May the mumbling commence!
Let’s give thanks for those marvelous women of faith in the Hebrew Bible. Today’s Scripture reading includes 1 Samuel 25. In this chapter, only Abigail stands between two hotheaded men – her husband and David. Both Nabal (Abigail’s husband) and David make assumptions about the other based on their own ways of dealing with people.
David assumes that Nabal will reward him for protecting the flocks and servants under his care. David sends a message to Nabal at sheep shearing time so that David and his men might share in this time of harvest. David would reward those who protected his wealth.
Nabal, on the other hand, assumed David was up to no good. He did not who David the son of Jesse was, so Nabal assumed that David was trying to freeload. He assumed David had rebelled against his master King Saul. So Nabal refused to share. What a pity! Everything we needed to know we learned in kindergarten – and to share was one of those life skills.
When David’s men returned with this offensive response to David’s request, David’s sense of justice was aroused. He ordered his men to strap on their swords, and David strapped on his own sword. David made an oath to kill all the men of Nabal’s household.
Then the unlikely heroes stepped forward to prevent disaster. First, an unnamed servant stepped forward and told Abigail what had happened. Abigail and the servant realized the imminent danger, so Abigail reacted quickly and without the knowledge of her husband. She collected and sent a peace offering to David and his men that she rode behind to meet the war party. When she met David she fell on her face. Read their interaction below from 1 Samuel 25:24b-34:
"Upon me alone, my lord, be the guilt; please let your servant speak in your ears, and hear the words of your servant. My lord, do not take seriously this ill-natured fellow, Nabal; for as his name is, so is he; Nabal is his name, and folly is with him; but I, your servant, did not see the young men of my lord, whom you sent.
Now then, my lord, as the Lord lives, and as you yourself live, since the Lord has restrained you from bloodguilt and from taking vengeance with your own hand, now let your enemies and those who seek to do evil to my lord be like Nabal. And now let this present that your servant has brought to my lord be given to the young men who follow my lord. Please forgive the trespass of your servant; for the Lord will certainly make my lord a sure house, because my lord is fighting the battles of the Lord; and evil shall not be found in you so long as you live. If anyone should rise up to pursue you and to seek your life, the life of my lord shall be bound in the bundle of the living under the care of the Lord your God; but the lives of your enemies he shall sling out as from the hollow of a sling. When the Lord has done to my lord according to all the good that he has spoken concerning you, and has appointed you prince over Israel, my lord shall have no cause of grief, or pangs of conscience, for having shed blood without cause or for having saved himself. And when the Lord has dealt well with my lord, then remember your servant."
David said to Abigail, "Blessed be the Lord, the God of Israel, who sent you to meet me today! Blessed be your good sense, and blessed be you, who have kept me today from bloodguilt and from avenging myself by my own hand! For as surely as the Lord the God of Israel lives, who has restrained me from hurting you, unless you had hurried and come to meet me, truly by morning there would not have been left to Nabal so much as one male."
Abigail took all the blame on herself, and she took David’s willingness to listen as a sign that bloodshed would not be forthcoming. Then she named the present of food for David and his men. And Abigail named the fact that David is fighting the battles of the Lord – not that the Lord is with David but that David is with the Lord.
Abigail dispersed the assumptions of David and Nabal by speaking the truth of God. And David recognized the work of the Spirit in Abigail, so David’s wrath was turned away.
May we humble ourselves and be peacemakers, like Abigail.
Enough mumbling for now…
Peace Out
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