Dennis Tuuri

to the end that God would indeed grant us to shine forth in holy beauty as his people. We ask that he would shine the light of his word upon us today. The scripture text is 1 Samuel 25:1-42. Please stand for the reading of God’s word.

1 Samuel 25. Then Samuel died and the Israelites gathered together and lamented for him and buried him at his home in Ramah. And David arose and went down to the wilderness of Paran.

Now there was a man in Maon whose business was in Carmel. And the man was very rich. He had 3,000 sheep and a thousand goats. And he was shearing his sheep in Carmel. The name of the man was Nabal and the name of his wife Abigail. And she was a woman of good understanding and beautiful appearance. But the man was harsh and evil in his doings, and he was of the house of Caleb. When David heard in the wilderness that Nabal was shearing his sheep, David sent 10 young men.

And David said to the young men, “Go up to Carmel, go to Nabal, and greet him in my name. And this you shall say to him who lives in prosperity. Peace be to you, peace to your house, and peace to all that you have. Now I have heard that you have shearers. Your shepherds were with us and we did not harm them, nor was there anything missing from them all the while they were in Carmel. Ask your young men and they will tell you.

Therefore, let my young men find favor in your eyes, for we come on a feast day. Please give whatever comes to your hand to your servants and to your son David.” So when David’s young men came, they spoke to Nabal according to all these words in the name of David and waited. Then Nabal answered David’s servants and said, “Who is David and who is the son of Jesse? There are many servants nowadays who break away each one from his master.

Shall I then take my bread and my water and my meat that I have killed for my shearers and give it to men whom I do not know where they are from?” So David’s young men turned on their heels and went back. And they came and told him all these words. And then David said to his men, “Every man gird his sword.” So every man girded on his sword. And David also girded on his sword. And about 400 men went with David, and 200 stayed with the supplies.

Now, one of the young men told Abigail, Nabal’s wife, saying, “Look, David sent messengers from the wilderness to greet our master, and he reviled them. But the men were very good to us. We were not hurt, nor did we miss anything as long as we accompanied them when we were in the fields. They were a wall to us both by night and day. All the time we were with them keeping the sheep. Now therefore know and consider what you will do for harm is determined against our master and against all his household for he is such a scoundrel that one cannot speak to him.

Then Abigail made haste and took 200 loaves of bread, two skins of wine, five sheep already dressed, five seahs of roasted grain, 100 clusters of raisins and 200 cakes of figs, and loaded them on donkeys. And she said to her servants, “Go on before me. See, I am coming after you.” But she did not tell her husband Nabal. So it was as she rode on the donkey that she went down under cover of the hill, and there were David and his men coming down toward her, and she met them.

Now David had said, “Surely in vain I have protected all that this fellow has in the wilderness, so that nothing was missed of all that belongs to him, and he has repaid me evil for good. May God do so and more also to the enemies of David if I leave one male of all who belong to him by morning light.” Now when Abigail saw David, she hastened to dismount from the donkey, fell on her face before David, bowed down to the ground.

So she fell at his feet and said, “On me, my lord, on me let this iniquity be. And please let your maidservant speak in your ears and hear the words of your maidservant. Please let not my lord regard this scoundrel Nabal. For as his name is, so is he. Nabal is his name and folly is with him. But I, your maidservant, do not see the young men of my lord whom you sent. Now therefore, my lord, as the Lord lives, and as your soul lives, since the Lord has held you back from coming to bloodshed, and from avenging yourself with your own hand.

Now then, let your enemies and those who seek harm for my lord be as Nabal. And now this present which your maidservant has brought to my lord, let it be given to the young men who follow my lord. Please forgive the trespass of your maidservant. For the Lord will certainly make for my lord an enduring house because my lord fights the battles of the Lord and evil is not found in you throughout your days.

Yet a man has risen to pursue you and seek your life, but the life of my Lord shall be bound in the bundle of the living. But the Lord your God, and the lives of your enemies he shall sling out as from the pocket of a sling. And it shall come to pass, when the Lord has done for my Lord, according to all the good that he has spoken concerning you, and has appointed you ruler over Israel, that this will 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.

