Sunday School | David - 1 Samuel 25

We have quite a long chapter today, so we're going to jump into it. But before we look at the text, flip to 1 Samuel 25—that's where we're going to be. I have a quick announcement that I was supposed to do last week but forgot.

Childcare Workers Needed

I want you to think about this more through the lens of being a volunteer than a job. Although we would pay you, the money is not going to be the driving issue because there's not that much of it. So it's like you're volunteering for something, and then you find money in your pocket when you're all done.

Here's what we need: we need just a couple of childcare workers on Sunday nights. We have this fantastic program that we do every Sunday night for elementary school kids. It's super fun, but it's been really hard to have enough supervision to care for these kids during that hour. Because of our new policies to make sure that all the children are safe all the time, it's harder for us to count a 16-year-old as a worker—technically a 16-year-old is more of a child than an adult. As we try to keep our ratios right to be legal and safe so our kids are well cared for, we just need more full-on grown-ups participating in that work.

On Sunday nights, we need people downstairs from 4:45 to 6:45—that's two hours on a Sunday night to play with kids. It's not just play. It's Biblical play. We're teaching the children, we're helping the children, we're loving these kids. While they're down there, a lot of the time their parents are upstairs going through their LifeGroups. We want those LifeGroups to thrive, and in order for the adults to come, the parents need to know that the children are safe and being instructed and discipled in the Lord.

The pay is $25 a night. So you're working for $25 for two hours. If you did it every week—four weeks of the month—that's $100 for a date night. So here's what ends up happening: you love these kids, you're disciplining these kids, you're training these kids on a Sunday night. If you're not already doing something from 4:45 to 6:45 on a Sunday night, you come in and love these kids, and then you have a really nice $100 in your pocket a month for a date night to go do something fun with.

If that's interesting to you, and I hope it is because we really want to love our children well, just send me a note. The easiest thing would be to email me at timchsroanoke@com. I would love to hear from you and then go back to Darcy and Beth Ann who run that program and say, "Great news. Here's two or three people interested in doing that." Sunday nights, 4:45 to 6:45—we'd be super grateful for your help.

1 Samuel 25

All right. 1 Samuel 25. This is a long, long chapter. Normally what we do is we read it and talk about it. We're going to kind of summarize some of it and read some of it. If you haven't already been in the habit of doing this, can you guess what chapter we're going to study next week? 1 Samuel 26. Our whole sequential chapter thing is just our guiding principle. So it might be that you've already read chapter 25 in anticipation of this day, or it might be that you haven't. But I would really encourage you to do so. You could even read the whole chapter a couple times, even the rest of 1 Samuel a couple times and be ready for where we're going to go.

For those of you that already figured that out and your predictive skills are strong, what's going down in 1 Samuel 25? Did you read it? Do you know what's going on? You can even glance at it right now. What episode is this? David and Abigail. That's not a bad summary. So David and Abigail, but before it's David and Abigail, it's David and who? Nabal. Here's the deal: David and his men have been essentially camping out where this guy named Nabal has been pasturing his flocks. A thousand goats, 3,000 sheep—that's a ton of animals. And David and his men have basically been camping out there serving to protect this guy's flocks. Now, we don't want to overstate this—it's not their primary motive. They just happen to be there. But while they're there, they're going to scare off all the bad guys. They're going to scare off the wolves.

And then when the time comes for the sheep to be sheared, David thinks, well, a little bit of a tip would be appropriate. Now this is the sort of thing—whenever you read the Bible, you always have to be mindful that there are continuities and discontinuities between their life and your life. There are things about the human condition that are the same today, a thousand years in the future, five thousand years in the past. Just things about being human—it's normal continuities very much like us. And there are discontinuities. They didn't have cell phones. It's just something they would have no concept of, and you probably don't have a lot of agrarian culture to you. I mean, maybe some of you do, but maybe not quite like this.

