Samuel died; and all Israel gathered themselves together, and mourned for him, and buried him at his house at Ramah. Then David arose, and went down to the wilderness of Paran.* David has lost his closest confidant and support in Samuel, therefore he headed south to a desert area that had many caves and lots of foliage to hide in. David is still on the run from Saul who is trying to kill him because of the song of the women who danced and praised David for killing his 10 thousands, but only ascribed to King Saul the killing of thousands. In Saul’s mind, tortured now with envy and evil suspicion, he believed David would next take the kingdom from him. (1 Sam. 18:7-8) *World English Bible (WEB) used in this article.
2There was a man in Maon, whose possessions were in Carmel; these are both places in the tribe of Judah. And the man was very great. He had three thousand sheep and a thousand goats; and he was shearing his sheep in Carmel. This rich man could be considered a multimillionaire today because, in their day, wealth was computed in livestock. Compare Job, who had 7000 sheep, 3000 camels 500 yoke of oxen, 500 female donkeys and many servants, and that he was the greatest of all the people of the East. (Job 1:1-3) Job might be considered a multibillionaire in our day. 3Now the name of the man was Nabal; His name means foolish. and the name of his wife Abigail. Her name means, the father delights. This woman was intelligent and had a beautiful face; but the man was surly and evil in his doings. Unfortunately, this is a situation that happens all too often in this world, a bad husband with a good wife. Nabal was wealthy. Abigail married into money. She had good circumstances materially, but it’s hard to imagine she was happy with her husband.
He was of the house of Caleb. Caleb was one of the two spies that entered the land from the first generation. Because of his loyalty to Yahweh, he was given prime property in the land of Judah. Nabal got his wealth by inheritance. 4David heard in the wilderness that Nabal was shearing his sheep. Sheep shearing time was a time of festivity, much like harvest-time. It is comparable to our Thanksgiving or Christmas holidays. A time for rejoicing. All year the wool has been growing upon the sheep. Shearing them produces a harvest of wool that can be sold on the open market. With 3000 sheep, and the average of wool per sheep being about 12 pounds, that amounts to about 36,000 pounds, or 18 tons of raw wool. Allowing for shrinkage, poor fibers, dirt and oil about half of that would be useful, sellable wool. So that could be around 9 tons per year that Nabal could sell.
Lambs are difficult to shear. Like a boy who is afraid of his first haircut, lambs usually squirm and kick and bleat, therefore they use more manpower and time. The yield is generally smaller than that of mature sheep but their wool is fine and prized. Sheep are docile when being sheared. Perhaps they learn they’re better off to be relieved of their heavy coats each year.
They are also used for Passover sacrifices.
These facts remind us of Isaiah 53:7 concerning Messiah, “He was led as a lamb to the slaughter, And as a sheep before its shearers is silent so He opened not His mouth.” John the Baptist referred to Jesus as the Lamb of God (John 1:29). He is portrayed in Heaven as a Lamb as though it had been slain (Rev. 5:6). This figure of the Lamb stands for Jesus’s sacrifice of himself on the Cross at Passover. “For indeed Christ, our Passover, was sacrificed for us.” (1 Cor. 5:7b). We are called the sheep of his pasture (Ps 100:3, John 10:1-16; 21:15-17). Our “wool” is our service and praise to God for His care. As it says in Psalm 23, that He makes us lie down in green pastures (feeds us His Word both personally and through his under-shepherds, pastors and teachers) leads us beside still waters (to be partakers of the Holy Spirit) and restores our souls (saves us from our sins and puts childlike love for God and neighbor in our hearts). As a good Shepherd, Jesus laid down his life for his sheep. (John 10:11)
5David sent ten young men, and David said to the young men, “Go up to Carmel, and go to Nabal, and greet him in my name. 6Tell him, ‘Long life to you! Peace be to you, and peace be to your house, and peace be to all that you have. 7Now I have heard that you have shearers. Your shepherds have now been with us, and we didn’t harm them, neither was there anything missing from them, all the while they were in Carmel. 8Ask your young men, and they will tell you. Therefore let the young men find favor in your eyes; for we come on a good day. Please give whatever comes to your hand, to your servants, and to your son David.’” David is the anointed, but as yet, uninstalled king of Israel. It is the work of a king to guard his subjects from enemies foreign and domestic. Even on the run from his murderous and envious master, Saul, he does the work required of his office. He has been having his men guard Nabal’s flock throughout the year, keeping the shepherds and flock safe, although unsolicited and unacknowledged. It was only right for him to expect a donation to his men, especially at this festive time of year when hospitality was all the more expected. He did not demand any specific payment, like a tithe, for that would not be right, but only asked for any donation, “whatever comes to your hand” from the preparations that he would’ve made for his festival. David assures Nabal that nothing has been taken from him by his men nor was any of his wealth stolen by any of his men. In other words, they acted on Nabal’s behalf with integrity. They certainly were not outlaws as his reputation might have been in the mouths of some misinformed or antagonistic Israeli citizens.
