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[0:00] 1 Samuel, chapter 25. Now Samuel died, and all Israel assembled and mourned for him.

[0:11] They buried him at his home in Ramah. Then David got up, went down to the wilderness of Paran. There was a man in Maon whose property was in Carmel.

[0:25] The man was very rich. He had 3,000 sheep, 1,000 goats. He was shearing his sheep in Carmel. Now the name of the man was Nabal, and the name of his wife, Abigail.

[0:38] The woman was clever and beautiful, but the man was surly and mean. He was a Calebite. David heard in the wilderness that Nabal was shearing his sheep.

[0:49] So David sent up ten young men. And David said to the young men, Go up to Carmel, and go to Nabal, and greet him in my name. Thus you shall salute him.

[1:00] Peace be to you, and peace be to your house, and peace be to all that you have. I hear that you have shears. Now your shepherds have been with us, and we did them no harm, and they missed nothing all the time they were in Carmel.

[1:15] Ask your young men, and they will tell you. Therefore, let my young men find favor in your sight, for we have come on a feast day. Please give whatever you have at hand to your servants and to your son David.

[1:30] When David's young men came, they said all this to Nabal in the name of David. Then they waited. But Nabal answered, David's servants, Who is David?

[1:42] Who is the son of Jesse? There are many servants today who are breaking away from their masters. Shall I take my bread and my water and the meat that I have butchered for my shears and give it to men who come?

[1:58] I do not know where. So David's young men turned away and came back and told him all this. David said to his men, Every man strap on his sword.

[2:11] And every one of them strapped on his sword. David also strapped on his sword. And about 400 men went up with David, while 200 remained with the baggage. But one of the young men told Abigail and Nabal's wife, David sent messengers out of the wilderness to salute our master.

[2:32] And he shouted insults at them. Yet the men were very good to us. We suffered no harm. And we never missed anything when we were in the fields, as long as we were with them.

[2:46] They were a wall to us, both by night and by day. And all the while we were with them, keeping a sheep. Now therefore, know this and consider what you should do.

[2:57] For evil has been decided against our master and against all his house. He is so ill-natured that no one can speak to him. Then Abigail hurried and took 200 loaves, two skins of wine, five sheep ready dressed, five measures of parched grain, 100 clusters of raisins, 200 cakes of figs.

[3:19] She loaded them on donkeys and said to her young men, Go on ahead of me. I'm coming after you. But she did not tell her husband Nabal. As she rode on the donkey and came under cover of the mountain, David and his men came down toward her, and she met them.

[3:36] Now David had said, Surely it was in vain that I protected all this fellow has in the wilderness, so that nothing was missed, all that belonged to him.

[3:47] But he has returned me evil for good. God, do so to David, and more also, if by morning, I leave so much as one male of all who belong to him.

[4:03] When Abigail saw David, she hurried and alighted from the donkey, fell before David on her face, bowing to the ground. She fell at his feet and said, Upon me alone, my Lord, be the guilt.

[4:17] Please let your servant speak in your ears and hear the words of your servant. My Lord, do not take seriously this ill-natured fellow Nabal, for as his name is, so is he.

[4:30] Nabal is his name, and folly is with him. But I, your servant, do not see the young men of my Lord, whom you sent. Now then, my Lord, as the Lord lives, and as you yourself live, since the Lord has restrained you from blood guilt, and from taking vengeance with your own hand, now let your enemies, and those who seek to do evil to my Lord, be like Nabal.

[4:58] And now let this present, that your servant has brought to my Lord, be given to the young men who follow my Lord. Please forgive the trespass of your servant, for the Lord will certainly make my Lord a sure house, because my Lord is fighting the battles of the Lord, and evil shall not be found in you so long as you live.

[5:20] If anyone should raise up to pursue you and seek your life, the life of my Lord shall be bound in the bundle of the living under the care of the Lord your God.

[5:32] But the lives of your enemies he shall sling out as from a hollow of a sling. When the Lord has done to my Lord according to all the good that he has spoken concerning you, and has appointed you prince over Israel, my Lord shall have no cause of grief or pangs of conscience, for having shed blood without cause, or for having saved himself.