So when you read the story, you might be like, "Well, was it reasonable for David to expect to get paid for taking care of this guy's stuff when he didn't have a contract or there was no official assignment?" And I think the answer to that is yes. If it seems curious to you, that's just because you didn't live in 1000 B.C. Palestine, so why would you know that? But we can take it from the text if that's the case.

So this whole thing is playing out, and when David finds out that it's time to shear the sheep and it's essentially time to get paid, David sends his men with a message. Let me pull out chapter 25, verses 1 to 7. There are kind of three parts to their message. What are they?

He starts off with a greeting—a blessing. "Hey, long life, good health." Now if you happen to know the end of the story, long life and good health—this is not going to come to pass. I think part of the irony of the story is that David's initial "Hey, man, I hope you're healthy and you live for a long, long time"—you're going to be dead in less than a week. But that's the first thing.

What's the second thing? "We protected your shepherds. That's right. We did not mistreat your people. Nothing was missing. You have been well protected, well provided for, well cared for."

And then, what's the climax? What's the third point? It's the bellhop with his hand out. Right? It's like, "And so what do we get?"

Nabal's Response

Look at 1 Samuel 25:9.

When David's men arrived, they gave Nabal this message in David's name, and then they waited. And Nabal answered David's servants, verse 10. "Who is this David? Who is this son of Jesse? Many servants are breaking away from their masters these days."

By the way, isn't it funny to hear three thousand years ago people were using the phrase "these days" like things have gotten really bad in 2020? Isn't that a crazy thing? It was three thousand years ago and he's like, "Man, it's not like the good old days. These days people are breaking away."

He said, "Why should I take my bread and water and the meat that I've slaughtered for my shearers and give it to the men coming from who knows where?"

Now, based on what you've seen in David so far, what do you think his response will be to this?

Not good. What have we seen in David when he is insulted, attacked, maligned, when they try to kill him? How does he respond? Every time? God will defend him. He never returns unkindness with unkindness. He never throws the spear back at Saul. In every instance, every time Saul has pulled something on him, David always just kind of drinks it and says, "Far be it for me to lay my hand on the Lord's anointed."

What's he going to do here? "Put on your swords."

David's Shift

Now, this is what you've got to see. This is very different from David, how David has always been.

In verse 12, David's men turned around and went back. When they arrived, they reported every word. And David said to his men, "Put on your swords." So they put on their swords and David put on his. And about 400 men went up with David while 200 stayed with his supplies.

That's very different. As you're reading the story you should see, "Oh, this is a new side of David." It's not so much a new thing—this has always been here. This has always been beneath the surface, but something has been staying his hand and that is now removed.

The difference here is that Saul was the Lord's anointed. This is it. David's nature—if you punch David, he is going to punch you back, unless you are the Lord's anointed.

And so all of the patience and all of the long-suffering and all of the willingness to take the hit and to not return it—that's not his normal. David's a fighter. He's a man of war. That's his normal mode of being. But Saul is the king, and if Yahweh wants Saul on the throne, then David's take is like, who am I? Who am I to speak against that. Nabal is not under any such protection. And so Nabal is about to get his head cut off. 400 men are about to descend on him and make everything go very, very badly for him. You hear the difference? You see how he's in a different context. So he responds a little bit different.

And the servants very quickly realize this is bad. We are sheep shearers. We are not men of war. And whatever the number count is, David's friends are a rowdy bunch. Do you remember this? The people that he gathers around him are not peace-loving men. They're constantly like, "David, let's kill this guy. David, let's kill this guy." Finally, David's like, "put on your swords." And you've got to think, they're like, "Finally, you know?" And now we get to go get our hands dirty. And so they're off. Right? Make sense?

Okay, so look at verse 14:

One of the servants told Nabal's wife, Abigail, "David sent messengers from the desert to give our master's greeting, but he hurled insults at them. Yet these men—David's men—were very good to us. They didn't mistreat us, and the whole time we were out in the fields near them, nothing was missing. Night and day, there were a wall around us all the time. We were herding our sheep near them. Think it over, see what you can do because disaster is hanging over our master and his whole household—I.E. over me." — 1 Samuel 25:14-15

The servants maybe were concerned about what's good for Nabal, I suspect they were concerned about what's good for them. He's such a wicked man that no one can talk to him.

