Then Samuel said to Saul, “Wait a minute! Let me tell you what the Lord said to me last night.” Saul said to him, “Tell me.”

As he was speaking with them, the champion named Goliath, the Philistine from Gath, was coming up from the battle lines of the Philistines. He spoke the way he usually did, and David heard it.

When they came down from the high place to the town, Samuel spoke with Saul on the roof.

So Samuel listened to everything the people said and then reported it to the Lord.

When David’s words were overheard and reported to Saul, he called for him.

When Saul’s servants reported what David had said,

With regard to the matter that you and I discussed, the Lord is the witness between us forever!”

So David’s servants went and spoke all these words to Nabal in David’s name. Then they paused.

Eli said, “What message did he speak to you? Don’t conceal it from me. God will judge you severely if you conceal from me anything that he said to you!”

Now Hannah was speaking from her heart. Although her lips were moving, her voice was inaudible. Eli therefore thought she was drunk.

Don’t consider your servant a wicked woman, for until now I have spoken from my deep pain and anguish.”

Don’t keep speaking so arrogantly, letting proud talk come out of your mouth! For the Lord is a God who knows; he evaluates what people do.

Then the Lord came and stood nearby, calling as he had previously done, “Samuel! Samuel!” Samuel replied, “Speak, for your servant is listening!”

On that day I will carry out against Eli everything that I spoke about his house – from start to finish!

As she was dying, the women who were there with her said, “Don’t be afraid! You have given birth to a son!” But she did not reply or pay any attention.

When the messengers went to Gibeah (where Saul lived) and informed the people of these matters, all the people wept loudly.

Samuel did what the Lord told him. When he arrived in Bethlehem, the elders of the city were afraid to meet him. They said, “Do you come in peace?”

When David had finished talking with Saul, Jonathan and David became bound together in close friendship. Jonathan loved David as much as he did his own life.

So Saul’s servants spoke these words privately to David. David replied, “Is becoming the king’s son-in-law something insignificant to you? I’m just a poor and lightly-esteemed man!”

Then Saul told his son Jonathan and all his servants to kill David. But Saul’s son Jonathan liked David very much.