- Now as some of you know, today we are in part
two of a series entitled " Mean People " and specifically what
to do about them. Mean people and what
to do about them. And just so you know, I realize that you
have been mean, perhaps somebody is gonna
hear or watch this message, I hope not and
you'll come to mind. I hope that's not the case. We've all had
seasons in our lives when we've been the mean people. And mostly when we get together and open the scripture
together and worship together, we're talking about
how to live a life in such a way that we're
not the mean people. So we usually focus on how
to become better people but in this series, we're
talking specifically about how to respond to or what to do about the mean
people in our lives. Not just the folks who bug us, we all have people who bug us. Specifically, these
are the mean people. These are the people who are
deceptive, they're controlling, they're just unkind,
they're unpredictable, they're manipulative. To be specific, I'm not
talking about somebody who's physically or
sexually abusive. That's different,
that's illegal. This is just the mean people. And it's important
to talk about this And it's important
to think through how we're gonna respond because if we don't have a plan, if we're not prepared,
if we're not proactive, well you know what happens. What happens to the mean
people in our lives, the mean people in our lives, they actually gain a measure
of control over our lives. And before we know it, we
are being mean right back even if we don't mean to. In fact, it's almost
as if we have no choice because and you know this. Mean can make you mean, because mean people
keep us off balance. And if somebody walks
up to you and pushes you and you're off balance,
what do you do? Well, you have no choice. But to compensate when
we're off balance, we're forced to compensate. So when you're
around these people, you always feel a
little bit off balance. In fact, when you're
around these people, other people who know you
might even say to you. You know, when
you're around him, when you're with her, I noticed when you're together, you're not the same person
you are everywhere else. You seem to become
a different person, it's because that person has
kind of thrown you off balance. And obviously or it
seems intuitively, our only choice is to
respond and like kind. I told you the first part
of the story last week, we have an 80 year old friend
Sandra and I do name Alice. And Alice, Sandra
became her legal power, financial power of attorney because we needed to move
Alice out of her home into assisted living. And Sandra went to jump
through all the hoops to become legal
power of attorney. And we eventually
got Alice moved but during that process, Alice had invited a
friend to move in with her who had fallen on hard times. This guy's in his late 60s, living out of his car and out
of the goodness of her heart. she said, well you can
stay with me a few months until you kind of get
yourself together. And we were warned
that if he moved in, we would have a hard
time getting him out. But when I met this
guy, his name is Roger. He seemed like such a nice guy and he was actually
helpful with Alice and helpful with
the garage sale. So we eventually get
her house cleaned out. Some of you heard
this story last time, get her house cleaned out. We put the house on the
market but he won't move out. And we gave him a deadline,
he won't move out. We're showing the house
a real estate agent, showing the house. There's nothing in the house now except Roger's air mattress,
some clothes and his computer. It's a lovely home just
don't look in there at the guy camping out in
the house, he'll be gone. So we're trying
to show the house, sell the house so she
can get her money. She was living off a
pension, social security and there was a
little bit of a gap in terms of her monthly expenses
with the assisted living. So we really, really
wanted to sell her house, put her equity in the bank
and she'd be good to go. But Roger wouldn't move out. And what was our response? Well, our response
was pretty much what probably your
response would be. We sat around, coming up
with mean manipulative ways to get Roger out
of Alice's house because that's just what you do. And after a while we realized, we're becoming like Roger,
we're thinking like mean people. In fact he was so in our heads, it was like he was living
with us in our home. It was all we talked about. He became the focus
of our attention. I'd come home every day, what's the latest with Rogers? We got closer and
closer and closer. This closing and
we were so worried he was gonna
undermine the closing. In fact as I shared last time, he actually tried to do it. The point being, it's
difficult not to be mean to mean people. It's difficult not to be unkind to people who've been unkind as it's difficult to be