But when the Lord has dealt well with my lord, then remember your maidservant.” Then David said to Abigail, “Blessed is the Lord God of Israel, who sent you this day to meet me. Blessed is your advice. Blessed are you because you have kept me this day from coming to bloodshed and from avenging myself with my own hand. For indeed, as the Lord God of Israel lives, who has kept me back from hurting you, unless you had hastened and come to meet me, surely by morning light, no males would have been left to Nabal.

So David received from her hand what she had brought him and said to her, “Go up in peace to your house. See, I have heeded your voice and respected your person.” Now Abigail went to Nabal, and there he was holding a feast in his house, like the feast of a king. And Nabal’s heart was merry within him, for he was very drunk. Therefore, she told him nothing, little or much, until morning light. So it was in the morning, when the wine had gone from Nabal, and his wife had told him these things, that his heart died within him, and he became like a stone.

Then it came about after about 10 days, that the Lord struck Nabal, and he died. So when David heard that Nabal was dead, he said, “Blessed be the Lord who has pleaded the cause of my reproach from the hand of Nabal and has kept his servant from evil. For the Lord has returned the wickedness of Nabal on his own head.” And David sent and proposed to Abigail to take her as his wife. When the servants of David had come to Abigail at Carmel, they spoke to her, saying, “David sent us to you to ask you to become his wife.” And then she arose, bowed her face to the earth, and said, “Here is your maidservant, a servant to wash the feet of the servants of my Lord.

So Abigail arose in haste and rode on a donkey attended by five of her maidens and she followed the messengers of David and became his wife.

Let’s pray. Father, we thank you for your word. We thank you, Lord God, for the light of your word. We thank you that it is to this word and to this word alone that we turn to understand the times in which we live and the correct response that we as individuals and as a church should make to them. We pray Lord God that you would illuminate this text through understanding that you might show us marvelous things out of your word. Transform us. Bring us Lord God to repentance. Strike us, Father, through the text and heal us. In Christ’s name we ask it. Amen.

Please be seated.

Very early in the days of our country’s history, there was what we might call today a terrorist attack by pagans upon the church of Christ in 1675 or thereabouts. Please don’t hold me to the exact date. King Philip’s War was entered into. King Philip was an Indian and the Indians rose up against the colonists in the early portion of our country’s history and struck at churches in kind of terrorist guerrilla warfare sort of manner, took some people into captivity. We have the diary of a woman, a pastor’s wife, who was taken into captivity by the Indians and held for a while as a hostage.

And the response of the leadership to this is very interesting to note. Increase Mather was the father of Cotton Mather. So he’s like the second generation of Puritans in the context of the revival and the settling of America, and Cotton, his son, was third generation. We’re more familiar with Cotton, I suppose, and his being an eminent pastor and great effect on the civil magistrates of early colonial America, but he learned from his father, of course, the Puritan Increase Mather.

And Increase Mather saw, as many other clergy did in King Philip’s War, first and foremost the need to come to repentance. I have a book that is a summation of an account of Increase Mather’s commentary on King Philip’s War and the title of the book is, I think, the title of his sermon that he gave after this occurred. And the sermon was called “So Dreadful a Judgment.” Of course, the Puritans understood the need to rise to arms to fight the pagans, to fight the Indians, and to put them to shame for their dastardly deeds. But first and foremost they saw in the hand of an ungodly pagan group the hand of God. His sword lifted not first and foremost against the pagans, but his hand lifted first and foremost against his own people to chastise them.

I was at a luncheon meeting this last week with several probably the most committed and influential ground troop leaders, so to speak, in terms of Christian political action in the state of Oregon. And they were kind of plotting strategy for next year’s election cycle. And of course the topic of what’s occurred in the last couple of weeks came up. And one of the men was incensed that some had suggested, probably some who were not Christian, that since the target was the World Trade Center it was a judgment upon the materialism of America.