9When David’s young men came, they spoke to Nabal all those words in the name of David, and waited. 10Nabal answered David’s servants, and said, “Who is David? Who is the son of Jesse? There are many servants who break away from their masters these days. Nabal spurns David’s request. He thinks ill of him. He implies that David has rebelled against King Saul when he says that “servants are breaking away from their masters” when in reality it is Saul who chased David away from serving him because he was an evil master. For his part, David was a very loyal servant of the king and honored him as “The Lord’s anointed.” Considering that Nabal is much like King Saul in moral character – harsh and evil, he would not be one to treat his employees very well either, but that whenever they quit on him Nabal no doubt blamed them instead of himself. He justifies himself and Saul, but makes David out to be the bad one. It is common for the wicked to slander the righteous. 11Shall I then take my bread, my water, and my meat that I have killed for my shearers, and give it to men who I don’t know where they come from?” Nabal is a selfish and ungrateful man who cannot appreciate the value of David and his men’s ministry on his behalf, who were risking their lives to serve Nabal’s interests. But people are like that even toward God. He gives them food and water and life and clothing and jobs and opportunities and wealth and health yet He does not receive anything back from them, even any gratitude (Romans 1:21). Nor do they live a right life after being treated so well by God. Yet, like David, God is often blamed and hated for the things that go wrong in life by people who are thankless and who abuse the gifts God lavishes on them daily.
12 So David’s young men turned on their way, and went back, and came and told him all these words. 13David said to his men, “Every man put on his sword!” David also put on his sword. David is hot over the insult. After putting himself and his men at risk for Nabal, to be treated like this was more than David could tolerate from the ungrateful and nasty man. However, David is acting rashly.
About four hundred men followed David These seasoned warriors are an overwhelming force coming at Nabal. and two hundred stayed by the baggage. This is typical for an army, some fight and some handle logistics and supplies. Armies need both. So too we as believers have different roles in the army of the Lord. (1 Cor. 11-12). 14But one of the young men told Abigail, Nabal’s wife, saying, “Behold, David sent messengers out of the wilderness to Greet our master; and he insulted them. 15But the men were very good to us, and we were not harmed, and we didn’t miss anything, as long as we went with them, when we were in the fields. 16They were a wall to us both by night and by day, all the while we were with them keeping the sheep. Nabal’s servant is key here because he alerts Abigail, the go-to person in the household, about what’s happened. He lets her know that David and his men are responsible for their safety and the safety of Nabal’s possessions for the entire year. He calls them a wall. Jesus Christ is a wall to us, protecting and delivering us from trouble. We are a wall to those we pray for or minister to in their need. Parents are a wall to their children. That’s what police are to society, that’s what armies are, that’s what first responders are in any community: they are a wall between the citizen and danger. And there was much danger to worry about in those days. The Philistines were directly to the west of them (in the currently-called Gaza Strip) and there were Israeli bandits also prowling about. Certainly Nabal’s flocks and herds would be a plum target for invaders, marauders and bandits. The shepherds who work for Nabal are also at risk of life and limb from such threats in tending these valuable assets.
