, and she
says ‘Where are you going!?’ Now
her content was ‘Where are you going?’
Her attitude was ‘Who do you think you are, walking out of here
acting like that, where are you going!?’
Attitude is way louder than the content, and I say to her ‘I’m
going for a walk!’ and I walk out and slam the door, ‘Bam!’ My attitude said ‘I can’t get away from
you, you are bugging me,’ so our attitude and our actions speak louder than
our content. Because if I had said to
her ‘Honey, I’m just going to go for a walk, I’ve got to cool off,’ it’s
vastly different. If Abigail had come to
David and said ‘What the heck do you think you’re doing, you’re acting just
like him, all we need is one more fool in the kingdom,’ if she had come
with a wrong attitude, and David’s in front of 400 men, he’s already
humiliated. But she’s come so
differently, her attitude has preceded the truth of what she’s said and her
actions, and it has defused the entire situation. Again, actions even speak louder, the people
who study communication, I believe the deal is, it’s 50 percent of our
communication is action, 30 some percent is attitude, and the last part is
content, which is the smallest part of the whole thing, it ends up to be like 6
percent is content. You men know this,
if I come home, and walking up to the house, we have some roses up front, and
if I just pull one off and give it to Kathy when I come in, ‘Oh, Honey,
thank you, that’s nice.’ If I pull
over where those guys are selling flowers for a couple bucks on the side of the
road and I buy one of those, and bring it in, ‘Ooooh Honey, thanks,’ she
knows I paid for it, I didn’t get a cheap one off the front lawn, ‘Ooooh
Honey, thank you,’ it talks a day longer.
But if I go into a florist, and I get a rose wrapped up with those fern
things and those little white flowers around it and bring it in, it’s ‘OH
Honey,’ I’m in man [laughter], that will be on the table talking to her for
at least three days, ‘he’s a jerk, but he’s being nice right now, you leave
him alone, he’s trying.’ So actions
speak, attitude speaks, content is the last thing that speaks. And this woman is wise, and she comes to
David with the right attitude, bringing the supplies, the right actions, and
David is disarmed, David is disarmed by her, and he listens to her reproof and
her challenge, he is blessed by it. Now
look, the question of course, as we go through this, Abigail is one of the most
remarkable women in Scripture. The
question is, how could such a remarkable woman end up with such a fool? The way that happened was probably by
arrangement, when she was a young girl or a little girl, maybe her parents were
friends with Nabal’s parents, it was arranged, and it was a different
time. You know, we live in a much
different culture today, back then, when you grew up it was already arranged
sometimes who you were going to be married to.
And if when you both grew up and he didn’t look like Frankenstein by the
time he grew up, that was gravy, that was good.
And if you actually liked him, that was gravy on top. But it had nothing to do with whether you were
going to be married to him or not. That
was a covenant that was to be honoured, it didn’t have anything to do with,
we’ve taken it far to the other extreme today, from reading Harlequin Novels
and watching Love Boat, then we got all the Desperate Housewives
and all this stuff telling us, we just go beyond that and forget all about
that. Back then it was based on honour,
based on a covenant, it was most often arranged, and if you actually had
somebody you liked to look at and you cared for, that was gravy on top of
everything else. [Comment: In this world, which is not God’s world, our
youth and society are being assaulted in ways that go far beyond the tame
heterosexual books and television programs of the past which Pastor Joe just
mentioned. And although we in the Body
of Christ are not meant to play politics or the condemnation game so many
evangelicals have done, i.e. our job is to proclaim the Gospel and leave
society for God to handle, as he will at the 2nd coming of
Jesus. But what exactly is going on in our society which is so alien
to our way of life, which has to remain outside the walls of the Church? see: https://www.cbsnews.com/pictures/the-50-most-banned-books-in-america/?utm_source=pocket-newtab
Of all the banned books listed here in that article, there are a few which
shouldn’t be banned, as far as our youth within the walls of our churches are
concerned, books which depict social injustice and racism should be allowed. Out of all the books listed in that linked
article, books such as these shouldn’t be banned from our youth, so they can
come to appreciate what should never be allowed in God’s coming Kingdom, nor within
our churches, books such as ‘The HATE
You Give,’ ‘Sold,’ ‘Monday’s Not Coming,’ ‘All American Boys,’ ‘Beloved’ by
Toni Morrison, and ‘The Kite Runner.’ That’s
just five books that schools have banned, which ought not to be banned, out of
fifty books which we should lovingly screen from our children in our
churches. It’s spiritual common sense,
the old computer programmer saying applies, ‘Garbage in, garbage out,’ what
you put into the mind will come out in your actions. We are living in the end times, just before
Jesus 2nd coming, which is preceded by World War III, the
tribulation. The world is being actively
led by Satan into a cesspool of sin and degradation. But do we respond in hatred toward those who
are caught in Satan’s web without realizing it, of sexual depravity and
sin? No, but I don’t have time to
explain it here, I explain how we are to respond to all of this, in my final
chapter of America-ModernRomans [log onto and read https://unityinchrist.com/topical%20studies/America-ModernRomans6.htm] So she’s married to Nabal. Listen, you ladies, you Abigails that are
here, are without excuse. The fool has
said in his heart there is no God. You
gals, if you end up with a fool, that’s your fault, nobody’s arranged it. And most of you gals who have a dad who cares
about you, he’s going to say ‘What are you doing going out with that fool?’ he’s
going to get involved anyway. You don’t
have the right to be going out with somebody who says in his heart ‘There is
no God.’ And if you get involved in
that, you have to ask yourself that question.