sensitive to insensitive people. And again, the
golden rule is like right out the window, isn't it? When it comes to mean people, now it's the iron rule. It's the do unto others
as they have done unto you or as they are doing unto
you or even worse, right? But of course and we
talked about this. The problem with getting
back at the mean people or the problem with trying
to get even with mean people is that it actually
makes things worse. Because the problem
with getting even is that it makes us
even with someone we don't really even like. It makes us like someone
that we actually dislike. So the question we're
asking in this series and we began unpacking
the answer last time is what do we do? I mean, you can't just
ignore these people, that actually empowers them and eventually you're
gonna break, right? Eventually you're gonna break, you're gonna act
like them or worse, which actually gives
them more power over you. In fact, we have all been there. Some of our greatest
regrets perhaps or how we responded
or how we reacted to the people who
threw us off balance, the mean people in our lives. So there's actually
a third option. You don't have to ignore them, you don't have to
become like them. There's a third
option that actually takes away some of their power. I meant it actually positions
us to keep our frustration from overflowing into other
relationships around us. Maybe you grew up in a family
where your mom was angry, your father was angry
and as you got older, you realized they're not
really angry with me, they're angry with their
father, their mother. They're angry with
somebody else, they're angry with life but their anger just overflowed
and how they parented. And this third
option protects us from falling into
that trap as well. Jesus taught it of course, and Jesus modeled it. In fact, he was
the ultimate model but Abigail modeled it as well. And Abigail is a character
in the old Testament that many people
don't know about and she's part of,
sort of the backstory of the story of David. Most of us are familiar
with king David if you grew up in church. Maybe you know the story
of shepherd boy, David. But this story takes place
in the season of his life where he is fugitive David. When he was a teenager
as most of us know, he marched down into
the valley of Elah. He killed Goliath
with a Slingshot. In that moment, he
became a national hero. So king Saul the king of
Israel brought him in close, actually made him
part of his family because he was a national
hero and he was a leader and he had influence. King Saul was smart
enough to know, you keep your enemies, You
keep your friends close and you keep your
enemies close as well. And David, he realized
was a bit of a threat to his power and his
influence in Israel. And then, he gets word that a rogue Prophet had
actually gone to David's house when he was a little
boy and anointed him as the next king of Israel. And if you are the current king, of course that's a problem because you want your son
to become the next king. So now David is a threat
to Saul's dynasty. So he tries to kill David,
he eventually banishes him. David becomes a fugitive, he gathers other
fugitives around him. Before long, he's
got about 600 men. Their wives, their
girlfriends, you know. Their kids kind of
traipsing along behind him. He's got a small army but
he's a fugitive from the law and he's angry and he's
angry with king Saul and he's angry with
the circumstances. But he can't get to Saul, so he just kind of
carries the seething anger every where he goes. And that's what
brings us to the story and this is where
we meet Abigail. So I'm gonna catch you up
a little bit with the story and then we'll
continue from there. Here's how the story begins. 1 Samuel 25. Samuel was essentially
David's biographer. A certain man in Maon, who
had property there in Carmel, was very wealthy. He had a thousand goats
and three thousand sheep, which he was shearing in Carmel and his name was Nabal. Now during sheep
shearing season, men and families who
had a lot of sheep discovered just how much
wealthier they had become. This was like payday, this is
an annual financial report. His name was Nabal and his
wife's name was Abigail. And she was an intelligent
and beautiful woman, but her husband
was harsh and mean. There's our word,
in his dealings. So David and his men hear about the fact that Nabal is having
sheep shearing in Carmel and realizes, Nabal's about
to become even wealthier. So David sends 10
of his men to Carmel to meet with Nabal to say. Hey, would you be willing
to share some of your wealth and some of your extra wealth, some of your extra
with me and my men. And why would David feel like
he could make that request? Well that's what the
message to Nabal, the message from Davids
meant to Nabal explains that, here's what they said. They said Nabal, When your shepherds were
with us out in the fields for months and