And I brought up this incident that in the context of King Philip’s War, Increase Mather fought in just those same terms. I don’t know if that’s what the proper understanding of the World Trade Center bombing is, but I do know that materialism and a lust for gold has been a continuing sin in the context of America’s history and remains so today. Increase Mather bemoaned the fact that in his time various Puritan pastors were leaving their pulpit to go get vast land holdings in the newly conquered lands. And he saw this as a judgment specifically upon pastors for their greed as well as the congregants as well.

I want to look at a couple of texts today including one we just read, and we won’t be able to anywhere near plumb the depths of this text. Howard did a wonderful job a month or so ago speaking of it in terms of the peacemaking principles or truths found in the scriptures and other places, and it’s a good illustration of that, and Howard preached from that text. God laid it on my heart that this is also a wonderful picture and application to us of how we are to petition God in times of difficulty or trouble. Not knowing of course at the time that the text would be so applicable to what we would go through as a nation and people and through what some of us in our personal lives are going through as well.

So we want to look at that text. We want to look at the account in Luke of the collapse of a tower of Siloam where 18 people were killed as a result of a tower collapsing. And we want to look at these texts as a way to properly understand and evaluate what’s happened in the last two weeks both in the context of our nation and our church and in our individual families represented here.

What I want to do then is talk about praying for peace. In a sense, that’s what Abigail is doing. Now, she’s not praying, you know, in the sense that we would think of it, but she’s petitioning the lesser David as we petition the greater David for peace in her time. Peace, of course, is not defined as the absence of conflict or the victory of one group over another. Ultimately, peace is defined as the presence of God and all his blessings.

And as the text moved ahead with Abigail’s request, she prayed for peace. Peace was granted. God destroyed the wicked who would not repent from his deeds. Nabal was destroyed. God kept David from sin and from avenging himself with his own hand. He was not yet king. He’d been anointed king, but he knew that he had to wait for Saul to be judged by God and set aside. And so his kingdom was established with more righteousness than it would have been otherwise. That’s peace.

And as we come together to consider the events of the last two weeks, we want to pray for peace, not ultimately war. Warfare is to the end that God’s blessings might be established in the land. And I think that praying for peace involves these two elements that Increase Mather understood the need to pray for. Certainly judgment against the wicked and victory in battle, but also certainly repentance on the part of the nation for whatever it is that God is judging us for. And there are many and myriad causes of such judgments.

You know, it struck me as I was thinking about this last night that we began as a church somewhere in the early 80s, 83 or so. And you know, I think from the very first year we began meeting, we began holding these imprecatory prayer services. Every year on the anniversary of Roe v. Wade, we ask for God’s judgment upon the nation. And so when God humbles our nation and provides what could be interpreted as a judgment, it seems fit to understand that our prayers are being answered.

So let’s think again today about the prayers of God’s people and their importance in the context of who we are as a people and nation and church. And let’s look at this text regarding Abigail as an example to us.

Proper prayer. On your outlines: First of all, prayers are of central importance in times of national distress and trouble. Psalm 50:15 says, “Call upon me, God says, in the day of trouble, I will deliver you and you shall glorify me.” In Joel 2, we’re told that whenever disaster happens, and in the time of Joel they were to call a solemn assembly, call people to fasting, and call people to pray for the great disasters that God had brought upon people.

Times of national difficulties and disasters, times of personal trials and tribulations in our lives are times in which we should seek the face of God. John Calvin in his Institutes said this. When there appear the judgments of the Lord’s anger as pestilence, war, and famine, fasting is a holy ordinance and one salutary for all ages. The pastors urge the people to public fasting and extraordinary prayers.

Again, later in Calvin’s Institutes, he says, “And if either pestilence or famine or war begins to rage or if any disaster seems to threaten any district and people, then also it is the duty of the pastors, the duty of the pastors, to urge the church to fasting in order that by supplication the Lord’s wrath may be averted.”