[5:58] And when the Lord has dealt well with my Lord, then remember your servant. David said to Abigail, Blessed be the Lord, the God of Israel, who sent you to meet me today.

[6:12] Blessed be your good sense. Blessed be you who have kept me today from blood guilt and from avenging myself by my own hand.

[6:24] For as surely as the Lord, the God of Israel lives, who has restrained me from hurting you, unless you had hurried and come to meet me, truly by morning, there would not have been left to Nabal so much as one male.

[6:39] Then David received her hand, which she had brought him. He said to her, Go up to your house in peace. See, I have heeded your voice, and I have granted your petition.

[6:52] Abigail came to Nabal. He was holding a feast in his house, like the feast of a king. Nabal's heart was merry within him, for he was very drunk. So she told him nothing at all until the morning light.

[7:07] In the morning, when the wine had gone out of Nabal, his wife told him these things, and his heart died within him. He became like a stone. About ten days later, the Lord struck Nabal, and he died.

[7:22] When David heard that Nabal was dead, he said, Blessed be the Lord who has judged the case of Nabal's insult to me, and has kept back his servant from evil. The Lord has returned the evil doing of Nabal upon his own head, that David sent and wooed Abigail to make her his wife.

[7:40] When David's servants came to Abigail at Carmel, they said to her, David has sent us to you, to take you to him as his wife. She rose, bowed down with her face to the ground, and said, Your servant is a slave to wash the feet of the servants of my Lord.

[7:58] Abigail got up hurriedly and rode away on the donkey. Her five maids attended her. She went after the messengers of David and became his wife. David also married Ahinom of Jezreel.

[8:11] Both of them became his wives. Saul had given his daughter Michael, David's wife, to Palti, son of Laish, who was from Galim. This is the word of the Lord.

[8:23] Amen. Good afternoon to you.

[8:39] It's good to be in God's house with God's people and having the opportunity to share God's word. Let's pray. Heavenly Father, we give praise to your name for this afternoon.

[8:54] Your many kindnesses to us. Thank you for your grace in your son that we embrace with all of our hearts. We pray on this afternoon that the words of my mouth, meditation of my heart, be acceptable in your sight, O Lord.

[9:12] I strengthen my redeemer. Amen. Amen. Have you ever observed a couple, a man and a wife, and you wondered, how did those people ever get together?

[9:31] There's something about them that appears to be a mix match. You know, we may have said to ourselves, there's something wrong with this picture.

[9:46] It may have been personality or age. What are they doing together? It may have been race or social status that we are zeroing in on. It may have been even educational level, but something about them is strange.

[10:03] We may not voice it to anybody else, but in the ponderings of our own hearts, probably each of us has done something similar to that.

[10:17] Well, if there is ever one odd couple in Scripture, we have them before us on this afternoon.

[10:28] Nabal and Abigail. They're the ones, at least the couple, that's featured in the text on this afternoon.

[10:40] And each of them represents a way that you and I can respond to the Lord's anointing, respond to God's king.

[10:53] Interestingly, look at the chapter with me, because it begins with a reference to the death of Samuel. You remember him, don't you? He's the godly, respected, very capable leader of God's people.

[11:10] He had shepherded them through tough times. The Lord had used him mightily. He had come on the scene early in age himself, ministering to the Lord as we see in the early chapters of 1 Samuel.

[11:27] It was Samuel who had overseen the transition from the time of the judges to the time of the monarchy. He had even anointed both Saul and David as kings over Israel.

[11:41] And properly, there was widespread mourning over the death of this great servant of God. Scripture doesn't mention here, we are really left to speculate as to whether Saul was there or David was there or both of them were there or neither of them was there.

[11:58] It doesn't go into all that. But one thing was sure, the death of the Lord's servants then and now does not mean the death of the Lord's agenda, that it is over.

[12:11] God has a way of raising up people, men and women, to carry on his agenda even as one person after another begins to leave the scene, begins to leave this life.

