2 Samuel 6
Worship: Uzzah Dies, David Dances, Michal Scorns.
When you hear this story, beyond “what is an ephod?” your first question might be, “Why did God kill Uzzah?” - He seemed to be doing a good thing – stopping the Ark of the Covenant from falling and smashing on the ground!
We aren’t told much about Uzzah – He was the son of Abinadab (the Ark was in Abinidab’s house for years) he was incharge of the transport of the Ark with his brother, Ahio. He tried to steady the Ark when he thought it would fall, and he died for his efforts.
If we do a little CSI, we might be able to figure this out.
The Ark of the Covenant (Not Noah’s Ark!) was a rectangular box about four feet long and 2 feet wide and high. (it was not huge) It was made of wood and plated with gold. On the solid gold lid were two angels that framed the mercy seat. In the box were three items – the stone tablets with the Ten Commandments on them, a jar of manna (bread that God had given the people in the wilderness) and Aaron’s rod that had budded.
The Ark became the symbol of God’s presence in Israel. It was not an idol, or a talisman, but every once in a while the people would treat it that way. It was like thinking that your wedding ring keeps a marriage together while you are misbehaving. When they treated it that way, there was always trouble.
Over 20 years before this event, even before David was on the scene, the Israelites took the Ark into battle thinking it would bring them success – it didn’t they lost the battle and the Ark. The Philistines captured it and brought it back as a trophy. It caused them no end of trouble, so they sent it back. But it got only as far as Abinadab’s house, where it stayed for 20 years.
I think that this is an important thing to remember – the Ark had been in Uzzah’s house for 20 years!
One could imagine that Uzzah had started to believe that he was in charge of the Ark, and thus in charge of God. People down though the ages have postulated that Uzzah not only had God’s box, but he had God in a box – a box that he, Uzzah was in charge of.
Eugene Peterson writes, “we can guess that Uzzah’s reflexive act – reaching out to steady the Ark as the oxen stumbled – wasn’t the mistake of a moment; it was a piece of his lifelong obsession with managing the Ark.”
God had told Moses that the Ark should be carried on the shoulders of Levites using long poles when it was moved. For some reason, Uzzah and Ahio go against this stipulation and transport it on an ox cart, which was pretty new technology at the time. It may be that he was concerned about these dirty human hands would get too close to God, or maybe he just wanted to show off his fancy new oxcart!
As a side note – God has declared that human hands will carry his presence – when we get enamored with the latest technology as a method or means to carry the presence of God, we get into trouble. God’s presence is carried by you and I – a bumper sticker, or a new website just won’t do it. Technology can help, but God uses the human touch.
History paints Uzzah as “God handler:” the guy that makes sure that only the “right” people get access to God, that God gets protected from the grit and grime of humanity, that God always gets presented in a good light.
I do it – I try to present God’s better points’ leave his more difficult points in the dark – Anne Lamont – came to belief through Keirkegard’s reflection on Abraham’s sacrifice of Isaac!
I know others who have the same attitude about God, like he is the queen or something. They will accidently let a curse fly in church, and then get all embarrassed and say, “I can’t believe I cursed in church!” And I say, “what, you don’t think that God knows that you curse?” God knows us in and out – he doesn’t need us to be religious to protect Him.
Uzzah teaches us that we need to remember that God is God, he doesn’t need us to control access to him, he doesn’t need us to protect him. – it cost Uzzah his life.
David
David is completely different than Uzzah – David has no need to control or protect God.
What shocks you more – that David gets furious with God, or that he danced wearing a linen ephod?
It is pretty shocking that David blows a gasket – maybe not too surprising that he gets angry – some of you likely got angry that God killed Uzzah. But it surprising that he expresses it so well. Anger and fear – He shuts down the whole show – sends everyone home & leaves the Ark with Obed Edam. And he names the place “Perez Uzzah” - “outbreak against Uzzah” The writer says that it is still called that when he wrote 2 Samuel!
When people tell me that they are angry with God, I tell them that they are in good company. Almost all of the prophets expressed great anger with God, many of the other Bible characters get livid with God. God seems okay with it.
This is what Peterson writes:
David’s anger with God didn’t get him killed. It didn’t gert him killed because David was as alive to God in his anger as he was earlier in his praise. Alive to God. Alive. David didn’t like what had happened, but at least he was treating God as God. Uzzah would never have gotten angry with God; he was far too well mannered and proper. And besides, one doesn’t get angry with a box.