months and months. When your shepherds were with
us, we did not mistreat them. And the whole time
they were at Carmel, nothing of theirs was missing. In other words, our men could have taken
whatever they wanted to take. We could have taken women,
we could have taken sheep, we could have mistreated
your shepherds but instead, you
can talk to them. Nothing went missing. In other words, your profit is due in
part to our protection. So this seemed
kind of reasonable. Hey, would you share with
us your profits because you know, your profits are
due in part to our protection. Nabal's response, he was rude. He said this who to
David's messengers. Who is this David? Now he knew who he was. Who is this David? Who is this son of Jesse? Who's broken away from the king. He's just abandoned,
he's a fugitive, he's a nobody, he's an outlaw. I did not ask for his help, I didn't need his help and
I don't owe him anything. And you can go back
and tell him that. So David's men they've turned
around and they went back. When they arrived, they
reported every word. And if you were
with us last time, you'll remember
David's response. David said to his men, " Each of you strap
on your sword." So they did and David
strapped his arm as well. And about four hundred men, about four hundred men
went up with David. They were headed out of
the mountains to caramel. Now this four hundred men,
this was an overreaction as we said of ethic proportion. This was going to be a massacre. And as he rides along, he does what many of us
have done many, many times. As he rides along, he kind
of builds up a head of steam. He begins justifying to himself what he wasn't 100%
sure he should be doing. It's been useless, he
mutters to himself. It's been useless, all my watch over this fellow's
property in the wilderness so that nothing of his missing. And what has he done? How has he responded to me? He has paid me
back evil for good. And then God, you know. David evokes God's name and
invite God into the equation. May God deal with me, he says. " May God deal with me,
may God deal with David " Be it ever so
severely if by morning " I leave alive one male
of all who belong to him." I'm gonna kill his servants,
his friends, his sons and then I'm gonna kill him. Now again, you read this
through and you're like, okay. So David, he didn't
share with you. Is this what you do? Well, if we know anything or if you know anything
about David's history, this is what he did. So he's riding along, he's hurt, he's angry. He's powering up, It's
gonna be evil for evil. He's really channeling,
I think his frustration with king Saul but king
Saul is untouchable. But he's found somebody he
can take his anger out on. And that's pretty much
where we left off last time with the story. So, we'll continue from there. Meanwhile back in Carmel,
here's what happened. One of the servants,
Nebal's servants told Abigail, Nabal's wife. " David sent messengers." You weren't here,
we find out later. You weren't here but let
me tell you what happened. " David sent messengers
from the wilderness " To give our
master his greetings " But our master hurled
insults at them." Yet Abigail, these men. David's men. These men were so good to us, they did not mistreat
us the whole time we were out in the
fields near them nothing went missing
night and day. Night and day they were
like a wall around us. They protected us the whole time we were herding our
sheep near them. And then she says,
Abigail think it over. I want you to think it over
and see what you can do because disaster is
hanging over our master and his whole household. He and then I
think she leans in. She doesn't say this very loud. She whispers in Abigail's ear. He is such a wicked man. He's such a wicked man that
nobody, nobody can talk to him. So Abigail acted quickly. And here's what she does,
it's kind of interesting. She assembles a caravan
of food donkeys. If you're familiar
with food trucks, Okay. Food donkeys, the
caravan of food donkey. She gets all these
donkeys, ties them together and then she loads
them up with food. Food donkeys, there were
hundreds of loaves of bread, figs, cakes, wine. She just loads them up, she knows she has about
400 male mouth to feed. Then she told her servant,
this was so smart. She said to her servants,
you go on ahead. You head out toward the
plain, I'll follow you. But she did not tell her husband
Nabal what she was up to. Meanwhile, coming down
out of the mountains here comes David and his
400 men armed for battle. And he's just
mumbling to himself, building up this head of steam. Justifying, building
up justification for what he's about to do. And as he comes out of this
ravine, the text tells. As he comes out of this ravine onto this big wide open plane. And what does he see? A caravan of food donkeys and in the front is
this beautiful woman. And it totally
