And then the title of my sermon this morning is Mine Hand Shall Not Be Upon Thee.
It says in verse number 12 there, the Lord judge between me and thee, and the Lord avenge
me of thee, but my hand shall not be upon thee.
As saith the proverb of the ancients, wickedness proceedeth from the wicked, but my hand shall
not be upon thee.
David brings this up in the context of King Saul coming after him and hunting him without
a cause because David has been nothing but a faithful, godly servant unto King Saul,
but Saul is out to persecute him and destroy him and David doesn't want to fight back.
He doesn't want to retaliate.
He doesn't want to take vengeance because he doesn't want to touch the Lord's anointed.
And so he believes that Saul is God's anointed and that he would not be right to attack
him since especially Saul had been the one who even, you know, brought him into the
military and had given him a lot of things in the past and so forth.
And so he's loyal to Saul even though Saul is completely disloyal to him.
What I want to point out this morning is that this is just one of many incidents in
the life of David where David has some enemy, someone who has wronged him, and he
does not retaliate.
He does not avenge himself and God ends up avenging David of his enemies again
and again as you read the Bible.
Of course, with King Saul, it's a famous example where he doesn't kill Saul.
He has two chances to kill him and he lets him go.
And then of course, God takes vengeance on Saul.
God destroys Saul at Mount Gilboa at the end of the book of 1 Samuel.
But there are actually several other instances in the life of David where David does not
take vengeance on his own enemies and so God destroys them through other means.
And David says this in chapter 24, my hand shall not be upon thee, and then he practices
this over and over again after chapter 24.
So look if you would at chapter 25.
The first one I want to point out to you, of course we already talked about Saul, that's
number one, but let's move on to the other examples.
Number two is a guy named Nabal.
So David is enemies with a guy named Nabal.
I'm not going to tell the whole story for sake of time, but Nabal's wife comes
and intercedes to David because David has armed up his troops and he's about to just
go kill Nabal and just kill his entire household.
And so Nabal's wife comes and intercedes in verse 25.
Let not my Lord I pray thee regard this man of Belial, even Nabal.
We're in verse 25 of chapter 25.
For as his name is, so is he, Nabal is his name and folly is with him.
But I thine handmaid saw not the young man of my Lord whom thou didst sin.
Now therefore, my Lord, as the Lord liveth and as thy soul liveth, seeing the Lord
hath withholden thee from coming to shed blood and from avenging thyself, pay attention to
that phrase, avenging thyself with thine own hand.
Now let thine enemies and they that seek even to my Lord be as Nabal, okay?
Jump down if you would to verse number 30.
It shall come to pass when the Lord shall have done to my Lord, according to all the
good that he had spoken concerning thee and shall have appointed thee ruler over Israel,
that this shall be no grief unto thee nor offensive heart unto my Lord, either that
thou has shed blood causeless or that my Lord avenged himself.
But when the Lord shall have dealt well with my Lord, then remember thine handmaid.
So let me kind of just translate what she's saying here.
She's saying, look, you know, Nabal has done you dirty and you want to take vengeance
and maybe you're right to do this and maybe you're wrong.
But she said eventually it's not really going to matter to you whether you were right
or wrong.
Eventually you're not going to care whether you shed blood causeless here or whether
you avenged yourself.
You know, someday you're going to be the king of Israel and this little squabble
with Nabal is just not going to matter at all.
Do you see what she's saying there?
It says in verse 31 again, this shall be no grief unto thee nor offensive heart unto
my Lord, either that thou has shed blood causeless or that my Lord has avenged himself.
You know, whichever it is, whether you did it causelessly, whether you righteously
avenged yourself, someday it's not going to matter.
And we need to understand that the things that we get so worked up about today in
2022 in our lives where we just are so mad and we're so upset and we just have to pay
back somebody for what they've done to us, you know, someday those things just aren't
going to matter.
We're not going to care five years from now.
We're not going to care 10 years from now.
We're not going to care.
And here's what you need to understand.
Sometimes the things in your life that you're so worked up about right now, you don't
realize that you're not going to care down the road.
They're not going to matter in the scheme of things.
And you know what?
We are here on this earth to serve the Lord, not for our own personal agenda, okay?
We must decrease and he must increase.
And so our life is not about ourselves.
And so if somebody wrongs us and we just feel like we have to avenge ourselves and
take vengeance, just realize, you know what, let it go because it's not going to matter
and God can take care of our enemies.
Avenge not yourselves, beloved is what the Bible says.
The evidence belongs to the Lord, let him take care of it.
And so David here almost makes a big mistake by going in and slaughtering Nabal and slaughtering
his house.
