Our God is so gracious to include the true story of a narcissistic abuser in His Word. Our Sovereign God has helped us and prepared us and has chosen us for such a time as this…and He also helped, prepared and chose a godly woman, Abigail, for an amazing true story during the times of King David of Israel. The Bible says that “she was a woman of good understanding and beautiful appearance…” (Please reference 1st Samuel 25 for this account.)
The Bible describes the man Nabal like this: he was very rich and owned three thousand sheep and a thousand goats. Nabal was harsh and evil in his doings (v. 3).
He refused to share the shearing time feast with the King’s servants saying, “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 to men when I do not know where they are from?”
How rude! How disrespectful to the King of Israel! What a narcissistic clod! And you just know that God was observing all of this…
Even his godly wife, Abigail, called him a scoundrel in verse 25, saying, “For as his name is, so is he: Nabal is his name, and folly is with him!” Literally the name Nabal means “fool”. The Book of Proverbs speaks abundantly to us about fools. The word can literally be translated and exchanged for the word, abuser.
Nabal held an “After-the-Shearing-Party” at his house. Here’s how God’s Word describes the scene from verse 36: “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…”
Nabal the Fool, the Abuser, did not even know that his godly wife had ridden her donkey off into the landscape to try and turn King David away from his stated plan to punish Nabal and his entire household with about 200 sword-girded soldiers. He had instructed his men to not leave one male alive of all who belong to Nabal. He was planning an all-night retribution against Nabal for his terrible disrespect.
Imagine the scene: the sun is setting into the mountains, and here comes Abigail on her donkey with her maid servants and a literal caravan of food and treats for the King and his men. The Bible says in verse 18: “Then Abigail made haste and took two hundred loaves of bread, two skins of wine, five sheep already dressed, five seahs of roasted grain, one hundred clusters of raisins, and two hundred cakes of figs and loaded them on donkeys.”
Abigail dismounts from her donkey and falls down before King David, begging forgiveness and mercy. She praises him for his valiance and grace to all. She blesses the King with these words: “may the life of my lord be bound in the bundle of the living with the Lord your God; and the lives of your enemies He shall sling out, as from the pocket of a sling…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.” (v. 31)
King David relents from his destructive plan.
Abigail rides her donkey back home to the drunken Nabal and waits til morning to tell him these things. The party’s over for this hungover abusive husband. Nabal listens to Abigail’s report of how the King was coming to destroy him and all his everythings, how she had persuaded the King to spare his life.
“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 happened, after about ten days, that the Lord struck Nabal, and he died.” (v. 37-38)
BOOM!
Well, of course, King David heard all about this situation. I wonder if he was surprised? 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.” David knew that God is able to deal with vile, harsh, abusive, repulsive, rude, evil, wicked men. God sees, He hears and His arm is not too short to deal with those who oppress women and revile the King.
God had His justice.
And, of course, this true story has a Happily Ever After… King David took Abigail to be his wife.
We do not know how God will work in our lives or in the lives of our abusers. Sometimes He will take them. Sometimes He will leave them. God’s ways are higher than ours and His thoughts way higher than ours. What I know for sure is this: God is merciful and He is sovereign over all of our lives. His love is above us and around us, to preserve us and comfort us. His grace is sufficient for whatever we are going through. May the Lord bless and keep you today. May His comfort and hope surround you and give you peace.
