Window Pain | Pastor Marcus Mecum

2 Samuel, chapter 6. And I'm going to read from the screens, because I forgot my glasses. But I do have a Bible, and it does work, but my eyes don't work. So let's look at it, verse 12. When I was told King David saying, "The Lord has blessed the house of Obed, Edom, and all that belongs to Him." This is the reason why, because of the ark of God. We'll talk about that in a minute. So David went and brought up the ark of God from the house of Obed, Edom, to the city of David, or Jerusalem, with gladness. And so it was when those bearing the ark of the Lord had gone six paces, so they'd take about six steps, and then they would sacrifice oxen in fatted sheet. And David danced before the Lord with all of his mind. How wonderful is that? He was wearing a linen ephod. And so David and all the house of Israel brought the ark of the Lord with shouting. It's a good place to shout if you want to, and with the sound of a trumpet. And as the ark of the Lord came to the city of David, this is now we're going to change tone a little bit. So we're here seeing the ark, and we're seeing everybody shout, dance, and celebrate. But Michael Saul's daughter looked through a window, everybody say window. And Saul, King David, leaping and whirling before the Lord, and she despised Him in her heart, something had gotten into her heart. So this isn't a surface issue. This is something that got in her heart, and so they dropped down to verse 20 if you can for me. And then David returned to bless his household, and Michael, the daughter of Saul, came out to meet David and said how glorious was the king, she's mocking him, is what's happening. How glorious was the king of Israel the day, uncovering himself in the eyes of the maids of his servants as one of those base fellows shamelessly uncovers himself.

We're almost done. So David said to Michael, this is a little marriage spat, it's what's going on, if you don't know, if you haven't caught yet, this is a couple, and they're having at it a little bit. So David, of course he brings up her family, he brings up her dad. Isn't that what you do when you're in a real fight, you'd be like you just like your mom, you're just like your dad. Your family is nuts, crazy family. But it was the Lord who chose me instead of your father and all his house to appoint me ruler over the people of the Lord, over Israel, therefore I will play music before the Lord. Watch this, and I will be even more undignified than this, and will be humble in my own sight. I'm not going to get big in my own head. I'm not going to think of myself as more than I should. This is a king talking. But for the maidservants of whom you have spoken by them, I will be held in honor. Therefore Michael the daughter saw I had no children to the day of her death. So she's looking out this window of you know much, this is not deep, but windows are encased in a window pane, and that's what I want to talk to you about window pane, not P-A-N-E, but P-A-I-N, window pane. The story takes place at a time when the Ark of the Covenant, which was really a Godbox, that was a picture of God's presence, it was a picture of that which God dwelled around, which inside of this Godbox was the Ten Commandments, was Aaron's rod that budded, a pot of manna, all of those things had great symbolism to him, speaking of the word of God. Aaron's rod that budded is the resurrection, the pot of manna is how God is faithful to provide. And then of course on the top of this Godbox was the mercy seat where the blood would be sprinkled over the mercy seat would be two cherubums or angels. Their eyes would be focused down on the mercy seat, their wings extended and would touch one another. And then the glory of God dwelt over that, speaking of the fact that the glory of God dwells over mercy. And the angels, even though they're not looking eye to eye, they could still touch because they were focused on mercy.

All of this speaks to us of the attitude, the spirit that the presence of God is drawn to. [BLANK_AUDIO] And it goes back to Haphne and Phineas who were the sons of the high priest Eli, and they had neglected the things of God, they had neglected their position, and in a battle with the Philistines, they were killed, and the Ark of the Covenant was captured. And so for 90 years, which would include the 40-year reign of King Saul, nobody seemed to be interested in bringing the presence of God back to Israel. Nobody seemed to care that it was missing. The Scripture says that they inquired not at all concerning the Ark of the Covenant all the days of Saul. So for 90 years, this God box has been absent, but now King David has taken the throne, and even though Saul was not interested, David, the first thing he does is he's like, "I've got to make sure that we get God back in our nation." He didn't want to go one step. He didn't want to live one day as King. He needed. He understood that God was who placed him in that position. God is who gave him everything that he had, and he needed God. He needed to have a closeness with the Lord that had been missing for some time, and so he set out with that heartbeat and that understanding to retrieve the Ark of the Covenant. It's such a monumental event that the Bible says he would take six steps, stop, and then they would make a sacrifice before the Lord, and it paints this picture to us of a man who understood what worship looks like, and that he would take off his Kingly garments, he'd take off the robe, and his crown, and his signet ring, or whatever spoke of royalty. He took all of that off in order to worship God, just saying you cannot take those things that humanly, in human terms we lift the status, prestige, the things that we give a claim to those things don't belong in worship. They don't belong in the presence of God, and so David stripped himself of all of those symbols of status. This is a picture of somebody that wants to be close to God.