And I'll tell you right now, you know, again, we don't have time to delve into
the whole story about Nabal, but I would say David is not justified in what he's
doing at all.
And he's totally wrong.
But either way, Abigail talks him off the ledge and gives him good advice and says,
look, I'm not even going to argue with you about whether you're right or wrong.
Someday you're going to be king of Israel and you're not going to care about this stupid
fight with Nabal.
So just let it go.
There's no need to avenge yourself.
Let's just make peace.
Okay.
And this is the advice that we need to take in our lives because we can sometimes
get angry at people and have people that are our personal enemies or even just get
angry at the enemies of the Lord and feel like we need to take things into our own hands to go punish
the wicked.
But what the Bible says is that vengeance belongs to the Lord.
He will repay.
And so we need to have this motto that David had.
My hand should not be upon me.
Right.
And he said in first Samuel 24 that that was like an ancient proverb that was around
in David's day.
That was something that people talked about as a piece of wisdom of, hey, don't take
it into your own hands.
Don't take vengeance yourself.
And so David here does not take vengeance.
And what ends up happening?
Well, we'll jump down to the end of the story, but it says in first Samuel 25 verse 36, Abigail
came to Nabal and behold, he held a feast in his house like the feast of a king and
Nabal's heart was Mary within him for he was very drunken.
Wherefore she told him nothing less or more until the morning light.
But it came to pass in the morning when the wine was gone out of Nabal and his wife
had told him these things that his heart died within him and he became as a stone.
And it came to pass about 10 days after that the Lord smote Nabal that he died.
And when David heard that Nabal was dead, he said, blessed be the Lord that had pleaded
the cause of my reproach from the hand of Nabal and it kept his servant from evil.
He's saying, thank you God for keeping me from evil, for keeping me from taking
this into my own hands and avenging myself.
Thank you for sending Abigail to talk me down.
For the Lord has returned the wickedness of Nabal upon his own head.
And David sent and communed with Abigail to take her to him to wipe.
And so God killed Nabal.
David didn't have to do it.
And so David was really glad that he didn't take anything into his own hands because
God took care of it anyway.
Okay.
And so we need to understand that God is able to avenge us if we need avenging and
we need to not take things into our hands.
And look, I'm telling you, there have been so many things that I was so upset about
and so worked up about.
Time heals all wounds.
And it's like Abigail said, down the road, you're not going to care so much about this.
You're not going to be so worked up about this.
You're going to move on.
It's very immature when you can only see what's right in front of you instead of realizing
how long life is and how things are going to change over time.
Let's go to another example.
Look at 2 Samuel chapter three.
So far we've seen the example with David and Saul.
David didn't avenge himself of Saul.
God destroyed Saul.
Then we saw Nabal.
David didn't assault Nabal.
God ended up destroying Nabal for him.
Now here's a third enemy, Abner.
Now Abner is the captain of Saul's host and Abner is the one who's actively been
hunting David and wanting to destroy David.
And David's just a super forgiving guy.
He's just a godly man who doesn't want to take vengeance and he's forgiving and merciful.
And so Abner comes to him in 2 Samuel chapter three and David makes peace with
Abner and David forgives him, lets him go, everything's fine.
But look what it says in verse 26.
And when Joab, 2 Samuel 3 26, when Joab was come out from David, he sent messengers
after Abner, which brought him again from the well of Sirah, but David knew it not.
And when Abner was returned to Hebron, Joab took him aside in the gate to speak with
him quietly and smote him there under the fifth rib that he died for the blood
of Asahel, his brother.
And afterward, when David heard it, he said, I in my kingdom are guiltless before the
Lord forever from the blood of Abner, the son of Nur.
Let it rest on the head of Joab and on all his father's house and let there not
fail from the house of Joab one that hath an issue or that is a leper or that leaneth
on a staff or that falleth on the sword or that lacketh bread.
And so look, David sincerely has forgiven Abner, doesn't wish him any ill, doesn't take
vengeance on him, but Abner ends up getting destroyed anyway by Joab.
And so look, our enemies, if God sees fit to allow them to be destroyed or to even
destroy them himself, then he'll do it.
We don't need to avenge ourselves.
And so David's able to say, I'm not guilty of the blood of Abner.
It's not my fault.
I made peace with him.
I forgave him.
His blood is not on my head.
His blood's on Joab's head.
Okay.
Now let's look at another example.
Go to second Samuel chapter four.
So we've seen so far Saul, Nabal, Abner.
Now let's look at the example of Ish-bosheth.
Now who is Ish-bosheth?
