Seeing as God sees

Well, uh, good morning. Um, my name is Derek. I'm one of the elders here. Um, if you're new with us, you may not know that Stephen, our pastor, works full-time outside of the church. And so, uh, the other elder, Ronnie, and I, um, will from time to time give him a break during the week to try and, um, catch up and take a breath. Um, and so this was to be Ronnie's week. Um, and Ronnie is uh out of town with Heather. They're at down in Charleston where their youngest daughter is going to college. It's her 21st birthday. So, I'm third string. So, there you go. That's um uh when I was in high school, I was on the wrestling team and my junior year in high school was my first full year in varsity. uh about midseason that year, we had a dual match, my high school against one other high school. It was a little bit out in the country. Um and in my weight class, this particular school had a legend. His name was Dave Angel. He had not lost a match in over two years. State champ, whole nine yards. And this was who I was to wrestle that day during the season up to that point. Um, I had lost regularly. Um, in fact, I'd lost twice as often as I'd won and, um, so I was, you know, a individual contributor doing my best. Was hardly the rock of the team or anything, but I had to wrestle Dave that day. I and and um I but I'd never been pinned. So, I don't know if you've, you know, know anything about wrestling, but that's kind of that that was a small victory for me that I'd never actually lost by pin. It's all been by points. So, if I had an aspirational goal that day, it was to lose by points, to not be pinned by Dave Angel, which would have been an accomplishment in and of itself because, as I said, he hadn't lost in two years, and most of those people had in fact been pinned. Um, but I was awfully nervous. And if the truth be told, my real goal was just to last long enough to not be totally embarrassed by the whole thing, humiliated. So, in the first uh period of a wrestling match, both uh wrestlers are standing to start and the referee blows the whistle and I immediately shoot in for his legs and very unexpectedly find myself having completed successfully a takedown and am on top up two points. I was winning two to nothing at that point. Not too much longer after that, he had successfully reversed us, reversed me. We were and he was now in control. That means he got two more points. We're now tied two to nothing or I'm sorry, two to two. And that's how the first period finished. Second period, I start on top. Um and um and he very quickly reverses me and then into that second period. So he's now up 4 to2 and that's how the second period finished. And the third period I start on top. I'm sorry. I he starts on top. I'm on the bottom. And um there were no more points scored except that he made three technical errors. Very small little technical errors. The first one's a caution and the second one rewards me a point. The third one rewards me a point and we finish the match four to four. I had tied Dave Angel. Um, yeah, I know, right? So, every week they would post the rankings by weight class in the newspaper back home and and there was Dave still at the top of the weight class, but he went from 16 and0 to 16 and 1. That was me. And I would go to other tournaments and so forth after that and guys would come up to me in the locker rooms from other schools and go, "You're the one that tied Dave Angel." Um, I'm under no illusion that um I was some great man of faith or that God was at work to accomplish his great covenant purpose in my wrestling match. But this is as close as I've ever gotten to understanding what David must have felt like the day he took on Goliath. The story of David and Goliath is likely familiar to most of us. It has become part of our lexicon to mean the little guy taking on and defeating the big guy. The original story is found in 1st Samuel 17, which is where we'll be today. David, if you remember, we were introduced to last week, he's the youngest brother of eight sons. He's uh he's a teenaged shepherd boy. And so David and I were likely about the same age, 15 to 17 years old when we took on our giants. Um, we were introduced, like I said, to David last week when Samuel came to Jesse's house uh to um reveal who the new king was going to be. And if you remember the story from last week, David had was not even invited into the house. When Samuel came to do that, he was left in the fields to take care of the the sheep. And as today's story opens, David is back in the field with a sheep while his three oldest brothers are on the battle line as Israel is ra uh arrayed again against the Philistines. And each army is on a hillside and there's a valley in between and they're each kind of waiting for the other to make a move. This entire book of 1st Samuel has been a study and compare and contrast, but maybe none more than 1 Samuel chapter 17, which is why I titled this message greater than. It is my conviction that historically we have done this story a bit of a disservice. as many of us have learned it or taught it to our kids, including myself. The story uh the the moral of the story goes something like this. David beat the giant because of his great faith. Be like David. And I think that mistakenly puts David and by extension us in the hero's seat. I hope you'll stick with me as we look at the story together and see the contrast in the text and what they actually point us to. So, it's a long chapter. I won't read the whole thing. I'm going to read a few um high points here uh so we can kind of get an overview of where we're headed. So, starting