messes up his mood. You've ever had that happen. Like you've got your
speech perfectly planned and you've kind of
built up a head of steam and you're gonna go home or you're gonna go
walk down the office to the other office. You've got it all worked out. And then somebody apologizes or somebody does
something so nice for you. It's like, I was so mad. I was perfectly mad, I was perfectly mad to
deliver this message. So here comes David. I mean he's spent all this
time, he's got these guys. And here's the food
caravan, ruins his mood. I mean, you just can't
mad with that going on. So here's what the text says. " When Abigail saw David, " She quickly got off her donkey " And she bow down before David " With her face to the ground." And this is so powerful. She begins to speak to David. She begins to speak to David as if he is already the man that she hopes he will become. Now ladies, you should
take note of this. This will work on us even when
we know what you're up to. It just works, you know. Honey, you are so
patient with the kids. I am? Yes you are so, it's
like a Jedi mind trick. You are so patient with our
son and with our daughter. Honey, you are such
a good planner. I can't wait to see what
you've planned for my birthday. You're such, such
a good planner. It's like, I am? Anyway here's what she
does, it's so powerful. She fell at his
feet and she said, Pardon your servant my lord
and let me speak to you. In other words, just
give me a minute. And please hear what
your servant has to say. Please, she says. Pay no attention to
my husband, my Lord. That wicked man Nabal,
he is just like his name. His name means fool,
and folly goes with him. So you're not wrong
about my husband, okay. And as for me, your servant. I wasn't there when
your 10 men showed up and made the request. If I'd been there, I may have been able to
influence my husband. I wasn't there. This
wasn't my fault. Referring to the 10 men that
David had sent ahead of time. Then here she goes,
this is so powerful. Here's what she says. And now my Lord, as surely
as the lord your God lives and as you live, since the Lord has kept
you from bloodshed, since the lord has kept
you from avenging yourself with your own hands. And David's like, he did? she's like, yes he did. In other words, David, you're not
the type of person that would avenge yourself
on a defenseless person. Are you? I guess I'm not. And then she gives him credit again for being even better
than he was about to be. She continues. And let this gift, which your servant has
brought to my Lord, be given to the
men who follow you. Again, this just completely
ruined his plans. I mean, how do you justify
slaughter and pillage when somebody is bringing you
what you were gonna steal. The Lord your God. The Lord your God
will certainly make a lasting dynasty for my Lord because you fight
the Lord's battles. He's like, I do? Yes, you do. You fight the Lord's battles. You don't have to fight
your own battles David. And no wrongdoing will be found
in you as long as you live. It won't? No, it won't. Even though, and then she refers to king Saul 'cause everybody knew the story, everybody knew the background
of why David was a fugitive. Even though someone is
pursuing you to take your life, the life of my Lord will be... She uses some interesting
Hebrew imagery. The life of my Lord
will be bound securely in the bundle of the living by the Lord your God. which is like what here's... Here's basically
what she's saying. Even though someone is
trying to steal your life, your life is tucked
away securely and safely in God's wallet. Your life is hidden in the
bottom of a lady's large purse. It's safe, no one will be
ever be able to find it. Then, this is my favorite part. Then she takes him back
to 15 year old David, he's 15 year old self when he faced Goliath. In fact, perhaps as we
talked about last time, David sword was Goliaths sword. He'd actually taken it
from a priest earlier just a few chapters earlier. Perhaps she saw Goliath
sword strapped to his back or strapped across
the back of his mule. Maybe that's what
gave her this idea. Here's what she says, but the lives, this is so great. But the lives of your enemies, he, God. Will hurl away as from
the pocket of a sling. David. Remember, remember
God's past faithfulness. Remember when you
marched down into, walk down into the valley
of the valley of Elah to face Goliath. You weren't a warrior, you weren't equipped for battle. You didn't have a sword. You just did what you felt
like God wanted you to do. And do you remember how
God came to your rescue? Do you remember how
God defended You? Remember those days. David, you don't
need to get even. You have no need to
return evil for evil. For the lord Your
God is with you. And then she speaks
to his future. And essentially, she asks the question that we
ask all the time around here. She asked the question