Well, after Saul died, the kingdom didn't just go straight to David because you know, we
sometimes have an oversimplified view of how things worked with Israel.
We say, Hey, Saul's the first King and then David and then Solomon.
But obviously if we zoom in a little bit, we can see that it wasn't quite that simple
because there were a lot of people who believed that someone in Saul's household should
be on that throne.
Even though Saul and his sons all died on Mount Gilboa, you know, there's always still
another son, another nephew, you know.
So there were some people who said, no, no, no, Ish-bosheth is our guy.
Okay.
Now David right away ended up reigning over the tribe of Judah.
So he ruled over Judah for seven years, but then eventually he's going to become
King of all Israel.
But in the meantime, this guy, Ish-bosheth is reigning.
And during the time that Ish-bosheth is reigning over other tribes, there's basically war between
the house of Saul and the house of David.
There's war between Ish-bosheth and David.
So Ish-bosheth is David's enemy.
This is one of David's enemies who has done him wrong.
David is the legitimate King that was anointed by God, chosen by God.
Samuel anointed him to be the next King after Saul.
But yet Ish-bosheth and his crew are stubbornly resisting God's will and fighting
against David.
And so what happens to Ish-bosheth?
Look at verse five of second Samuel chapter four.
And the sons of Rim and the Bearethite, Rekab and Baanah, went and came about the heat
of the day to the house of Ish-bosheth who lay on a bed at noon.
Okay.
So don't sleep in the middle of the daytime is the moral of the story.
And they came thither into the midst of the house as though they would have fetched
wheat and they smote him under the fifth rib and Rekab and Baanah, his brother, escaped.
And when they came into the house, he lay on his bed in his bed chamber and they smote
him and slew him and beheaded him and took his head and get them away through the
plane all night.
And they brought the head of his Bosheth unto David to Hebron and said to the King, behold
the head of his Bosheth, the son of Saul, thine enemy, which sought thy life.
And the Lord had avenged my Lord, the King, this day of Saul and of his seed.
And David answered Rekab and Baanah, his brother, the sons of Rim and the Bearethite.
And he said unto them, as the Lord liveth with redeem my soul out of all adversity,
when one told me saying, behold, Saul is dead, thinking to have brought good tidings,
I took hold of him and slew him in Ziklag, who thought that I would have given a reward
for his tidings.
How much more when wicked men have slain a righteous person in his own house upon
his bed, shall I not now therefore require his blood of your hand and take you away
from the earth.
And David commanded his young men and they slew them and cut off their hands and their
feet and hang them up over the pool in Hebron.
But they took the head of his Bosheth and buried it in the sepulcher of Abner in Hebron.
What do we see here?
Is David a guy who says, hey, no one should ever be punished.
No one ever should be put to death.
Mercy for everybody.
You know, an eye for an eye leaves the whole world blind.
Is that what he is?
That what David's saying?
Is that what the Bible's teaching?
David has no problem executing a criminal, does he?
When people go in and murder some guy in his bed in cold blood, David has no issue
putting them to death and just chopping off their hands and feet into the bargain.
No issue there.
So it's not that David doesn't believe in justice.
It's not that David doesn't believe in the death penalty.
It's not that the word of God is teaching that criminals shouldn't be punished, but rather
it's that we should not take things into our own hands against our own personal
enemies.
We should not avenge ourselves and take vengeance for ourselves against our own personal
enemies.
If someone commits murder, they should be put to death.
If someone commits rape or adultery or a child molester, they should be put to death.
But if somebody does us wrong, we don't need to pay them back and punish them and get
back at that person at work or get back at that person in the neighborhood who did
us wrong.
No, no, no.
Don't avenge yourself.
Don't hold a grudge.
Let it go.
Forgive.
Move on.
And David's really good at forgiving.
Even when someone else killed Ish-bosheth, he condemns it.
When someone else kills Abner, he condemns it.
So so far, four of David's enemies, David did not avenge himself, but God avenged David
of his enemies because God allowed Ish-bosheth to die.
God allowed, even if the people who did it weren't right about the way they did
it, you know, God still allowed that to happen just to take Ish-bosheth out of the
way because Ish-bosheth wasn't pleasing to God.
So God allowed him to be killed.
And so we see with Saul, we see with Nabal, we see with Abner, we see with Ish-bosheth
And we see David's attitude was different in each case.
When Saul died, David was upset because David truly forgave Saul.
When Nabal died, David was pretty happy to see him get what was coming to him.
But either way, he didn't do it himself.
He didn't take it into his own hands, you know, so he was able to sit back and let
God take care of it.
Abner and Ish-bosheth, you know, he had truly forgiven those guys too.
