1 Samuel 27

²⁷Why do you say, O Jacob, and why do you assert, O Israel, “My way is hidden from the Lord, and my claim is ignored by my God”?

²⁸Do you not know? Have you not heard? The Lord is the everlasting God, the Creator of the ends of the earth. He will not grow tired or weary; His understanding is beyond searching out.

¹²“I, even I, am He who comforts you. Why should you be afraid of mortal man, of a son of man who withers like grass?

¹⁷saying, “Do not be afraid, for my father Saul will never lay a hand on you. And you will be king over Israel, and I will be your second-in-command. Even my father Saul knows this is true.”

¹Now in those days the Philistines gathered their forces for warfare against Israel. So Achish said to David, “You must understand that you and your men are to go out to battle with me.”

²David replied, “Then you will come to know what your servant can do.” “Very well,” said Achish. “I will make you my bodyguard for life.”

¹³So Samuel took the horn of oil and anointed him in the presence of his brothers, and the Spirit of the Lord rushed upon David from that day forward. Then Samuel set out and went to Ramah.

¹⁰who would ask him, “What have you raided today?” And David would reply, “The Negev of Judah,” or “The Negev of Jerahmeel,” or “The Negev of the Kenites.”

¹¹David did not leave a man or woman alive to be brought to Gath, for he said, “Otherwise they will report us, saying, ‘This is what David did.’” And this was David’s custom the whole time he lived in Philistine territory.

¹³And David said to his men, “Strap on your swords!” So David and all his men strapped on their swords, and about four hundred men followed David, while two hundred stayed with the supplies.

¹⁰That day David fled from Saul and went to Achish king of Gath.

³⁹After three years, however, two of Shimei’s slaves ran away to Achish son of Maacah, king of Gath. And Shimei was told, “Look, your slaves are in Gath.”

⁴⁰So Shimei saddled his donkey and set out to Achish at Gath in search of his slaves, and he brought them back from Gath.

⁸and David inquired of the Lord: “Should I pursue these raiders? Will I overtake them?” “Pursue them,” the Lord replied, “for you will surely overtake them and rescue the captives.”

⁴²So Abigail hurried and got on a donkey, and attended by five of her maidens, she followed David’s messengers and became his wife.

⁴³David had also married Ahinoam of Jezreel. So she and Abigail were both his wives.

⁵David’s two wives, Ahinoam of Jezreel and Abigail the widow of Nabal of Carmel, had been taken captive.

³His name was Nabal, and his wife’s name was Abigail. She was an intelligent and beautiful woman, but her husband, a Calebite, was harsh and evil in his dealings.

¹⁸Then Abigail hurried and took two hundred loaves of bread, two skins of wine, five butchered sheep, five seahs of roasted grain, a hundred clusters of raisins, and two hundred cakes of figs. She loaded them on donkeys

¹⁹and said to her young men, “Go ahead of me. I will be right behind you.” But she did not tell her husband Nabal.

³When David and his men came to the city, they found it burned down and their wives and sons and daughters taken captive.

²¹Then Saul replied, “I have sinned. Come back, David my son. I will never harm you again, because today you considered my life precious. I have played the fool and have committed a grave error!”

³⁴you are to say, ‘Your servants have raised livestock ever since our youth—both we and our fathers.’ Then you will be allowed to settle in the land of Goshen, since all shepherds are detestable to the Egyptians.”

¹⁷“Therefore come out from among them and be separate, says the Lord. Touch no unclean thing, and I will receive you.”

²⁸in Ziklag; in Meconah and its villages;

³¹Ziklag, Madmannah, Sansannah,

⁵He took his life in his hands when he struck down the Philistine, and the Lord worked a great salvation for all Israel. You saw it and rejoiced, so why would you sin against innocent blood by killing David for no reason?”

¹After the death of Saul, David returned from the slaughter of the Amalekites and stayed in Ziklag two days.

