The way of wisdom is not to say, “I will repay evil.” but instead to wait for the Lord, knowing that he in his justice, in his future and coming justice, will fully deliver."

Confidence in Future Justice

David’s Last Words

1 Kings 2

When David’s time to die drew near, he commanded Solomon his son, saying, “I am about to go the way of all the earth. Be strong, and show yourself a man, and keep the charge of the Lord your God, walking in his ways and keeping his statutes, his commandments, his rules, and his testimonies, as it is written in the Law of Moses, that you may prosper in all that you do and wherever you turn, that the Lord may establish his word that he spoke concerning me, saying, ‘If your sons pay close attention to their way, to walk before me in faithfulness with all their heart and with all their soul, you shall not lack a man on the throne of Israel.’

Moreover, you also know what Joab the son of Zeruiah did to me, how he dealt with the two commanders of the armies of Israel, Abner the son of Ner, and Amasa the son of Jether, whom he killed, avenging in time of peace for blood that had been shed in war, and putting the blood of war on the belt around his waist and on the sandals on his feet. Act therefore according to your wisdom, but do not let his gray head go down to Sheol in peace.

But deal loyally with the sons of Barzillai the Gileadite, and let them be among those who eat at your table, for with such loyalty they met me when I fled from Absalom your brother.

And there is also with you Shimei the son of Gera, the Benjaminite from Bahurim, who cursed me with a grievous curse on the day when I went to Mahanaim. But when he came down to meet me at the Jordan, I swore to him by the Lord, saying, ‘I will not put you to death with the sword.’ Now therefore do not hold him guiltless, for you are a wise man. You will know what you ought to do to him, and you shall bring his gray head down with blood to Sheol.”

Devotion to God’s Word

As David reached the end of his life and began to pass on words of wisdom, further down the road than where most of us are, he reflected on what will really matter in the end. The first thing he goes to is saying God’s word matters. Staying devoted to God involves staying devoted to his word – not just in a way of hearing it once in a while and keeping it on the shelf, but doing it, because it has reshaped your thinking and sunk all the way into your heart. One thing that will really matter in the end is that kind of wholehearted devotion to scripture. David’s challenge says to us: don’t just leave your knowledge about the Bible on the shelf. Let it sink deep within you. Let it sink deep within you day by day as you keep thinking about the things that God’s word talks about, as you keep thinking about the things that God’s word reveals about God, as you keep thinking about the things that the Bible reveals about God’s ways.

Maybe some of us need to be challenged by David’s parting words. Maybe some of us need to be challenged to realize we can’t just leave this on the shelf. We’ve got to let it sink deep into our hearts, and we’ve got to let it grow out in actions in our lives. Here’s the first thing that will really matter, according to King David: God’s word. It challenges us to an attitude, a posture of wholehearted devotion to God’s word.

Devotion to…Retribution?

But then we come to part two of David’s speech, verses 5 through 9, and we need to ask a question: What’s going on here?

If we were reading through 1 and 2 Samuel, which are like the prequels to First Kings, and we read about the life of King David, we would already be familiar with some of these characters that David brings up in verses 5 through 9 – Joab, the men from Gilead, Shimei. If we had been reading through 2 Samuel, we would know that David has had a gracious posture specifically towards Shimei, and to some degree toward Joab. We may wonder to ourselves, what’s going on with David now at the end of his life, saying to the coming king, “Hey, coming king, I know that you will know what to do with these guys that I was merciful toward – don’t let their gray head go down to Sheol in peace.” Maybe it makes us a little uncomfortable, because we might look at this and wonder: Is David becoming vengeful and vindictive and unforgiving in his old age, or what’s going on here? It’s a challenging question to figure out. It takes a little patience to sort through.

Before I give you my answer to that question, we can just review some of these storylines for a moment together. There are a few storylines here in this passage. One of them is talking about future justice for Joab, verses 5 and 6. Now, who is Joab? Joab was a military commander who worked closely with David for many years of David’s life, but he was a complicated figure. At times, he acted heroically. At times, he was so devoted to the king’s honor that he was the one who wanted to rush out and chop off someone’s head in order to defend the king. He was very loyal to King David and his honor, but he had this complaint about David: across the years, Joab complained that David didn’t let him chop off enough heads. His complaint includes this direct quote: “David, you love those who hate you.” This is Joab, the complicated military commander’s complaint about King David, which is part of why Joab has such a complicated legacy.

