Part 21 (1/2)
Then Abner said to him, ”Go back home!” So he went back. 2 Samuel 3:16 More battles, more bloodshed as David conquered Jerusalem, was anointed king of Israel, then defeated the Philistines. Once again, there's no mention of Michal. What was she doing?
We know what David was doing. He was busy collecting more concubines and more wives-at least twenty in all. David was a busy man, since eleven more children were born to him in Jerusalem.
But what he wanted more than anything was to bring the ark of the covenant into the City of David. When he did so, it was a serious party.
David and the whole house of Israel were celebrating with all their might before the LORD, with songs and with harps, lyres, tambourines, sistrums and cymbals. 2 Samuel 6:5 As a composer, David orchestrated a spectacular musical entrance for the slow-moving ark. Thousands marched, instruments in hand, creating a cacophony that surely was heard for miles. It was only natural that ecstatic dancing would accompany all that music.
David, wearing a linen ephod, danced before the LORD with all his might... 2 Samuel 6:14 Ditching his robe, his tunic, and all other symbols of cla.s.s and wealth, David sported only a simple ephod-a ceremonial ap.r.o.n or loincloth that probably covered very little of his...uh...manhood. David wasn't an exhibitionist. On the contrary, he wanted to humble himself and identify with his people as their priest, not as their king.
How it must have delighted the thousands of partic.i.p.ants who saw the mighty David celebrating his Lord with such enthusiastic abandon! All along the route the generous king offered sacrifices, blessed his people, handed out cakes with raisins and dates, and in general partied like it was 1999.
...while he and the entire house of Israel brought up the ark of the LORD with shouts and the sound of trumpets. 2 Samuel 6:15 Shouting? Trumpets? This was one loud procession, easily heard even from high in the palace.
As the ark of the LORD was entering the City of David, Michal daughter of Saul watched from a window. 2 Samuel 6:16 Is it significant that both of Michal's big scenes took place in windows-first, when she helped him escape, and here, as she watched him dance before the Lord? In the movie King David, starring Richard Gere, David criticizes Michal for not being part of the fun. But custom did not permit the wife of the king to partic.i.p.ate in the festivities surrounding the ark. Instead, she gazed down from on high, distanced from David by more than a few cubits.
It wasn't her alt.i.tude that was the problem.
It was her att.i.tude.
And when she saw King David leaping and dancing before the LORD, she despised him in her heart. 2 Samuel 6:16 His leaping was the last straw, but the haystack had been building for a very long time. David had deserted her, ignored her, married other wives, fathered other children, and neglected even to include her in his life until it was politically expedient.
I know that David has always been painted as a prince among men and a hero's hero, but his treatment of Michal was a smeary inkblot on his resume, don't you think?
Underneath the queenly gowns of Michal beat the heart of a hurting young girl, abandoned practically at the altar, then years later forced to share her handsome husband with other women. Imagine competing with the wise and competent Abigail and, later, the comely Bathsheba-two among many who provided David with strapping sons.
We identify with Michal's jealousy and shattered emotions.
But when it came to G.o.dly obedience, Michal was off the mark.
Even if she no longer loved the man, she should have joined him in wors.h.i.+ping G.o.d. But perhaps Michal never fully understood David's G.o.d, never openly embraced Jehovah as her own, never grasped the value of wors.h.i.+p.
David's dancing didn't turn her heart; it turned her stomach. Various translations tell us she was ”filled with contempt” (NLT), ”disgusted” (CEV), and that she just plain ”hated him” (ICB).
The exultant David didn't have a clue what awaited him back at the palace.
When David returned home to bless his household, Michal daughter of Saul came out to meet him... 2 Samuel 6:20 She went out to meet him? Ooh, the woman was hot! She'd been building up steam since the Flash Dance number. The minute she saw him approach the house, Michal made her move.
One minor note: She's called ”daughter of Saul” here, not ”wife of David.” Was that a clue to her allegiance? Was blood thicker than her see-through sham of a marriage?
...and [she] said, ”How the king of Israel has distinguished himself today...” 2 Samuel 6:20 Even on paper, her biting sarcasm drips from every word.
”...disrobing in the sight of the slave girls of his servants as any vulgar fellow would!” 2 Samuel 6:20 Michal had three problems with David's dance: (1) He removed most of his clothes, (2) the lowest women in the kingdom saw portions of David that were supposed to be the queen's territory alone, and (3) he looked like a common jerk (that's the Lizzie Revised Version), or as more scholarly types have phrased it, ”foolish” (ICB), ”base” (NKJV), ”indecent” (NLT), ”worthless” (AMP), and my favorite, ”a dirty old man” (CEV)!
