But first Samuel, chapter 17, verses 31 through 40, I'm just going to read to you the first three verses or so 31 through 33. So I said, you hear the word of God. When the words that David spoke were heard, they were repeated them before they repeated them before Saul and he sent for him. And David said to Saul, let no man's heart fail because of him, your servant will go and fight with the Philistine. And Saul said to David, you're not able to go against this Philistine to fight with him for you are but a youth. And he has been a man of war from his youth. Let us pray. Father, I pray this morning that as we consider this story well-known of David and Goliath that you would show us something bigger, show us the gospel of Jesus, show us how it also might apply to our own lives. I pray that you be in my head and in my thinking, in my heart and in my understanding and in my mouth and in my speaking. In Christ's name we pray these things, amen, and amen. Well, if this is your first time here, you were in the second week of a series on the book of Samuel and really the series started about three years ago because I only preached the Old Testament in the fall and so over the past three years or so we've been looking at this book of first Samuel in the fall. And we happen to start this time in the story of David and Goliath. And I've told you before the story of David and Goliath is easily the most famous of all stories in all of the Bible. I mean, even someone who's never read of the Bible, people have never heard of the Bible. Anytime you're watching TV and there's a story of someone small or an underdog who's taking on a favorite or someone big, it's always known as a David and Goliath story. And in fact, you know, one of my favorite books besides Huckleberry Finn is Tom Sawyer, who sort of prided himself on not knowing the Bible. You know, Mark Twing was very cynical about religion. Even Tom Sawyer knew the story of David and Goliath. And so the story of David and Goliath is well known. We think on one hand, on the other hand, I'm sort of now as we look at it in depth, I hope you're getting the rest of the story, if you will, because really to understand the story of David and Goliath, you've got to understand the background of the whole book of Samuel. And if you remember the background to the book of Samuel, it was the book of Judges. So I'm going to take the next two hours and explain the book of Judges and then in reality, all you need to know about the book of Judges is this is that it was making a case that Israel needs a king. In fact, all the books that we read as Western, you know, American Christians and call them historical books, the Israelites would have looked at those and they would have called them prophetic books because they're all trying to persuade them of something. And the book of Judges is trying to persuade Israel that they need a king. And the book of Samuel picks up on the book of Judges. Samuel is the last judge and the purpose of the book of Samuel is just this that in fact, Israel does need a king, but they need a very specific kind of king. They need a king like David. And so the whole book of Samuel is making a case that you need a king like David. And the story starts out if you remember that Samuel comes along and by chapter 8 of Samuel, they ask for Israel comes and asks for a king. They ask for a very specific king as well. They ask for a king who is like the other nations. And God says, you sure you want a king like the other nations or you don't want a king like I'm going to give you. And they say, we want one like the other nations. And so he said, you want it, you got it. And so he gave him a king just like the other nations in the person of Saul. And how was Saul like the other nations in at least three ways that we know Israel's king was supposed to be the shepherd of Israel. He's supposed he was called the shepherd of Israel. And what we know about Saul was that he was a horrible shepherd. In fact, Saul was tasked at one point in this book to find two of his father's donkeys and he couldn't find two donkeys. So here's the guy who's supposed to shepherd a whole nation. And yet we're told he can't even find where two donkeys are. So that's the first thing. Second thing we know that that Israel's king is supposed to be very spiritually adept. He's supposed to know the law and meditate on it and teach the law. Saul is is is is done more than a bag of hammers. Frankly, when it comes to his relationship with God, he's very spiritually dull. He doesn't know God. We I don't think because as you go through this book, he just seems to go back and forth. He he he acts like he knows God. A lot of people are good at acting like their Christians are acting like they know God. But really Saul's behavior shows something quite different. So he's very spiritually dull. And the last thing that's important for this story is Saul is very physically imposing. Literally. Remember the Bible says that Saul is a head taller than anyone else in Israel. So the king's job is is to protect and defend his people. And I guess it's always a good thing if your king is the biggest guy in the camp. In which would make sense when they're getting ready to face the biggest guy they have ever seen. On the other hand, this the story unfolds and you learn about David. David was the exact opposite of Saul. A one hand David was an excellent shepherd. Dave was incredibly spiritually aware and David was just a boy, at least when we meet him. He wasn't physically imposing for sure. And so that's the context in which we find that we jump into the story of David and Goliath. Last week, we looked at the first part. I'm going to call that scene one. Today we'll look at scene two. Next week, we'll look at scene three. And in scene one, really, we were just introduced to the characters and the problem in where the main characters you begin with, you have Israel against the Philistines. And the Philistines were basically the nemesis. They were the thorn in the side of Israel for their whole existence. And so the Philistines had come to one side of the valley of Ilan, the Israelites were on the other side of the valley. And Israel is getting ready to fight and all of a sudden the Philistines sent out their champion. A man named