MICHAL, SAUL's DAUGHTER
1 Samuel 18:20-30
"Through His servant Samuel, God had already anointed David as His chosen king over His people Israel. But the Spirit of the Lord had departed from Saul, and an evil spirit had gained possession of
him.
David was of a beautiful countenance (1Sa 16:12), and the younger daughter of Saul lost her heart to him, yet it would seem that Michal was attracted far more by David's external appearance than by any appreciation of his godly life. Saul, under the influence of Satan as he was, made Michal's love to David serve his own ends, and promised her to him to wife if he should slay one hundred Philistines; and he sent his servants that they might commune with David and instigate him to purchase Michal for his wife by such a slaughter of the king's enemies.
At first she took her husband's side against her ungodly father, but in doing so, she betrayed the treachery of her heart, and when Saul sent to take David, she did not hesitate to tell a lie to screen him from Saul's anger. David's wife did not share his confidence in God. ...Michal substituted human
devices for faith in God. Hearing of her father's determination to slay David, she persuaded him to flee, and she let him down through a window, that he might escape. But Saul was not so easily to be put off; and when her father commanded that David should be brought to him, Michal was ready with her lie, and told Saul that he was sick.
Poor Michal had never recognised David as her king, nor Jehovah as her God. She had married to satisfy her own delight in David's appearance, or in his manner, or something which ministered to herself. No wonder, when David was no longer present, that her self‐seeking heart must find another attraction.
devices for faith in God. Hearing of her father's determination to slay David, she persuaded him to flee, and she let him down through a window, that he might escape. But Saul was not so easily to be put off; and when her father commanded that David should be brought to him, Michal was ready with her lie, and told Saul that he was sick.
Disappointed of his purpose, Saul commanded that the messengers should bring David up in the bed, that he might be slain, and the imperious king found that Michal had substituted an image on which he should wreak his vengeance and so she had mocked him.
SHE DECEIVED HER FATHER.
A woman who will be untrue to her father will be untrue to her husband also. There was a want of integrity about Saul's daughter which followed her through life. The enmity of Saul against David increased, and David was obliged to flee. Then it was that Michal his wife was given to another, and she very soon forgot her first love. Michal's was no true woman's heart. Neither God nor David were all in all to her. There is, in the present day, especially amongst certain classes of our population, an appalling lightness about engagements to marry. One hears of a young couple engaged to be married, and for the merest trifle, this covenant, which ought to be made in heaven, is broken. "What God hath joined together let no man put asunder." (Mat 19:6). The facility of divorce in American society has become a scandal in the world.
When, at last David became king, and demanded of Abner that he should restore Michal, Saul's daughter, whom he calls "my wife Michal, which I espoused to me" (2Sa 3:13-14), Ish‐bosheth and Abner took her from her husband, who "went along with her; weeping behind her." But there was no reconciliation between David and Michal; she was bitter against her first love; she never submitted to him as king; and when David brought up the Ark of the Lord, Michal appeared in her true character. She despised David in her heart, and mocked at his joy in the service of God.
Thus this woman who lived to herself had to live by herself, for, probably, she lived in solitary confinement until the day of her death. It is a sad history of a selfish woman, who never fulfilled her vocation as a helpmeet."
Mary Elizabeth Baxter