Look at that paragraph again. What is the point? Like, in the narrative, remember the author of 1 Samuel—he's got a message. He's using a story to convey something. What do you think the point of that paragraph is? What's the takeaway as we're trying to understand the life of David?

This is kind of like an independent confirmation of what? Of his character. Yes. This is exactly right. This guy is not on the payroll. He has no motive to speak well of David, and yet he speaks well of David. The purpose of this paragraph is to be like, "No, seriously, you guys. David is a really, really good man. He has done good things. He behaves well. He treats people well. They've done everything right. He's not some scandalous guy." It's a vouching of David's character in case you haven't been convinced by some of the what may have felt like propaganda—more praise for David.

And then now finally—well, I was just gonna say you also hear another echo of Nabal's support. Yes. The opening paragraph is he's a certain kind of man, then you hear that he's a fool, well, then you hear that nobody can talk to him, then after he rejects David with that haughty rejection, then Abigail sees a fool. Throughout the whole narrative, you hear that Nabal is terrible. Nothing good is ever said about Nabal. He's a fool. His name literally means fool.

What Does It Mean to Be a Fool?

What does "fool" connote to you? What does that mean? If somebody's a fool, what is it? The opposite of wise. So what is the paradigm from wise to foolish? What are we talking about here? Unteachable. Cannot listen. Will not hear. Tendency towards self-destruction. Is it synonymous with being stupid? Are fools stupid?

Interesting. So sometimes is foolish more than stupid or less than stupid? More. Willful? Yes. It's almost like they're seeking conflict, seeking strife, seeking whatever motivation is pulling them down. Willful stupidness. Has a self-orientation. They consult themselves. Self-oriented.

Can I give an example from the story? Sure. So he's confronted by David's men in the desert saying, "Give us space." And he's like, "Well, who are you? Who are you? We don't know you." It's the son of Jesse. This is the king. Yes. Abigail recognizes someone as the king. And then at the end of the story, Nabal's throwing a vapor for himself, and he's acting like a king. It's like he's foolish. He's assuming he's the king. He makes the decisions. He's self-referent. Yes.

So here what you see is there are different aspects of foolishness, and we'll try to package it up tightly before we move on. Nabal is self-referential, self-oriented. He's blind in this particular case—he is blind to see the kingship of David, which is right before him—but he has a very clear vision of his own kingship. He's going to treat himself like a king.

Proverbs, of course, has tons to say about wisdom and folly. The essence of wisdom, the beginning of complete this phrase: the beginning of wisdom is? The fear of the Lord. Well, it suggests that the beginning of foolishness is a refusal to fear, a refusal to see the Lord.

Foolishness is very ingrained and is what we all do. There would be stupidnesses that persist, but I do like it when they fade away. Jesus says don't call somebody a fool. We'd be careful throwing that around.

So it seems like folly comprises some sense of knowledge or understanding, but there's also a component of the moral and what is good. It's not merely that I don't understand, it's that I don't want to understand. It's not merely that I'm stupid, but it's that I'm choosing to be evil. Nabal is this fool. He lives in this place where he should know better, but he doesn't want to know better, and he's content to be referring to whatever he happens to want in that particular moment. Nabal is a warning for us because truthfully, we do foolish things all the time.

Can we line up wisdom on the one side and foolishness on the other? Does that relate to humility and to pride? I think it absolutely does. It is wise to be humble, it is foolish to be arrogant. The arrogant are given to folly and the humble are given to wisdom. I think those things line up beautifully.

David is absolutely in the right. This is appropriate. All of his men see it. His wife sees it. Everybody sees it except him. That's a scary thing. It is possible to be the one guy that's right and everybody's wrong. We do not determine truth by the crowd, but we should be suspicious if everyone in the world disagrees with me, I should be suspicious that maybe I'm wrong. Nabal didn't seem to have that suspicion.