[12:29] The Lord was on the move and his agenda for the protection of God's anointed, he had done that through Samuel in a sense.

[12:39] Samuel's gone but that agenda continued. As for David, the fugitive, we find him still on the run from Saul.

[12:51] He's in the wilderness of Paran. You see that there in verse 1b? He is in the wilderness and near the city of Maon in the hill country of Judah.

[13:03] That's where it was. But in this incident today, we get another view, another glimpse of the desperation, the jealousy, and the foolishness of Saul.

[13:18] You say, well, Pastor Jay, Saul is barely mentioned in the chapter. And that is true. But the writer is trying to show us something here.

[13:30] Saul's name is mentioned only in verse 44. But still, Saul, nonetheless, makes his way into even chapter 25 of the chapter.

[13:43] Well, you say, how so, Pastor Jay? Number one, Nabal reminds us of Saul. Nabal, in a sense, is Saul in character.

[13:57] Just as we saw Doeg as the shadow of Saul in 1 Samuel chapter 21, even so, Nabal's foolishness mirrors the foolishness of Saul in chapter 25.

[14:14] Let me just show you one thing. Turn over to chapter 26 and verse 21, and you will see this rather clearly by Saul's own admission.

[14:29] Jim is going to preach this on next week, but I want you to see the connection here. Look at verse 21, chapter 26, and Saul said, I have sinned.

[14:41] Return my son David, for I have no more, I will no more do you harm, because my life was precious in your sight, in your eyes this day. Behold, notice what it says, ESV, I have acted foolishly and have made a great mistake.

[14:59] Huh? David, even here, as in chapter 24, had the opportunity to kill, to take matters in his own hand.

[15:11] Chapter 24, it was Saul. He didn't. But similarly, in today's text, he has the opportunity to kill a person who opposed him, but he refused to do that with the help of God's servant Abigail.

[15:27] The author really wants us to see that in chapter 25 today. So, in verses 2 and 3, our odd couple is introduced. Take a look at them with me in chapter 25, verses 2 and 3.

[15:39] And there was a man in Maon whose business was in Carmel. The man was very rich. He had 3,000 sheep and 1,000 goats.

[15:50] He was shearing the sheep in Carmel. Now, the name of the man was Nabal, and the name of his wife, Abigail. The woman was discerning and beautiful, but the man was harsh and badly behaved.

[16:03] He was a Calebite. We see them here. Nabal, he's a wealthy herdsman. Wealth in that day was measured in livestock.

[16:14] You remember Job, don't you, in chapter 1? He had all that, thousands of livestock. Similarly here, he was a wealthy man. Nabal was his name. Nabal itself, it means fool.

[16:29] That is the biblical word, one of the biblical words for fool in the Old Testament. Now, you would say, who would ever name their child stupid, blockhead, or fool in our day?

[16:49] Hey, believe me, his mama did not give him that name. It was likely because of his behavior in his character that she got a nickname.

[17:00] Y'all know Bubba, don't you? You know what Bubba looks like, you know Slim, you know Buster. It's a nickname that was given based on either looks or appearance or character.

[17:14] And no doubt, perhaps early on, somebody saw this young lad acting foolishly and they gave him a label. Let me say this, beware of labels.

[17:28] Labels can have a way of sticking and you will find people acting out the way that they are named. Beware of labels, huh?

[17:42] And then we see Abigail, oh Abigail, what a woman. She is attractive in her demeanor as she is in her physical appearance.

[17:55] And you say, well how did these folks get together? It probably, I would like to think at least that it was an arranged kind of marriage, huh? Beware looking at somebody on the external of the car that they drive, of the clothes that they wear.

[18:14] And sometimes we think that we really can get a catch. And there are a lot of people in mourning today because they picked somebody and wove their way into their lives on the basis of something external.

[18:29] And not really examining character enough, can I say, watch out for the externals, huh?

[18:41] Hey, there's several things that I really want you to see from this text on today. Having been introduced to this odd couple, first thing I want you to see is that the Lord's anointed, he is refused.