Increase Mather had the same mindset, and “So Dreadful a Judgment” upon the Puritan people was his first instinct in times of national disaster.

Secondly, of course, prayer is of central importance to the church as we worship. We’ve talked about this last year as we went through the worship services of the church. We know in Genesis 4:26, the very concept of worship is summarized by saying that men began to call on the name of the Lord, to call, to pray to God. This is the essence of worship. We know that in Leviticus 9:22, a nice summation of tabernacle worship, the offerings were presented as a precursor to Aaron placing his benediction upon the people.

And we know that all those offerings, the smoke that went up as well as the incense that form part of the temple offering are specifically linked in Psalm 141:2 as well as in Revelation 8 to prayer. Psalm 141:2 says, “Let my prayer be set before you as incense.” So at the center of the worship in the tabernacle and the temple was this rising up representing the prayers of God’s people, prayers of central significance to the prayer of the church in the Old Testament and the worship of the church in the Old Testament and also prayers of central significance to the worship of the church in the New Testament.

You’ll remember that several weeks ago when I preached on Jesus’s first cleansing of the temple, we made reference to Jesus’s last cleansing of the temple in Mark 11:17. And our Savior said then, he said that he taught them saying, “Is it not written, my house shall be called a house of prayer for all nations, but you have made it a den of thieves.” Our Savior identifies the place where God’s people come together to worship him as preeminently a house of prayer, not just for that group or that nation, but for all nations.

You know, when Darius provided money and materials to have the temple rebuilt, it was for this very reason. Darius said that he needed prayer. The nations of the world needed prayer and prayer is to be set in the context of that temple and the worship of God. So that was Darius’s entire motivation to fund the rebuilding of Jerusalem, the walls and the temple, was to provide a place of prayer for all the nations.

And so our Savior identifies the house of God today as we assemble together. And I think our Savior tells us that we are preeminently a house of prayer for all the nations. Paul in Acts 16:13 when he goes on the Sabbath day to preach and see where he could worship God, he goes to a place where it is said prayer was customarily made. They would gather together for prayer.

Indeed, in 1 Timothy 2, as Paul writes to a pastor, and his purpose in writing, he says explicitly later in this epistle, is so that Timothy would know how to conduct himself in the house of God, should Paul not be able to get to him personally and give him more instruction. Paul says, “I’ve written you an epistle. I’ve written all pastors an epistle to tell them how the church, how the church is supposed to be characterized and what should be done there.”

And with that in mind, we read in 1 Timothy 2:1. Paul says, “Therefore, I exhort first of all, of primary importance—don’t miss this—I exhort first of all that supplications, prayers, intercessions, and giving of thanks be made for all men, for kings, and all who are in authority, that we may lead a quiet and peaceable life in all godliness and reverence. For this is good and acceptable in the sight of God our Savior who desires all men to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth.”

Paul, I think, here has in mind shadows, as it were, of a text from Jeremiah where Jeremiah said when you go into captivity work for the peace of where you go and pray for the city that you might be able to live your lives out peaceably. And as a result of that living your life out peaceably, proclaim the gospel, the good news that Christ is coming (in Jeremiah’s time) and in our time that Christ has come.

So Paul tells us that the very essence of the worship of the church is intercessory prayer and specifically for leaders and specifically in the context of a nation that is not explicitly Christian, to the end that it might become explicitly Christian. He desires all kinds of men to be saved and ultimately all the world to be saved. That’s the flow of history. And so God wants our governors, our mayors, our presidents, whoever they are, to be saved. And you might say that God desires then that this become once more an explicitly Christian nation.

So prayer is what we’re all about as a church. Prayer in times of national catastrophe, but prayer also in terms of the worship of the church and what it fundamentally is all about. So prayer should certainly be of central importance for us today as we meet in a time of national crisis, a time of national crisis when bad things happen to us.