And so he was sad when they died and he had a great attitude about that.
The next example is Absalom, and I'm not going to take the time to go through the
whole Absalom story because it's too big of a story, but of course, Absalom is the
wicked son of King David who rebels against him and ends up causing all kinds of harm
and doing perverted things and just destroying David's family and messing up their life
and everything.
And David had to flee Jerusalem and he tried to murder his own father.
And so a really wicked guy, but again, even though Absalom was so wicked toward David,
he still commanded his generals, be gentle, deal gently with the young man Absalom for
my sake.
So he still had forgiveness in his heart toward even a wicked guy like Absalom.
And of course, Joab is the one who ends up murdering Absalom because Absalom is
totally harmless, he's totally defenseless.
He's basically just a POW and instead of obeying the king's order to deal gently with
him while he's hanging from his hair in the tree, of course, they throw darts at
him, they use him for a human dartboard, and then they end up just killing him with
a sword.
And so either way, David was avenged of Absalom.
He didn't have to do it himself.
He didn't have to have vengeance in his heart toward Absalom.
God took care of it anyway through Joab.
But now let's look at Shimei.
Go to 2 Samuel chapter 19.
So far we've already seen five examples of David's enemies where he backed off, he
was merciful, he was forgiving, he was gentle, or at least he said, hey, I'm going
to leave it in God's hands.
And God avenged David so far of five different enemies so far.
And there are just so many examples of this when you're reading the Bible.
And this is one of the key attributes of David is that he was willing to let vengeance
belong to God.
He didn't have to take everything into his own hands.
Look at 2 Samuel 19 verse 16, and Shimei the son of Gerah, Benjamin, which was of
Bahorim, hasted and came down with the men of Judah to meet King David.
And there were a thousand men of Benjamin with him, and Ziba the servant of the house
of Saul and his 15 sons and his 20 servants with them.
And they went over Jordan before the king, and there went over a ferry boat to carry
over the king's household and to do what he thought good.
And Shimei the son of Gerah fell down before the king as he was come over Jordan
and said to the king, let now my Lord impute iniquity unto me, neither do thou remember
that which thy servant did perversely the day that my Lord the king went out of Jerusalem,
that the king should take it to his heart.
So let me tell you what's going on here.
When David was fleeing from before the face of Absalom, this guy Shimei came out and
was throwing rocks at him and cursing him and lying about him and saying that he
killed Saul.
I mean, he wasn't even there when Saul died.
He wasn't even in the same battle, but he's lying and saying that he killed Saul
and that he killed Saul's household and that he's a bloody man and he's a wicked person.
And so this guy's cursing and lying about David, throwing rocks at him.
And David's man wanted to go kill this guy.
And David says, no, no, let him curse me.
My, you know, my own son is rebelling against me.
How much more is this Benjamite going to curse me?
Just maybe, maybe God told this guy to curse me.
Maybe I'm being punished for my sins, which David kind of was being punished, but that's
a whole nother story.
And so he just left the guy curse him.
And now that David is back in the throne and back in charge, now all of a sudden Shimei
is coming to him, hat in hand and saying like, oh man, I'm so sorry.
I shouldn't have said all that stuff.
And so he's like, man, can we just forget about all that stuff I said that day?
And it says in verse number 19 at the end there, you know, that, you know, he doesn't
want the king to take it to his heart.
Verse 20, for thy servant doth know that I've sinned.
Therefore behold, I'm the first, I'm come the first this day of all the house of Joseph
to go down to meet my Lord the King.
But Abishai the son of Zeruiah answered and said, shall not Shimei be put to death
for this?
Because he cursed the Lord's anointed.
And David said, what have I to do with you, you sons of Zeruiah, that ye should
this day be adversaries unto me?
Shall there any man be put to death this day in Israel?
For do not I know that I'm this day king over Israel?
Therefore the king said unto Shimei, thou shalt not die and the king swear unto him.
So he basically just says, you know what, look, I know I'm the king, I don't have anything
else to prove.
We defeated the enemies.
Let's stop killing people now.
Let's just let it go.
And so he swear to this guy like that he's going to, he's going to live.
He says, I'm not going to kill you.
Everybody wants to kill him.
And he's like, no, no, we're going to let this guy live.
Thou shalt not die and the king swear unto him.
Now let's fast forward to first Kings chapter two, first Kings chapter two.
And we're fast forwarding to not really very much later, actually, probably like less
than a year later, actually, because David died not too much longer after this.
So maybe like less than a year later or whatever, but David's on his death bed.
Okay.
And David's on his death bed.