[18:53] That's the first thing. The second thing, the Lord's anointed is received, and I'll help you when we get to these places in the text. And then I want you to see the Lord's anointed is restrained, and finally, the Lord's anointed is rewarded.

[19:14] I really, really, really want you to see that from the text on this afternoon. What about then, Pastor Jay, the Lord's anointed refused? Huh?

[19:25] We see that in verses 4 through 17. And what we see there is a foolish refusal of the Lord's anointed. Nabal refused to meet David and his men's very legitimate needs.

[19:43] Very legitimate needs in that day. Here, here's an abbreviated version of the story. Nabal and his men are in the area. I mean, David and his men are in the area.

[19:56] And what they really served as, they served as unofficial kind of security guards in that day. they were protecting, they were protectors, and what you're seeing here is what David and his men provided for Nabal.

[20:14] There was a sense in which David and his men had provided for all of Israel because they were a force to be reckoned with. David had already begun to lead Israel in fighting the Lord's battles for Samuel chapter 17, case in point.

[20:30] But there was this unofficial security guard for Nabal's herdsmen, protecting them from thieves and robbers and other kinds of threats that would invade their space.

[20:43] Their own testimony supports the fact that they provided that kind of care and that kind of protection for Nabal and his herdsmen. Look at verses 15 and 16 of chapter 25.

[20:56] Look there with me. Verse 15, yet the men were very good to us. This is Nabal's herdsmen's testimony. They were very good to us and we suffered no harm.

[21:10] We did not miss anything when we were in the fields as long as we went with them. And notice verse 16. They were a wall to us both by night and by day.

[21:23] All the while we were with them keeping the sheep. They were a security force for us in the wilderness. That was the testimony.

[21:35] Now, here's the deal. Sheep shearing time was a very festive kind of time in that day. So this is what David does. Knowing that this was a festival kind of time and that a celebration was going, he sends a 10-person delegation.

[21:50] There's representatives. They go in David's name to Nabal. And here was the request. Allow my men to share in the goodies of the feast.

[22:01] Give them a little something something. After all, we've been around here helping out, guarding them, protecting them, and about hospitality standards, that would be the thing to do.

[22:14] To give them something. It was a request for Nabal to be hospitable. And rather than responding with hospitality, Nabal responds with haughtiness.

[22:30] He responds with hostility. Matter of fact, look at verses 10-12. Notice there, and Nabal answered David's servants, who's David? Huh?

[22:42] Who's the son of Jesse? There are many servants these days who are breaking away from their master, shall I take, and notice what he says, my bread, my water, and my meat that I've killed for my shearers, and give it to men who come from, I don't know, I don't know, from where, who are these people?

[23:06] Isaiah chapter 32 verse 6, and you needn't turn to it now, but you might want to later, really describes Nabal to rally, and his heart is busy with iniquity, to practice ungodliness, to utter error concerning the Lord, to leave the cravings of the hungry unsatisfied, and to deprive the thirsty of drink.

[23:36] That is characteristic of a fool. You see that here, you see that in Isaiah, you see that in Proverbs, that gives this portrait of what foolish people do.

[23:49] the demands of hospitality of that day, call for kind consideration and sharing. That hasn't stopped today, has it?

[24:02] You and for me, in our day, same thing. Oftentimes we take what we have, it is my food, it is my home, it is my vehicle, not knowing that the Lord has entrusted certain things to us, not to hoard, but in order to share.

[24:26] Huh? The earth is the Lord's, the fullness thereof, the world and those who dwell in it, and you and I, but stewards to manage what God has entrusted to us.

[24:41] Huh? Nabal, blinded by self-interest, and perhaps even political interest, and that it seems like he was squarely in Saul's camp. Huh?

[24:53] He speaks like Saul, he acts like Saul. Huh? Nabal represents, friends, foolish rejection. Oh, but notice, Abigail's response was so, so different.

[25:09] Huh? The Lord's anointed refused on the one hand, but in Abigail, the Lord's anointed is received. Foolish rejection is contrasted with wise reception.

[25:23] She warmly receives the Lord's anointed, and notice how her reception, it was a royal, respectful, and reverent kind of reception that she gives.

