2 Samuel 25
Abigal had taken gifts of food to David to ask him to forgive her husband for his foolish ways because he had made David angry enough to kill not only him but everyone around him. David did understand what she had said to him and then he sent her back home. When she got there, Nabal had been celebrating as if he were a king and had become very drunk. And so Abigail waited until morning when he was sober to tell him the things that had gone on the day before and at hearing this his heart failed him and his body became as stone, according to verse 37. About ten days later, God struck him dead.
When David heard that God had done this, he praised God that he had stopped him from going through with his plan, and that God himself took it upon himself to take Nabal out.
David then sent Abigail a message to ask her if she would become his wife and she accepted, and his servants went to take her to him. She and her five female servants did go and she married him. (vs 18-32)
And so what can we take away from this account to benefit us in today's world?
Instead of becoming fearful of what was going to happen, she took this bold step and immediately sprang into action to solve the situation. And in doing so, David had remembered that he was an honorable man who actually thanked her for making him see that he would have killed many innocent lives, had she not done what she did.
(Could we be as bold and courageous as Abigail should we need it in our world today?)
Abigail had taken much abuse from Nabal for many years. But she was a humble woman and recognized David as being a powerful man of God. It was courage on her part to go before him and his army that stopped him from doing what he went there to do. And because of it she had saved her entire household from attack.
(Are we as humble as she was, no matter what abuse we might take from others. Always keeping our faith in God and recognizing that he really is God?)
Even though Nabal had been cruel to her for so many years, she still seemed to honor him as she goes home and finds him drunk. Instead of telling him what had happened the day before, she waited until he was sober enough to get it whereas she could have instead gotten angry and thrown a hissy fit for having his party and becoming drunk.
(Can we hold back our anger until the time is right to calmly speak to someone that needs to hear what we have to say?)
And lastly but not in the least, that sometimes God will intervene in our situations to avert impending disaster or for some other reason that he has for us.
These are a few things we can take from Abigail's story And yet...
Don't get me wrong. I am not allocating cruelty or abuse in any sense of the word. However, dealing with it, not in anger but in ways that God calls us to do, is what is important. Learning to understand that whatever we are going through, we are growing in him for what is our ahead in our lives to make us stronger in him. And when we do, he will bless us. Just as he did Abigail by turning the cruelty she had endured by living with a rich husband, into being the wife of a one day king. Even.if that means our real blessing does not come until we go on to be with our King in heaven. That is where true blessing lies.
March 25, 2019 Promise: Praise be to God the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ who has blessed us in the heavenly realm with every spiritual blessing in Christ. Ephesians 1:3.
Thanks for coming today Friends! Have a blessed new week!
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