without asking it directly. Essentially this
next part, she says. David, what story
do you want to tell when this is nothing but
a story that you tell? Years from now, when
your looking back on this season of your
life as a fugitive because one day you're
gonna be the king, God's gonna keep
his promise to you. But when you look
back on the season, what story do you want to tell? Here's her version. When the Lord has
fulfilled for my Lord, every good thing he
promised concerning him and has appointed him
ruler or king over Israel. My Lord, this is so great. My Lord will not have
on his conscience the staggering burden
of needless bloodshed or having avenged himself. David, isn't this
the better story? Don't you want to look
back on this season and realize that
you stepped back instead of taking matters
into your own hands. And of course, David
comes to he's senses. He's about to act like
somebody he doesn't even like. And David said to Abigail " praise be to the
Lord, the God of Israel. " Who has sent you
today to meet me. " May you be blessed
for your good judgment." In other words, you had good judgment I didn't. I'm thanking God for
your good judgment and I'm so grateful
it intersected with the decision I
was about to make, for keeping me from
bloodshed this day and from avenging myself
with my own hands. I have heard your words and
I'm granting you your request. Now at some point, we all need an Abigail
in our lives don't we? We all need somebody
who can talk us down, we all need somebody
who has access to us. We all need somebody
who feels permission to delve into those
areas of our lives that we oftentimes just
keep people away from. We all need an Abigail. And when she shows up or when
he shows up in our lives, we should be wise
enough to listen. In fact some of us
if we're honest, one of our greatest regrets
could have been avoided if we had listened to
the Abigail in our life. Somebody did say
something, maybe a parent, maybe a friend, maybe
somebody you work with, somebody you date. They did say something but
you just wouldn't listen. We need to listen
to those people who speak to our
preferred future. Who reminds us that what we
want immediately sometimes, is gonna get in the way of
what we want ultimately. That we'll feel what
feels right, right now may haunt us later. And then and I was
tempted to skip the rest of the story because it's a little bit storybook but hey, this is
how the story ends and this is how things
went down back then. When Abigail went to Nabal, he was in a house holding a
banquet like that of a king cause he's got all
this extra wealth. He was in high spirits,
he was so happy and very drunk. And so she told him nothing
at all until daybreak. She doesn't go back and say, you really owe me
big time because, she just waits. Then in the morning
when Nabal was sober, his wife told him
everything that had happened and his heart failed him when he realized how close
he came to being executed and losing everything he had and he became like a stone. And then about 10 days later, the Lord struck
Nabal and he died. And then the storybook ending. Then David sent word to Abigail asking her to become his wife. It's like, really? Yeah, this is just how
things happened back then. And what do you think she did? Abigail quickly got on a donkey and attended by her
five female servants, went with David's messengers
and became his wife and of course they live
happily ever after. The end. So yeah, I made that part up. So, here's what we have and this is where this
begins to interface with all of our lives
either now or in the future. Three characters, three
different responses but only one hero. Nabal, David and Abigail. Evil for good, evil for evil. This is where we're
tempted to live and then good for evil. As we said last time as
you get to know Nabal, he's pretty much maniacal. David is predictable
in this circumstance and Abigail is remarkable. And these are our
choices, really. And if you're not a Jesus
follower, you get to choose. And hopefully you will lean more in one direction
than the other but it's up to you, you're the captain
of your own ship. But if you're a Jesus follower. For those of us who
not just Christians, not those of us who just
say we believe stuff. For those of us who
wake up every day and say to our heavenly father, I want to surrender
my eyes, my ears, my will, my life, my resources. To the best of my ability,
I want to follow you. We're really only
left with one option and that's remarkable. And the reason it's our
only option is two fold. Number one, we've been on the
receiving end of remarkable and we have been
called to model it. We don't call our remarkable
Abigail, amazing Abigail. We call ours amazing
what, amazing grace. That while we were
still sinners, Christ died for our sins. And then Jesus who
died for our sins says now I want you to