[25:37] The Lord's anointed, friends, it's a reception that was fit for a king. How about you, in your reception of the Lord's King, none other than our Christ, our Lord, Jesus Christ?

[25:52] Nabal gives the fool, and fool is mentioned 40 times in Proverbs, Nabal gives the fool of Proverbs, we get a face with him, and Abigail does the same thing for wisdom.

[26:08] She is wisdom for sonified. You want a name for the virtuous woman in Proverbs 31? Name her Abigail, if you will. My father is joy.

[26:19] My father is rejoicing. It means something like that. She acted quickly in a way that countered her husband's foolishness. Because of his rash words and actions and insults, David was bent on bloodshed.

[26:36] Basically, he says to his men, let ride. Huh? How does Abigail then respond to the Lord's anointed, to the Lord's chosen king?

[26:52] Huh? She prepared, as I mentioned, food for a king. And then she traveled to meet him, verses 18 through 20. She approached David respectfully and humbly and acknowledged her husband's character, that what he had done was wrong.

[27:07] We see that in verses 23 through 25. But notice in verses 26 through 31, particularly, she reproached the matters at hand theologically.

[27:20] In other words, what the Lord was really doing, what the Lord was really up to. Look at verses 26 through 31. Her respect is indicated 15 times.

[27:34] she refers to David as Lord. It was a term of respect. Other versions would say master. But look at verse 26. Then my Lord, notice what she says, the Lord lives and as your soul lives because, notice, the Lord has restrained you from blood guilt, shedding blood, and from saving with your own hand.

[27:55] Now then, let your enemies and those who seek to do evil to my Lord be as Nabal. and now let this present, your servant is brought to my Lord, be given to the young men who follow my Lord.

[28:07] Please forgive the trespass of your servant for, notice what she says, she's approaching it theologically. The Lord will certainly make my Lord a sure house, a Davidic dynasty that would last because my Lord is fighting the battles, notice again, of the Lord, and evil shall not be found in you so long as you live.

[28:28] And notice verse 30. If men rise up to pursue you and seek your life, the life of my Lord shall be bound as a bundle of the living and the care of the Lord your God, she's approaching it theologically, and as the lives of your enemies, she shall slay out from the hollow of the slain.

[28:48] Look at all this imagery, some of which we've seen already in 1 Samuel that's returning here in this particular passage.

[28:58] Her words, were refreshing and as nourishing as the meal that she had prepared. What a reception!

[29:10] What a fitting reception for the Lord's appointed and anointed king in that day. On the one hand, we see the Lord's anointed refused and received, but on the other hand, we see the anointed king restrained and rewarded in the remaining verses.

[29:36] What about the Lord's anointed restrained, huh? David's words, look at verse 32. David said to Abigail, blessed be the Lord, the God of Israel who sent you this day to meet me.

[29:53] Blessed be your discretion, and blessed be you who have kept me this day from blood guilt and from avenging myself with my own hand. For surely as the Lord, unless you had hurried and come to meet me, excuse me, for surely as the Lord, the God of Israel lives, who has restrained me from hurting you, unless you had hurried and come to meet me truly by morning, there had not been one left to Nabal so much as one male.

[30:25] The Lord's anointed restrained, huh? She's been sent by the Lord. She is the Lord's agent in this situation.

[30:36] Like wisdom in Proverbs, who is the Lord's handmaiden. So, Abigail, in this text, she restrained David from what he would regret later that he had done.

[30:54] She was the Lord's means for preserving his anointed. You've kept me from blood guilt, verse 33. The Lord sent you to restrain me, verse 34.

[31:06] Such, friends, is the nature of wisdom, is it not? Proverbs chapter 4, verses 5 and 6 says this to say, get wisdom, get insight, do not forget, and do not turn away from the words of my mouth, do not forsake her.

[31:22] Listen to this. She'll keep you, huh? Love her, and she'll guard you, huh? Abigail personifies the wisdom in this text, huh?

[31:36] Oh, and listen to this, friends, the marvelous restraint of wisdom, huh? She keeps you from physical harm, and from relational harm, and from moral damage, huh?