Abigail Enters the Story

So enter the hero of the story: Abigail. Abigail is his wife. Abigail means the father's joy, daddy's delight, those sorts of things.

Abigail lost no time. She took 200 loaves of bread, two skins of wine, five dressed sheep, five seahs of roasted grain, a bunch of cakes of raisins, all this other stuff. She sends the food ahead, but she doesn't tell her husband. Abigail is going to be the hero of this story. She's going to be the one who's going to fix everything. She is described with two adjectives in this chapter: discerning and beautiful, intelligent and a smokeshow. This is Abigail, married to this loser, so you've got to wonder how that came about.

When Abigail comes riding in, David shows up and he sees all of this food. Look at what David says in 1 Samuel 25:21:

David had just said, "It's been useless, all of my watching over this fellow's property in the desert so that nothing of his was missing. He's paid me back evil for good. May God deal with David, be it ever so severely, if by morning I leave alive one male of all who belong to him."

There's a footnote there—that verse is terribly translated in the NIV. But what is David's message here? What is he fulminating on? What is he seeing?

Waste of his time. Right? He's paying back evil for good, and the punch line in verse 22. What's the punch line in 22? Can I kill him? I'm gonna kill him. Okay. Now anybody that doesn't have the NIV, give me verse 22 because the ESV is gonna get this right. Does somebody have verse 22? You got it? Okay. That's probably gonna be right as well. Give us verse 22, Gary.

May God do so to the enemies of David and more also if by morning I leave as much as one male of any who belong to him. — 1 Samuel 25:22

Okay. That was right. So what David is saying is I'm gonna kill him and if I don't, may God kill him. That's what he's saying. The NIV says I'm gonna kill him and if I don't, may God kill me. And that's not what David said, okay? So there is this vow like, so help me, and I was like, so help me God, I'm gonna die if I don't—that's not what he said. He's like, if I don't kill him, let God kill him. And the reason that's important—well, we'll see why that gets important as we go. But David makes a vow and Abigail is gonna make him step down from it. Okay? And when he does, he's gonna do so consistent with his own words as properly rendered in NASB or the ESV but not in the NIV. Okay? Can I get the ESV one more time?

May God do so to the enemies of David and more also, if by morning I leave as much as one male of any who belong to him. — 1 Samuel 25:22

Got it? So may God do it not to David, but may God do it to the enemies of David is what he's saying. Okay? There's a hand. John?

Yeah. King James translates this very well. How do they—you wanna read it to us?

I don't have Hebrews. It's more explicit about it, more vaguely.

Oh, is that right? More explicit? Is it a little more violent?

And it's—I have not seen that. It's King James version. It says, "If I lean to the fallen ones, put it against the walls."

Oh, is this that? I've heard of that verse. That's it? Okay, go ahead. Let's share it. King James:

And 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. — 1 Samuel 25:22 (KJV)

Okay. I have heard that there was a verse somewhere in the King James Bible that says, "he that pisseth against the wall," and we have found it. So praise God. Is that a word to say? What is that, David? David, he's a wall of protection. I think it means that dudes are supposed to pee standing up, but I don't know. I've heard of that almost in the lore category, but I never noticed it because I don't read King James. That's really funny.

Okay, so David wants to kill this guy, and Abigail is just showing up with a pile of food—like just food and food and food and food and food—to kind of take the edge off before the conversation goes. This is kind of good advice. If somebody's mad at you, give them some food and then make your case, right?

So what happens here? This is Abigail. Tell me if you know this—this is kind of a long passage. I'm going to read this. What is this passage right here, 25:23 to I don't know what the end of it is, 31? What is the claim to fame of this passage? This is a superlative. If this was a high school student, this would get what superlative? Here's how it goes.