And he didn't avenge himself of Shimei, but turns out he didn't really forgive Shimei
either.
He got to thinking about it later and he's like, man, that guy probably should be put
to death.
So it says in first Kings chapter two, verse five, uh, this is David's instructions to
Solomon.
Moreover, thou knowest also what Joab the son of Zeruiah did to me and what he did
to the two captains of the host of Israel on Abner, the son of Nern unto a Mesa, the
son of Jethur, whom he slew and shed the blood of war at peace and put the blood
of war upon his girdle that was about his loins and in his shoes that were on his
feet.
Do therefore according to thy wisdom and let not his whore head go down to the grave
in peace.
So he's still saying it was wrong to kill Abner as we saw earlier in the sermon, but
show kindness unto the sons of Barzillai the Gileadite and let them be of those that
eat at thy table.
For so they came to me when I fled because of Absalom, thy brother.
So he's giving like last instructions on his deathbed to Solomon.
Verse eight and behold, thou hast with thee Shimei.
That's the guy we're talking about the through the rocks and curse David Shimei,
the son of Gira, a Benjamite of Baharim, which cursed me with a grievous curse
in the day when I went to man in, but he came down to meet me at Jordan and I swear
to him by the Lord saying, I will not put thee to death with the sword.
Now therefore hold him not guiltless for thou art a wise man and knowest what thou oughtest
to do unto him, but his whore head bring down to the grave with blood.
So what's he basically saying?
He's saying, look, I swear to this guy that I wasn't going to put him to death, but
you're a really smart guy.
So just kind of figure out a way to take care of that idiot, but just, you know,
make sure that he gets what's coming to him and bring down his, uh, his whore head down
to the grave of blood whore, H O A R means white and it's just referring to like white
hair that he's an old man.
Okay.
Now, what does he do?
Well, well, of course, King Solomon is a really smart guy.
And so what King Solomon ends up doing to Shimei, I'll just tell you the story for
sake of time, but he basically just says to him, Hey, I want you to build your house
in Jerusalem.
You're going to come over here, buy me and build a house in Jerusalem where I can keep
an eye on you.
Okay.
And as long as you don't cross the Jordan river or as long as you don't cross, sorry,
as long as you don't cross the Brook Caidron, as long as you stay on this side
of the Brook Caidron, you'll be fine.
I remember what you did when you cursed dad, but you know what?
I'm going to cut you some slack.
You're going to live here.
You can live in Jerusalem, build a house here, but as soon as you cross over that Brook
Caidron, you die.
And the guy's like, Hey, no problem.
Great deal.
I mean, imagine if you were made that deal, you know, somebody has the power to just
put you to death and they tell you, well, here, I'm going to cut you some slack.
You know, you got to go live over in Mesa or whatever.
But as soon as you cross over into Tempe, you die.
You just stay over there.
Stay with all those bunch of Mormons over there.
And so, you know, I guess King Solomon just knew that human nature is such that eventually
the guy's just going to do it cause he's an idiot or God, if God wants the guy to
get destroyed, then God will provoke the guy to go across and cross over that canal
into Tempe, you know.
So basically, he tells him this and for like two years, the guy is a good boy and stays
on the right side of Caidron.
But then one of the guy's servants runs away and flees across the Brook Caidron.
Maybe he knew about that prohibition, like, yeah, come, come and get me buddy.
So he crosses the Brook Caidron and then Shimei goes after him and then Solomon brings
him, you know, Solomon finds out about it and says, Hey, look buddy, you were told
that you had to stay over here and you know what, you're really dying because of what
you did to my dad.
You threw rocks and cursed him and everything else.
He cursed the Lord's anointed and now God has brought your own wickedness upon
your own head cause you've crossed the Brook Caidron and now I have an excuse
to kill you.
And then he kills him.
So that's what happened.
So, I mean, you know, I don't even think I got all the examples, but those are six
really good examples from the life of David where David had somebody who did him wrong,
harmed him, hurt him in some way, and yet God took vengeance for David.
David never had to take things into his own hands.
This doesn't mean that he wasn't a man of justice.
This doesn't mean that criminals weren't executed under his rule.
What this means is that when he had a personal beef with somebody, when he had a personal
problem with somebody, he didn't need to avenge himself.
God took care of it and his hand did not have to be upon them and the Lord avenged
him.
Now let's just look at a few scriptures from the New Testament on this.
Go to Romans chapter 12, if you would, Romans chapter 12 and while you're turning there,
Psalm 94 is a great Psalm on this subject.
It says in verse one, Oh Lord God to whom vengeance belongeth.