[31:54] She keeps you from the path of a strange woman, and other wily and dangerous things in life. wisdom. The voice of wisdom is overwhelmingly parental, and wisdom and the home is the academy for wisdom, huh?

[32:11] How are you doing? Are you listening to, are you heeding the voice of wisdom based on, centered in the fear of God that will keep you, regardless of your sphere of endeavor?

[32:24] Wisdom will keep you in the marketplace. Wisdom will keep you in the academy. Wisdom will keep you in the home. It's the nature of wisdom. Don't reject her.

[32:36] Listen to her. And finally, note with me in verses 36 through 44, the Lord's anointed is rewarded.

[32:47] And there's a twofold reward that we see. First of all, there is vindication from the Lord in verses 36 through 39. The big header that we see there is vindication is mine.

[33:01] I will repay, says the Lord. That's the big header that we see there. David did not, having heeded the voice of wisdom, take matters into his own hands.

[33:14] He refused to smite Saul. And, though opportunity had presented itself here in chapter 25, he refused, having listened to the voice of wisdom, restraining him, he refused to smite Nabal.

[33:33] So, don't you love Nabal in the verses here? When the report that what Abigail had done, had sunk in after a night of drunken stupor and a hangover, this man, when he knew that his stuff had gotten out of his house into David and his men's hands, the brother could not handle it.

[34:04] He either had a heart attack or a stroke or something that stopped him in his tracks. Huh? Huh? It was not David's hand that smote him, it was the Lord's, verse 38, who was struck.

[34:23] Vindication from the Lord. The Lord returned the evil of Nabal on his own head. And guess what? He would do the same for Saul. And, oh, this was for David.

[34:36] This was David, sort of like the Lord's happening on the show. Stay on track, David. You could get off track here, but you need to listen to the voice of wisdom. Perhaps would the Lord say that to you today?

[34:47] Stay on track. Don't get sidetracked. Don't take things into your own hands. Hold your peace. let the Lord fight your battles. Voice of wisdom. You don't have to go it on your own.

[34:59] Allow the Lord to speak to your heart. You don't have to go it on your own. So may it be the same for us when we're tempted to take matters in our own hands, to speak or act in ways that may even appear to be justifiable.

[35:18] I've got the right to speak up. Do you know what he did to me or she did to me? Huh? What are the demands of wisdom? Does wisdom indeed demand restraint a certain situation?

[35:35] Hold your feet. Let the Lord put his dukes up rather than yours. Let the Lord speak up rather than you speak up. Restraint oftentimes is demanded is the wise course of action.

[35:52] Number one, what was the reward? Number one, vindication from the Lord. Reward number two, virtuous wife from the Lord. You see that there in verses 39 through 44?

[36:06] The reward of the Lord's anointed included a virtuous wife. As a matter of fact, the unvirtuous wife, chapter 25 verse 44, Michael had been given away by Saul.

[36:25] Whether it was political for whatever reason, that was the fact. But the Lord provided a virtuous wife, Abigail, this wise woman came to dwell with David.

[36:36] Some feel that Nabal's goods may have gone. The text doesn't say that. It really doesn't matter whether it was true or not. We know in verse 42 that Abigail's attendance went with her.

[36:52] In verse 42, did you know that wisdom, Proverbs chapter 1, also has attendance, just like bridesmaids that line up? Discretion, understanding, knowledge, all of those are the attendance of wisdom.

[37:11] And so, Abigail's attendance go with her. A lot of good takeaways from today's text, things that we could say about it.

[37:23] But I want one way to look at this, in the rearview mirror of the cross. This is what you have, friend. You've got the Lord's anointed passing the test in the wilderness.

[37:38] Centuries later, the greater son of David, the Lord Jesus Christ, would do the same thing. he would pass the test in the wilderness and thereby demonstrate himself to be the Lord's anointed, worthy of that particular title.

[37:56] He would demonstrate his worth in the wilderness before going into his ministry. So David here in the wilderness. But here's another thing, the question that I want to help you to see.