Goliath, who just happened to be nine feet six inches tall. He wore armor that was 125 pounds. He wore a helmet of bronze. He had a sword across his shoulder. He had a javelin that was as big as a weaver's beam with a 15 pound head on it. And on top of that, he had a shield bearer. In other word, he had a person whose job it was to do nothing but carry his shield for him. And he came down and said, send one person out to fight me. You see, the Philistines were more into to conquering and subjugating and taxing people rather than just raping and pillaging. So why would they kill all the able bodied men when they could just send one person out to fight on their behalf and whoever wins the fight takes everything. And that sort of threw Israel for a loop because they're not used to that, although they should have been because if you look back through the history of the Bible, the Bible is full of pointers to places where one person represents everybody. You think right to the very beginning, Adam represented everybody. Abraham represented everybody. Moses represented Israel before the people. You go on or not. And so they should have known or at least asked the question, is it possible that one person could represent us? That one person could face our enemies and deliver us from all of our enemies. Just one. And the answer, of course, is yes, the king could do it if it's the right king. And we know that Saul wasn't the right king because the characters unfold. What we see about Saul is the scene opens. It's the only thing we know about Saul if we jumped into the story right here is that he is afraid he can't. That Saul, as soon as Goliath came down and challenged, if Saul was anything, if he's any kind of king, Saul would have stepped forward and says, no one talks to Israel like that. I'm the king. You'll fight me. And instead, what we see is that Saul fled with everyone else because he was greatly afraid and dismayed. And then the very next words you hear are but David. David, on the other hand, comes down. David hears. He hears this, this Philistine, mocking Israel. And he just asks a question. Remember the question he asks, who is this on the circumcised Philistine that he would, would defy the armies of the living God? Who is he? He's a nat compared to God. What are you guys doing here? David asks the right questions. But in order for David to face Goliath, he's got to face at least two obstacles before he can actually get to the real fight. And what are the obstacles that David has to face before he faces the real obstacle of Goliath? And the answer, if you remember from last week is just this, it's church people. It always is. Remember the problem with Goliath is he says, who is his on the circumcised Philistine that he would defy us? And by calling him on the circumcised, he's basically saying he's outside of the covenant people. He's not part of us. And who are the people that try and stop David from confronting Goliath on the outside? It's people inside the covenant or what for them would have been church people. And it's always been like that. Jesus came and said, I am the light of the world whoever follows me will not walk in darkness. Who are the people that stopped him or tried to stop him? The tax collectors, the sinners, the Gentiles that I am in. It was the religious people that not only tried to stop Jesus, but they crucified Jesus. And in the process, they actually accomplished the very thing he was setting out to do. And that was conquering our greatest giant, which was sin. So that leads us to the second scene of this story of David and Goliath. David is coming. He has asked the question, who is this on circumcised Philistine? His brother alive says, you know, you're just a shepherd. What good is that going to do anybody? Go back. You're just prideful and you wanted to see the fight. David keeps asking the question. And that's where we pick up. We're really going to look at two things this morning. Most of them are going to go through a sort of verse by verse, but we're going to look at David's offer and Saul's response. And then the next section is Saul's offer and David's response. So let's look first at David's offer, verse 31 says, when the words that David spoke were heard, they repeated them before Saul and he sent for him. And David said to Saul, let no man's heart fail because of him, your servant will go and fight with this Philistine. The first thing I want you to notice is how desperate Saul is. Saul not only supposed to be the one who's leading the fight, he's not always supposed to be the one that's leading the church, we learned early, we learned last week that Saul's actually trying to hire somebody to fight so that he doesn't have to go out there. He'll give him his daughter, he'll give them a tax break and he'll make him extremely wealthy. And so now Saul hears there's someone who's asking questions about Goliath, someone who's being defiant of Goliath. And even though it's a boy, even though he's not a warrior, even though he's a shepherd, Saul's willing to at least hear him out, he's desperate now. And then you see David being extremely tactful because it's just David and Saul. And instead of David coming in and saying, Saul, you just need to man up. Don't be afraid of this guy. Instead David uses the language and he bears more like the royal we. Let no one be afraid of this one. Saul, you shouldn't be afraid of him. In fact, I will go and fight this Philistine. Now remember if the purpose of the book is to show you that you need a king like David, who are you sort of leaning toward right now? Saul or David? David at least has heard at this point. He says, let me go fight the Philistine. And the way that Saul responds immediately is the response of a religious person. Notice I didn't say it's a response of a Christian or the response of faith. It is a response of a religious person because what the religious person, the way the religious person responds to challenge is ask themself, do I have the means to meet this challenge? Notice what Saul says to David. He doesn't even ask him a question. David says, let no man's heart fail and Saul said to David, you are not able to go against this Philistine to fight with him for you or but a youth and he has been a man of war from his youth.