Oh God to whom vengeance belongeth, show thyself, lift up thyself, thou judge of the earth,
render a reward to the proud Lord.
How long shall the wicked, how long shall the wicked triumph?
How long shall they utter and speak hard things?
And all the workers of iniquity boast themselves.
They break in pieces thy people, the Lord and afflict thine heritage.
They slay the widow and the stranger and they murder the fatherless.
Yet they say the Lord shall not see, neither shall the God of Jacob regard it.
So what we see in Psalm 94 is a prayer to God saying, God, you are the God to whom
vengeance belongeth.
How long are you not going to punish these people?
Now look, that prayer can be appropriate.
Obviously the prayers of David in the book of Psalms are the word of God.
They're scripture, they're Holy Spirit inspired.
In fact, when the New Testament quotes Psalms, it says, well spake the Holy Ghost by the
mouth of David the prophet, and then it quotes Psalms.
So Psalms, the word of God.
And so we have all these Psalms where the Psalmist is crying out to God for vengeance
against the wicked, super wicked people, reprobates, sons of Belial in this world.
In the New Testament, we're even told to sing the Psalms, speak to ourselves in Psalms
and hymns and spiritual songs.
And so the book of Psalms is replete with this kind of imprecatory material, right?
Praying out to God for vengeance, to curse his enemies, to destroy the enemies of the
Lord, the enemies of humanity.
And there are some evil, horrible people out there.
And so for some people is appropriate that we would pray down the wrath of God upon
them.
What's not appropriate is for us to physically fight people in this world because our weapons
are not carnal.
We don't wrestle against flesh and blood.
We wrestle against principalities, against powers, against the rules of the darkness
of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places.
It's never our place to take up the sword or take up the AR-15 and go out and take
vengeance either on our personal enemies or on the wicked.
You know, the wicked let God destroy them.
You know, we don't need to go destroy the sodomites.
God's going to destroy them.
And someday they're not going to matter.
Just like Abigail said, they're not going to matter.
Someday we're going to be ruling and reigning with Christ.
They're going to be burning in hell.
They're not going to matter.
So who cares?
Why are you so worried about it now, right?
You know, yes, we should fight against them with the word of God.
Yes, we should preach the truth and speak the word of God and fight the spiritual battle.
But it's never right for us to physically attack and fight physically against the enemies
of the Lord or against our own personal enemies.
Now obviously I believe in self-defense, you know, if somebody breaks into my house,
they're going to get blown away.
But that doesn't mean that we should ever for any reason go out and be on the offense,
even against wicked people, even against bad people.
You know, we're supposed to let the law take care of that.
The law is a revenger to execute wrath upon them to do with evil.
Let the government take care of that.
And if you say, well, the government's not doing it, well then you know what, then you
just pray to the Lord because there'd be higher than they and the Lord can take vengeance
upon our adversaries.
If he did it for David one time, second time, third time, fourth time, fifth time,
sixth time, God can avenge you of your adversaries and God can destroy the wicked.
So when it comes to the sons of Belial, when it comes to the reprobate, super evil
people, that's where Psalm 94 kicks in.
And you're saying, oh Lord God, to whom vengeance belongeth.
How long?
That's where they die.
And you're like, David, blessed be the Lord that that son of Belial is dead.
But is that how David was when Saul died?
No.
Is that how he was when Abner died?
No.
Is that how he was when Ishbasheth died?
No.
Why?
Because those people weren't reprobates.
They weren't sons of Belial.
They were his personal enemies.
Okay, they weren't necessarily horrible reprobates, okay?
But the people described in Psalm 94, we're talking about these horrible reprobates.
They're not personal enemies.
They're just really wicked people, enemies of humanity, enemies of God, and so forth.
Look what the Bible says in Romans chapter 12 verse 17, recompense to no man, evil
for evil, provide things honest in the sight of all men.
If it be possible as much as lieth in you, live peaceably with all men.
Dearly beloved, avenge not yourselves, but rather give place unto wrath, for it is
written vengeance is mine, I will repay, sayeth the Lord.
Therefore if thine enemy hunger, feed him.
If he thirst, give him drink, for in so doing, thou shalt heap coals of fire on
his head.
Be not overcome of evil, but overcome evil with good.
So what's the Bible saying here?
Our personal enemies, the people who do us wrong, we should do good unto them.
And David actually practiced that.
He actually did good unto people like Saul, Abner, Ish-bosheth.
He did good unto them, even though they were hateful and wicked toward him.
He even did good unto Absalom, and obviously Absalom was super wicked.
The Bible's telling us that if our personal enemy hungers, we should feed him.
