After God’s Heart (Part 7) (2 Samuel 6:12-23)                                                                                                 2009.01.18    Pastor Edward Cheng

Today we turn again to David in our “After God’s Heart” series, continuing to follow his life from the time when he was just a shepherd boy and God chose and Samuel anointed him.  He was chased by Saul, and after Saul died, the kingdom was divided for a time.  Now David is finally king of all Israel, and what’s the first thing he does?  He worships God.

In our passage, 2 Samuel 6:12-23, David shows us what it looks like to worship unashamedly.  The situation: The ark of God, the centerpiece of Israel’s worship, has not been in its proper place, captured by enemies and moved about, and now it’s time for David to take it back to its resting place.  And David is so excited about this day that he dances in the street.  Although we usually pay a lot of attention to David’s dancing and his willingness to be “even more undignified than this” (v. 22), this passage is only secondarily about his dancing.  It’s first and foremost about the greatness of God.  It’s because God is great that David dances and makes the effort to bring the ark back. 

2 Samuel 6:2 describes the ark as “the ark of God, which is called by the Name, the name of the LORD Almighty, who is enthroned between the cherubim that are on the ark.”  In a sense, where the ark was, there God was.  “The LORD Almighty” is also translated the Lord of hosts—the Lord of armies, the great God, the most powerful being and worthy of our praises.  The phrase “the LORD Almighty” in v. 2 serves as the first half of an inclusio, meaning the front half of a section which is closed by the same phrase, and the whole section is about that phrase.  2 Samuel 6:18 repeats “in the name of the LORD Almighty,” indicating that the focus of this section is the greatness of God. 

When we come together for corporate worship, we tend to focus on how God has been good to me.  That’s partly why we come—we want to be touched, to be recharged.  But there are problems with coming solely to be recharged.  We become critical of the service and of the worship experience.  We might say, “I wasn’t blessed by the message today; I wasn’t moved by the worship.”  But we’re getting it backwards; actually we are the performers, notwithstanding those who are up on stage leading.  God is there to receive our praises of Him.  Our purpose in coming to church is primarily to bless God, and secondarily to be blessed. 

We naturally want to be blessed—two of the most common benedictions used by pastors emphasize God’s blessing on us.  They are both biblical (Num. 6:24-26 and 2 Cor. 13:14) and beautiful, and not at all a bad thing, but maybe our attention as we leave a worship service should be on the LORD Almighty, as in the benediction from Eph. 3:20.  David’s actions show that his focus is on the name of the LORD Almighty, and that’s why he dances.  Worship is first of all about the greatness of God. 

The second thing David shows us is that worshipping God should never be restrained by fear of what others might think.  David’s worship comes out of his genuine excitement—the ark is back!!—not caring if people are watching or not. 

Michal, who is David’s wife, has a different reaction.  (Notice that the narrator repeatedly describes her as “daughter of Saul” rather than “wife of David.”)  She greets him in v. 20 with “How the king of Israel has distinguished himself,” “distinguished” carrying the sense of “heavy” or “important.” Her words to David are dripping with sarcasm.  He responds using an opposite term: “I will become even more undignified than this”—as in, “light,” un-kinglike.  His priority is not to be regal here.  He goes on, “It was before the LORD, who chose me… I will celebrate before the LORD” (v. 21).  His priority is to worship before the LORD, regardless of embarrassment.

How many of us let embarrassment hinder us from fully expressing our worship of God?  From singing to God?  Clapping?  Lifting up our hands?  We are often fearful of what others think.  When everyone else is singing loudly, then we sing loudly.  When we’re not surrounded by the sounds of other people, we sing softly, because someone might hear us!  We hold back what shouldn’t be held back.  But the worship of God is not for other people.  We are not supposed to be restrained when it comes to the worship of our God.  David was not restrained.  “It was before the LORD” that he worshipped.  We’re not in the business of entertainment—we are here to worship God.