in 1st Samuel 4, I'm 17:4. And there came out of the camp of the Philistines a champion named Goliath of Gath, whose height was six cubits in a span. He had a helmet of bronze on his head, and he was armed with a coat of male, and the weight of his coat was 5,000 shekels of bronze. And he had bronze armor on his legs, and a javelin of bronze slung on between his shoulders. The shaft of a spear was like a weaver's beam, and the spear's head weighed 600 shekels of iron, and a shieldbearer went before him. He stood and shouted to the ranks of Israel, "Why would you come out and draw up for a battle? Am I not a Philistine?" And are you not servants of Saul? Choose a man for yourselves and let him come down to me. If he is able to fight me, fight with me and kill me, then we will be your servants. But if I prevail against him and kill him, then you shall be our servants and and serve us. And the Philistines said, "I defy the ranks of Israel this day. Give me a man that we may fight together." Skipping down to verse 32. And David said to Saul, "Let no man's heart fail because of him. Your servant will go and fight with the fight with this Philistine." And Saul said to David, "You are not able to go up to the Philistine and fight with him, for you are but a youth, and he has been raised as a man of war from his youth." But sa David said to Saul, "Your servant used to keep sheep for his father. And when there came a lion or a bear and took a lamb from the flock, I went after him and struck him and delivered it out of his mouth. And if he rose up against me, I caught him by his beard and struck him and killed him. Your servant has struck down both lions and bears. And this uncircumcised Philistine shall be like one of them, for he has defied the armies of the living God. And David said, "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 the Philistine." And then Saul actually tries to get David to put on his armor. And David can't even move. So he takes it off. He grabs five uh stones from the creek and his sling and he goes out into the valley to meet Goliath. Verse 43. And the Philistines said to David, "Am I a dog that you come to me with sticks?" And the Philistine cursed David by his gods. And the Philistines said to David, "Come to me and I will give your flesh to the birds of the air and to the beasts of the field." Then David said to the Philistine, "You come to me with a sword and with a spear and with a javelin, but I come to you in the name of the Lord of Hosts, the God of the armies of Israel, whom you have defied. This day the Lord will deliver you into my hand, and I will strike you down and cut off your head. And I will give the dead bodies of the host of the Philistines this day to the birds of the air and to the wild beasts of the earth, that all the earth may know that there is a God in Israel." Verse 49. And David put his hand in his bag and took out a stone and slung it and struck the Philistine on his forehead. The stone sank into his forehead and fell on his face on the ground. So David prevailed over the Philistine with a sling and with a stone and struck the Philistine and killed him. There was no sword in the hand of David. After that the Israelites actually went and routed the Philistines that day. So, let me uh pray for us and we'll look at this text in a little more detail, try and draw some conclusions. Father in heaven, we come to you this morning opening your word, your revelation of yourself to us. It is that that we desire to see you, revealed to us this morning. This is a great story. It's a familiar story, but I believe you have something to teach us today. And again, it is my heart that that is what we would hear and in that be changed. So, Father, do what you do. Speak through your spirit. Have your way with us today in Jesus name. Amen. So starting in verse two, I'm sorry, uh the first section I am calling this Goliath is greater than Saul. Goliath is greater than Saul. Back in chapter 9, we were introduced to Saul and we read his entire resume in verse two of chapter 9. And it went like this. It says, "And he, Kish, who was the father of Saul, and he Kish had a son whose name was Saul. And here's his resume. You ready? And he was a handsome young man. There was not a man among Israel more handsome than he. From his shoulders upward, he was taller than any of the people. It's his entire resume. It's not much to build a leadership career on, is it? And since chapter nine, we've actually seen leadership failure after leadership failure culminating in the departure of the Holy Spirit from him and the promise of the end of his reign. And then last week, the identification of his successor, this young David. Now, if we um move forward to today's text in verse four, we're introduced to Goliath. says this, "And there came out from the camp of the Philistines a champion named Goliath, whose height was six cubits in a span." We've seen that the Philistines are the everpresent nemesis during this period of time of the people of God. And in this particular encounter, there's a standoff that apparently would have been fairly common where the two two armies would array on hillsides valley in between. And in order to avoid the high cost, the high body count that would come with a fullfledged war. They would send out a representative from each. They would fight and whoever won this representative battle would win the larger battle would be declared the winner of the larger battle. And it was seen as essentially a competition of gods and whoever's god whoever won their gods were then to be perceived as superior. So we don't know exactly how