Because today, in the church as believers, there is no reason for an
Abigail to be married to a Nabal, so learn a lesson when you look here and see
what’s going on. The
LORD
Deals With Nabal “And
Abigail came to Nabal; and, behold, he held a feast in his house, like the
feast of a king; and Nabal’s heart was merry within him, for he was
very drunken: wherefore she told him
nothing, less or more, until the morning light.” (verse 36)
‘his royal highness, king fool,’ is having a big party there. Notice, it had to be the feast of a king if
he didn’t know 200 loaves of bread and five sheep were gone. He’s pickled, “wherefore she told him
nothing, less or more, until the morning light.” Wise again, you can’t reason with a drunk, it
doesn’t work, it doesn’t work. She
figures ‘I’m not going to do this, I don’t know how abusive he might have
been,’ he’s in front of everyone, she doesn’t want to humiliate him, she’s
not going to tell him about David, not going to do that. Listen, I wonder, when we come to the New
Testament, if Jesus is thinking of this situation when he talks about a man, he
says ‘The ground of a certain rich man brought forth plentifully, he
thought within himself saying, What shall I do, because I have no room where to
bestow my fruits, and he said This will I do, I’ll pull down my barns, I’ll
build greater ones, and there will I bestow all of my fruit, the fruits of my
labour, and I will say to my soul, Soul, thou hast much good laid up for many
years, take thine ease, eat, drink and be merry. But God said unto him, Thou fool,’ Nabal,
‘this night thy soul shall be required of thee, then whose shall those
things be which thou hast provided, so is he that layeth up treasure for
himself, and is not rich towards God.’ Jesus
said to us, ‘Take heed to yourselves, lest that any time your hearts be
overcharged with eating and drunkenness, and the cares of this life, so that
the day, the return of Christ, comes upon you unaware.’ We have a picture here, Nabal, he’s drunk,
this is a guy who said ‘My crops, my sheep, my this, my that,’ and next
day he’s getting struck down, and ten days later he’s going to be dead. He’s treating himself like a king, he’s
drunken, she decides ‘I’m not gonna tell him what went on.’ “But it came to pass in the morning,
when the wine was gone out of Nabal,” against the wall, it doesn’t say
that, “and his wife had told him these things, that his heart died within
him, and he became as a stone.” (verse 37) that’s pretty
poetic. We don’t know whether he has a
stroke or a heart attack [one or the other], she tells him what happened, and
he goes down. It’s interesting, it says
like a stone, because she had said to David ‘The LORD
will cast your enemies out like a stone out of a sling,’ and
now he becomes, it says, like a stone.
Had he thought ‘You did what to David? Wait till Saul finds out, that’s the end of
us.’ Had he thought ‘I was that
close to death and didn’t even know it.’
Is he so aggravated with her that he just has a heart-attack? We don’t know. But the morning comes, and she tells him what
had taken place, when he heard these things his heart, it says “died within
him, and he became as a stone.” And
look, “And it came to pass about ten days after, that the LORD
smote Nabal, that he died.” (verse 38) ten
days later, that’s God’s grace, because for ten days he had Abigail next to
him, for ten days she must have said ‘Nabal, you can turn to the LORD,
Nabal, he’ll forgive you, Nabal, he’s a good God, think of how he treated
Jacob, how he treated connivers in the past, you can turn to him.’ You know, it’s
interesting, Proverbs 11, again, let me read this to you, Proverbs
11:31 says “Behold, the righteous shall be recompensed in the
earth, much more the wicked and the sinner.’ Behold, It’s the only proverb in
all the chapters of Proverbs that begins with the word “Behold,” the only
one. ‘Behold, consider, think
about this, the righteous shall be recompensed in the earth, much more the
wicked and the sinner.’ This
man, gone, struck down, Nabal. I’m sure
she was gracious to him in those ten days, and I hope in those ten days his
heart turned, we don’t know…that’s why we’re all going to have new names there,
so nobody will know none of our past lurking around. Guys,
If You Find An Abigail, One’s Enough “And
when David heard that Nabal was dead, he said, Blessed be the LORD,
that hath pleaded the cause of my reproach from the hand of Nabal, and hath
kept his servant from evil: for the LORD
hath returned the wickedness of Nabal upon his own head.” Now
we don’t know if this is the other reason he was praising the LORD,
“And David sent and communed with Abigail, to take her to him to wife.”