God desires relationship with us – relationship over ritual or religion – he doesn’t want us to be careful with him, he wants us to be intimate with him.
Jesus says to the church in Laodicea, “I know all the things you do, that you are neither hot nor cold. I wish that you were one or the other! 16 But since you are like lukewarm water, neither hot nor cold, I will spit you out of my mouth! Revelations 3:15-16
So David gets hot angry with God and goes home like an angry lover and sulks. But like an angry lover who keeps asking how their lover is, David gets reports that God is blessing Obed Edam for housing the Ark of the Covenant. He begins to think that it wouldn’t be so bad to have the Ark in Jerusalem. So they head back to Perez Uzzah to fetch the Ark.
This time they do it right: The Priests carry the Ark – they take six steps and they sacrifice bull and a young calf – that’s a lot of beef by the time they get into Jerusalem! The people would have been able to roast and eat the meat, and David made sure that everyone had bread and figs and raisins as well. This is a huge party!
And David is so happy that he dances with all his might. He was wearing a linen ephod, which was a priestly garment, but it might have been all he was wearing since his wife accused him of dancing half naked.
I actually want to concentrate on the “with all his might” rather than his clothing, or lack there of.
Just as he pours out all his anger on God months before, here he pours out all his pleasure and adoration. The Hebrew word that is used to describe David’s dance could be translated “Whirling”
This is the way our relationship God is supposed to be – open and passionate. This is the way our worship to God is to be – open and passionate.
The difficulty is that most of us, myself included, are much more like Uzzah in our worship than we are like David – we want to be religious and protect the dignity of God. Maybe this is why God chose the passionate Mediterranean Jews to be his chosen people rather than some stuffy northern European people!
We need to be more like David than Uzzah
Learning to give yourself to God in worship
Dancing might not be the place to start – if you don’t dance around your house, you will likely not express worship to God in this way.
David comes from a part of the world where men dance – our experience in Cyprus vs. white man dance
You might think of how you express joy or appreciation in other areas of your life – at a sports game, at a play…
A good way to become more free in worship is to try it out at home on your own – put some worship music on – lift your hands, kneel, lie face down, dance
Worship comes from the inside out – meditate on the good. Remember the goodness of God, respond to his goodness
Michal
David comes home from his celebration to bless his family, and Michal is waiting with a needle to burst his bubble.
After all the sacrifices were over, David came into his house to bless his family, but Michal met him at the door and she said to him, "How the king of Israel honoured himself today, uncovering himself today before the eyes of his servants’ maids, as any vulgar fellow might shamelessly uncover himself!"
David said to Michal, "It was before the Lord, who chose me in the place of your father and all his household, to appoint me as prince over Israel, the people of the Lord, that I have danced before the Lord. I will make myself yet more contemptible than this, and I will be abased in my own eyes; but by the maids of whom you have spoken, by them I shall be held in honour."
And it says that Michal, the daughter of Saul had no child to the day of her death.
Michal just didn’t get it, she didn’t realise that worship is always first and foremost for God, and that he is the audience, He is the one to judge if worship is good or not, not us. Michal was ashamed because of the way that David acted before God, and because she thought that he was acting like an idiot, she assumed everyone else did too. She said the whole nation thinks you’re an idiot, even the girls of your servants think you’re an idiot. David says, "I don’t care! Let them think that I am an even bigger fool as long as it pleases God, because it is him who I am trying to please, not you, not the nation, and not those little girls. An do you know what, I did please God, and unlike you, those little girls knew it, and because they know that I please God, they hold me in honour.
David knew what worship is about - it is about God, and always him first and foremost. Michal didn’t know what David’s worship was about, she thought it was about her, and her opinions of what is good and bad. Her demeaning of David’s sincere and holy worship killed their marriage, and they had no love and no children and Michal died unloved. But David was called a man after God’s own heart because he knew what worship is about
Tells us 4 things
- Don’t try to “handle” God
- Give yourself fully to God – in this way he is safe
- don’t judge other’s worship
“Who do they think they are? Raising their hands, dancing, kneeling… Or “Why don’t they get into it, they must not love God as much as I do.”
- Judge your own worship by who you are doing it for.
Motives are a funny thing, - they are usually more Neapolitan than straight vanilla. All the same, work on focusing on what God wants – being real before him.