tall Saul was. It says he was head and shoulders above everybody else in Israel. So, I don't know, we estimate 65, 66, something that would have been particularly notable of that day. Something very tall would be tall today, but at the time, I think it would have been extraordinarily tall. Head and shoulders above everybody is what it says. and he was obviously the most impressive physical specimen that Israel had to offer and therefore the natural choice to go forward and fight on behalf of the armies of Israel. Um the problem is that if your resume has at the top of it that you are tall, there's always somebody taller. If the most you have to offer is that you look good, there's somebody prettier. If the most you have to offer is that you're smarter, somebody's always smarter. If your church has a really cool pastor, there's always somebody cooler. So, it's ultimately a fight that cannot be won if you're going to look purely at physical characteristics. Based on our understanding of measurements of the time, Goliath's six cubits and of span would have made him something like 9 1/2 ft tall, which is hard to even imagine.  It is possible that there's a bit of hyperbole here, but there's a detail in this story that's interesting. It says Goliath was from Gath. The land of the Philistines had five great cities and one of those cities was Gath. If we go back even further all the way back to when um when Joshua led the Israel into the land of the Philistines, I'm sorry, into the land of of Canaan to conquer uh the land of Canaan. Um, one of the encounters that they kept having was with these people that they called giants called the Anakim. Um, and these people kept showing up and Israel would say, "We don't want to go there because the sons of Anakim are there." And they would then back down and not go in. And again, they were described as giants. when is it when Joshua completed the um conquering of the nation of of the land of Canaan and they unsuccessfully or were disobedient and not actually clearing everybody but they were pushed back. Guess where the remnants of the land of the people of Anakim settled? Gath. So it is possible that there is some genetic connection between uh between Goliath and these Anakim that had gone long before and that Israel is now being taunted not just by this Philistine but in many respects by their failure to clear out the people that God had commanded them to clear out many years ago. So they were being taunted not just by Goliath literally but also fig figuratively by their past failures. I think that's kind of interesting. Verse 8 says he um Goliath stood and shouted to the ranks of Israel, why have you come out to draw up for battle? Am I not a Philistine and are you not servants of Saul? Choose for choose a man for yourselves and let him come down to me. If he is able to fight me and kill me, then we will be your servants. But if I prevail against him and kill him, then you shall be our servants and serve us." And the Philistines said, "I defy the ranks of Israel this day. Give me a man that we may fight together." When Saul and all all Israel heard these words of the Philistine, they were greatly they were dismayed dismayed and greatly afraid. So again, if your reliance is on yourself and your own skills and your own strength and your own talents, then there will always be somebody else. Saul's had a series of failures. and at this moment as the tallest man in the in the nation of Israel was greatly afraid and unable to lead his people. And the stakes are pretty high. The Bible could have gotten a lot shorter at this point. Saul goes out, fights Goliath, dies, Israel becomes servants of of the Philistines, and the Bible's over. And that's it. If this had gone a different way because Goliath was greater than Saul. Moving on, Goliath is greater than David. This idea for me I think was the newer insight that I think changed what I believe the true and greater message of the story actually is. I think at times what we were shown is that David while unexpected was a young man of great courage and skill whose experience in shephering had protected the sheep and he developed all these great skills and that ultimately God could put those skills to use. In my experience, David is the hero whom we are to emulate. Yet, what I noticed this time as I went through this story is how hard the author works works to make sure we know that David isn't the great undiscovered warrior that just needed a chance to show what he could do, but he was a boy, a shepherd boy that shouldn't have been there anyway. Verse 13 says this this. The three oldest sons of Jesse had followed Saul to the battle. And the names of the three sons that went to the battle were Eliab, the firstborn, and next to him Abinadab, and the third Shama. David was the youngest. The three eldest followed Saul, but David went back and forth from Saul to feed the father's sheep at Bethlehem. So, David was actually too young to even be in the army. The age of service was 20. And as the youngest, David was relegated to sheep duty. We saw the last week that he wasn't even invited again to be present when Samuel had showed up to reveal the next king. So, it's ironic that that revelation turned out to be David himself. Saw that last week. But in this case, again, we see that David is the youngest and he's a shepherd boy. He's not even in the army. Verse 17. And Jesse said to David his son, "Take for your brothers and epha of this parched grain and these 10 loaves and carry them quickly to the camp for your brothers." So So David wasn't at the battlefield just because he was too little