They've lost it, but he wants it back, "God, I want you more than I want anything else that this world can give me," and so that's David, but then we have this other character that enters the drama by the name of Michael, and Michael is the wife of David, and she's the daughter of King Saul. And we pretty quickly see the stark contrast between Michael and David, where David, we get the picture of somebody that sold out. I mean, he is committed, his heart is in things, I mean, this is all he wants, this is what he's all about so much so that this moment of worship becomes historic. This is a historic moment for David, but when we look at Michael experiencing the same event, Michael is distant, she's withdrawn, she's critical of this moment and critical of David's worship. And most of the time, he included anybody that preaches this makes Michael out to be a horrible person. We villainize her, but Michael was a victim in many ways herself. If we could just for a moment consider what maybe some of the things were in her life, I think we would agree that she is a woman who had a wounded spirit. She was raised in the household of King Saul, so this is her father around royalty and prestige, but Saul we would know is insecure, volatile, competitive. We would know that Saul was fighting his own demons that he was unable to deal with. And when Michael would marry David, this would just like pour a gas on Saul's insecurities and they would just, they would be just going at one another. David and King Saul so much so that the chaos reached a place where Saul is trying to kill David. And Michael just caught in between loving her dad, but she loved Can you imagine what that might have felt like? Just being torn between her own father and her husband. Michael, to save the life of David, lets him out the window in the palace. And when King Saul discovers that she aided David's escape, the Bible says that he marries her off to another man.

And so maybe it was a way of getting back at David. Maybe it was a way of trying to teach his daughter a lesson, but either way she was just a pawn in the politics of her family. And she enters the house of this new man and David is nowhere to be found. And her and this man, they fall in love. David becomes King and he asks for Michael to come back, really demands that he comes back. And we know that they were close because this man who is her new husband, Paulty is following behind her, grieving and weeping. And so here she is again, one that love of her life was ripped away from her father. And now she finally gets over that meets a new man and they fall in love. And now that's being taken from her. Maybe her wounds were not just from her family, maybe they were self-inflicted. Maybe she had some issues with God. The Bible says all those years she was married, she still was barren, she never bore the child. She could have been wounded for many reasons. Nevertheless, like every one of us, we know that she encountered some things that got into her heart, they wounded her spirit. I don't need to convince one person here today that you are going to face things that do not make sense. Things that will leave you wounded, things that will leave you broken, things that will leave you confused,

wounded by somebody you love, wounded by a critic, wounded maybe by your own failure, wounded by the lack of integrity concerning those who are around you. The point is somewhere something is going to wound you in your walk with God. And the problem with wounds that we see with Michael is they can become detrimental. Hebrews 12 and 15 warns us that you are to look diligently at the wounds in your life because they don't just stay wounds. They end up becoming what's called a root of bitterness. So a wound is many times out of your control but it becoming something that's rooted deep in your life that is bitterness. And the Bible says when you least expect it, it just springs up and it troubles you and it defiles everything around you. And so among the ways that wounds can hinder the plan of God in your life, many are seen in the story of Michael. She so wounded that instead of being down where the Ark of the Covenant was, where this God box is, where God's mercy and God's presence was instead of being in the place where she should be rejoicing at its return with everyone else including her husband David. We find her in an isolated place, a secluded place and she's looking through a little window. Having a partial picture of what should have been a significant day in her life, she's in this secluded place and the wound has become a window into what God was doing. Everything that she's going to approach God with in this story, she approaches looking through her window pain,

