But one of the
young men told Abigail, Nabal’s wife, saying, Behold, David sent messengers out
of the wilderness to salute our master; and he railed on them (I Sam. 25:14).
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
with thine own hand, now let thine enemies, and they that seek evil to my lord,
be as Nabal (I Sam. 25:26).
For in very
deed, as the Lord God of Israel liveth, which hath kept me
back from hurting thee, except thou hadst hasted and come to meet me,
surely there had not been left unto Nabal by the morning light any that pisseth
against the wall (I Sam. 25:34).
COMMON GRACE ARGUMENT:
Q. “God
restrained David from taking revenge on Nabal for scorning the messengers that
David sent to greet Nabal (I Sam. 25:14). Abigail, Nabal’s wife, recognized
God’s restraint when she pleaded with David not to seek vengeance against her
husband, ‘seeing the Lord hath withholden thee from coming to shed blood,
and from avenging thyself with thine own hand’ (26). David acknowledged this
truth: ‘as the Lord God of Israel liveth, which hath kept me back from
hurting thee …’ (34). Is this restraint of David from sinning an example of
a common grace?”
(I)
Rev. Ronald Hanko
[Source: Covenant Reformed News, vol. 18, no. 16 (Aug. 2021)]
David … was a godly [man], and there can be no question that God’s restraint of sin in [this case] was gracious. He kept David from vengeful murder… David was, as we know, a man after God’s own heart and a picture of Christ. That God restrains His people from sin is one of the great blessings of grace, for we are so foolish that we would go headlong into sin, were it not for His restraining hand and Spirit ...
God uses many different means to restrain man’s wickedness: the fear of punishment; the desire for the praise of others; the social shame and disgrace that wickedness brings at times, even among the ungodly; the fear of revenge; the evil consequences of sin to one’s health, family or career. Even then, these restraints only just keep sin in check. When they are removed, it becomes evident that man’s heart was not changed by these restraints, for he is still just as depraved and prone to all evil as before ...
Our denial of common grace … is not a denial of God’s restraint of sin, nor of the fact that this restraint is the work of His Spirit, nor of His gracious purpose in restraining sin. It is simply that there is no grace except in the cross and shed blood of our Saviour, and no grace for those who are without Christ. Proverbs 3:33 reminds us that “the curse of the Lord is in the house of the wicked,” not His grace …
[With regard to] God’s gracious restraint of sin in His people, as in the case of David …, we should remember that He also, in His justice, sometimes removes those restraints so that we fall into sin. This happens when we are hard-hearted and stubborn, and when we neglect prayer and watching. We must, therefore, be warned and be constant, lest we fall into temptation and into the snares of Satan. This matter of the restraint of sin should teach us, therefore, to look to Him always in the great battle we fight against Satan’s wiles and our own sinfulness.
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(II)
More to come! (DV)
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