When sheep are stressed their wool does not grow very well. That means that Nabal’s wealth is maximized by the protection of David’s men. These are all invisible benefits that prosper Nabal, but he is indifferent to them, a fool, as his name suggests. Being a rich man he should have realized the value of undisturbed sheep. The servants certainly did. Nevertheless, Nabal has total disdain for David. He only confirms his evil and harsh character.
People fret over the prosperity of the wicked. We read of that in Psalm 73:3-12 or 17:14 but Jesus tells us in Luke 6:35 that God is kind to the evil and the wicked. Yet, they have little regard for God’s demands on them to live rightly.
Romans chapter 2:4 tells us not to despise the goodness of God, for it is to lead us to repentance. But oh how often the rich have no time to appreciate God or the people that keep them wealthy by their protection or services. Even the rich would be stressed out if garbage men go on strike. Mansions become unpleasant places to live if their garbage is ripening in the summer heat. When’s the last time you gave thanks for those in such humble roles who keep your life from discomfort? We would not want to live without their services.
The big danger among those who are rich is highmindedness and trusting in wealth. That is what Paul warns those who are rich in this life against in 1 Timothy 6:17.
What the rich like Nabal do not realize is that their riches all they’re getting from life forever (unless they repent of course). It seems Nabal might have been in James’s mind when he wrote: “Come now, you rich, weep and howl for your miseries that are coming upon you! 2 Your riches are corrupted, and your garments are moth-eaten. 3 Your gold and silver are corroded, and their corrosion will be a witness against you and will eat your flesh like fire. You have heaped up treasure in the last days. 4 Indeed the wages of the laborers who mowed your fields, which you kept back by fraud, cry out; and the cries of the reapers have reached the ears of the Lord of Sabaoth. 5 You have lived on the earth in pleasure and luxury; you have fattened your hearts as in a day of slaughter.” (James 5:1-5) Jesus in Luke 6:24 tells us, “Woe unto you who are rich, for you are receiving your comfort in full.” Considering how little most of the rich regard God or repentance or love of neighbor, it is easy to see why Jesus says, How hard it is for those who trust in riches to enter the Kingdom (Mark 10:24). The rich man in Luke 16 never relieved his poor neighbor Lazarus with even the leftovers of his meals. He ended up in Hades begging for a drop of water from the same man he had no time or mercy for in his lifetime. We better be paying attention to these profound truths God mercifully gives us in His word. They are “a lamp to our feet and a light to our paths.” (Ps. 119:105)
17Now therefore know and consider what you will do; for evil is determined against our master, and against all his house; for he is such a worthless fellow that one can’t speak to him.” Abigail must’ve turned white with horror hearing these words. But this news only confirmed to her once again just how evil and foolish her husband is. She must act quickly.
18Then Abigail hurried and took two hundred loaves of bread, two bottles of wine, five sheep ready dressed, five seahs of parched grain, one hundred clusters of raisins, and two hundred cakes of figs, and laid them on donkeys. Being the mistress of the household Abigail could take from the provisions made for the great sheep-shearing festival. In effect, she raided the refrigerator to send to David what he should have gotten from her husband. 19She said to her young men, “Go on before me. Behold, I am coming after you.” Wisely, she sent the gift ahead of herself. Perhaps she remembered that Jacob sent gifts ahead of himself to Esau, the brother who wanted to kill him 20 years ago, on his way back to Canaan. Proverbs 18:16 tells us that “a man’s gift makes room for him.” Her hope is the gift would soften David’s wrath. But she didn’t tell her husband, Nabal. Abigail displays her wisdom again by not telling Nabal, because he would’ve put the kibosh on the emergency plan and thus doomed himself and his household to death that night. 20As she rode on her donkey, and came down by the covert of the mountain, that behold, David and his men came down toward her, and she met them. She is not a moment too soon.