Notice a few of the things that are on Joab’s resume: He killed Abner, as is mentioned here in this text and in 2 Samuel chapter 3. He killed Amasa. Both of these were situations when leaders in the kingdom of Israel were not in unity with each other, and Joab’s solution to disunity was to chop off heads. He conspired with David in the wrongful death – putting it mildly – of Uriah, Bathsheba’s first husband. Beyond all of that, he killed David’s son Absalom, against David’s direct orders. Joab was a military commander who in many ways was loyal to King David for many years, but he has this complicated legacy around him. David never personally executed Joab, never found it fit to do so, never thought it right to do so. But now, as he reaches the end of his life, he thinks about Joab, the complicated military commander, and he realizes there will need to be future justice from a coming king to deal with Joab’s complicated legacy.

Another character who comes up in this passage is Shimei – doubtless one of the most diabolical characters in all of the Bible. There’s a story in 2 Samuel about how David’s son rebelled against David’s authority and crowned himself as king, kicking David out of Jerusalem, sending David running for his life with only a few loyal friends, in fear, because of the temporarily successful coup led by his own son. As David, the anointed king, is walking out of the city of Jerusalem without a throne to sit on, without being recognized as God’s king, walking down the mountain, there is a man who stands up at the ridge above David and his men and starts shouting curses down at the defeated king in his moment of deepest darkness. He shouts at David, “You are a worthless man.” This is part of why I describe Shimei as a diabolical figure – his words reflect the actions of Satan himself, known as the accuser of the brethren. We know that swords and spears can pierce deep, but I think most of us know that words, in some ways, have a capacity to pierce even deeper than swords and spears can go. Here is David in his moment of deepest darkness, walking down the mountainside, and here is Shimei up on the ridge, shouting curses at him, calling him worthless.

David’s men, like Joab, want to go and chop off Shimei’s head at that very moment. David, however, says in 2 Samuel 16 about this diabolical accuser, “Leave him alone. Let him curse, for the Lord has told him to. It may be that the Lord will look on the wrong done to me and that the Lord will repay me with good for his cursing today.” If you are letting that sink in, that is an astonishing statement. Let him keep cursing. Instead of repaying his evil with more evil, instead of repaying his violence with more violence, David says, “It may be that the Lord will look on the wrong done to me and the Lord will repay me with good for his cursing today.”

Do you notice how David is able to get to that conclusion – let him be, we don’t need to chop off his head today? Do you notice how David was able to get to that conclusion in 2 Samuel 16? He was able to get to the conclusion, “We don’t need to chop off his head. We don’t need to repay violence with violence. We don’t need to repay evil for evil today.” Why? Because we know a God of justice who repays. Do you see how that theological conviction has gone down so deep in David’s heart that it’s reshaping his thinking and even reshaping the way he acts in life?

Nonetheless, what does Shimei do? 2 Samuel 16:13 says, “David and his men went on the road, while Shimei went along the hillside opposite him and kept on cursing as he went and threw stones at David and flung dust.” David has this theological conviction that there is a God of justice who repays, so we can endure this. We don’t have to repay evil for evil. But as David gets to the end of his life, there is still a longing in his heart, isn’t there? There’s still a longing for justice to show up. Nobody ever shut Shimei’s mouth yet. Shouldn’t Shimei’s mouth get shut? There’s a yearning for justice.

Devotion to Justice

At the end of David’s life, he’s endured. He’s refused to pay evil for evil at his best moments – at least, not always, but at his best moments. He’s refused to pay evil for evil out of this conviction that justice is coming. But now he reaches the end, and it’s apparent that justice has not been served in full to complicated characters like Joab or to diabolical accusers like Shimei. And at the end of his life, David demonstrates: Not only does it matter to be devoted to God’s word, it also matters, in the last analysis, to be confident in future justice. To be confident that even if we choose not to repay evil for evil out of a conviction that the Lord may reward, we need a confidence that will keep on carrying us – a confidence that says there is a coming king who will be able to execute the justice that I’ve been hoping for.