When Abigail saw David, she quickly got off her donkey, bowed down before David with a face to the ground. She fell at his feet and said, "My Lord, let the blame be on me alone. Please let your servant speak to you. Hear what your servant has to say. May my lord pay no attention to that wicked man Nabal. He's just like his name—his name is fool, and folly goes with him. But as for me, your servant, I did not see the men that my master sent." — 1 Samuel 25:23-25

Kelly, this is what you're saying—just more language on Nabal just being a loser.

Now, since the Lord has kept you, my master, from bloodshed and from avenging yourself with your own hands. As surely as the Lord lives and as you live, may your enemies and all who intend to harm my master be like Nabal. — 1 Samuel 25:26

Okay. What is she saying there in verse 26? She has a peculiar insight here.

Now since the Lord has kept you, my master, from bloodshed and from avenging yourself with your own hands, as surely as the Lord lives, may your enemies and all who intend to harm my master be like Nabal.

What is she—She's playing back to his character of not doing the bloodshed. That's almost like she's predicting.

Yes. Not doing what bloodshed? Taking revenge against Nabal.

I think she's seeing beyond that or before that. King—some days, he's also—she's pretty prophetic throughout.

She is prophetic, but I think—I don't think she's talking about her husband.

Lily? She's not going say anything to Stady because she stated she's almost—Yes. He says that he's gonna die. She's speaking the same word against David's enemies and David himself. She definitely is. Yes.

Something else here still that I want you to catch. Abigail is remarking on God's sovereignty, that God was ordaining it. Where has David failed to avenge himself over and over and over again? I think what she's saying is, time after time after time, you have stayed your hand. You have not put on your sword, and God will honor that.

I don't know exactly how she knows what the rumors are. Maybe everybody figured out David is perfectly capable of killing Saul. Maybe the cutting the corner of the robe off story has leaked out. Or maybe they just know without those particulars that David has killed his tens of thousands. And he could kill Saul if he wanted to, but he hasn't. I think she's tapping into his good character, previously displayed. You've done it so well here. Wouldn't it be a shame for you to step away from that? You have succeeded. All of your goodness, you've done it well. Don't blow it now, David. You could do it here. God has honored that. He will honor this. She is again speaking back just like the men were. She's speaking to his good character and calling him to continue to live at the height of excellence that he was. Don't stop now.

Also, at verse 24, she fell at his feet and said:

On me alone, on me alone be the guilt.

Isn't that twice? Absolutely. Abigail is saying, may the evil that has been done fall upon me instead. It is an atoning action, a substitutionary moment for sure.

So she's saying, listen, guy, like you've done it right. Don't blow it now. Verse 27:

Let this gift which your servant has brought to my master be given to the men who follow you. Forgive your servant's offense, for the Lord will certainly make a lasting dynasty for my master.

Now she's super prophetic, right? You will be—we keep hearing this over and over again. Saul says it. Jonathan says it. Abigail is saying it. You will be king. She continues:

Surely the Lord will make a lasting dynasty for my master, because he fights the Lord's battles. Let no wrongdoing be found in you as long as you live. Even though someone is pursuing you to take your life, the life of my master will be bound securely in the bundle of the living by the Lord your God.

God protects you from Saul. He's going to protect you all the way to the throne. Stay the course. Don't back down because you're in a bad mood, because somebody didn't give you a raisin cake. Here's a raisin cake, by the way. But listen to this:

The lives of your enemies—I.e., my husband—he will hurl away as from the pocket of a sling.

Isn't that an interesting little illustration to use with somebody who's the most famous sling thrower in all of history? That's interesting. My idiot husband will be like a rock in your sling. She continues:

When the Lord has done for my master every good thing he promised concerning him and has appointed him leader over Israel, my master will not have on his conscience the staggering burden of needless blood shed or of having avenged himself.

If her speech feels awkward, do you know why? Because she's bad at pronouns. She never uses pronouns. She keeps saying:

When the Lord has brought my master success...

It's like twelve times, fourteen times Abigail calls him "my master," "my lord." It's king language. She is saying, you are going to be the king, but you're already mine. It's pretty extraordinary.

