The Well
The Well |
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Connecting Hope to the Hurting | |
Monday
May 19, 2008
There was a wealthy man from Maon who owned property near the village of
Carmel. He had three thousand sheep and a thousand goats, and it was
sheep-shearing time. This man's name was Nabal, and his wife, Abigail, was a
sensible and beautiful woman. But Nabal, a descendant of Caleb, was mean and
dishonest in all his dealings…
Meanwhile, one of Nabal's servants went to
Abigail and told her, "David sent men from the wilderness to talk to our master,
and he insulted them. But David's men were very good to us, and we never
suffered any harm from them. Nothing was stolen from us the whole time they were
with us. In fact, day and night they were like a wall of protection to us and
the sheep. You'd better think fast, for there is going to be trouble for our
master and his whole family. He's so ill-tempered that no one can even talk to
him!"
Abigail lost no time. She quickly gathered two hundred loaves of bread,
two skins of wine, five dressed sheep, nearly a bushel of roasted grain, one hundred raisin cakes, and two hundred fig
cakes. She packed them on donkeys and said to her servants, "Go on ahead. I will
follow you shortly." But she didn't tell her husband what she was
doing.
When Abigail arrived home, she found that Nabal had thrown a
big party and was celebrating like a king. He was very drunk, so she didn't tell
him anything about her meeting with David until the next morning. The next
morning when he was sober, she told him what had happened. As a result he had a
stroke, and he lay on his bed paralyzed. About ten days later, the
LORD struck him and he died.
When David heard that Nabal
was dead, he said, "Praise the LORD, who has paid back Nabal
and kept me from doing it myself. Nabal has received the punishment for his
sin." Then David wasted no time in sending messengers to Abigail to ask her to
become his wife.
1 Samuel 25:2-3; 14-19; 36-39
Again, I must refer to words from the Quick Verse Book I am studying, which says; "In the TV series 'The Honeymooners' Ralph Cramden used to threaten to knock his wife clear to the moon. 'One of these days, Alice, bang . . . zoom!' We all give similar threats at one time or another: 'I'll get you for this!' 'You'll be sorry you ever treated me that way!' 'You'll wish you had never been born!' When people mistreat us, we instinctively want revenge. We want to get even, to show them how it feels." I'm sure most of you can relate to this…right? I know I can, but I sure wish I couldn't!
Abigail did the right thing, for the right reason, at the right time, and got rewarded. However, she did it against her husband's wishes. Now, some would say that was horrible today; that a woman should never obey God over her husband…I disagree today as much as I did eight years ago when I got kicked out of a church for saying it when I compared Abigail and Sapphira (Acts 5).
Abigail was trying to save her husband's life, instead, because of his bitterness against David, he lost his life and she became the wife of the King. Now, is that not a turn of events? David knew what the outcome for a woman alone would be, so he rescued her just as she had rescued him. In the long run, she became one of his favorites!
Comments welcomed!
