June 24, 2012
After God's Own Heart - Lord of the Impossible
- 1 Samuel 17:41-50
- Rev. Jim Capps
Since this is our first annual Summer Sunday Celebration, I want to start my remarks today with a game. I don’t know about you, but I am a competitor and love games. I remember particularly enjoying Bible drills, quizzes and contests which made getting into the Bible lots of fun.
As we set up the passage we are going to talk about today, see how well you can do. There are only 5 questions. Let’s see if any of you can get all of them correct.
- Q. What kind of man was Boaz before he got married?
- Ruthless
- Q. Who was the greatest financier in the Bible?
- Noah. He was floating his stock while everyone else was in liquidation.
- Q. Who was the greatest female financier in the Bible?
- Pharoah’s daughter. She went down to the bank of the Nile and drew out a little prophet.
- What excuse did Adam give to his children as to why they no longer lived in Eden?
- Your mother ate us out of house and home.
- Q. Who is the greatest babysitter mentioned in the Bible?
- David. He rocked Goliath into a deep sleep.
How did you do? There is no better known story in the whole Bible than David and Goliath. It is love by people of all ages. How often have you heard it used in political campaigns or sporting events when speaking of the underdog winning against all odds?
Today, as we continue this series of messages on “After God’s Own Heart,” in which we are looking at the life of David, we are going to look aty the story of David and Goliath. Since I Samuel 17 is a long passage, let me set it up before I read about the actual confrontation….
- The battle lines have been drawn between Israel and their arch-enemy, the Philistines in the Valley of Elah, which wasn’t far from David’s hometown, Bethlehem. For 40 days the Philistine giant has taunted Israel striking fear into Saul and his men.
- Jesse’s three oldest sons are in King Saul’s army. David has been traveling back and forth singing and playing his harp for Saul and tending Jesse’s sheep. Jesse asks David to take provisions to his brothers and their commander.
- David arrives just as Goliath bellows out his challenge. The naïve shepherd boy wonders why everyone is so frightened. He volunteers to take on the giant. After Saul refuses, David tells him about his exploits with the lion and the bear. The Lord would bring him the victory.
- Saul finally acquiesces, giving David his armor, helmet and sword which were both amusing and unworkable.
- David instead takes only his shepherd’s staff and then stops at the brook on the floor of the valley and selects 5 smooth stones which he puts in his shepherd’s bag. So, he’s going against the grizzly giant with his staff in one hand and his sling in the other. Quite a sight!
- That’s where we pick up the reading.
Read- I Samuel 17:41-50
GOLIATH, THE PHILISTINE GIANT, IS A SEEMINGLY IMPOSSIBLE FOE.
No matter how you look at it, Goliath was a mountain of a man. Shaquelle O’Neal and Yao Ming, two former NBA centers would both have had to look up to Goliath. Listen to how Eugene Peterson describes him in The Message:
“A giant nearly 10 feet tall stepped out from the Philistine line into the open. Goliath came from Gath. He had a bronze helmet on his head and was dressed in armor—126 pounds of it! He wore bronze shin guards and carried a bronze sword. Spear was like a fence rail—the spear tip alone weighed over 15 pounds.”
Goliath had played havoc with the emotions of the Israelite army. They couldn’t imagine anyone being able to stand against the monster. Saul, who was head and shoulders taller than any in his army, was just as frightened as the rest of them. When Goliath trashed talked the Israelites every day, they were paralyzed with fear.
Try to imagine the sense of indignation Goliath must have felt when he saw David, this teen-age boy, without armor or weapons. “Am I a dog that you come to me with sticks,” Goliath bellows. With that he began to curse David with the names of his gods. Humanly speaking, it was an amusing, yet foolish sight.
Trying to intimidate David, Goliath roars, “Come to me, and I will give your flesh to the birds of the air and the wild animals of the field.” In our world, he was saying, “David, you are about to become road-kill!”
Are there giants striking fear into your life? By giants I am talking about that fear which causes you to wake up in the middle of the night or that seemingly impossible situation which makes you feel stuck or paralyzed to do anything about it.
Maybe your giant is cancer; or, Alzheimer’s. Maybe it’s losing your job or fear of economic failure. Maybe it’s the fear of death or the death of someone you love. Possibly your giant is losing the control over the lives of your children. Perhaps it’s the deep concern that we are going to be the victims of another terrorist attack. Maybe your giant is something that happened to you in your past and you just can’t let it go. Maybe it’s an addiction or habit which seems impossible to shake.
Do you have a giant talking trash to you, stoking the coals of fear?
DAVID HAS FAITH IN THE LORD OF HOSTS, THE GOD OF THE ARMIES OF ISRAEL.
David may be young, but he has had experiences that have prepared him for this very moment in time. He has fought off lions and bears protecting his father’s sheep. He knew that it was God who had allowed him to overcome these wild animals. God was more than able to defeat the bully giant.
Listen to these words from Marshall Shelley as he talks about traveling in Jordan:
“While driving through the countryside and small towns, you’re impressed by how many Jordanians spontaneously wave at the bus.
Some of those who waved were shepherd boys. Usually alone, a boy perhaps 12 or 14 years old would be standing near a flock of goats or sheep, often in utterly desolate terrain…
Toward evening, we’d see a boy leading the flock back to the tent where his Bedouin family lives. What does such a boy do all day?...