(verse 39) ‘Thank you LORD
that I didn’t kill him, you do a better job than me, this is great!’ Single men, keep your eyes open for Abigails
[I am, but with no luck so far, but then I’ve been on a very strange spiritual
journey (see https://unityinchrist.com/author.htm)] “And when the servants of David were come
to Abigail to Carmel, they spake unto her, saying, David sent us unto thee, to
take thee to him to wife. And she arose,
and bowed herself on her face to the earth, and said, Behold, let
thine handmaid be a servant to wash the feet of the servants of my
lord.” (verses 40-41) She’s not just
saying it when David’s angry and she’s worried, there’s an attitude in her that
is abiding here that’s wonderful. Now
look, it says they spake to her that David wanted her to be his wife, she
arose, like back in verse 12, she arose up quick, she didn’t have to pray very
long about this one, she’s on her way.
It says “And Abigail hasted, and arose, and rode upon an ass, with
five damsels of hers that went after her; and she went after the messengers of
David, and became his wife. And David
also took Ahinoam of Jezreel; and they were also both of them his wives.”
(verses 42-43) Now that never works,
don’t even think about it, it never works.
[Just go back to the history of Jacob’s life] It ends by saying, “But Saul had given
Michal his daughter, David’s wife, to Phalti the son of Laish, which was
of Gallim.” (verse 44) So, Michal,
David’s wife is in adultery, Saul gave her to another man as he drove David
away, not wanting, no doubt, David to have any attachment to the throne at all,
in case he would die and David would live.
Phalti by the way, his name means “deliverance of Jehovah,” and when you
understand what kind of gal Michal was, that’s a good name for the man that
took her away from David. He probably
praised the LORD
on that one too. But Ahinoam is always
mentioned first as we go through the wives of David. Amnon will be her son. It is not God’s ideal, Jesus said “in
the beginning, from the beginning it was not so, for this reason shall a man
leave his own mother and father and cleave to his wife,” that there
would be one man and one woman together for their entire lives. As we come through the era of the kings, back
in Deuteronomy 17:17 it said “Thou shalt not multiply thy
wives unto thyself.” So David
must figure he’s not multiplying, he’s just adding here. We’ll follow him here up to at least six
wives before he gets involved with Bathsheba.
But, this is never a good start to anything. And this is one of David’s weaknesses. I mean, I don’t know what Ahinoam was like,
but he should have stopped there [with Abigail], but now he has Ahinoam and
Abigail, this is a chink in his armour and we will watch this as we go forward
from here. In
closing Well
we can come back to the Ziphites, we can’t do this next chapter in ten
minutes. Ah, I can’t do that. Let’s do this, let’s have the musicians come,
let’s sing several songs. I don’t want
to try to squeeze a chapter into ten minutes, I want to teach the Word, so
let’s do this. Look, we have some things
to think about this evening. I don’t
think these things are here just as a recorded history. There’s over 60 chapters on the life of
David, besides Jesus Christ we have more on David than any other personality in
the Scripture. And God is not at all
hesitant to frame out the strengths and weaknesses of the man, he was the man
who was after God’s own heart, he is the man who is after God’s
own heart. And the best of men are men
at best. And David is very human, but
David is a man who does love God. David is
going to make some huge mistakes, but it’s very interesting to watch this
school that God is taking him through.
Saul, he, David says, ‘I don’t want to touch the LORD’s
anointed,’ Saul was the LORD’s
anointed, at this point in time he was anointed to rub David raw, to aggravate
him to no end. Because God was teaching
David tolerance, he was pushing David to the edge and not letting him go over
the edge, he’s teaching him lessons. And
the fact now that he has by his side Abigail, and we don’t know that much about
Ahinoam. In the next chapter where he
has opportunity one more time to kill Saul, and Abishai, the first of his
mighty men that’s really mentioned, Abner is still with Saul. Abner will waste a lifetime, and towards the
end of his life finally come to David’s side and acknowledge that David’s the
rightful king. But David, listen, we
find him with his older brothers who don’t like him, we find David with Saul
who turns on him, we find David with Michal, who turns on him, we find David
with Jonathan, who professes love in a remarkable way, and yet fails at this in
some very particular ways. We find David
with the Ziphites, that turn on him, and treat him wrongly. We find David with Nabal. David is a very interesting guy because
there’s very few people around him. I
mean, Joab is going to be loyal to the point where he’s a headache, and David
can’t get rid of him. Abigail, is one of
the remarkable people in David’s life. And she will stand in the background. But in the next chapter when he has
opportunity to kill Saul again, he’s very clearly, I think if he hadn’t had
this experience in chapter 25 Saul might have been dead in chapter 26. But David says “no, he’s the LORD’s
anointed, God will fight my battles.”