Did Saul say anything wrong there? In some sense he didn't. What Saul said was common sense. All things being equal, you're a youth and he has been fighting since he was a youth. Plus or minus three feet or so. You can't go because common sense says you can't go. All things being equal mean you can't go. But what Saul doesn't know and Saul doesn't ever apparently get is that all things aren't equal. At least for the one who trusts in the living God. The religious person is always asking themselves, do we have the means to do this? Do we have the right thing to do? In other words, the way that religious people make decisions is the first thing they look at is a calculator and a spreadsheet and their own possessions and say, can we do this? And then the religious person stops there and they say, you know what, the calculator and the spreadsheet says we're not going to have enough so therefore we won't take any risk. Now what's interesting is David's response to Saul. The way David responds to Saul is he does two things. He looks backwards and he looks forward and by looking backward and forward to his present is defined. What does David do? He recalls what God has done for him in the past. Notice, says, but David said to Saul, your servant used to keep sheep for his father. And when there came a lion or a bear and they took a lamb from the flock, I went after him and struck him and delivered it out of his mouth. And if he arose against me, I caught him by his beard and struck him and killed him. Your servant is struck down with lions and bears and this uncircumcised Philistine will be like one of them where he has defined the armies of the living God.
The first thing you see, what's the very thing that has prepared David for this challenge?
The very thing for which his brother mocked him. He said, you've been out there just taking care of those few sheep, wasting your time. And David's perspective from the eyes of faith, David says, here's how I know that I can take on Goliath because when I was taking care of those few sheep, the lion would come and the bear would come and we actually see that later it was plural. He said when I confronted lions and bears, when the lion would come and the bear would come and they would take one of my sheep, I would go after them. And if they didn't drop the sheep and they had turned on me, I would grab them by their beard and I would smite them. That's a word we need to reintegrate back into our vocabulary. He smote them. He killed them. So David looks back, but what's interesting is that they took this responsibility on one hand, but did you notice how he defines it? On one hand he says, I killed the lion and the bear, therefore this Philistine will be like one of them. That David is looking at what God has done in his past and is saying if he's done it in the past, he can do it in the future. Notice the next thing he says, he says, the Lord who delivered me from the paw of the lion and from the paw of the bear will deliver me from the hand of this Philistine. So David looks back and he says God delivered me from the lion, he delivered me from the bear and because he did that, I have full confidence that he can deliver me from Goliath. In other words, God's deliverance and his faithfulness to me in the past gives me confidence in his faithfulness to me in the future. And the question is why doesn't that happen with us either? Has God ever been faithful to any of us in the past? Let me ask those of you who have been members of this church for more than 20 or 30 years, was God faithful to us in the past? Did God do amazing things here in the past? And now the question is, is there any reason to believe he wouldn't do amazing things in the future?