The first thing that our thoughts should be is not going to war, not this, that, or the other thing. Our first response when bad things happen—whether they’re small things in just our lives or the life of the nation—when bad things happen to us, our first instinct that the Holy Spirit moves us toward is prayer. Our prayers are as the incense going up in temple worship and we send them up before God. And Paul told Timothy that when we come together to do church, what is the most important thing for you to remember to do? Paul said, and Paul said to Timothy, it is to pray.

And we pray in times of national emergency because God is sovereign. This church, our foundation, is the triune God of scripture who is sovereign, who has decreed whatsoever things have come to pass. This is the Orthodox faith once delivered. For 2,000 years, this has been the truth of the Christian church, and for 4,000 years before that it was the truth of the church in the Old Covenant as well.

God is sovereign. The scriptures tell us that the lot is cast into the lap, but every decision is from the Lord. Who decided what people were in the building and not in the building? God. God is sovereign. We know that the king’s heart is like channels of water in the hands of the Lord. He turns it wherever he wishes—Proverbs 21:1. God uses sin sinlessly. And while what happened a week and a half ago in our country happened as a result of evil men, make no mistake about it. God is not the author of sin. Yet God uses sin sinlessly.

And we must always recognize God’s sovereignty in the judgments that come upon us. John Calvin said this in his Institutes. “What then, you will say? Does nothing happen fortuitously? Nothing contingently by way of chance? I answer. It was a true saying of Basil the Great that fortune and chance are heathen terms. Repeat that. Fortune and chance are heathen terms,” Calvin said. “The meaning of which ought not to occupy pious minds. For if all success is blessing from God, and calamity and adversity are his curse, there is no place left in human affairs for chance, fortune and chance.”

That’s what we believe as a church. God has decreed whatsoever comes to pass. Who is in charge of all things, good and bad? God. God is not the author of sin, but God uses sin sinlessly to affect his glory, to affect the well-being of his people, and to affect his plans in human history.

Turn, if you will, to Luke 13, and we’ll look at this account of a tragedy very much like ours. Luke chapter 13, beginning at verse one. We’ll notice our Savior’s response to a national disaster or at least a disaster of some proportions at the time of his life.

Luke 13, beginning at verse one. There were present at that season some who told him about the Galileans whose blood Pilate had mingled with their sacrifices. So we don’t know what the specific thing was, but Pilate’s men, the Roman army had killed a bunch of Jews. And people are talking about it. You know, a foreign power comes into your land, kills some of your people. And of course, people talk about it. So this is what the context is for the next story.

Jesus answered, this is his response to this. And he said to them, “Do you suppose that these Galileans were worse sinners than all other Galileans because they suffered such things? I tell you, no. But unless you repent, you will all likewise perish. Or those 18 on whom the tower in Siloam fell and killed them. Do you think that they were worse sinners than all other men who dwell in Jerusalem? I tell you, no. But unless you repent, you will all likewise perish.”

These are very similar events to what we’ve just gone through. We’ve had foreigners come onto our soil and kill our people, many of whom were Christians. We’ve had two towers, two huge buildings, collapse and destroy, kill thousands of people, like the tower of Siloam fell on 18. This text is instructive for us. Jesus does not talk about chance. He doesn’t talk about, you know, what might be going on and who knows what’s happening. He obviously addresses it through the lens of God’s sovereignty. He’s saying that unless you repent, you’re going to perish likewise.

It’s the judgment of God. He said that unless you repent the judgment of God will fall upon you. So he treats this from a perspective of God’s sovereignty. You know, his disciples came to him about a man born blind from birth. And they said, “Well, what is it? For his sins or the sins of his parents? What’s or sins of a previous life? What’s the deal? Why is this guy born blind from birth?” And Jesus didn’t say, “Well, why you terrible people, don’t blame God for this.”