Not only is he remembering now, he’s moved his reminder into the tent
with him, Abigail must tell him every morning, ‘Now remember now, I’m
invested in this too.’ So for us,
lesson, look, vengeance doesn’t belong to us. If I saw my granddaughter being molested,
there’s enough Rambo left in me to do some damage, it’s going to come to
life. There is a right time to act,
there is a time when that is the only moral and proper response, to defend the
less fortunate. Not to do that for
yourself. There is a time to act for the
things of God. But there is largely,
most of the time, those would be the exception. The rule for you and I is to restrain
ourselves, for you and I to turn the other cheek, with the Saul’s in our lives,
not to fight the battles in our lives strictly on the basis of right and wrong,
that is not the premise. Turning the
other cheek is not fighting the battle of right and wrong, going the extra mile
is not fighting the battle on the basis of right and wrong. It says when Christ suffered wrong, that he
didn’t rail back, that he didn’t fight back, he entrusted himself to the
Shepherd, to the Bishop of his soul, and somewhere in there, as hard as that
is, God is constantly putting these lessons before us. We’re going to worship, sing several
songs. Look, if there’s somebody tonight
you need to forgive, I know sometimes this is so hard, and you can never do it
on your own, only as God supplies his agape-love, the divine love, can you do
that. But listen, as long as you’re
bitter, and as long as that person is under your skin, they hold the power,
you’re captive. When the day comes and
you can say ‘You know what, they were wrong, I’m right. But Lord Jesus, you’ve forgiven me, I’m a
sinner in my thoughts, my attitudes, Lord, you said I’m justified, sanctified,
glorified Lord, you’ve forgiven me, how can I begrudge anything to anyone else
Lord? I’m walking away, I’m not gonna
let them haunt me for the rest of my life, Lord you take them, you deal with
them. If there is a Nabal, and they need
to fall down, you take care of that. If
they’re a prodigal, and they need to break and come back to you on their knees,
Lord, then you bring them back. Don’t
make me hang around with them, I’ll spend eternity with them, but just don’t
make me hang around with them down here.’
I understand sometimes, let’s do that, don’t just fight the battles
on the basis of right and wrong, don’t retaliate in your strength and your own
means. If you have an Abigail around
you, male or female version, thank the Lord that somebody is giving you wise
counsel, and recognize God’s hand in that.
David said ‘I thank the LORD
that has sent thee this day my way.’ Let’s
maybe just maybe, I don’t know why, but maybe bring these things before him as
we sing, as we worship, I would stay seated, let’s worship, if you want prayer,
if you’re grinding, and let me tell you something, bitterness, it says a root
of bitterness defiles many, not only that I think bitterness will give you high
blood pressure, I think it will give you heart disease, I think bitterness does
all kinds of things to us, that are unhealthy.
So maybe as we’re worshipping, if there’s somebody, there’s people like
that in our lives, look, take a key and hide it outside your house, so that if
you ever get locked out, you can get in, you will not remember where you hid
that key. Because what we do is we
remember the people we want to forget, and we forget the people we want to
remember. The person that drives you
crazy, you can’t get them out of you mind.
And maybe tonight as we worship, you need to say ‘Lord, help me pass
this, I want to be free, I want a new start, I want to be able to jettison
this.’ And maybe if you feel you
need prayer, you want to rise above some things, you can stand right where
you’re at, and the people around you will pray for you. But let’s just take that time tonight, let’s
worship, ‘Lord, the fruit of your Spirit is love, it’s joy, it’s peace, it’s
longsuffering, it’s patience, Lord, fill me afresh with your Spirit, let those
things be evident in my life,’ ok…[transcript of a connective expository
sermon on 1st Samuel 25:14-44, given by Pastor Joe Focht, Calvary
Chapel of Philadelphia, 13500 Philmont Avenue, Philadelphia, PA 19116] related
links: What
is going on in our society which is so alien to our way of life, which has to
remain outside the walls of the Church?
see: https://www.cbsnews.com/pictures/the-50-most-banned-books-in-america/?utm_source=pocket-newtab But
do we respond in hatred toward those who are caught in Satan’s web without
realizing it, of sexual depravity and sin?
No, but I don’t have time to explain it here, I explain how we are to
respond to all of this, in my final chapter of America-ModernRomans [log onto
and read https://unityinchrist.com/topical%20studies/America-ModernRomans6.htm Audio
version: https://resources.ccphilly.org/detail.asp?TopicID=&Teaching=WED661
|