or um he he was a shepherd, but he was sent not as a warrior, but as a messenger, as a as a deliverer of goods. He was the Amazon guy. um 13 miles between this battle site and Bethlehem and he was apparently going back and forth carrying food to his brothers and he was just a messenger. Verse 28. Now Eliab the his eldest brother when he spoke to the man and Eliab's anger was kindled against David and he said why have you come down and with whom have you left those few sheep in the wilderness? I know your presumption and the evil of your heart, for you have come down to see the battle. David's brother does not find D I'm sorry. David's brother Elab does not find David's presence comforting or helpful but irritating. He's a boy, a shepherd. He doesn't belong there. And in theory, he wasn't supposed to be where he was. And in fact, if you read the story, it says he shows up at the camp, has these this bread and this stuff that he was supposed to bring for his brothers, and he should have left it there at the camp and returned to Bethlehem. But what did he do? He left it at the camp. He found the guy taking care of the camp. Said, "Here's the stuff. Give it to my brothers when they come back." And where did David go? Not back to Bethlehem. He went to the battlefield. He wasn't supposed to be there. He went to the battlefield and Eliab's looking at him going, "What in the heck are you doing here? You don't belong here." And he was kind of right at some level. And in then he he so he not only shows up where he's not supposed to be, he looks at Saul and says, "I'll go I'll go fight this giant." And Saul said to David, verse 33, you are not able to go against this Philistine to fight with him, for you are a youth and have been a man man of war. And that he has been a man of war from his youth. Again, what are we seeing about David? We're seeing David as a shepherd, as a youth, being somewhere he wasn't supposed to be. Uh uh Saul confirms him as a youth. What's the author trying to show us? Is David this undisvered great talent? No, he is a boy. He's a shepherd boy. Again, Saul points out his youth and the fact that Goliath is not a run-of-the-mill good soldier, but a historically great warrior, over 9 ft tall, armored and armed to the max with an armor bearer who was likely larger than David himself. and he is there only to hold the shield of Goliath. Verse 38, then Saul clothed David with his armor. He put a helmet of bronze on his head and clothed him with a co coat of male and David strapped his sword over his armor. And he tried to in vain to go for he had not tested them. Then David said to Saul, "I cannot go with these for I have not tested them." So David put them off. So David was actually too small and inexperienced to even wear armor. Verse 42. And then when the Philistine looked at David, he disdained him, for he was but a youth, ruddy and handsome of appearance. And he said said the Philistine to David, "Am I a dog that you come to me with sticks?" And the Philistine cursed David by his God. God. Goliath is insulted that this is the best they could come up with to fight an unarmored boy with a stick and a sling. Historically, I have read these verses as the failure of the people around him to see what potential David had. And I guess at some level this is true. But I think that the greater message is the reality that David is in fact a teenage boy. with no battle experience who shouldn't have been there in the first place with only a stick and a sling going against a 9 and 1/2 ft giant who was battle tested. This is not a story of the backup quarterback who just never had a chance to show what he really had. But David is truly outsized and outskilled and he has no business being there. Goliath was greater than David. However, God is greater than Goliath. As far as the author knew at the writing of this book, this is the key idea of the passage. God is the true champion. Let me read a few verses here and try and convince you of that. That that is in fact what the author meant for us to see. And David said to the men who stood by him, "What shall be done for this man who kills this Philistine and takes away the reproach from Israel," for who is this uncircumcised Philistine that he should defy the armies of the living God? Verse 36, "Your servant who has struck down both lions and bears, and this uncircumcised Philistine shall be like one of them, for he has defied the armies of the living God." And David said, "The Lord who delivered me from the paw of the lion and the bear and of the bear and the paw of the bear will deliver me from the hand of this Philistine." And Saul said to David, "Go, and the Lord be with you." Verse 45. Then David said to the Philistine, "You came to me with a sword and with a spear and with a javelin, but I come to you in the name of the Lord of hosts, the God of the armies of Israel, whom you have defied. This day the Lord will deliver me into your hand and I will strike you down and cut you off cut off your head and I will give uh the dead bodies of the host of the Philistines this day to the birds of the air and to the wild beasts of the earth that all the earth may know that there is a God in Israel and that all this assembly may know that the Lord saves not with the sword and the spear for the battle is the Lord's and he will give you into our hand again what I see is the author going to great lengths to show us that David was not the champion. It was not David's great skills that delivered them that day or even David's great faith, but it was the Lord who did the work. I don't believe David ever saw himself as the best or only