21Now David had said, “Surely in vain have I kept all that this fellow has in the wilderness, so that nothing was missed of all that pertained to him. He has returned me evil for good. David repeats this in Psalm 109:5, “Thus they have rewarded me evil for good, And hatred for my love.” David continues to fume over this evil man’s response to his reasonable request for a donation. 22God do so to the enemies of David, and more also, if I leave of all that belongs to him by the morning light so much as one who urinates on a wall.” David plans to kill every male in Nabal’s household before dawn.
23When Abigail saw David, she hurried and got off of her donkey, and fell before David on her face, and bowed herself to the ground. Abigail assumes the posture of one who is thoroughly humbled. She is fighting for the lives of her husband and his household, just like Christ fought for us by humbling himself to death. “Let this mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus, who, being in the form of God, did not consider it robbery to be equal with God, but made Himself of no reputation, taking the form of a bondservant, and coming in the likeness of men. And being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself and became obedient to the point of death, even the death of the cross. ” (Philippians 2:5-8) 24She fell at his feet, and said, “On me, my lord, on me be the blame! What Abigail says here also makes her a type of Christ. Jesus told the Pharisees, you search the Scriptures in which you think you have eternal life, but they are they which testify of me. (John 5:39) So too, Abigail’s words and action testify of Jesus. The innocent Abigail takes the blame for the guilty Nabal. Christ took the blame for the guilty sinners of the world (which is all of us), as Isaiah 53:5 says of Messiah, “But He was wounded for our transgressions, He was bruised for our iniquities; The chastisement for our peace was upon Him,” Abigail has humbled herself before wrathful David. Christ humbled himself unto death to satisfy the wrath of God against us.
If Abigail was of a low character, she very well may have allowed David to come and kill her husband and thus be rid of the tyrant for good. But she is not, she respects Nabal as her husband, honoring her covenant with him. She loves him enough to put herself at risk for his sake, just as Christ did for us in our wickedness.
A very evil man has been protected by someone else without his knowledge. Nabal’s wealth was dependent upon the protection of David and his men; and the loyalty and hard work of his servants. Yet through all that, he was still harsh and evil in his dealings. Some people simply will never have faith and will stay blind all their lives to the good all around them.
Please let your servant speak in your ears. Hear the words of your servant. Jesus asked his Father while they were nailing him to the cross, “Father forgive them for they do not know what they are doing.”
25Please don’t let my lord pay attention to this worthless fellow, Nabal; for as his name is, so is he. Nabal is his name, and folly is with him; Abigail is not naive nor a doormat. She fully recognizes the character of her husband. So too with Christ, he does not turn a blind eye to our sins but convicts us of them so we might repent. But I, your servant, didn’t see my lord’s young men, whom you sent. 26Now therefore, my lord, as Yahweh lives, and as your soul lives, since Yahweh has withheld you from blood guiltiness, and from avenging yourself with your own hand, Abigail knows that David is acting in haste to seek to shed blood for the insult. Although David is wrong in his anger to kill, his anger stands as a type for the wrath of God, which, in His case, is just. Now therefore let your enemies, and those who seek evil to my lord, be as Nabal. Abigail recognizes that Nabal will reap what he has sown. And that it might be right soon. 27Now this present which your servant has brought to my lord, let it be given to the young men who follow my lord. Since the gift was something that David had originally sought from Nabal she hopes he will be pleased with it enough to turn back. 28Please forgive the trespass of your servant. We can hear Jesus asking for forgiveness for the offender in the words of Abigail. For Yahweh will certainly make my lord a sure house, Abigail now prophesies because my lord fights Yahweh’s battles. Abigail recognizes that David is serving God militarily. Evil will not be found in you all your days. Abigail is discreetly saying not to kill Nabal so that his service as a warrior for Yahweh will not have the stain of having killed a citizen over an insult.