The Longest Speech by a Woman in the Old Testament

Do you know what the claim to fame of that passage is? The longest dialogue by a woman. That's exactly right. The longest speech by a woman in the Old Testament is Abigail's speech right there. And it's interesting. The longest speech by a woman in the Old Testament is an attestation to the certainty of David's kingship, to the certainty of David's righteousness, but it's a rebuke. She's saying, you are the king, you are the great one, you are going to reign over all things. However, let me tell you what you need to do right now. It's a bold move. She's coming from a position of weakness. She is the servant in this relationship, and yet she is saying, don't screw this up, David.

There's an enormous amount of courage from a position of weakness to call him to a higher standard, to call him, frankly, to his own standard. And it works. It works beautifully. She encourages David to choose the path of peace, and he takes it. Takes the rebuke.

He admits that he's wrong, that he was doing something rash, and he humbles himself. And again, you guys, when we watch what are David's two biggest issues that are going to mess up his life? Lust and anger. Right now, he's super angry. He's literally got 400 men putting on swords to go kill this guy. Anger is in full effect and she's able to dissipate it. It's pretty amazing.

Catherine, here's another good example of how God uses women, and like, women weren't supposed to do that, what she did.

That's right. I mean, culturally, you just don't do that.

That's right. But she saw her responsibility, and so she's extremely brave. And it just shows the importance of women all through the Bible. He uplifts them up. I think that's absolutely one of the things we are to take from this story—to see that Abigail, who was not in a position of influence or power, nevertheless, from the position that she has and the wisdom that she has, she goes in and she's going to change the whole thing, which is going to be good for her household. Not good for Nabal, but we'll see that in a second. Good for her household and good for God's eternal purposes as it contributes to David's rise to the throne.

So take a look. Verse 32. David says to Abigail:

Praise be to the Lord, the God of Israel, who has sent you today to meet me. — 1 Samuel 25:32

That's high praise. Right? You're not functioning on your own. You're not independently doing this. You are God's agent. Sometimes God speaks directly to David, but today he's going to speak to David through the mouthpiece of Abigail.

May you be blessed for your good judgment. — 1 Samuel 25:33

She had the judgment that he didn't have. You ever notice your judgment fails when you get angry? Right? She had good judgment enough to overcome his, to keep him from bloodshed this day and from avenging myself with his own hands. Thirty seconds ago, avenging himself with his own hands seemed like a brilliant idea to him. And now something changed, and it doesn't seem that way anymore.

As surely as the Lord, the God of Israel lives, who has kept me from harming you, if you had not come quickly to meet me, not one male belonging to Nabal would have been left alive by daybreak. — 1 Samuel 25:34

Do you believe him? That's true. That's not hyperbole. He's like, there would have been blood everywhere.

And then David accepted from her hand what she had brought to him and said, go home in peace. I've heard your words and granted your request. — 1 Samuel 25:35

Okay? Anybody have ESV on that?

Yeah. The ESV really highlights the blessings, the three blessings.

That's right. Listen, this—the enemy totally obscures this. Hear this tripartite thing going on.

He said to Abigail, blessed be the Lord, the God of Israel, who sent you this day to meet me. Blessed be your discretion, and blessed be you who have kept me this day from the blood guilt and from avenging myself with my own hands. — 1 Samuel 25:33-34 (ESV paraphrase)

That's a better—that's a more apt translation. It's, I think, a little bit prettier than the way the NIV tries to smooth things out, but sometimes it loses stuff. David is speaking blessings, right, on her, on her judgment, on what God has done, and it's good news.

Foreshadowing and Prophecy

Now, what we're about to enter into is something prophetic. This whole story—Abigail has made a prophecy of what is going to happen, but this whole event is going to foreshadow something. It's not hard at all for us to look and say, Saul is doing evil to David and he takes it and doesn't avenge himself. Nabal is trying to be evil to David but he takes it and doesn't avenge himself. What the author of this thing wants you to learn, to see this—okay, maybe there's tension. The Nabal story is a microcosm of the Saul story. It's a preview of what's to come.

