Then Abigail hurried and took two hundred loaves of bread and two jugs of wine and five sheep already prepared and five measures of roasted grain and a hundred clusters of raisins and two hundred cakes of figs, and loaded them on donkeys.
She said to her young men, “Go on before me; behold, I am coming after you.” But she did not tell her husband Nabal.
— First Samuel 25:18-19
What Abigail brought to David may not have been enough to satisfy his entire army, but it was probably all she could do at the moment. When she saw David, she bowed low before him and said, “On me, my lord, on me let this iniquity be!” (1 Sam. 25:24). She was saying her husband’s foolish act was her fault, and to punish him would be unjust. We must learn from Abigail and cover others’ mistakes in love (1 Pet. 4:8; James 5:20). If possible, deflect punishment away from those less able to bear it.
Adapted from David: After God’s Heart, page 79.
Tomorrow: “Abagail’s Supplication” (3)