29Though men may rise up to pursue you, and to seek your soul, yet the soul of my lord will be bound in the bundle of life with Yahweh your God. Abigail prophesies again that David will be protected by God even though he is being persecuted by Saul. It also stands for Jesus, who, although slain by those who sought his soul to destroy it, he will be raised from the dead – “bound in the bundle of life with Yahweh, His God.” He will sling out the souls of your enemies, as from the hollow of a sling. This is true of how God treats his enemies. Eventually he will throw all rebels into the lake of fire forever like slinging them out from a sling (See Rev. 20:15). 30It will come to pass, when Yahweh has done to my lord according to all the good that he has spoken concerning you, and has appointed you prince over Israel, 31that this shall be no grief to you, nor offense of heart to my lord, either that you have shed blood without cause, or that my lord has avenged himself. Abigail is simply brilliant. She can see that when David is finally King, and everything is good and prosperous in his life, and he looks back on this incident with Nabal it will seem very small to him. He will then regret it if he had killed him for it. When Yahweh has dealt well with my lord, then remember your servant.” Her final words to David to remember your servant, reminds us of the repentant thief on the cross whose final words to Jesus in Luke 23 were, “Lord, remember me when you come into your kingdom.” David will remember her later when the Lord takes her husband’s life. He will take the widow as his wife.
32David said to Abigail, “Blessed is Yahweh, the God of Israel, who sent you today to meet me! David recognizes that it was God himself who sent Abigail to him. 33Blessed is your discretion, David is impressed with her wisdom and character and blessed are you, who have kept me today from blood guiltiness, David finally recognizes that he would’ve been wrong to kill Nabal. Her soft answer has turned away his wrath. “A gentle answer (in this case, from Abigail) turns away wrath, but a harsh word (in this case, from Nabal) stirs up anger (in this case, David’s)” Proverbs 15:1. And from avenging myself with my own hand. David realizes he needed to “give room for wrath (to God) for, ‘Vengeance is mine, I will repay,’ saith the Lord.” (Romans 12:19) 34For indeed, as Yahweh, the God of Israel, lives, who has withheld me from harming you, unless you had hurried and come to meet me, surely there wouldn’t have been left to Nabal by the morning light so much as one who urinates on a wall.” Unless Christ had sacrificed himself to God surely there would not have been anyone of us saved from the earth.
35So David received from her hand that which she had brought him. God received the sacrifice of Jesus on our behalf. Then he said to her, “Go up in peace to your house. Behold, I have listened to your voice, and have granted your request.” The request that God has granted from Jesus is that we might have forgiveness of sins, for ‘his blood speaks better things than that of Abel’s’ (Hebrews 12:24).
36Abigail came to Nabal; and behold, he held a feast in his house, like the feast of a king. Nabal’s heart was merry within him, for he was very drunk. Here, Nabal represents the world because it wants only to eat drink and be merry. All the while, just outside the perimeter of their knowledge, the wrath of God is building up to descend upon them just as David would have done to Nabal. Jesus warned his own disciples (us) “Be on guard, so that your hearts will not be weighted down with dissipation and drunkenness and the worries of life, and that day will not come on you suddenly like a trap; for it will come upon all those who dwell on the face of all the earth.” Luke 21:34-35. And, “It was the same as happened in the days of Lot: they were eating, they were drinking, they were buying, they were selling, they were planting, they were building; but on the day that Lot went out from Sodom it rained fire and brimstone from heaven and destroyed them all. It will be just the same on the day that the Son of Man is revealed.” Luke 17:28-30 Nabal is a fool in every sense of the word. He is about to reap what he has sowed.
