Fighting the Battles

About 1200 years before Christ, around the time of the Exodus, the escape of the Israelites from Egypt, a group of seafolk, most likely from Crete and the other Greek islands, decided to move to the plain of Sharon, a well-watered, fertile coastal plain in southern Palestine. Today, this plain is known as the Gaza strip. In the Old Testament, this area – and these people – were known as the Philistines.

The Philistines settled here just before the Israelites invaded the land from the East. Because the land was relatively flat and fertile, they quickly grew in numbers – and were able to use chariots, the tanks of the ancient world. Drawn by teams of 2 or 4 fast horses, a chariot held a driver and 1 or 2 soldiers who carried spears and swords. When a chariot rushed at a man on the ground, the horses and the spears were terrifying. Plus, a chariot could easily outrun men on foot, attacking them many times until they broke ranks and ran away. And then, the chariots followed up, running down the fleeing infantry. Chariots were very powerful on flat land – but they were almost worthless in rough country.

The Israelites settled in the rough country, the hills and steep ravines of central Palestine. Here, the Israelites had the advantage with their clan- and tribe-based spearmen, able to ambush Philistines from behind rocks as they headed up the narrow ravines. Back and forth the war raged between the Philistines and the Israelites, with the Israelites mostly winning in the hills under King Saul and his son Jonathan – and the Philistines winning on the plain.

One day the Philistines invaded the land of the tribe of Judah. Saul and the Israelites assembled to meet the invasion. There were two hills, with the Philistines camped on one hill and the Israelites camped on the other hill, with a valley between them, the Valley of Elah shown on the screen as it is today.

The Philistines had five major cities, of which Gath was one of the leading cities. A man named Goliath was from Gath – his height was six cubits and a span, or roughly 9 foot 9 inches. This sounds impossible, but skeletons have been found in ancient graves in France with heights of 11 feet or so. A man in Illinois, Robert Wadlow was 8 foot 11 inches when he died in 1940. Additionally, Goliath may have suffered like Wadlow from a pituitary tumor which caused his growth – and that of his family as found in other parts of scripture. However, the text of Samuel from the Dead Sea Scrolls gives Goliath’s height as 4 cubits and a span, or 6 foot 9 inches, which is still an impressive giant of a man, especially at a time when the average man was 5’ 4” tall.

So Goliath wore a bronze helmet and wore bronze armor that weighed 125 pounds. He had armor on his legs and carried a spear with a point that weighed 15 pounds. He had a huge sword. Additionally, another man carried a shield for him. All of this was very expensive and heavy. Only Goliath could wield these weapons. They would only work for him. Goliath was a human tank!

Day after day, he would walk into the valley and shout at the Israelites, taunting them for being the “servants of Saul” and challenging them to send out a man for single combat, the losing side becoming the slaves of the winning side. He did this for forty days, the Bible’s time of preparation.

Meanwhile, David the teenager was attending the sheep back home in Bethlehem.

One day, Jesse, David’s father, asked him to take a 40-pound bag of roasted grain and ten loaves of bread to his brothers who were in the army, and to take ten chesses to their commander. See how the brothers are doing and bring back word from them.

So the next day, David loaded up and went to the camp, finding his brothers and talking to them when Goliath did his daily taunt. The Israelites nearby repeated a rumor – Saul will give great wealth to the man who kills Goliath, plus his daughter and an exemption from taxes for his family.

His brother overheard him speaking to the other men, and chewed him out, as big brothers sometimes do, saying, in essence, “War is serious business and you should be watching the sheep. Instead you are here just to be a spectator at the battle.”

Someone overheard David complaining about Goliath, so King Saul sent for him. When he met Saul, David said, “Let no one lose heart on account of this Philistine; I’ll go and fight him.”

Saul pointed out that David was only a young man and Goliath was an experienced warrior.

David said confidently, “I’ve been keeping sheep and fought lions and bears, killing them. This uncircumcised Philistine will be like one of them, because he has defied the armies of the living God. The Lord rescued me from the lion and the bear and will rescue me from Goliath.”

Saul said to David, “Go and the Lord be with you.” He gave him his own tunic and armor, sword, and bronze helmet, but they were too heavy for David, so he tried them on and then took them off. Instead, he took his staff, five smooth stones that he found in the stream, and his sling. He did not use another man’s weapons – he used the cheap weapons that he understood and could afford – a wooden staff, stones he found in abundance in the stream, and a sling, a piece of leather with a couple of cords attached.