The truth is, Michal missed the point. She didn't comprehend the purpose of David's dancing. She saw it as a pa.s.sion of the flesh, when David knew it was a spiritual pa.s.sion for G.o.d that set his feet in motion.
David said to Michal, ”It was before the LORD, who chose me rather than your father or anyone from his house when he appointed me ruler over the LORD's people Israel-” 2 Samuel 6:21 Ouch, David! Obviously his temper was heating up as well. He reminded her, none too gently, that the Lord had chosen him instead of selecting someone from Saul's household.
”I will celebrate before the LORD.” 2 Samuel 6:21 He made his purpose-and his future plans-clear.
”I will become even more undignified than this, and I will be humiliated in my own eyes.” 2 Samuel 6:22 In other words, ”You thought that was bad, Michal? Baby, you ain't seen nothin' yet! I intend to make a bloomin' fool of myself.”
”But by these slave girls you spoke of, I will be held in honor.” 2 Samuel 6:22 David had spotted the green-eyed monster lurking in Michal's eyes when she mentioned the slave girls, and he used her jealousy as a sharp knife, severing their relations.h.i.+p for good. As one writer put it, ”he cut her from his heart.”8 We are never told that David divorced Michal.
Nor is she ever spoken of again, except for one sad closing verse.
And Michal daughter of Saul had no children to the day of her death. 2 Samuel 6:23 Still called the ”daughter of Saul.” To me, that was the whole problem in a nutsh.e.l.l. Michal never left her father and mother and cleaved to her husband. To his grave-and hers-she was Daddy's girl.
In the same way, she never reached out to her heavenly Father, never gave her heart to G.o.d. Though her caustic words to David made Michal Bad for a Moment, in truth she never depended on the goodness of G.o.d to make her whole.
That last verse is a telling one. To die with no children was the ultimate disgrace for a Hebrew woman. Some commentators suggested that G.o.d closed her womb. I beg to differ, only because that isn't so stated. A more likely scenario? David never brought her to his bed again. She never knew him as a wife knows a husband, nor was she allowed to bed with another man...and live. Hence, no children.
Not that she didn't have the chance to care for little ones. When her sister Merab died at an early age, Michal raised her sister's five sons, only to suffer a mother's anguish when all five were literally hung out to dry on a hill at Gibeah.9 As King David's first wife, Michal had the opportunity to learn true wors.h.i.+p from a flawed but pa.s.sionate man after G.o.d's own heart. Instead, she threw away such blessings with both hands, then shoved her manicured fists inside the folds of her costly tunic, determined to be miserable forever.
And so she was.
What Lessons Can We Learn from Michal?
When G.o.d says dance, strap on your tap shoes!
Sometimes we don't know what to do around Christians whose exuberance for the Lord includes lifting hands, clapping, or dancing. If we join in strictly to please men, our motives are wrong, and the Lord won't be glorified, no matter how fancy our footwork. But if we dance unto the Lord, as David did, even in the privacy of our own homes, we just might experience the same att.i.tude adjustment that David discovered, including a whole new wardrobe of joy!
You turned my wailing into dancing; you removed my sackcloth and clothed me with joy. Psalm 30:11 Nothing stops wors.h.i.+p like unconfessed sin.
Michal wouldn't have seen her unsupportive, critical words as sin-but we would. She didn't merely reject David; she ridiculed his G.o.d. When the appeal of wors.h.i.+p eludes us-when we find ourselves judging the soloist, the choir, the robes, the flowers on the altar, whatever-that's a sure sign that sin has hardened our hearts. As one writer phrased it, ”Michal was proud and cold of heart-toward G.o.d, toward her people, toward her husband.”10 Before we fall into the same trap, sisters, let's confess, repent, and start singing with a lighter heart!
An evil man is snared by his own sin, but a righteous one can sing and be glad. Proverbs 29:6 Words spoken in the heat of anger are sure to burn.
Michal has been called ”a divine looking-gla.s.s for all angry and outspoken wives.”11 Yes, I see myself in her, and I don't like the view. If only I could take back every angry word I've ever spoken! When our tempers flare and words follow, they scorch the listener, but the flames lick at our own souls, too. How many times do you suppose Michal eyed other wives with their arms full of babies and regretted her angry diatribe? Hot words may eventually cool, but the burn scars last forever.
Everyone should be quick to listen, slow to speak and slow to become angry, for man's anger does not bring about the righteous life that G.o.d desires. James 1:19-20 Wise is the woman who rises above her circ.u.mstances.