And so what's about to happen to Nabal is going to happen to Saul. Does this make sense? It is meant. You're supposed to watch this story and think, "Man, David could kill this guy. It would be reasonable for him to do so, but he's going to stay his hand and entrust himself to the Lord. I wonder how it's going to work out." And then once we get that answer to how that works out, our job is to take that and then apply that to the broader narrative that we're following as well. Cool? See how the foreshadow is going to play?

So what's going to happen?

When Abigail went to Nabal, he was in the house holding a banquet like that of a king. — 1 Samuel 25:36

What kind of banquet? To celebrate his own kingdom.

That's right. A banquet like that of a king. Who's the real king? It's David. But he's placing himself in the role of king. Of course he does. He's got 3,000 sheep and like a thousand—what did it say? Goats. Like, he's wealthy. He must get all the excess to feed those guys if he's having this banquet.

That's right. It would cost him nothing to have paid for these men, but instead he's just throwing himself a king party.

He was in high spirits and very drunk, so she told him nothing until daybreak. — 1 Samuel 25:36-37

Also, good tip, right? Smart.

And then in the morning when Nabal was sober and perhaps hungover, his wife told him all these things, and his heart failed him, and he became like a stone. About ten days later, the Lord struck Nabal and he died. I don't know what that means technically. Who were the physicians? His heart failed and became like a stone. Did he have a stroke? Did he have a heart attack? What is going on?

Something. Ten days later, he is dead. So what is it? He has a seizure. And does it say that he also died at 38? Yes. Okay, so at 37 he has a seizure and was paralyzed. That would make sense what became like a stone, meaning he couldn't move anymore. That makes sense. And then at 38 you've got that he's dead? Yeah. Okay?

Now remember the foreshadowing. What happens when David doesn't lay a hand on his enemy and just entrusts himself to the Lord? God takes care of it. This is going back to that thing that the NIV botched earlier on, where if I don't kill him, may the Lord do so. That's exactly what comes to pass. Once again, the imprecatory Psalms allow us to be peaceful. I do not need to be the agent of God's wrath. I do not need to be the avenger. Sometimes I want to be, but we don't get to be.

And David's like, Alright, if I don't avenge myself, the Lord's going to be like, Well, I guess I better do it. And that's what he does here. So the Lord avenges himself against Nabal, and when David hears that he's dead, he says, praise be to the Lord who has upheld my cause against Nabal for treating me with contempt. He has kept his servant from doing wrong and has brought Nabal's wrongdoing down on his head. David now very clearly thinks that the work that he thought was right and righteous is wrong. It would have been wrong. He has kept me from doing wrong and has brought Nabal's wrongdoing down on his own head.

When you're angry, everything feels righteous. And then later on, you're like, oh, that would have not been the right play. And that's what happens for David. Okay? And when David sees that he's gone, it's all over. And then to add insult to injury, what's the last thing that's going to happen to Nabal? He takes his wife. And by the way, not only is this guy could have gotten out of this for a raisin cake. Okay? He is going to die and his wife is going to be in the arms of David. Oh, and by the way, when David takes Abigail as his wife, what does Abigail bring with her? All of it. David's inheriting the entire estate.

I'm telling you, he could have gotten out of this for a nickel, and he's going to lose his life and his wife and his estate. And David never needed to raise a finger. Okay? What's that? I mean, how foolish. Like, my Nabal, I mean, could have been all yours. You could have kept it. You could have repented. You could have grown in wisdom and kindness. But instead, you're just surly and stupid and wicked, and so you lose absolutely everything.

And then David, David's pathway to being king is accelerated. And we get one more click on this whole journey. Okay?

Yeah, Hannah? What was the superlative that you would give out about Abigail? Well, in this passage, it's the longest speech of any woman in the Old Testament. That's what I meant. So not her, but this passage, the superlative of the passage, not of Abigail, is this is the longest speech of a woman. And it is the feminine role of leadership—massive influence, changing the direction, changing the course of this thing through not through domination and power, but through persuasion and kindness and generosity and beauty, and she wins the game. She's the hero of the story.