Now David did not use a slingshot like so many boys have played with. He used a military sling, a leather thong in which he placed a stone and then spun rapidly around his head, letting fly when the stone was moving very rapidly. The device was later used by the Romans as a sort of artillery, with dozens of slingers working together flinging dozens of rocks at the enemy. It took a lot of practice to be accurate with a military sling – but David had nothing much to do during those long days with the sheep except to practice with his sling. He had become very good with it.

As David approached Goliath, the giant kept coming closer, together with his shield bearer. He saw this teenager coming toward him, apparently only with a wooden staff. Goliath made fun of his stick and cursed David by his gods.

David responded. “You come against me with sword and spear and javelin, but I come against you in the name of the Lord Almighty the God of the armies of Israel, whom you have defied. This day the Lord will deliver you into my hands, and I’ll strike you down and cut off your head. This very day I will give the carcasses of the Philistine army to the birds and the wild animals, and the whole world will know that there is a God in Israel. All those gathered here will know that it is not by sword or spear that the Lord saves; for the battle is the Lord’s, and he will give all of you into our hands.”

The two closed for battle. David slung a stone at Goliath and cracked him on the forehead. The text says “the stone sank into his forehead”. That was a hard hit. Goliath fell facedown. David took Goliath’s sword and then cut off Goliath’s head.

After this, the Philistines ran and the Israelites pursued them by to Gath, killing many on the way. David was given a high rank in the army.

We’ve all head this story, even though it may have been many years. It is so widely known that David versus Goliath has even become a way of describing whenever a man or woman stands against a large enemy, whether it be in battle, in a legal fight, in a commercial competition, or wherever.

But there are still lessons to be learned. Let’s look at them.

The little guy can win. But how? How did David win?

He did not fight Goliath as Goliath expected and wanted to be fought. David did not take a sword and spear and armor and fight Goliath hand-to-hand. No, David took a dangerous weapon of his own, the sling, which allowed him to fight Goliath from a distance where he could not be hurt by Goliath’s size and strength. If you are going to fight a human tank, it helps to have a good missile.

David kept his distance. He did this by slinging the stone early – and he also was much more mobile than Goliath. It doesn’t really matter who you are – 125 pounds of armor is bound to slow you down. David, with his five stones, was clearly prepared to keep running around and slinging at Goliath until one of the stones hit Goliath hard. And if those five stones didn’t do the job, well, there were plenty more in the stream where those came from.

David aimed at the forehead, which Goliath’s helmet and Goliath’s shield did not cover. David knew the helmet was tough – so he didn’t attack the helmet. David wasn’t planning on just battering Goliath with stones – he was aiming carefully at a particular weak spot.

In our battles with others, we need to keep in mind these things: Don’t fight the giant the way the giant wants to fight – use our own dangerous weapon. Keep your distance and aim at a particular weak spot.

But this is just looking at the battle from a man versus man point of view. There was more to play here – and there is more to play in our battles.

David understood that there was another player on the field. God. God was actively present, and this was what gave David his great confidence.

You will notice that for forty days no one had taken up the giant’s challenge. No one else had the confidence to even fight. The other Israelites were too frightened of Goliath. Did you also notice, though, that the Philistines had not attacked the Israelites? They understood that they would have to run up a hillside to attack the Israelite lines, but that would put them at a disadvantage, so for forty days, they were also too scared to attack.

But David knew God was with him, so David wasn’t frightened. In fact, when David starts his words with Goliath, he points out that David is backed up by the Lord, literally Yahweh Almighty.

I used to own a small dog, a little Shih Tzu puppy. She was very ferocious, barking at strangers and strange dogs – if she knew I was standing behind her. But she was such a coward at heart – If I wasn’t there, she would run and hide. But when she saw me standing behind her, she was tough!

God is always standing behind us when our battles are just. God was standing behind David – God was in front of David, guiding that first stone straight to it’s mark. God had been with David for years, helping him develop his aim, helping him develop his strength to sling those stones, giving him test battles against lions and bears and protecting him all the way. And David had understood that God was always with him – And God has always been with you.

Today is Father’s Day. Men, God is with you, has always been with you, will always be with you. There may have been times when you forgot this, even times you turned away from God. But God never left you – He was and is and always will be there beside you, behind you, in front of you. You simply have to open the eyes of your heart to recognize that.

For the lesson we often forget about David versus Goliath is that we all know that Goliath was supposed to win. Looking at David versus Goliath without God – bet on Goliath. When you are fighting a Goliath without God – bet on Goliath, not yourself. The Israelite army was not filled with cowards – those men were perfectly rational, making an honest evaluation and analysis of what would happen if any one of them took up the challenge – they would die. All the sports commentators knew it. All the captains and even King Saul knew it. You beat on the big guy because, without God, the big guys almost always win.