Therefore she told him nothing, until the morning light. Never minister the Gospel to a drunk. Wait until they are sober. God does not want drunken converts because in the morning they will have forgotten what they said the night before or will change their minds. Sober truths must be given to those who are sober. The prodigal son did not come home until all the drinking and wild living went out of him. 37In the morning, when the wine had gone out of Nabal, his wife told him these things, and his heart died within him, and he became as a stone. Nabal had something like a seizure upon hearing this news that left him paralyzed. 38About ten days later, Yahweh struck Nabal, so that he died. God gave him 10 days to repent. In that time, if he could have, he should have sent a gift to David, perhaps double, with an apology and an admission of being foolish and ungrateful. But that is not what we read here for if he had repented, certainly the Lord would not have struck him in judgment. 39When David heard that Nabal was dead, he said, “Blessed is Yahweh, who has pleaded the cause of my reproach from the hand of Nabal, the Lord will always vindicate his servants, sooner or later. We must not grow weary in well doing even if we do not see our vindication here on earth. Many believers have died without ever being vindicated in this life. Certainly on the day of judgment all things will be revealed and fitting recompenses and rewards will be given out.
And has kept back his servant from evil. David recognizes that if he had he killed Nabal and his household he would be guilty of committing a great evil. Yahweh has returned the evildoing of Nabal on his own head.” The Lord says, vengeance is mine I will repay. And he finally did, on David’s behalf. David sent and spoke concerning Abigail, to take her to himself as wife. Had David killed Nabal, it would’ve been improper for him to benefit from the act by taking the widow that he made. (Although he would sadly do that later with Bathsheba) It was God who had joined Nabal and Abigail together in the covenant of marriage, and it was God who ended that covenant by the death of the husband.
40When David’s servants had come to Abigail to Carmel, they spoke to her, saying, “David has sent us to you, to take you to him as wife. This marriage between David and Abigail hides for us a very profound truth revealed in the New Testament. In Romans 7:2-4, it states “For the woman who has a husband is bound by the law to her husband as long as he lives. But if the husband dies, she is released from the law of her husband. 3 So then if, while her husband lives, she marries another man, she will be called an adulteress; but if her husband dies, she is free from that law, so that she is no adulteress, though she has married another man. 4 Therefore, my brethren, you also have become dead to the law through the body of Christ, that you may be married to another—to Him who was raised from the dead, that we should bear fruit to God.” The apostle makes an analogy between a married couple and our relationship, first to the law, then to Christ. A wife cannot be joined to another man all the while her husband lives. If she does, she will be an adulteress-someone who cannot inherit the kingdom of God (see I Cor. 6:9-10). She must remain loyal to her husband for his entire life, as Abigail was. She could not have been happy with such a harsh husband, nor are we happy to have the law as our spiritual husband.
The law cannot be reasoned with, just as it was said of Nabal previously in verse 17, “there is no talking to him.” Taking this one sentence about him, Abigail’s husband was a type of the law. You can’t appeal to it to change its mind about what’s a sin or how severe it is. The Law is a fixed thing and only condemns if we break it. “The written law brings death,” (2 Cor. 3:6b). It offers no remedy, it offers no mercy. All people are “married” to the Law just by being human. We must all submit to it like a wife to a husband. Its harshness makes us miserable because we are sinful by nature. It makes us “children (objects) of wrath.” (Eph. 2:2)
As Peter put it about the burden of the Law, “Now therefore, why do you test God by putting a yoke [of the Law] on the neck of the disciples which neither our fathers nor we were able to bear?” (Acts 15:10) It is not that the law is evil. Paul testifies that “the law is holy, and the commandment holy and just and good.” (Ro. 7:12) It is clear that the law is a good thing, for it is wrong to steal, or murder, or commit adultery, or lie about someone in court. These laws if obeyed, make society good and peaceful to live in. Yet we are all lawbreakers in one way or another, if only in our hearts, especially before God, whose laws are perfect and whose demands are ultimate.