the window pain of life. I've watched this tendency in my own life, I've watched it in the lives of others, people who end up wounded, they separate themselves, they find themselves spiritually secluded and the window pain allows them to be close enough to catch a glimpse, but yet too far away to actually grab a hold of what God wants for their life. They're limited to watching, limited to spectating, maybe feeling safe at the distance that they found, but there are dangerous aspects to the window pain. Michael looks through it so she could see through that window pain, everything that transpired, she could see the worship, but she could only get It's there you can see, but it's too small to really see the full breadth of what God is up to in your life. It was big enough to see the things that frustrated her. But it was too small to see what God was offering her. It was big enough to see the things she didn't like, things she didn't agree with, things that she thought should be different. But it was too small to see the healing that was right there in front of her that she desperately needed. It was big enough to see the things that offended her about church and how it should be this and how it should be that. But it was too small for her to see the big picture. And so from behind the window pane, she watches. It doesn't matter how great the presence of God is, it doesn't matter how strong the power of God is, it doesn't matter how intense the anointing is. When you are in a wounded place, you simply cannot see the big picture of what God's doing because of the window pane. Michael could see worship, she just couldn't see how worship would heal her. But David understood I need worship. David understood I can't go any further without it, I need to humble myself. I'm keen, think about that.

No one is higher in status than him, but he knew he needed God. But Michael was just the opposite, she found herself elevating her wound above her worship. Her window pane wouldn't allow her to humble herself, she couldn't see the need for worship. From the window pane, she couldn't lay down her pride, I'm too dignified to worship like that. That's not the way I was raised, that's not my upbringing, that's not the way I was taught that royalty should act. But David is just the opposite. In absolute humility, he strips all of that off, he wants nothing to do with any of that when it comes to worship. And I say this because I'm guessing that some of you, many of you, at some point somewhere, somebody hurt you. Somewhere, you were wounded. And from the window pane, you look out. From that window pane, you're seeing everything that God wants to do, you're safe at a distance. I get it, I understand. But I believe that God has brought you here today because he wants to heal you. I'm not saying things are going to be perfect and anybody can snap their fingers. I'm saying that we serve a God that doesn't want you to live the rest of your life behind the window pane. God wants you to be healed. And what we see with David is that he experienced the same pain, the same wounds, the same disappointments that Michael did. You could even say much worse than Michael did. But where Michael stays behind the window pane and looks down and stays withdrawn, David strips off those garments and he humbles himself and he begins to worship God. In other words, he turns his pain into praise. He turned his wound into worship. He turned his fear into faith. And at some point, you learned that praise, the very thing that Michael is despising, is the thing that would strip her of the sense of entitlement. You can deliver her from her pride, praise purifies your desires, it shields you from discouragement. You can worship your way to being healed. You don't wait to be healed. You worship your way into being healed. And that's why the Bible says we enter his gates with thanksgiving and his courts with praise. But you can't get through the gate if you don't come out from behind the window pane. You're never going to enter the courts if you don't come out from behind the window pane.

The second thing we see is that from the window pane, there was great commitment. she just seemed to think that commitment when it comes to the things of God is optional. The Bible says that they would march from Obed, Edom's house, three miles, they would carry the Ark of the Covenant approximately back to Jerusalem, and this was not a casual stroll. We read it every six steps they would take. They would make a sacrifice. And so a three miles would equate for the average man about 6,500 steps. If David stopped every six steps, that would equal 1,083 sacrifices. And even if my math is not perfect, go with me for a minute. If they didn't sleep and every sacrifice took about five minutes, it would take them three to four days to make that journey. What I want you to see is David understood commitment was needed. David understood that great commitment would precede the things that God was wanting to bring into his life. But he didn't just focus on the commitment, he focused on the good that would be on the back end of his commitment. Where Michael, all she could do is see what it was gonna cost her, what it was gonna demand of her, commitment was an ugly thing, it was an unnecessary thing, it was an unattractive thing. She just couldn't seem to get herself there.