In the fall of 1946, there was a high school in the village of Pullman in Ritchie County. Pullman had a population of 210 at the time. They could barely field a football team, but they challenged the Big Reds of Parkersburg High School, with three thousand students, to a football game. The Big Reds, needing a scrimmage, accepted. It was David versus Goliath, again.

The Big Reds could choose from all those students and get the best students on their football team. At Pullman, almost every student had to play.

But Pullman had a surprise waiting for Parkersburg. It seems that almost the entire classes of 1942, 43, and 44 had volunteered or been drafted into the army during World War II. And now, those boys – who were now ages 19, 20, 21, 22 with years of military experience – these men had come back to Pullman high school to take classes and get their diplomas. And these men had found God in those foxholes in Europe.

Pullman beat the pants off Parkersburg High.

It is tempting to support the underdog – but don’t bet on the underdog unless you know the underdog has God’s support. Like David did. Like Pullman did. Like you do – if you will just look around and remember that God is with you.

Many years later, Peter and the disciples were faced with their own battle – a storm had come up and threatened to swamp them. They were good sailors – but this was a BIG storm.

Jesus had asked them to sail to the other side of the Lake of Galilee. Jesus went to the stern, the rear of the boat, and fell asleep on a cushion. The storm came up and waves began to break over the boat, frightening Peter and the other disciples. But Jesus just continued to sleep until they woke Him up, saying, “Teacher, don’t you care if we drown?”

He got up, rebuked the wind and said to the waves, “Quiet! Be still!” Then the wind died down and it was completely calm. He said, “Why are you so afraid? Do you still have no faith?”

And then, if they were frightened before, they were terrified now. The hair on the back of their necks stood up and they asked each other, “Who is this? Even the wind and the waves obey him!”

And, of course, this was Jesus, the Son of God, God the Son walking on the earth. But this was also a man who remember, constantly, that God the Father loved Him, had always been with Him, was with Him, and would always be with Him. This was what faith in God can do. For any one of the disciples could have stopped the storm with the help of God. But none of them thought to ask God the Father directly for that help.

Thankfully for them, Jesus was God.

You know, sometimes we look toward the giants around us as a church and we get demoralized. The big churches, it seems, are able to do anything because of their donations, while we have little money. We look at dollars as weapons, just as the Israelites looked at the size of Goliath, his spear, and his sword. But David didn’t worry about expensive weapons. He pulled 5 smooth stones from a stream that had thousands of stones and used them in his cheap leather sling. And it only took one stone for David to win – because God was with him.

Instead of focusing upon the size of the big churches around us, let’s remember that in Wood County alone, of 80,000 people, only about 30,000 actually have a home church. The other 50,000 people are like stones in a stream, ready to be picked up and used by God. We simply need to recognize their value and pick them up. The task of talking to people about Christ becomes a lot easier when we realize that there are 50,000 people in this county alone who need to hear about Jesus. Which five of these stony hearts will you bring home? You can do it – David could do it – with God’s help!

The next time Goliath walks toward you, fathers, remember that you set the spiritual tone for your family. If you turn to God, your family will also turn to God. If you whine, your family will whine. If you lash out, frustrated, your family will also lash out frustrated. But if you turn to God, asking God for help, confidently having faith that God is there, paying attention, guiding your efforts – your family will also do that.

I knew a man at another church some years ago. He was a very godly man, a pillar of his church, responsible for many good projects and he was kindly, focused on finding God’s will in all things before he stepped forward. Eventually, in his late 80’s, he got pneumonia and was on his death bed. His family came to the hospital to be with him his final days.

I was able to witness two of his granddaughters and a daughter-in-law talking. They were sharing which daily devotionals they were each reading from, for all three were strong Christian women. His family had followed his example, and all three participated in his funeral the next week, in a funeral that filled the church to overflowing.

Fathers – and mothers – remember that this life is not all about you. There are many people watching your daily battles – think about all the people who saw David defeat Goliath, think about all the people who have heard the stories over the centuries.

Those people watching – friends, neighbors, your children and grandchildren – they are watching to see whether you approach life as Goliath – armored and weaponed and blustering about how strong you are and how bad your opponents are – as the disciples did – afraid for your lives - or whether you approach life as David did – confident that God is with you, guiding your movements, ultimately ensuring your success, or as Jesus did – unafraid, confident that God controls all things and will complete His plans for His glory and our good.

Trust in God. God will be there.

Post-Sermon Song: God will take care of you.

Benediction: May God the Father, God the Son and God the Holy Spirit fill you and guide you this week, that you may do the will of God. Be blessed!

5 Closing Song –Trust and Obey