person to engage Goliath. In fact, I mean, I'm guessing here, but it is my suspicion that he's sitting there as he's at the front lines wondering why nobody else has gone. They all serve the same God. That he brought nothing particularly special to the table. That anybody could have gone in the name of the Lord and defeated the Philistine that day. And I'm guessing, again, I'm guessing, but I've got to believe that David didn't want the credit as the hero that day. The only thing he wanted credit for was to be the willing servant. If David's faith was so extraordinary, why'd he take five rocks? David was an amazing young man to be sure, but he was a young man. And ultimately, it wasn't the size of David's faith, but the object of David's faith that made the difference that day. It wasn't the great promise of David's skills, but the great promises of God. David wasn't the great giant killer that day. God was the great giant killer that day. And maybe you're thinking that I'm splitting hairs that David was still the vessel. And at some level that's true. And if we were to sit here today and read the story, I would say yes. If we were to choose somebody in this story to emulate, then I would say we should desire to be have the faith of David rather than the thousands of other men that were standing there that day that did nothing. If we were to emulate somebody, David's the one we should emulate. But at the end of the day, again, it wasn't the faith of David that won that day. It was God that won that day. God um God was the giant killer which leads us to putting this story in the larger context of great God's great covenant promise to gather to himself a people of his own possession and that's that Jesus is actually greater than giants. When we look back on the story now through the lens of the New Testament, what I hope we see is that Jesus is actually the true and better David, the great giant killer who defeated sin and death, the giants we would never be able to defeat. It isn't that God is calling us to be giant killers so much as he is calling us to follow the true and better giant killer. So, here's the thing. We all face giants in seemingly insurmountable obstacles. It can be addiction or broken relationships or financial pressures. Maybe anxiety or depression. Maybe a bully at school or self-criticism. The call of scripture is not that we find victory in ourselves, but that Jesus is the one who is victorious and in only in him can we find victory ourselves. Paul put it this way in Romans 8. Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation or distress or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword? As it is written, for your sake we are being killed all day long. We are regarded as sheep to be slaughtered. Know in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am sure that neither death nor life, nor angels, nor rulers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord. In Christ, he promises victory. Here's the thing. The nature of that victory may not necessarily be exactly like what we think or hope it would be. Yet Jesus promises us as we come against giants, he promises us presence that he will be with us and he will walk with us through these difficult times. He promises us power in the midst of the in in the midst of it in the person of the indwelling Holy Spirit with whom victory is possible in this life and he promises peace both in conflict and the ultimate victory this in this life at the end of this life. What he does not promise is deliverance in this life from all giants. He does not promise that. He does not promise us that all our troubles will melt away and it will be a life of ease. He may, but most of us who have struggled with the giant would likely testify that there may be seasons of victory and seasons of struggle. Yet the constant in that is the presence of Jesus and his spirit who equips us to fight and that there is peace not necessarily from the battle but in the midst of the battle. And I think that this is important because I think in the struggle the message we can too often hear is that you just need to have more faith. You need to try harder. I mean, after all, David conquered Goliath. And I'm afraid what that does is shift the focus from our God to ourselves. From God as the true conqueror to ourselves and our own ability to fight. And this has the potential I think to breed either pride if successful or frustration and defeat if not. We are more than conquerors but only in Christ. And the goal is not to fight harder, but to press into Jesus, who is the true and better giant killer, to allow him to use us as the vessel and display his glory and to stay faithful to him. Pray with me. Heavenly Father, again it is from you we desire to hear today and we're reminded of the work that you did for us in the in your son Jesus who defeated sin and death when he died and rose again. And in that we can know true life. a true life that we can know at the end of this life, but we can know now with your presence, your your power, and your peace. And so, it is my prayer that as we walk out of here today, as we see and encounter giants, which we certainly will, you promise that, that what we would ultimately remember is that you are the giant killer, not us. And in fact, it is for us to not try to get in front of you, but to follow you and to press into you and the victory that you have already gained for us. And so that is my prayer, Father, that as we go here today that you have not called us to be giant killers. In fact, we're illquipped to do that, but that we follow the one who is in Jesus name. Amen.