And by the way, don't fall into this trap that says, oh, well that's the difference
between the New Testament and the Old Testament.
No.
You know, that's what people say who don't know the Bible.
They don't know the Bible.
You know, the Old Testament God is this really angry, vindictive, unforgiving.
Can I tell you something?
The Old Testament God's vindictive too, because I think we're, can we all agree that Romans
is the New Testament?
I mean, this is the New Testament by anybody's definition.
Okay.
And yet, what does it say at the end of verse 19?
Vengeance is mine.
Sounds like God's a vindictive God.
And guess what?
That's why when we get to revelation, we see vengeance and vengeance and more vengeance.
And God has taken a lot of vengeance in the book of Revelation.
So don't ever believe for one second this garbage that says, well, the Old Testament
God's a vengeful God and the New Testament God's a loving God.
No, no, no.
The Old Testament God's a loving God and the New Testament God's a vengeful God.
Because they're both the same God.
They're both loving and they're both vindictive, okay?
They're both the same.
Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and forever.
And guess what?
This verse right here that says, if your enemy hunger feed him, or where Jesus said,
but I say unto you, love your enemies, you can find that in the Old Testament.
Jesus is literally referring back to teachings of the Old Testament, because in the Mosaic
law, it says that if you find your enemy's ass in the ditch or whatever, you know,
you pull it out, you help your enemy, you return it to your enemy, you do good unto
your enemy.
The Bible already taught that in the books of Moses, to love your enemies, to do good
unto your enemies.
Even in the Old Testament, we see the example of David saying, my hand shall not be upon
thee.
Right?
I'm not going to take vengeance.
Vengeance belongs to the Lord.
Let the Lord avenge me and bind enemies.
So don't fall into this trap of thinking that all of a sudden God has totally changed
in the New Testament, like he softened up in his old age or something.
He's timeless.
He's eternal.
He doesn't grow old.
He is the same always.
And what they do is they try to create this dichotomy between the Old Testament
God and the New Testament God.
And then what they try to do is then ignore all of the wrath of God from the Old Testament.
But then they just conveniently ignore the book of Revelation as well and reject that
conveniently because revelation is meaner than anything in the Old Testament.
There's nothing in the Old Testament more wrathful or meaner than the book of Revelation.
That's the coup de grace, my friend.
Revelation is the roughest book in the entire Bible as far as God killing the most
people and pouring out the most wrath and being the most vindictive.
This revelation, hands down, there's no contest.
And so this teaching of loving our enemies is a timeless teaching.
It was around in the Old Testament.
It's here in the New Testament.
We are to love our enemies, do good unto them.
If our enemy hunger, feed him.
If he thirsts, give him a drink.
This is talking about people who do us wrong personally.
They're not necessarily horrible, God hating reprobates, but they're people who harm us.
And you know what a lot of times you can do with these people is you can turn your enemies
into friends, you know, and you have enemies and they do you wrong.
If you're good unto them, if you pray for them, if you feed them when they're hungry,
if you give them to drink when they're thirsty, you can actually turn that relationship
around.
And I guarantee you there will be people in your life that hate you, that you can
eventually turn around to where they'll love you and be your good friend.
I've seen it happen in my life and in the lives of others.
And so you can overcome evil with good by doing good unto your enemy.
But let's say you do good unto your enemy and they never get right.
Let's say you do good unto your enemy and they just stay your enemy and they hate
you no matter what you do.
And there are some people where the nicer you are to them, the more they hate you
and the worse they treat you.
Am I right?
I mean the more favor be shown unto them, the more wicked they get.
But guess what?
It's okay too, because the Bible says that by giving them food and drink, you're heaping
coals of fire on their head.
Now here's the thing, look, people that are my enemies that I'm mad at, that I want
to see punished, yeah, let's heap some coals of fire on their head.
So even if that's your attitude, even if your attitude is, I want to heap some coals
of fire on this guy's head, well, the best way to do that is by being good unto
your enemies.
And then God sees that he gets even madder.
God's like, man, I thought this guy was a jerk before, but now I see my children being
good unto him and he's even, he's still being wicked.
Then God's really going to cloud up and rain on that guy.
And here's the thing, whatever vengeance we devise for people, it's not going to be
as good as what God does.
God has so many more resources for hurting people than we do.
You know what I mean?
If we just think like, oh man, I got to make this guy pay.
You know what?
God can make people pay more than you've ever dreamed, but you know what?
I would rather have my enemies get right with God and not have to pay at all.
Amen.
I mean, here's the thing, if I had some, some enemy who did me wrong, if I had someone
who did something really hurtful to me and really defrauded me or injured me in some
way, it's not like, oh, the greatest thing would be to see them get punished.