That's a question of faith, isn't it? Because I read a sermon this week, it was one of the most convicting sermons I've ever read and it was extremely convicting for me at the age of 43, and I was reading through it, I said thank God I'm not 73 or 63 or 53. And of course it was a sermon by Charles Spurgeon on this text, and Charles Spurgeon said, woe unto you who have experienced more grace and more of God's faithfulness, who do not as you move forward, take more risks for the sake of the gospel. In other words, Spurgeon is saying for those of us who have been in the faith, the longer you have been in the faith, the crazier you ought to be, the longer you have been a Christian, the more risk, the more apt toward taking risk you ought to be. And yet for some reason, the reason he had to preach it, the reason I bring it up now is because as we get older, we tend to be more and more risk averse, do we not? I mean, it would be interesting if you could see a time-lapse photography of 30 or 40 years ago, and some of us here in this room who were pushing to leave another denomination to start off on our own, to build new buildings, to do all of these things, who now look at a spreadsheet and say we can't do it. Why would you do that? Spurgeon would say those of us who have experienced more grace and more faithfulness over more years should be the ones who are leading the charge and doing what God has called us to do. And I ask you a question, are you a person if you've been in the faith for years, are you leading the charge and what God is calling us to do, are you pulling the rest of the church back like Eliabood or like Saul would? Only you can answer that question. I can't. The great thing about what that you see with David is knowing that God's faithfulness in his past and his promised faithfulness in the future enables him to take risk in the present. The other thing you have to notice here about David is that you can never experience God's faithfulness unless you take some action. In other words it's a very presbyterian thing to do, to sit back and say well you know God promised he would be faithful, God is sovereign over all things and therefore I'm just going to sit here and watch it all pan out. When in fact you can never really understand God's faithfulness until you put it to the test. You can never know that you can never say God was faithful to me in the past unless you've actually been through some trials, unless you've taken some risk and unless you've stepped out in the past to enable him to be faithful to you. So the tension between human freedom and divine sovereignty really isn't attention at all. Are you going to step out and do something on behalf of the gospel or not? You know the session and I've talked about over the years B-hags. You know what a B-hag is a big hairy audacious goal right and a B-hag is basically something that you couldn't you wouldn't imagine doing in and of yourself. It's just so big and so crazy. David right here this is a B-hag. David is saying you know what I face the lion and I face the bear that's Philistine he'll be like one of them. And if you listen to the next line from Saul you would almost be tempted to think that Saul started to get it and it's amazing what you know what you read commentaries how commentators I guess I don't know if they just need something to write they'll say here Saul shows that he finally has come around he finally understands because Saul's response to David is what let me read it. Saul says to David go and the Lord be with you. Now what did this Saul really is that really an act of faith on Saul's part it could be until you read the very next sentence because what does Saul do the very next sentence he does the thing that that religious people do that pragmatists do Saul does the same thing that that my father-in-law did to me he does to David you see when I was in in Judy and I were in college and we've been friends for a while and we decided we wanted to get married and I thought I didn't tell her by the way that I was going to go talk to her parents and you know I've worked and drove to like two in the morning it was just you know I I went I went the extra mile to be honest with you. So I drove from Tallahassee to Sarasota and I talked to my father but see my in-laws owned a real estate company the pretty successful and every time I've been around them my father-in-law and my Judy's brothers they're all business people and they all talk about business and spread cheats and so I knew I had to have a plan when I went there and I had one and I went and I said Mr. Allen you know they she had the same maiden name which makes things a lot easier. Mr. Allen you know I'd like to marry your daughter and here's my plan you know we have enough money to get through the the last year of college we were seniors and we have enough money to get through the next three years of seminary and then after that I'll either go on to be a professor which I might make a pretty good living or I might go on to be a missionary in which I might not make that much at all. I shouldn't have said that last part he said well what do you mean by that and of course I'm being young and I said well you know we're just gonna have to trust God then and he said well Tom you know trust all that trust in God stuff is good but you need something else in your back pocket as well and I thought okay so that yes or no and obviously I asked for the business and got it that's what David that has sold us to David here he says oh Lord be with you but before you go here's my armor now remember David is still a boy and Saul is at least the biggest guy in Israel and so so Saul's not even an advertised guy and so he tells David what here's my tunic here's my my breastplate here's all of my stuff wear it let me read that to you he says then Saul clothed David with his armory put on a helmet of bronze on his head and clothed them with a coat of mail and David strapped his sword over his armor and he tried and vained to go for he had not tested them you know what the scene reminds me of if you've ever seen the