[38:10] how do we respond, how do you and I respond to the Lord's appointed king, even Jesus? With Psalm, let me say this, with Psalm 2 submission, with Psalm 2, turn with me to Psalm 2, can't read it all, this is a great chapter, it's messianic, it speaks of the future reign of Christ, God's message to the rulers of the earth, but I want you to see particularly verses 10 through 12, because it's very consistent with what we see in 1 Samuel chapter 25.

[38:55] How shall we respond? Now therefore, O kings, be wise and be warned, O rulers of the earth. You see the parallelism there, the kings and the rulers and wisdom and warned, serve the Lord, how, with fear, with reverence and rejoice with trembling and here's the submission, kiss the son, lest he be angry and you perish in the way for his wrath is quickly kindled.

[39:21] Blessed are those who take refuge in him. How do you respond to the Lord's anointed, even the Lord Jesus Christ in our day? Respond to him with Psalm 2 submission and we see shadows of that even in our text today.

[39:36] And here's the deal, friends, it is the height of folly not to recognize and to respect the Lord's anointed king, the Lord Jesus Christ. The height of foolishness not to recognize him and not to respond to him on the basis of what you and I see in him as revealed in history and more acutely and specifically in God's word.

[39:58] Height of folly not to respond to him as Lord, not to respond to him as the one who has paid the price for your sins and mine. Hide the folly.

[40:09] The call of today's text is for all of us to be wise and to submit to and to serve the Lord's king just as Abigail did. Don't refuse him.

[40:22] Receive him. That's how do we respond? But then, I want you to ponder your response to him. Ponder your response to the Lord Jesus.

[40:37] I mean, even as you've accepted him, do you respond to him submissively and humbly and reverently? You should. But the second question is what do we learn from the Lord's anointed?

[40:51] We respond with Psalm 2, submission, but we learn from 1 Peter 2, restraint. The restraint.

[41:02] As a matter of fact, look with me, 1 Peter 2, and I'm about to close, but I want you to see this, because we see similarly what Jesus did. David teaches us, but more importantly, Jesus teaches us how it is that we're to respond even in the face of odds.

[41:21] 1 Peter chapter 2, look at verses 22 and 23. Now, he committed no sin, neither was any deceit in his mouth, but when he was reviled, that's verbal abuse, he did not revile in return.

[41:36] When he suffered, he did not threaten, but continued entrusting himself to him who judges justly. Is that what you do? That's what we should do.

[41:47] Rather than retaliation, the exercise of restraint, on the one hand, we learn from David, but more importantly, we learn from the greater son of David, even the Lord Jesus Christ, how to re-inspire.

[42:02] Even we're in the right to allow, even when we are in the right, allow the Lord to restrain us. Don't miss these times. We could end up regretting our words and actions if we don't follow the Lord.

[42:19] What am I saying on this afternoon, both for you and for me? Look at what the Lord is showing us. God once again helps his anointed king.

[42:35] Samuel's dead, but still he has different ones who are responding as the Lord would have them to him. Do you recognize and respect the Lord's anointed king, Jesus?

[42:52] How should we respond? We should respond as the song that we're going to sing at the name of Jesus. Think about it.

[43:03] Thrones and dominions will acknowledge him and rulers. You and I have the privilege to acknowledge him as such now. May we do that for the glory and honor of God.

[43:17] May we find ourselves acting and responding wisely even in our day even as we see in today's text. Let us pray.

[43:30] Heavenly Father, we give you praise and honor and worship. Our prayer is that none of us here today would by our actions, our response to the Lord's anointed be labeled as a fool.

[43:50] faithful. But may we respond wisely even as we have seen the text reverently, humbly, not heartily, but hostily.

[44:01] Lord, you know where our resistances are. We pray that you would forgive us and cleanse us of not giving you the kind of respect that you're worthy of and that's due you.

[44:13] May we learn from David on the one hand, but Lord Jesus, you have perfected, Lord, what David had done well, but you have perfected that. We bless you and we honor you.

[44:27]  We long to be like you and submit to you. Blessed be your name. Amen. Amen.