He said, “It’s for the glory of God. God.” He didn’t deny God’s sovereignty in times of national disaster or in times of personal difficulties. Jesus sees through the lens of the sovereignty of God. But note that our natural tendency then is to put ourselves in the place of being rebuked by our Savior. Well, if God is sovereign, then those people who were killed at the Tower of Siloam or those Gentiles who were killed by the Roman soldiers or those people in either the Pentagon or New York City who were killed—well, that must mean they’re bad people. They’re worse than us. Jesus says, “No, don’t assume when these sorts of things happen that you can tell what that person is like. There’s a commonality,” he says, “between all Galileans and between all those that dwell in Jerusalem. He says, “Don’t do that. We want to do that because we want to think we’re alive. We’re better.” So, or that we can have some effect over what God’s judgment will look like in our lives.

We don’t want to be killed in a tower. So we think if we just do enough good works, then God won’t kill us. But that is not the case. God is sovereign and he causes things to happen to us through disease, sickness, calamity, death for his glory and for our well-being. And we can’t say that, you know, this is for our well-being. Sickness is an illness. And God says it all is ministered to you through the love of Jesus Christ. It’s all intended as blessing to you in Christ. Yes, there are chastisements and maturing going on.

So, you know, we don’t want to respond to these tragedies saying those people deserved it. Jesus is—our response should be just the opposite. We must see these events through the lens of knowing the sovereignty of God in the context of our lives. So our response must be in terms of those things. Were those men that died worse than other men in their city? No, absolutely not. Can we tell if a man is good or bad by what things happen to him? Can we look and say, “Oh well, that guy’s always having trouble. He’s always sick. Yeah, he’s no good. He’s under the curse of God”? No, we can’t do that.

And our Savior warns us against that. He rebukes the thoughts of those who thought those ways in Luke chapter 13. Jesus says instead what our response to these tragedies should be. He says, “Okay, here’s what’s happened. Foreigners come in and kill some people and a tower collapses and people get killed. What’s the proper response?” Jesus says, “he says the proper response is repentance. We’re supposed to look at all things in terms of the judgments of God and be moved to repentance in our own lives. We’re to look at ourselves, Jesus says, as part of our response to these sorts of things.

You know, it’s interesting what kind of people God used to come in and judge northern Israel. He used Assyrians, and the Romans were sort of the historical successors to the Assyrian army. And God is using them in Luke 13 to affect his judgments. And who is God using today? Well, he’s using the same people. In all likelihood, the greatest power behind what’s happened in the last two weeks with the bombings is Saddam Hussein. And he sees himself as the successor to Assyria.

My son Elijah pointed out that when we went through world history, we know that the Assyrians conquered by terror. That’s what they were as terrorists. They would go into a city, kill a bunch of guys, and then pile the heads up at the gates of the city. So, it scare everybody to pieces. You know, all these heads piled up. Well, my son pointed out that Saddam Hussein has done exactly the same thing. He’s got a statue made up of skulls in the context of his country. So we have this horrible evil fellow who wants the world to burn. And yet God says, “Well, let’s remember what’s going on here ultimately. Let’s remember this story that God wants the Assyrians to repent.”

If our instinct is first and foremost to kill these people as opposed to bringing them to repentance, then we are like Jonah. We’re fleeing the evangelistic mission of the church to call men everywhere to repentance. Now don’t—I’m not saying that people shouldn’t be killed. Osama bin Laden, if he’s behind this, Saddam Hussein should be executed. But we should seek for their repentance as they’re arrested or even in the events of their day over the next few days or weeks until they’re either captured or killed. Our instincts should be to call out to God, understanding that he’s still using Assyrians today to judge his people.

The Indians in King Philip’s War were like the Assyrians, and the Puritan pastors knew that this was the judgment of God upon them. Yes, you must go to war. Yes, we must rally the troops, but yes, we must also seek God’s forgiveness as we come to repentance for our own sins. The judgment of God is being portrayed in all of these things. Same as today—Assyrians. We should acknowledge this 911 call that was made a week and a half ago.

Now, again, nothing is by chance in God’s world. 911 is the call for an emergency. And we have a giant wakeup call given to this country a week and a half, two weeks ago. And I’m not sure that the proper response is happening on the part of God’s people. There seems to be a great deal of patriotism, which we thank God for. I mean, you know, we’ve gone from flag burning to flag raising there. You know, thank God for small miracles. We thank God that people aren’t tearing at each other and this kind of thing.