This theme of confidence in future justice also shows up in a somewhat different way with the men from Gilead, who are mentioned in verses 7 and 8. There’s this man, Barzillai – love that name. David mentions there’s a need for future justice for Joab, there’s a need for future justice for Shimei, and there’s also a need for future justice for the men from Gilead related to Barzillai, but it’s a very different kind of justice, right? We sometimes think of justice only as punishing those who do wrong. The Bible’s idea of justice also involves lifting those who are beloved by God.

And what about those like Barzillai, who showed kindness to David in his moments of deepest darkness and yet never personally experienced a reward for it? What about them? Here again, David demonstrates a confidence in future justice. Back in that same storyline, when David was leaving Jerusalem in disgrace and Shimei was raining down his curses from up on the hillside, when David got to the other side of the river, there was this man named Barzillai, who showed hospitality to David. He provided for David – he gave him food, something to drink, shelter, a place to stay – all at risk, of course, to his own life.

As the story unfolded, the Lord made a way for David to return to the throne in Jerusalem. And as David prepared to travel back to Jerusalem as the recognized king, he met with Barzillai and told him, “I want to repay you for what you’ve done.” Notice what it says in 2 Samuel about Barzillai’s reply. Barzillai was a very aged man, 80 years old. Some of you who are in your 80s say, “Amen, I feel very aged as well.” I’m just telling you what the Bible says. Very aged man, 80 years old, he had provided the king with food while he stayed nearby, and the king said to Barzillai, “Come with me and I will provide for you with me in Jerusalem.” Barzillai said to the king, “How many years have I still to live, that I should go up with the king to Jerusalem? No, your servant will go a little way over the Jordan with the king. But why should the king repay me with such a reward as a place in the king’s own house? Please let your servant return, that I may die in my own city near the grave of my father and my mother.”

So Barzillai, the man from Gilead, went back home without any visible reward for his loyalty to God’s anointed king in the darkest and hardest of days. And as David draws near to the end, here again David demonstrates that in the kingdom of God, we need a certain kind of confidence in future justice – confidence not only that the Lord will take care of the things that haven’t yet been taken care of, but also confidence that the Lord will reward the things that have not yet been rewarded.

In the last analysis, in the end, what will really matter? God’s word will really matter, and future justice will really matter as well.

Wait for the Lord to deliver you

Now, what will we do with this, though? I think this is an important question to pause and ask briefly before we wrap up. It’s important to ask because there are some approaches to reading the Bible that are as simple as this: David gives orders to kill people out of revenge, so I want to give orders to kill people out of revenge. It’s applying God’s word, right? No. Let me be clear – no. In fact, as we pay attention to how scripture interprets scripture, we realize that what this text teaches us is kind of the opposite of a manifesto for repaying evil with evil.

Solomon himself, although he executes justice in the remainder of chapter 2, tells us in his wisdom, in the book of Proverbs, chapter 20, verse 22: “Do not say, ‘I will repay evil.’” Instead, what should you do? Solomon tells us: “Wait for the Lord, and he will deliver you.” Solomon himself tells us this is the way of wisdom – not repaying evil for evil, eye for eye, tooth for tooth, vengeance for vengeance. The way of wisdom is not to say, “I will repay evil,” but instead to wait for the Lord, knowing that he in his justice, in his future and coming justice, will fully deliver.

Fulfillment in King David’s Greater Son

In fact, this theme was lived out most impressively, most admirably, and most courageously in the life of our Lord Jesus himself. Peter tells us that in our suffering, in our lives, we need to see Jesus as an example for us in the way that he suffered. And if we pay attention to the life of Jesus as a pattern for our lives, what will we learn? First Peter chapter 2, verse 23: When he was reviled, Jesus did not revile in return; when he had words spoken against him, he didn’t respond with the same kinds of words. When he suffered, he did not threaten. But what did he do? He continued entrusting himself to him who judges justly.

