Bible Talks

From: Messages of God's Love: 1954

1 Samuel 25:2-36²And there was a man in Maon, whose possessions were in Carmel; and the man was very great, and he had three thousand sheep, and a thousand goats: and he was shearing his sheep in Carmel. ³Now the name of the man was Nabal; and the name of his wife Abigail: and she was a woman of good understanding, and of a beautiful countenance: but the man was churlish and evil in his doings; and he was of the house of Caleb. ⁴And David heard in the wilderness that Nabal did shear his sheep. ⁵And David sent out ten young men, and David said unto the young men, Get you up to Carmel, and go to Nabal, and greet him in my name: ⁶And thus shall ye say to him that liveth in prosperity, Peace be both to thee, and peace be to thine house, and peace be unto all that thou hast. ⁷And now I have heard that thou hast shearers: now thy shepherds which were with us, we hurt them not, neither was there ought missing unto them, all the while they were in Carmel. ⁸Ask thy young men, and they will show thee. Wherefore let the young men find favor in thine eyes: for we come in a good day: give, I pray thee, whatsoever cometh to thine hand unto thy servants, and to thy son David. ⁹And when David's young men came, they spake to Nabal according to all those words in the name of David, and ceased. ¹⁰And Nabal answered David's servants, and said, Who is David? and who is the son of Jesse? there be many servants now a days that break away every man from his master. ¹¹Shall 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? ¹²So David's young men turned their way, and went again, and came and told him all those sayings. ¹³And 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. ¹⁴But 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. ¹⁵But 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: ¹⁶They were a wall unto us both by night and day, all the while we were with them keeping the sheep. ¹⁷Now 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. ¹⁸Then 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. ¹⁹And she said unto her servants, Go on before me; behold, I come after you. But she told not her husband Nabal. ²⁰And 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. ²¹Now 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. ²²So 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. ²³And when Abigail saw David, she hasted, and lighted off the ass, and fell before David on her face, and bowed herself to the ground, ²⁴And 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. ²⁵Let 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. ²⁶Now 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. ²⁷And now this blessing which thine handmaid hath brought unto my lord, let it even be given unto the young men that follow my lord. ²⁸I 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. ²⁹Yet 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. ³⁰And 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; ³¹That 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. ³²And David said to Abigail, Blessed be the Lord God of Israel, which sent thee this day to meet me: ³³And 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. ³⁴For 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. ³⁵So 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. ³⁶And 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. (1 Samuel 25:2‑36)

We now come to the story of Nabal, who pictures to us the ungodly part of the nation, of Israel who would not receive the Lord Jesus when He came into this world in humiliation. David sent a message to Nabal saying, “Peace be both to thee, and peace be to thine house, and peace be unto all that thou hast.” How this reminds us of the message spoken by the angels at the birth of the Lord Jesus, “On earth peace, good will toward men.” Luke 2:14¹⁴Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men. (Luke 2:14). But how was this message received by men, and by the nation of Israel to whom the Lord Jesus came? Alas, it was received in the same way as Nabal received the message from David, the rejected king. Nabal said, “Who is David? and who is the son of Jesse? there be many servants nowadays that break away every man from his master.” And so when the Lord Jesus came there was no room for Him in the inn. “He is despised and rejected of men.” Isaiah 53:3³He is despised and rejected of men; a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief: and we hid as it were our faces from him; he was despised, and we esteemed him not. (Isaiah 53:3). “He came unto His own, and His own received Him not.” John 1:11¹¹He came unto his own, and his own received him not. (John 1:11). They did not see or believe who He was as the sent One of God, nor would they even accept the works He did as a testimony to it (John 10:38, 39³⁸But if I do, though ye believe not me, believe the works: that ye may know, and believe, that the Father is in me, and I in him. ³⁹Therefore they sought again to take him: but he escaped out of their hand, (John 10:38‑39)). David had shown great kindness to Nabal and his men, but Nabal reward him evil for good. And oh, what wonderful works of love and grace the Lord Jesus did, yet in His hour of need, He could say, “I looked for some to take pity, but there was none; and for comforters, but I found none. They gave Me also gall for My meat; and in My thirst they gave Me vinegar to drink.” Psalm 69:20, 21²⁰Reproach hath broken my heart; and I am full of heaviness: and I looked for some to take pity, but there was none; and for comforters, but I found none. ²¹They gave me also gall for my meat; and in my thirst they gave me vinegar to drink. (Psalm 69:20‑21). They not only rejected the Lord of life and glory, but they crucified Him, putting Him to death in the most shameful way.

It is beautiful at this point to see Abigail, the wife of Nabal, brought in. She went out to meet David and brought food and wine for him. She spoke of Nabal as a son of Belial and acknowdged David as her lord, bowing down before him. She owned the guilt of her husband as though it were her own, and pleaded for mercy. David had come out to judge Nabal and his household, but the judgment was not executed at that time. In this way John the Baptist said, when announcing the coming of Christ, “And now also the ax is laid unto the root of the trees: therefore every tree which bringeth not forth good fruit is hewn down, and cast into the fire.” Matthew 3:10¹⁰And now also the axe is laid unto the root of the trees: therefore every tree which bringeth not forth good fruit is hewn down, and cast into the fire. (Matthew 3:10). Those who came out and were baptized with the baptism of rentance were like Abigail, who identified herself with David, and so the judgment of which John the Baptist spoke, did not fall at once on the guilty nation of Israel. Whether they would receive Christ or not was the final test.