But on the other hand, the first and foremost response should be repentance for national sins. And we see precious little of that today. And in the places where that is the message going forth, great opposition is given to those men and they’re being likened. Men who call for a re-examination of policies relative to abortion, et cetera, are being called the American Osama bin Ladens, fundamentalist extremists.

We should acknowledge God’s 911 call to us, right? Not just to us as a nation, but—are we any better? Were the people that died at WTC any worse than you? No, they weren’t. Jesus says as you watch these things, come to repentance for your own sins. And come to repentance and seek his face, pray for the peace of the world. And today’s text gives us an illustration of the church at prayer.

And let’s talk about this briefly. Abigail, in a time of pending national and familial disaster to her extended household, prays for peace. She makes intercession to the lesser David as we are to make intercession to the greater David. What should our prayer be like? Well, we should be praying for the Nabal, the foolish leaders of our day who do not hold God in all their thoughts.

Nabal was a fool. His name means fool. And the scriptures tell us that the fool does not have God in all his thoughts. I’m giving you some references there from the Psalms. That’s what the definition of an idiot or a fool is—he doesn’t realize that God is there. He, you know, he’s suppressed the truth of God in unrighteousness to the end that he’s just a complete fool. He doesn’t recognize things. And Nabal is that. Nabal is this proud man who when David’s men come to him to get just recompense for the protection they’d provided to Nabal’s men, rebukes them.

I read the text carefully to point out to you and emphasize certain things. And what Nabal’s men told Abigail was that as we went with them, they were a wall to us from our enemies. And the implication from what they say is that it was their initiation to seek out protection from David and his men. So David and his men were not acting like some neighborhood, you know, protection group. They were graciously providing protection in very difficult times that even Nabal acknowledges in his speech when men had broken off from masters. Insurrection is everywhere. He’s protected by the wall of David which his men sought out, and he, fool that he is, thinks that somehow it’s himself that’s provided this protection and thinks he can rebuke David.

You know, Abigail is—Nabal is the dog. We didn’t read the euphemistic expression that Peter Leithart reminded us of a couple of years ago at family camp where it says males twice in our text. It actually could be better translated, “I’m going to leave nobody alive who pisses against a wall.” That’s what the Hebrew text tells us, and it tells us that for a reason. Because any man that treats David the way that Nabal treats him here and acts so foolishly and pridefully and wickedly is a dog. He’s denied his image being created in the image of God and instead has become a brute beast of a man. And that’s, I think, why that euphemistic phrase is used there to describe the ones that God’s judgment, his sword, is lifted against.

Abigail, on the other hand, is the picture of humility. And as we respond to this national disaster, as we seek to petition the greater David for peace, we would learn from Abigail’s example. She doesn’t want her husband ultimately to die. She hopes he’ll repent. She’s trying to preserve David from bringing war against the whole household. That should be our intent as well. We don’t want our country to be destroyed. We don’t want the judgments of God to go unnoticed by our country so that they must become greater and greater from the hand of God. And we petition him. We petition him for leaders who do not acknowledge his sovereignty and his blessing upon us.

But in the way she petitioned—I read it very carefully here as well—she sends the gifts on ahead then she gets there. And the text says she fell down, she bowed down, she fell on her knees. There’s a several series of threefold repetitions in this text. I would urge you all to read this text in your homes this next week or two and see things that are there. The Spirit of God will bring out many truths to you from this text. But here we see a threefold repetition of the humility of Abigail as she prostrates herself before David.

We must as well, as we go to pray for the leaders of our country, even if they are totally foolish—worst case scenario, they don’t have God in all their thoughts—and that’s not true in our case, but worst case scenario, whatever foolishness they enter into, we should be making intercession for them with the greater David, and we should go about doing these prayers with a state of great humility ourselves. Great humility.

