June 5

So he said to his men, “The LORD forbid that I should do such a thing to my master, the LORD’s anointed. May I never lift my hand against him, since he is the LORD’s anointed.” — 1 Sam 24:6 BSB

“Wouldn’t it be natural to resent it?” someone asked after being insulted. “Yes,” came the reply, “but it would be godlike to forgive it.” David chose the godlike response. He had the chance to take revenge. Saul, his enemy, was at his mercy. One strike, and Saul would no longer trouble David. He could have become king immediately. His men urged him to do it, and David himself was tempted. But he resisted the temptation, allowing Saul to leave unharmed. He listened to God’s voice in his conscience and restrained the impulse to take revenge.

The first instinct of a child, when wronged, is to seek revenge. Sometimes adults even encourage this by telling children to punish an object that has hurt them, like a chair or a toy. In adults, too, the desire for revenge is natural, and only the higher law of love that Christ teaches can repress it. The lesson is that the punishment of sin belongs in God’s hands, not ours. Our duty is to bear wrongs patiently, not to repay injury with injury, but to return kindness for unkindness and to overcome evil with good.