the Lord of the Rings trilogy the last one where Sam and Frodo basically put on the armor of orcs to disguise themselves as they go into the evil mordor and you know as you watch the movie you think come on because they're like three feet tall and orcs are like seven feet tall and they've got this armor on and they can hardly move that's what David looks like he's walking around and what's his David's response he says I cannot go with these or I cannot walk with these for I've not tested them and then you have one of those so David put them off remember when you're reading the Old Testament I taught you you need to listen for these editorial comments because in the editorial comments is where you get the big remember like Goliath it was was taunting Israel and David had come down to bring raisins and cheese or bread and cheese to his brothers and it's a Goliath was taunting Israel and then all this and you just have this editorial comment and David heard you know you know you know you hear the good the bad and the ugly music and David heard and so David tries on Saul's armor and he's walking around he says I can't even walk with these things oh wants so David took them off right he's a boy but he's not a boy to be messed with David puts them off why did what is the the author wants to know about these the David is not relying on common sense David is not relying on the common conventions of the day David is not relying on the armor of some other person but David is relying on his faith in the living God and what's the lesson in there for us the question is what do you and I rely on you see God calls each and every one of us in this room assuming you're a Christian into ministry he calls you to face giants he calls you into battle and the question is are you does he call you into battle wearing the armor of someone else or does he call you into battle given who you are in in other words God has gifted each one of us in different ways and some people never do anything really for the gospel's sake because they say you don't have armor like David I don't have armor like Tommy I'm not dressed like this guy I don't have the tools that this person has but the fact of the matter is if the gospel is true that every person in this room has something that this church needs in order to move forward you've got something what did David move forward with people had to have thought he was crazy because Saul had to say well if you're not going to wear the armor what are you going to do what are you going to take out there with you and David I just imagine him pulling out of his pocket got this thing sling this is all David had I made this this week by the way just to see if it worked I wait it's all the cars were gone so how can David walk out with just this and the answer is because that's what God had given him that's the way God had gifted him God calls you into battle with the tools that he has given you and David knew that David thought I'm a shepherd I know how to use a sling and I know how to use this staff and I know I'm supposed to face that giant so it doesn't make sense to try and do everything else it doesn't try and make sense to try and draw up all the great plans it doesn't make sense to go to all the eaurs in the in the camp and ask them for their advice because they're all going to say oh no you're just going to get killed none of that makes sense what makes sense is that God has called me a shepherd boy with this sling to face that giant and I will never know if God's going to be faithful unless I step out and face him and that's the very next thing it says it says and his sling was in his hand and he approached the Philistine you know I'm not only close with this one of my favorite churches or clusters of churches where I was first ordained was a church called in town community church in Atlanta and it was part of it was a church plant of a church called perimeter church and the pastor's name was Randy Pope and I remember when I got there they wanted me to memorize their motto and I thought it was crazy at first 30 or 40 years ago when Randy Pope got to Atlanta he started the perimeter church and it was up you know like in a storefront like anything else and their motto was attempt something so great for God that it is doomed to fail unless God be in it if we made that our motto here some people would have a hard time being gone imagine a church having a motto attempt something so great for God that it is doomed to fail unless God be in it I can't imagine we're sitting in one of our session meeting going all right God guys should we do this I don't know is it doomed to fail looks like it's doomed to fail to me then it's all aboard let's go and yet given that model and that faithfulness 30 years later I think there are about 30 churches now that perimeter has started the perimeter itself is about six or seven thousand members and continues to grow it and it has worldwide influence why because all of the things that they're doing were just too big they were all goliaths they were all things that were just too big for them to think about doing themselves and instead they relied on God now let me give you some encouragement because a lot of us sit here and go man I haven't done anything for years the thing that she give you hope and confidence going forward to face any giant anything any challenge any risk is just this is that the true son of David Jesus has already gone ahead of you and he has slain the greatest of all giants he's slain that you're sin he's slain you're guilt and he has given you all the credit for the victory and now you stand up and face anything a winner you've already won and the question is are you going to live in that or are you not think about that let me pray for us while they're praying that as we continue to consider David and goliath and then later David and Jonathan that you would simply work faith into our hearts that we would be like David that we would exercise our faith and at the older we get the more willing to exercise that faith we would be rather we thank you and Christ's name amen and amen