NOT Being like David: The Woman in the Window (Sidetrack:The story of Michal)

2 Samuel 6:1-5, 12-23

So I wanted to preach about rejoicing and worship today. I wanted to preach a joyous message about how important, great, wonderful it is to be able to just rejoice in the presence of God, about the place of worship in our lives and in the Church, which I am sure would have said good Biblical things about worship and rejoicing. But. . . then I got distracted by the woman in the window. Briefly I toyed with seeing the problem here as the difficulty which arises when two different people see worship differently and then talk a little about how it is ok for some people to be more exuberant in their worship and for others to b be more reserved; placing Michal in the position of one who is a bit more reserved and David as one who is a bit more exuberant (to put it mildly), and then discuss how none of us should look down on or “despise” others, who are legitimately worshiping God, for the way they are worshiping God. And, although that is an important lesson to learn as the people of God; that really is not what is going on in this passage. So in our series about David, we are taking a little sidetrack to look at this woman in the window. Look at her story, her relationship with David, and the role she is playing in the events of David’s life. The passage we have here this morning just a much marks the beginning of a new era in the life of Israel and a new era of the center of all religious and political power being placed in Jerusalem, the city which David conquered that was neither a part of Judah or Israel but was neutral ground from which he could rule the whole kingdom without showing favor to either side, as it also marks the end of the story about Michal and David. In our focus on David and his ascent to kingship we have left out many threads in David’s story. One of those threads is his relationship with Michal. The story of David and Michal begins the day he slew Goliath on the fields of Ephes-Damim. Among other things, Saul had promised his firstborn daughter to the one who was able to slay Goliath. So after the defeat of the Philistines following the death of Goliath, Saul begins the process of acquiring Merab for David as his wife. There is only one minor little problem in this plan. Merab is already married to Adriel the Meholathite. Luckily Saul had two daughters the younger of which was named Michal who had seen David and loved him. The scriptures tell us that this pleased Saul. At this point he was not so keen on David or on the idea of David being his son-in-law, perhaps thinking that having the nations’ new favorite warrior and the one Samuel had already anointed as king, as his son-in-law and thus possibly having claim to throne, was perhaps not such a great idea. So Saul saw that he could use Michal’s love as a way to entrap David. So he offered Michal to David as his wife. When David inquired about the bride price pointing out that he and his family were not very well off and did not have what would be appropriate to offer a king as a bride price for his daughter, King Saul shrewdly thinking that by asking something absurd from David, he was either be sending David to his death or giving himself a good reason pull out of his promise to marry David to his daughter, due to failure to pay the bride price, so her told David that he would not ask for much, just the foreskins of 100 Philistines. But to everyone’s surprise and perhaps even a little horror and dismay, David does this and wins Michal as his wife. Marrying Michal moves David into the King’s household, placing him dangerously close to Saul when Saul’s moods turn him against David. On one such occasion after David had helped defeat the Philistines, yet again, while David sat in the court playing his harp for Saul, Saul threw a spear at David in an attempt to kill him, but David moved out of the way and the spear hit the wall instead. Michal fearing for David’s life talked him into escaping the Palace so that Saul would not attempt to kill him again the next day and that next time actually succeed in doing so. So she while he was in her room that night, she helped him escape through her window and on this occasion Michal watches out the window as the husband she loves runs away into the night. She then takes and idol (what was an idol doing in her room anyway?) and dressed it up to look like David and put it in the bed so people would believe that it was David. She lied to the men who came looking for him and lied to her father in an attempt to save David’s life. She is mentioned again in 1 Samuel when David takes Abigail and Ahinoam as wives, the explanation being that when David had fled Saul had given Michal to Paltiel, son of Laish from Gallim as his wife. She is not mentioned again until after the death of Saulwhen David insists upon having Michal brought back to him at the expense of her new husband who apparently cares enough for her to follow after the men who are taking her weeping. So here is a brief summary of her life prior to the events in this passage, as depicted in scripture. She was offered to David as a prize, used as was way to entrap him, forgotten, given to another man in marriage, and then torn unwillingly from that marriage by Abner who a member of King’s Saul’s court using her retrieval as way win David’s favor. Here in this passage she is again standing in a window watching her husband, this he is dancing (how shall we say this?) wearing an insufficient amount of clothing. As she looks back at their relationship and watches him now she can’t help despise David. Despise, a pretty harsh word, considering she entered the story because she loved David.When David returns from his revelries she speaks somewhat harshly and with no small amount of sarcasm to him about exposing himself to God, the virgins and everyone. David responds to her in kind, and thus, apparently, ends their romantic relationship, because Michal remained childless to the end of her life. Most people like to make Michal out to be in the wrong in this story. David is worshipping and praising God and Michal is getting upset about that? What right does she have to dictate to her husband how he should worship? She must be angry that he usurped her father’s throne, she must be insecure because these woman are witnessing a little more of David’s glory than she would like. She sees David worshipping half-dressed publically and she is not embarrassed by him, she is not ashamed of him, no she despises him. What has brought Michal to this point where this incident would cause her to despise him? Why would she go from loving him to despising him, from saving him to being distant from him until her death? This is a woman who became a piece in the rise to power. This was a woman who brought power and prestige just by being married to her. This is a woman who offered herself to another, did all she could to protect