Think.

I'm sure we've all heard the phrase, "Think before you speak" or "Think before you act."  Both phrases are very good advice.  But how often do we actually apply that advice to our lives?  This is one of those times where the phrase "Much easier said than done" is very easy to apply!  :)

1 Samuel 25:30-31 - 30 And when the Lord does for my lord according to all the good that He has spoken concerning you, and appoints you ruler over Israel, 31 this will not cause grief or a troubled heart to my lord, both by having shed blood without cause and by my lord having avenged himself.  When the Lord deals well with my lord, then remember your maidservant.

Yes, this section is a little bit confusing.  Abigail is speaking to David here.  Who is Abigail you might ask?  She is the wife of a certain man named Nabal. Nabal had refused to help out David's men in quite a rude and ungracious way.  David was outraged at Nabal's reply and immediately set out to avenge him.  Abigail met him halfway and talked him out of his revenge mind set.

In these verses we see her appeal to his conscience, his heart: 

"She cannot but think that if he should avenge himself it would afterwards be a grief and an offence of heart to him...She is confident that if he pass by the offense it will afterwards be no grief to him; but, on the contrary, it would yield him unspeakable satisfaction that his wisdom and grace had go the better of his passion" (Henry).

She knows he would regret this vengeance later.  After all, it would have been reckless and causeless "for though Nabal had been guilty of abominable rudeness, and ingratitude; yet he had done nothing worthy of death, by the laws of God or man.  And whatsoever he had done, the rest of his family were innocent" (Wesley).

If only we all had an Abigail to intercede and give us a chance to think about the actions in which we are about to partake.  It would be so much better for us if "when we are tempted to sin we should consider how it will appear in the reflection.  Let us never do any thing for which our own consciences will afterwards have occasion to upbraid us and which we shall look back upon with regret" (Henry).  

I challenge you today to think before you speak and think before you act.  When does the reflection of sin every prove good?  It doesn't!  Think.