The Bible provides a clue. One such shepherd boy who grew up not far away, named David, must have spent his time singing songs and throwing rocks. Day after day with the sheep, there would have been lots of time to make up songs. And there were an endless supply of rocks…
Interestingly, those two skills, honed by hours of solitary practice while watching sheep, provided crucial in God’s plans for him. His musical abilities were put to the service of the king…
And the rock throwing? That skill, of course, led David to a stunning victory over Goliath… as I traveled the rocky landscape of the holy land, I pondered the rocks. They’re everywhere! Easy to complain about, or overlook. Yet, for David they were the raw material that God used mightily.”
In courageous fashion, the lad David shouts back at the giant. He says that while Goliath comes with armor and weapons, he comes in the name of the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel armies whom he has defiled. David states confidently that the Lord will deliver Goliath into his hand. Not only that, but the Philistine army will be defeated so that “all the earth will know that there is a God in Israel…and that the Lord does not save by spear and sword.” Then with confidence the young lad says to the giant, “For the battle is the Lord’s and he will give you into our hand.”
Can you imagine how David’s older brothers must have felt as their precocious brother spoke those words to the giant? Or, what must Saul, the cowering king been thinking? And most especially, what must have been Goliath’s response? Incredulous? Dumbfounded? Angry? No one had spoken to him like that in a long time.
Would you have the courage to speak to your giant with the same kind of courage and confidence in the Lord? Oh, the situation is different to be sure, but we are talking about the same Lord, who is in bringing about deliverance every bit as much as He was in David’s day. As you face your giant and the seeming impossibility of your situation, do you believe that God has the power to bring you deliverance?
USING DAVID, THE LORD DEFEATED GOLIATH THAT DAY.
I picture David’s words so infuriating Goliath that he begins lumbering toward David. When David sees the giant approaching, we are told that he quickly ran to confront the giant head on. Feeling as if it would be something like swatting a troublesome gnat, Goliath let his guard down. In his mind, this wasn’t going to take long.
As he sprints toward the giant, David reaches into his shepherd’s bag and pulls out one of those five smooth stones which he had carefully selected from the brook. When he was close to the overconfident giant, in a way he had practiced thousands of times, with all of his might David let the rock fly. Just at the time he thought he would be dissecting David, the rock struck Goliath in the middle of the forehead. In shocked disbelief, he stopped in his tracks, stood there as his eyes glazed over and then fell face first to the ground.
There is a stunned silence in both camps as David walks up to the fallen giant, pulls out Goliath’s sword and then finishes him off. Suddenly thunderous cheers come from the Israelite army, who with new-found courage, charge after the Philistines who are fleeing in fear.
The God of Israel wins a great victory that day defeating the imposing giant. It’s one of those building blocks of faith not only for young David, but for all who were there and all who would hear the story in the days which followed.
APPLICATION
While the David and Goliath story is one which we may have learned from the time we were children, it has special significance for all ages for we who now follow Jesus. To interpret the Old Testament properly, we must begin with what it meant to them in their life situation.
Yet, as a people who place our faith in Great King David’s Greater Son, we also must look at the rest of the story. David’s God, the Lord of Israel, sent Jesus Christ as Immanuel, “God with us” in all the situations of our lives. He is the One who set an example of how we are to navigate life. But much more than that, Jesus was willing to die on a cruel cross so that we might experience forgiveness from our sins, joy and peace as we live, and hope as we face the future with all of its uncertainties.
The rest of the story also includes the revolutionary news that the Third Person of the Trinity, the Holy Spirit indwells all who claim Jesus as Savior and Lord. The same Holy Spirit who was there with David when he defeated Goliath; who was with early believers in the Book of Acts; and who has given people the courage and the power to defeat their giants since Biblical days, is present with us, right now, today.
Far from the latest self-help fad, this same Holy Spirit can help you and I defeat the giants in our lives. In the wonderful story we have delved into today, it’s never about David and what he has accomplished, even though that’s what the people wanted to say shortly after it happened. It’s always about the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel.
Dear friends, for you and me, as we do battle with the giants unique to each one of us, it’s never about us and how many prayers we have prayed, worship services we have attended, or hours have logged. While all of these things are important disciplines for Christian growth, it’s always about the Risen and Reigning Lord who through the power of the indwelling Holy Spirit who can make us more than conquers.
As you confront the giants in your life, I challenge you to call on Great King David’s Greater Son. I can’t promise you that God will bring you the same kind of spectacular victory He brought David. But, I can promise you that through the presence and power of the Spirit, Christ will be your strength.
Let me go one step further, sometimes we need other followers of Jesus to be alongside of us, helping to rescue us from the giants we face. That may come in the form of someone praying with your after the service. It may mean seeking counseling. Possibly, a 12-step program is what God wants to use if you are facing the giant of addiction.
It also may mean coming to a pastor, an elder, or a trusted friend, telling that person about your giant and asking that person to pray with and be alongside of you.
Likewise as we approach the challenge of Vision 2020, it is God who will help us meet the exciting challenge that is before us. He calls us to come together with the same kind of faith and courage as David did when he faced Goliath.
In Psalm 27, David wrote, “The Lord is my light and my salvation, whom shall I fear? The Lord is the stronghold of my life; of whom shall I be afraid?” David was speaking from experience. We knew what it was like to take on giants.
Dear friends, God wants to be your light, your salvation, your stronghold, driving out fear and defeating the giants of your life.