I don’t think David or Solomon worked out justice perfectly. We have more opportunities for me to spotlight the weaknesses in both of their kingdoms. But if we follow the last words of David to Solomon, and if we listen to the wisdom of Solomon himself – do not say in your heart, “I will repay evil” – it puts us on a path to realize that in the end, part of what matters is believing in the God of justice and believing that his justice is still coming with a future king. In fact, as Christians, we have this conviction that another king – one greater than Solomon – really is coming. And when he establishes his kind of justice, the wrongs will be dealt with, even those ones that kept going and going and nobody ever did anything sufficient about it. And those things that were done quietly, even things as simple as giving a cold cup of water to someone in need, even things as simple as sharing with someone in need, these will be repaid as kindnesses to the Lord himself. And on that day, all forms of evil and darkness and injustice – and even death and dying itself – will be removed forevermore. In the dawning of his kingdom, justice will shine brighter and more fully and more gloriously and more wonderfully than the warmest day of any sunshine you’ve ever felt in this life.

I wonder, do you believe that? Is that hope steering the way that you live today? I do think this is very important for us to pay attention to these days. We live in a politically polarized world. We live in a society in which violence seems to be increasingly common. We see it and hear about it so often that we almost get desensitized to it. How do we live as people who belong to God? How do we live as representatives of God’s kingdom in a divided world, where violence and cycles of violence are just getting louder and escalating?

A friend told me just recently, after the death of Charlie Kirk a few weeks ago, that there’s a famous pastor with a huge social media following who responded to the death of Charlie Kirk by saying, “We need to teach Christians to hate again.” My response to that was, “What could possibly go wrong?” That’s the laughable version. But there’s a deeper kind of response that God’s word teaches us – not a response that says, “If there is more and more violence and more and more polarization and more and more accusing each other of being enemies, then let’s just charge right in and start learning to hate.” There’s another way of cherishing God’s word. There’s another way of letting it sink down deep into our hearts until it changes our thinking and empowers a new and distinct way of living. I don’t think it looks so much like, “Let’s learn to hate. Let’s learn to be more violent. Let’s learn to punch back.” Instead, I think it looks a lot more like the wisdom of Solomon: “Do not say, ‘I will repay evil.’ Wait for the Lord and he will deliver you.” And I think it looks a lot more like the way of Jesus: when he suffered, he did not threaten, but he continued entrusting himself to him who judges justly.

Listen, as we take deep into our souls this conviction about the treasure that God’s word is and the importance of wholehearted devotion to it, and as we take down deep into our souls a conviction about future justice and confidence that God’s justice will show up when a son of David brings it to pass, I think this is what empowers us to keep on going, to keep living faithfully even in frightening, dark, dangerous, and tumultuous days around us.

The book of First Kings was not written for David’s generation or for Solomon’s. It was written, at least in its final form, for people living in exile in Babylon. I think some of the questions that First Kings wants to answer are: If the king of Babylon keeps on getting away with things, what are we supposed to do? I think the answer this points us toward is that we keep on devoting ourselves to God’s word and we keep on trusting that God’s justice will come with God’s future king.

Today, as the Holy Spirit is still speaking through his texts, as the Holy Spirit is still speaking through First Kings, we live in a world where some of us don’t even interpret our political environment the same way. Some of us think those guys are the bad guys; some of us think these guys are the bad guys; some of us think they’re all the bad guys; and some of us just wish we’d stop talking about it. However you read the world around you, I wonder if you can hear these words from the Holy Spirit – calling us to wholehearted devotion to God, to his word, and to his ways. Calling us to patiently honor him with our lives.

Because like David – at least at his best – and like Solomon – at least at his best – and like our Lord Jesus, who is the best, we believe. We believe in Him who judges justly, and we believe his King is coming, and he will make all things new.

Therefore, if we summarize this entire text in one word, how would we summarize it? Stay devoted to God. To his word. To his justice.

This is an excerpt of a sermon given by Josh Fenska on September 28, 2025 at Redeemer Community Church in Aurora, IL.