Revised Common Lectionary (Complementary)

² Now there was a man in Ma‘on who had property in Karmel. He was very rich, having three thousand sheep and a thousand goats; and he was shearing his sheep in Karmel. ³ The man’s name was Naval, and his wife was named Avigayil. The woman was intelligent and attractive, but the man was surly and mean in his actions; he belonged to the clan of Kalev. ⁴ David, there in the desert, heard that Naval was shearing his sheep. ⁵ David sent off ten young men with these orders: “Go up to Naval in Karmel, and bring him greetings from me. ⁶ Say, ‘Long life and shalom to you, shalom to your household, and shalom to everything that is yours! ⁷ I’ve heard that you now have shearers. Your shepherds were with us [for a while], we did them no harm, and they found nothing missing all the time they were in Karmel. ⁸ Ask your own men; they’ll tell you. Therefore, receive my men favorably, since we have come on a festive day. Please give what you can to your servants and to your son David.’”

⁹ On arrival, David’s men said all these things to Naval in David’s name. When they had finished, ¹⁰ Naval answered David’s servants, “Who is David? Who is the son of Yishai? There are many servants nowadays running away from their masters. ¹¹ Am I supposed to take my bread, my water and my meat that I slaughtered for my shearers and give it to men coming from who knows where?” ¹² So David’s men turned around, went back and came and told him everything Naval had said. ¹³ David said to his men, “Buckle your swords on, all of you!” Each one buckled on his sword, David too; and there went up after David about four hundred men, while two hundred stayed with the equipment.

¹⁴ But one of Naval’s men told Avigayil his wife, “David sent messengers from the desert to greet our master, and he flew on them in a rage, ¹⁵ even though the men had been very good to us — they didn’t harm us, and we found nothing missing during the entire time we went with them, while we were out in the countryside. ¹⁶ They served as a wall protecting us day and night all the time we were with them caring for the sheep. ¹⁷ So now decide what you are going to do, for clearly harm is on its way to our master and all his household, but he’s so mean that no one can tell him anything.”

¹⁸ Avigayil wasted no time in taking 200 loaves of bread, two skins of wine, five sheep already prepared, six quarts of roasted grain, a hundred clusters of raisins and 200 fig cakes, and having them loaded on donkeys. ¹⁹ Then she said to her young men, “Go on ahead of me, and I’ll come along after you.” But she didn’t tell her husband Naval.

²⁰ She was riding her donkey down past the hiding-place in the mountain, when David and his men descended toward her, and she met them. ²¹ David had said, “What a waste it has been guarding everything this fellow has in the desert, so that nothing of his was missing! He has repaid me bad for good!” ²² Then he swore, “May God do the same and more to David’s enemies if I leave alive even one male of everything he owns.”

6 How dare one of you with a complaint against another go to court before pagan judges and not before God’s people? ² Don’t you know that God’s people are going to judge the universe? If you are going to judge the universe, are you incompetent to judge these minor matters? ³ Don’t you know that we will judge angels, not to mention affairs of everyday life? ⁴ So if you require judgments about matters of everyday life, why do you put them in front of men who have no standing in the Messianic Community? ⁵ I say, shame on you! Can it be that there isn’t one person among you wise enough to be able to settle a dispute between brothers? ⁶ Instead, a brother brings a lawsuit against another brother, and that before unbelievers!

⁷ Actually, if you are bringing lawsuits against each other, it is already a defeat for you. Why not rather be wronged? Why not rather be cheated? ⁸ Instead, you yourselves wrong and cheat; and you do it to your own brothers! ⁹ Don’t you know that unrighteous people will have no share in the Kingdom of God? Don’t delude yourselves — people who engage in sex before marriage, who worship idols, who engage in sex after marriage with someone other than their spouse, who engage in active or passive homosexuality, ¹⁰ who steal, who are greedy, who get drunk, who assail people with contemptuous language, who rob — none of them will share in the Kingdom of God. ¹¹ Some of you used to do these things. But you have cleansed yourselves, you have been set apart for God, you have come to be counted righteous through the power of the Lord Yeshua the Messiah and the Spirit of our God.