The only remedy when one has violated the law and one hopes to avoid its wrath, is mercy. Although mercy is not found in the letter of the law, it can come from the Judge who administers that law. This is why we pray, God have mercy on me. We don’t pray “Law have mercy on me.”
As long as we are “married” to that law it has jurisdiction over us as long as we live. That’s the point Paul makes in Romans 7:1. A death must occur to break its domination. This is where Christ comes in. When we put our faith in Jesus Christ, we merge with his death. Baptism stands in part for our merging with His death. In effect, we die with him. This death sets us free from the law that had ruled so harshly over us but could never create righteousness in us.
The best we could ever come up with was still never completely good. There was some sin somewhere, sometime. “Surely there is not a righteous man on earth, who always does good and doesn’t sin.”(Eccl. 9:21). We were violators while married to the Law. When Christ was raised from the dead we could join with him now in a new life free of sin. Not only do we no longer hate and murder, but we also now pray for those who hate us; fornicators become chaste, thieves become industrious and generous, adulterers seek to return to their original spouse.
No longer do we do good works to offset our bad works, or to gain favor with God, but we do them out of a heart set free from its sins by the Son of God (John 8:31-36). To love God and neighbor was something the law as husband could never let us do. It was too weak through our flesh nature (Ro. 8:3). The persistent falling short of the glory of God while married to the Law as Paul speaks of in the rest of Romans 7 is now over. Through Christ who lives in us, we can live lives pleasing to God. That yoke that Peter speaks of has been taken off in Jesus. He takes from us the weary and heavy burden of our failure under our marriage to the Law and replaces it with a yoke that is easy and light as our new spiritual husband. (Matthew 11:28-30).
Abigail has left a life of wealth with many material possessions she had while married to a harsh man. Now she is joined with a good man but who is impoverished and on the run, whose “life is continually in his hands” (Ps. 119:109). Like Abigail, we too may find our lives physically or materially worse off following Jesus than we were before then. We have many examples of this in Scripture and from Church history.
It would not be until David was installed as king that Abigail would experience riches again. We too will not experience the eternal riches of the Kingdom until Christ is installed as king when he returns to earth. At that time the meek shall inherit the earth; then we will receive our heavenly rewards. It is then that no one will steal our riches and no moth nor rust will corrode them (Matthew 6:20), or as Peter says it will be “an inheritance incorruptible and undefiled and that does not fade away, reserved in heaven for you” (1 Peter 1:4).
41She arose, and bowed herself with her face to the earth, and said, “Behold, your servant is a servant to wash the feet of the servants of my lord.” Abigail exhibits the kind of humility Jesus himself exhibited and also enjoined on his disciples when he said, “whoever desires to become great among you, let him be your servant. And whoever desires to be first among you, let him be your slave— just as the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give His life a ransom for many.” (Matthew 20:26-28) 42Abigail hurried, and arose, and rode on a donkey, with five ladies of hers who followed her; and she went after the messengers of David, and became his wife. Abigail later gave birth to a son named Chileab. His name means “like the father.” (2 Samuel 3:3). Just like Abigail and David produced a child which was like the father, we too now being joined to Christ produce fruit unto God. We are called to “be perfect as your Heavenly Father is perfect.” (Matt. 5:48), but when we were married to the law the only child we ever produced was death (Romans 7:4). 43David also took Ahinoam of Jezreel; and they both became his wives. 44Now Saul had given Michal his daughter, David’s wife, to Palti the son of Laish, who was of Gallim. David had three wives now (Michal was betrothed to David, but taken away from him by her father, Saul. David would later retrieve her from her husband who wrongly had her for his wife (2 Samuel 3:14-15). David would have 4 more wives along with at least 10 concubines. Polygamy was overlooked by God at the time, but He now insists that we have one spouse until their death. This restriction stems from human marriages of men and women being a type of Christ’s eternal covenant with his Church.
Walking The Ancient Paths 