not just believe in me or believe things about me. I want you to get up every
single day and follow me. To which you may
be tempted to say, what does that look like? And Jesus would smile and say, well you should know by now. If you're gonna follow me,
it means you emulate me. Which means I want you
to love your enemies to which we say, you
mean tolerate and ignore. He says no, I mean love. Here's his words, his words. I want you to do good, not just ignore and
not just not be unkind. I want you to do good
to those who hate you. To what you would say, I thought I was doing
good Just not to hurt him, hurt her, or let the
air out of his tires or slip the air mattress and put all of his
clothes out on the street and change the locks. I mean, I thought I
was already doing good because of what I hadn't done. Jesus says no, that's not
what I'm talking about. And I want you to bless those, I want you to bless
those who curse you. And I want you to pray for
those who mistreat you. Does anybody do this? To pray for the... If we're honest we would say, I don't even spend a lot of time praying for the people
who treat me well. And Jesus says, I want you to pray for
those who mistreat you. I want you to pray
for the mean people. I don't want you to
do something to them, I want you to do
something for them because that's how you keep
from becoming like them. But there's a bonus. Jesus says, when you do to them and for them what they
don't deserve for you to do. And when you pray for them
and when you do good to them, you actually become like
your father in heaven because he is also kind to
the ungrateful and the wicked. So, got some mean
people in your life. Parents, do your children have some mean people
in their lives. And because your children have
mean people in their lives. You know if anybody
mistreats my kids it's like they're
mistreating me. And how have you responded? And what would it look like? You don't have to do it. And what would it look
like for your children? They don't have to do it either but what would it look
like in your circumstances to actually do good
to those who hate you? What would it look like
to return good for evil? As things continued to
escalate with Rodger, he threatened to Sue
our real estate agent. I mean, it just got
completely out of control. About six days before closing, the closing that we weren't
sure that was gonna happen because he wasn't
about to move out. And of course, you're not
gonna close on a house with somebody living in it. I mean, it was just so weird. I walked into the kitchen
and Sandra had been baking and she had cookie
sheets out with muffins out that were cooling. And then there was a paper
plate with six muffins with some cellophane over it and clearly she was gonna take
these muffins to somebody, what she does all the time. And I said, who are these for? And she looked at me and smile. She said, they're for Roger. And I'm like what? She said they are for Roger. A little backstory,
during the garage sale that Roger actually
helped us with, he actually bought
things from sweet Alice and then said he would've
thrown her out of her house. It's just crazy. Anyway, during the garage sale, Sandra took two different
kinds of muffins and he loved one
particular kind. So she got up that morning
and made his favorite muffins and was gonna go
over there and... I'm just like, darlin really? And here's what she said. She said I have
to do this for me. I have to do this for me, I
have to do something for him. I have to do something for him and this is the best thing
I could come up with. So she went out in the
garage, got on her donkey and rode to Lawrenceville. Now her plan was to get that and leave the muffins on his car and then text him and say, Hey, Roger you know. He was outside. They had a very
awkward conversation. She left the muffins,
didn't make a dent. Sandra, she would tell you. She was free. And then four days before the
closing was to take place, after again, all kinds
of just crazy stuff. He finally took he's
stuff and he left. But here's the
point for all of us. Let's not write a
predictable story, let's not write an
evil for evil story. It's so predictable, it's what everybody
expects you to do. It's what you're justified. You're your friends would say, well of course
that's what you did. This is our moment,
this is our opportunity. The meaner they are, the brighter our light has
an opportunity to shine. And I know that because I
don't know your circumstances, I know that so easy for me
to stand up here and say. But I'm not asking
you to follow me, I'm just trying to inspire
you and encourage you to follow our savior and to write a remarkable story. To do for others precisely
what they don't deserve for you to do. And it may not, In
fact it probably won't change anything
anything in them but it will do
something for you. And in doing so, you will be
like your father in heaven.