Today’s text gives us this illustration of the church at prayer, and Abigail is a representation, I think, of the bride of Christ. Being married to David at the end of the text the way that we have become the bride of the greater Bridegroom, the greater David, the Lord Jesus Christ. So pride versus humility, ignorance versus knowledge of what God is doing in our history.

Nabal was ignorant of two very important things, at least he had decided to be ignorant. He was ignorant, first of all, of David’s protection. And secondly, he seems to have been ignorant that David was the called of God who’s going to be anointed king.

Abigail, by talking to Nabal’s men, knows both things. When she goes to petition David, she goes with understanding of her times. She goes with a knowledge that indeed it is David who has kept protection for her over these many months as the men have been raising these sheep out in the context of a difficult and crime-filled scenario. And she also knows and says very explicitly that Saul is seeking David’s life. That’s who in the text when she says, “I know one is seeking you,” it’s Saul she’s speaking of.

And she also knows that David will be king. David has been anointed. She’s a good member of the theocracy who understands what God is doing. She understands the protection that God has provided through his man, and she also understands the position of authority that David is going to go to. And so we have to be men of understanding as well.

We have to understand that one of our first responses from the World Trade Center bombing should be, “Lord God, you have kept us safe for many years since the slaughter of abortion started, since the moving away from a Christian theocracy began in this country. God has kept us safe. The way that David was a wall to Nabal and his men, God has been a wall to America when she had no right to ask him for that or expect it from his hand. We should go to God and say, ‘We thank you, Lord God, for the protection you’ve given to us. We know now that difficult times have come, but we acknowledge first and foremost your protection of us.’”

We recognize that the greater David, while his rule may not be manifest yet in the context of our country, is indeed reigning now from the right hand of the Father. And we recognize his position. And we know that what will happen over the years and decades to come is the continuing manifestation of the reign of the greater David, David the Lord Jesus Christ. And we go to God as those who petition him humbly, understanding what’s happened in the context of our world and asking him for grace and mercy upon us.

You know, Isaiah 66:2 says that this is the one I esteem: “He who is humble and contrite in spirit and trembles at my word.” If God is going to hear the prayers of America, we must be humble in spirit and we must tremble at his word. We must recognize that as David had determined harm for the foolish Nabal, the nation that had forgotten him, God is determining harm for us today. As David and his men girded on the sword, the sword of God has struck at our country here a week and a half, two weeks ago. Yes, he’s used ungodly people that should be executed for their actions. Yes, we should pray and sing Psalm 83. But we should begin all of that with a recognition that God’s sword is drawn against us.

How can we interpret these events any other way when we as a church have prayed for this very thing for decades? You have to understand the nature of the times in which we live as we bring our prayers to God. This nation should be humbled and contrite before him. This nation must tremble, and we should tremble at the word of God, knowing that we’re no better than these men we pray for. We are those who the sword of God is raised against ultimately as well, should we fail to come to repentance.

David told Nebuchadnezzar, “Your kingdom shall be assured to you after you come to know that heaven rules.” Should be our message and our prayers: “Lord God, make our nation know that you rule from heaven. Make that manifest. Whatever it takes in our country, we should want to see that the nation might tremble again at God’s word.”

Abigail prayed for Nabal the fool. I think she did the right thing. I think she did the thing a submissive wife is supposed to do. You’re supposed to seek the protection of your husband, hoping that given more time, he’ll come to repentance. And we’re supposed to petition, whatever it takes, to make sure—within God’s means—that our rulers today, the foolishness of our rulers, whether they be in the church, the home, the civil state, and our local municipalities, the state or national fools that God tells us—our proper role is to pray for foolish leaders that they might become wise and that whatever wisdom they do have might be built upon.

We have a president who seems probably to be an immature fairly young Christian who’s apparently brought to the faith through the evangelist Billy Graham and that’s who he is. To expect anything else from him right now probably is not consistent with reality. But what we do pray for is that in his immaturity as a Christian, he moves himself forward, he humbles himself under God in his prayer closet, and then he leads the nation to acknowledge our need for repentance before God as well.