Today, I am reading and commenting on  1 Samuel 25-27.

There are three accounts of David’s time on the run from King Saul in today’s passage.  I am going to start with my thoughts today on the first one and we will see if I write about the other two or not.  So, first we have the account of David’s interaction with Nabal and Nabal’s wife Abigail.  The first aspect of this account is the way Nabal answered the men David sent to him.  To me reading it today, it seems like David’s response to Nabal’s words is a bit over the top. Yes, it is dismissive of David and somewhat insulting, but is it really a harsh enough insult to justify bloodshed.  However, Nabal’s own servants apparently thought it was.  They went to Nabal’s wife Abigail and begged her to do something.  So, we should be careful about judging a situation from outside it.  To me, David seems to have overreacted, but to all of those who were there, his reaction was expected and considered justified.  There is one other piece of this account I want to point out.  Both Abigail and David expressed that they were pleased that David did not avenge himself on Nabal.  Neither seem to think that he would have been in the wrong to do so, but both thought it was better that he had not done so.  In the end, God avenged David against Nabal, and David was grateful that he had not done so himself.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.