Yeah. Catherine? It seems like Solomon warned against all kinds of stuff with riches and multiple wives. They just get drunk on power and God has to deal with them. And that's been going on forever and ever. Right? And that you're right. I mean, the warnings are given to the king even before Solomon. In Deuteronomy, it says the kings must not have a lot of money and a lot of horses and a lot of wives. And then, of course, they go on to have as much money and horses and wives as they can have.

And again, David—this is by the way, this is David. Depending on how you count it, this is either David's second or third wife. Michael he kind of gets Michael and then Saul takes Michael away and that's going to be some weird stuff coming down the road with that. But David's going to have—you see in this story, it's lust and anger. Okay? The anger, he kind of overcomes that. But remember, Abigail's beautiful. David's going to win Abigail. He's building a harem, and this is what is going to lead to his downfall. Right? He is the picture of the Messiah, but he is not going to be the Messiah.

And in fact, in our precious minute left, here's what I want you to do. Just in your tables, just take a second.

We always want to try to look at what's happening and ask: what is the author trying to teach us not merely about David, but about the Messiah to whom David points? How does this story suggest or anticipate or foreshadow or frame in our minds how we should think about Messiah? Just take one minute and see what you can tease out, then we'll talk about it and then we'll be done.

Alright, I'd love to hear what you came up with. How does this story—when you look at it—what do you think the Holy Spirit meant for us to take away as he's building categories for Messiah in this? And I'll give to the front of the line anybody that hasn't already spoken today if you want to.

Eric pointed out that David's total faith in God for the results is just like Jesus' total faith and reliance in God for the results. Of course, David, being more flawed, would not always hold that faith and had to catch himself and remind himself. But it was that total faith and reliance on the Spirit.

I think that is the center of it, Eric—that David is completely reliant on the Lord, even to suffer whatever he has to suffer, believing that at the end of the day God is going to be his provision. Peter captures this idea. Look at this, I just looked this up while you guys were thinking:

When they hurled insults at him, he did not retaliate. When he suffered, he made no threats. Instead, he entrusted himself to him who judges justly. He himself bore our sins in his body on the tree so that we might die to sins and live for righteousness. By his wounds you have been healed. — 1 Peter 2

What we're seeing David do—and he's been doing a really good job, and then he kind of falters, then Abigail's like, "No, no, no, no. Stay in the game"—is that he entrusts himself to the Lord. And by that trust, the good end comes about. We're going to see Jesus do that. There are so many moments where if you were Jesus, you'd be like, "Okay, enough already. This is ridiculous. You're not listening to me." But Jesus stays under the suffering and trusts the Lord to provide. What David is doing, Jesus will do at a more extreme level, but David is doing that.

Lily asked whether Abigail is kind of adding to the image of David as the foreshadowing of the Messiah—especially since she says, "I'll wash the feet of the servants of my Lord." Is there something about that feminine wisdom and the nature of her being God's mouthpiece that shows a greater hold on what you see in David?

Yes. I would say Abigail is the hero of this particular chapter. David's not the hero of the story. It's absolutely Abigail. And you even see Abigail saying, as we mentioned earlier—she takes on herself the culpability of the blame for Nabal and says, "Let me be the bearer of sin in this instance." So yes, you absolutely see both parties playing that role. We often see David cast in the role of Messiah, but very often we'll see it lived out in Jonathan. We'll see it lived out in Abigail. We'll see it in relationships. So yes, I totally would affirm that.

And then one more thing before we go: How does the story end for David in this chapter? What does he win at the end of the story? He wins a bride, right? And so it is with Christ. He suffers. He entrusts himself to the Lord. He suffers all these things. And the result of his agony, the result of his trust in the Lord, is that he wins a bride who will be his. A beautiful bride.

That's it. Okay, all for now. Next week is whatever the next chapter is. So read ahead. Thanks.