You know, oh, revenge is so sweet.
No, I would much rather see that person repent, ask forgiveness of me, make things
right, get right with God and just be blessed and be happy and for no punishment to happen
to them.
I mean, that was David's attitude.
When people came to David and repented, he's like, sure.
And so that's even better.
So with God, it's a win-win.
If they're reprobates, then yeah, pray down the wrath of God for them, Allah, Psalm
94.
But it's not our problem.
Let God deal with it and don't sit around thinking about it all day either.
Just pray about it and just move on and be happy and live your life.
Be happy.
Okay.
If they're our personal enemies, you know what?
Bless them.
If they're not a reprobate, but they're just our personal enemy, hey, then get on your
knees and pray for God to bless them.
Maybe even do something nice for them and either one or two things are going to happen.
You're either going to turn them into your friend, which is the best case scenario
or worst case they persist in their wickedness and then they get smoked by God, which
is great too.
You just can't stop winning.
It's just everything works together for good to those who love God.
So don't sit around being angry, being upset, getting bitter.
It doesn't do anything.
It doesn't help you.
There's no point.
Be a person who lets things go one way or the other.
Either let it go by praying down the wrath of God on the wicked and then letting it
go or pray down the blessings of God on your enemies and then let it go and either
way it goes, in the end, you're going to look back like Abigail said, and you're going
to be glad that you did.
You're going to be glad.
You're going to say, you know what?
I'm glad I didn't shoot that person.
I'm glad I didn't beat the snot out of that guy.
I'm glad I didn't break that guy's bones, you know, because I didn't need to because
there's no point because whatever I'm worked up about right now isn't even going
to matter five years from now.
It's not going to matter 10 years from now.
And even if it does matter, God will take care of it.
And so we have a lot to learn from these Bible stories about David and from these
New Testament scriptures, both for our own health and our own sanity and our own joy
and good cheer, but also just so that we don't sin against God by getting physical
and beating people up or killing people or anything like that.
That's never our job.
And look, it's really sad when people get mad at my preaching and they say like, oh,
you know, you're preaching that people should pray these imprecatory prayers and, you know,
you preach that they should pray for these wicked, you know, perverts and child
molesters and mass murderers to die.
But here's the thing.
Like if I pray for them to die, I'm not hurting anybody, am I?
It's not like God's just like, oh, well, whatever Pastor Anderson says, I'm just going
to do it.
You know, God doesn't take orders from me.
So if I prayed for God to destroy some wicked reprobate, it doesn't mean that God's
necessarily going to do it.
But, you know, it just makes me feel better to get that off my chest.
And you know what?
Not only that, but I do believe that God will often answer that prayer and he will
destroy those people and he often does.
And if he does, praise God.
But you know what?
By taking away the imprecatory prayers from children of God, by asking them to remove
those 19 Psalms out of 150 Psalms by saying, oh, we're not going to talk about these
19, you know, those that we, uh, we don't want to talk about those.
What you're doing is you're taking away an outlet that God's people need, that vengeance
belongs to the Lord.
And then if you say, well, vengeance doesn't belong to the Lord, the Lord just forgives
everybody.
You're going to be kind of like, hmm, somebody needs to make these people pay.
That's why it's a better doctrine and it's the truth.
It's a better doctrine, even practically speaking to say, hey, God is a God of vengeance and
he's going to make these people pay because then you're like, yeah, they're going
to pay.
Now I can be happy and enjoy my life as opposed to like, no, no, God's going to forgive everybody
and Jeffrey Dahmer's in heaven right now.
Then you're just kind of like, all right, let's go load the guns and let's go.
You know, apparently God's not taking care of this.
We got to take care of it ourselves.
Look, God is going to take care of it.
God sees everything he hears everything and so we need to believe and preach and understand
that God's going to take care of these people because then we don't need to worry
about it.
Then we can go to bed and sleep like a baby knowing that God's got it all taken care of.
Amen.
That's about enough.
Word of prayer.
Father, we thank you so much for these stories about the life of David.
Lord, help us to learn from this man after your own heart and Lord, he definitely was
not a perfect person.
He didn't have a perfect attitude all the time toward his enemies.
Sometimes he had a wrong attitude, Lord, but thank you for these examples of so many
times that he held back from avenging himself.
Lord, help us to do the same thing.
Help us to hold back from avenging ourselves.
Help us to be forgiving, merciful, gracious people and Lord, when something really does
just eat us up so bad that we just can't let it go, then Lord, help us to take it
to you in prayer and never to get violent and in Jesus' name we pray, amen.