¹On the third day David and his men arrived in Ziklag, and the Amalekites had raided the Negev, attacked Ziklag, and burned it down.

¹Now these were the men who came to David at Ziklag, while he was still banished from the presence of Saul son of Kish (they were among the mighty men who helped him in battle;

³Then the commanders of the Philistines asked, “What about these Hebrews?” Achish replied, “Is this not David, the servant of King Saul of Israel? He has been with me all these days, even years, and from the day he defected until today I have found no fault in him.”

⁷Then Saul struck down the Amalekites all the way from Havilah to Shur, which is east of Egypt.

⁸He captured Agag king of Amalek alive, but devoted all the others to destruction with the sword.

²This is the land that remains: All the territory of the Philistines and the Geshurites,

¹³but the Israelites did not drive out the Geshurites or the Maacathites. So Geshur and Maacath dwell among the Israelites to this day.

²⁹Ephraim also failed to drive out the Canaanites living in Gezer; so the Canaanites continued to dwell among them in Gezer.

¹⁰But they did not drive out the Canaanites who lived in Gezer. So the Canaanites dwell among the Ephraimites to this day, but they are forced laborers.

¹⁴Then the Lord said to Moses, “Write this on a scroll as a reminder and recite it to Joshua, because I will utterly blot out the memory of Amalek from under heaven.”

¹⁵And Moses built an altar and named it The Lord Is My Banner.

³Now go and attack the Amalekites and devote to destruction all that belongs to them. Do not spare them, but put to death men and women, children and infants, oxen and sheep, camels and donkeys.’”

⁷Then Saul struck down the Amalekites all the way from Havilah to Shur, which is east of Egypt.

¹⁸Ishmael’s descendants settled from Havilah to Shur, which is near the border of Egypt as you go toward Asshur. And they lived in hostility toward all their brothers.

¹⁷Remember what the Amalekites did to you along your way from Egypt,

¹⁸how they met you on your journey when you were tired and weary, and they attacked all your stragglers; they had no fear of God.

²¹With the edge of the sword they devoted to destruction everything in the city—man and woman, young and old, oxen, sheep, and donkeys.

⁷Now the angel of the Lord found Hagar by a spring of water in the desert—the spring along the road to Shur.

¹⁶Now the descendants of Moses’ father-in-law, the Kenite, went up with the men of Judah from the City of Palms to the Wilderness of Judah in the Negev near Arad. They went to live among the people.

²⁵The sons of Jerahmeel the firstborn of Hezron: Ram his firstborn, Bunah, Oren, Ozem, and Ahijah.

⁹The sons who were born to Hezron: Jerahmeel, Ram, and Caleb.

¹¹Now Heber the Kenite had moved away from the Kenites, the descendants of Hobab the father-in-law of Moses, and had pitched his tent by the great tree of Zaanannim, which was near Kedesh.

²⁹to those in Racal and in the cities of the Jerahmeelites and Kenites;

¹¹When Cephas came to Antioch, however, I opposed him to his face, because he stood condemned.

¹²For before certain men came from James, he used to eat with the Gentiles. But when they arrived, he began to draw back and separate himself, for fear of those in the circumcision group.

²⁵The fear of man is a snare, but whoever trusts in the Lord is set securely on high.

¹⁹Truthful lips endure forever, but a lying tongue lasts only a moment.

²²Then David said to Abiathar, “I knew that Doeg the Edomite was there that day, and that he was sure to tell Saul. I myself am responsible for the lives of everyone in your father’s house.

³⁰Then Jacob said to Simeon and Levi, “You have brought trouble upon me by making me a stench to the Canaanites and Perizzites, the people of this land. We are few in number; if they unite against me and attack me, I and my household will be destroyed.”

⁴And all Israel heard the news: “Saul has attacked an outpost of the Philistines, and now Israel has become a stench to the Philistines!” Then the people were summoned to join Saul at Gilgal.