Maybe even commitment to her was an outdated thing. But to David, it was a mandated thing. David understood the importance of commitment because worship that costs the most counts the most. Good. The woman with the alabaster box of expensive perfume worth one year's wages, she broke it open, she poured it on the feet of Jesus and you can see the connection between commitment and worship, the worship that cost you the most. And when you have a wound, you've been wounded in your spirit, you've been hurt, you're starting to get a clue right there that that is the sign that you can actually worship in a way that you can't worship when everything's good. I heard someone say it like this, where pain is the deepest, the veil is the thinnest. In other words, the war, wounded you are, the closer God can be, the closer God can draw, into your life. What's the Bible say? He's near the brokenhearted, isn't that good? That I have a tendency to look at my life and say, man, these wounds and they grab my focus and they drain me of my energy and they make me want to isolate and build walls and all that kind of stuff when actually the wound is assigned to me that God is wanting to draw closer to me than he ever has before. (audience clapping)

- So Michael could see through the window paying what commitment demanded but she couldn't see the blessings. Whereas David, one of the things that motivated him to go get the Ark of the Covenant from Obed Edom's was the Bible says, the Lord hath blessed everything in Obed Edom's house and everything that pertained him. David essentially said, if commitment blessed, Obed Edom's house, then commitment can bless my house. And so every six steps, if they didn't sleep, they would stop 1,083 times and they would sacrifice a bull and a fat lean or 2,166 animals. And in David's mind, it made sense. In David's mind, I'm only going to go so far and then I'm going to stop and I'm going to worship and I'm going to reflect on, have I given God a sacrifice? Which is what the New Testament calls praise, right? Which is what the New Testament calls praise, right? That we all forgot a sacrifice of praise which is the fruit of our lips. Could be that that's why you take six days and then you stop and you show up on Sunday because it's just a moment to stop and look around your life and say, have I given God a sacrifice of praise recently? Which is the fruit of my lips, Have I let my lips, out of the abundance of my heart, my mouth is to speak? Have I taken time and opened my life enough to say, God, not everything is the way I hoped it would be

or imagined it would be. And I get the temptation to stay behind this window pane, but I'm going to come out from behind there long enough to simply say, I know you are good to me. And I know that you're working things together for my good, whether I understand it, get it or not. I'm not doing this without you. So from behind the window pane, Michael just thought serving God shouldn't be that demanding. It shouldn't have to be that kind of effort. But David understood serving God demands sacrifice. A sacrifice of your comfort, a sacrifice of your pride, the sacrifice of forgiveness. David knew it's worth the sacrifice. But many stay from behind the window pane. They're watching. Spiritually isolated and commitment is an ugly thing. It's an unattractive thing. You can't see the good. You can't see the blessings because everything in your life you can only see through the small window pane. And what we see with Michael is that she wastes her whole life. And this is what can happen to us. We can waste our whole life behind the window pane. Seeing God move in the life of somebody else, but feeling like we have our reasons to stay withdrawn ourselves. David comes home and Michael is just hurling insults and accusations at him. She's saying all kinds of horrible things to him

because she could only see a portion of what God was doing through her window pane. But just like Michael, you have to be careful because the Bible says that Michael became barren to the day of her death. And a lot of people can end up barren in their spiritual life because they stay behind the window pane. I'm not suggesting that you haven't been wounded. I'm not suggesting that somebody did not hurt you. I'm not saying that the pain is not real. I'm saying don't let your pain be in vain. Realize that God is able to heal. You are able to rise above your wounds. You can come out from behind the window pane and you can be healed. Don't let your pain be in vain. I mean, I look at Jesus and if anybody looked out the window pane as he hung and bled, he was looking out that window pane. How do you do it? I mean, look at that kind of a sacrifice. How did he work his way through the pain of that moment, the rejection of those closest to him, the false accusations that being treated like less than a dog, how did he even feeling the rejection of his father in that moment, how did he deal with the pain? The Bible says, for the joy that was set before him, he endured the cross. It doesn't say there wasn't pain. It says that somehow on that cross, he said, my pain is not going to be in vain.

He attached such purpose to his pain that something filled his soul with joy. I'm sorry. when if we could look at that wound. And if we could say, God, I know somehow, some way you are going to bring purpose from my pain. Jesus built the church while he was going through pain because of the joy that was set before him. In other words, he saw out into the future of the pain that he was going through. It's not going to be in vain. There is something and he saw you, he saw me, he saw days like this. He knew we would be going through our wounds. He knew that we would face life and he knew that we would face the things that were hurting us. And he wanted to simply step up and say, you do not have to live your life without that pain having a purpose. God can take the pain and he can help it not be in vain. What an amazing thought that through that kind of pain he would build the church. And countless lives are healed. Because he endured the cross for the joy that was set before him.