him and ended forgotten, as the spoils of war and left alone and then set aside as the one she loved pursues better things. She loved David but as most women of her was treated as an object, as a thing that could win favor with Saul, gain access to Saul’s household, and his court, something that helped him escape then be forgotten until her presence could help him again; until he could use her as part of the booty needed for another man to win his favor. When she is remembered she becomes not a wife, but a part of a harem in a polygamous marriage. By the time David brings her back into his household, he does not simply have the two wives, Abigail and Ahinoam, but he has five other wives, making Michal the sixth. Now the way that polygamy worked was that the first was the most important wife, the only one who would have gotten the title “queen”, the first among six. But still in a marriage that involves six women, although you maybe first you are still one among six. And as such she is the oldest, the forgotten prize wife from David’s past affairs with Saul. On the day that the Ark of the Covenant is brought into Jerusalem, she is alone in her room, forgotten once again, on the outside of the festivities. Of course she is angry, and now to add insult to injury she sees that not only is David celebrating, but he is doing so in a less than clothed fashion. And she realizes that she means nothing to him. It is one thing for him to reject her love by not waiting for her and taking another wife, but five other wives? And now he does not care to whom he exposes himself, even if he is worshiping God it is not befitting a king to go about in this manner and it hurts her. She loved him and she was just a piece of the puzzle that was his life. So she looked down on David and despised him, despised him for not loving her, despised him for forgetting her, for replacing her, for not caring about her or her feelings. It would be easy to say; well of course he treated her that way, that is the way women were treated at that time in history. I know that was a different time and a different place. People thought of women differently. I know it has only be in the very recent history that woman have enjoyed the kinds of freedoms and respect we enjoy now. I know and understand that as one of two daughters of a king she had only one option in marriage, and that is to marry the man her father felt would win him the political alliances he needed. She was his property to give for a bride price to the man he choose. She got lucky; she loved the man her father gave her to. It is not David’s fault that when she helps David flee for his life; her father then uses her to make some political alliance with Paltiel. David might not have known about Paltiel’s apparent love for her when he brought his wife back into his household. He might not have even considered the marriage to Paltiel legitimate and saw himself as retrieving his wife from a man who took her from him. I know that women were not seen as human beings but as pieces, as pawns, as property. But God did give women rights in a marriage as part of God’s instructions in the Torah. A wife had a right to food; a right to clothing, a right to be able to take care of her children. And it was a woman’s right to not have the ability to bear children denied to her. The passage is very delicate about this but the writer is careful to say that Micah had no child until her death, it does not say that she was barren, just that she did not bear any children. It is one thing to declare a woman barren and therefore remained childless, it is another for her simply to not bear children. The implication is that David chose not to do right by her. David denied her one of four rights she had a wife and therefore she remained childless. David did not do right by his wife. David was a good man. He was man of God. He was following God’s guidance in his life. He was a wise leader, a great warrior and a pious follower of God. But in all this he lost sight of individuals in his life. He forgot that Michal was a human being, a person who loved him, and risked her life for him. David forgot that she had feelings and needs and concerns. It is easy when we are doing the work of the Lord, when we are listening to God, doing the things that God told us to do to loose site of the living breathing people in our lives. It is easy sometimes to forget that every person matters, has worth and value. That each person we encounter has thoughts, feelings, and dreams and that they are not means to an ends. Not just another piece in the plans that God has for us.We are living our story, living our relationship with God but we are a part of other people’s stories and even when we are doing our best for God, even when we are rejoicing in the presence of God, glorying in how God has guided us and shown us our way, we cannot forget the people in our life, the individuals who are not merely a part of God’s plan for us, and our life, but that we are a part of their life, a part of the plans that God is working out for them. Are we working with them, encouraging them, helping them as they are accomplishing the things that God is calling for them to be, to do? In our quest for God’s best, for God’s plan, for being the people we are called to be, we cannot in our neglect, in our forgetfulness deny those around us, those with whom our life intersects the right for God’s best in their lives, to be the people God is calling them to be. It is possible to see the things that David did as not havingbeen done to purposefully harm Michal. He probably never meant her harm, but in his neglect, in his forgetfulness, he denied her the very things that God commanded to not be denied her. He in his benign oversight of her as are very real person in his life, in his forgetfulness of her love and loyalty, in his neglect to put her first, he denied her the ability to have God’s best in her life. Without his love, without his care, without being cherished and taken care of by her husband, she could not have the very things that would have won her respect and honor in her society. God did not desire for her to be alone, abandoned, over looked and forgotten 'til the end of her days. David perhaps through no malicious or purposeful intent denied her these very things. As Christians, attempting to be the people God is calling us to be, as people of God striving to love God and our world, we cannot forget to love the people in our lives; to treat all the people in our lives as if they are the precious people they are. No one is just another person; each person is a person God loves. Each one is a person God has a plan for. Each person is one of the people we are called to love when God calls us to love God and to love our world. Our world means the people in our world, the individuals, each one precious, each one to be respected, each one to not be forgotten, overlooked, or left alone, each one loved.