WWUTT 319 David and Goliath?

Whenever we hear the story of David and Goliath, often it's put as your David and Goliath is your problems and with enough faith, well, you can beat anything. But that's not the way we're supposed to understand the story when we.

Understanding David and Goliath in Its Proper Context

Understand the text. This is When We Understand the Text, a daily Bible.

Commentary to help encourage your time in the Word. Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday we feature New Testament study, an Old Testament book on Thursday, and our Q &A on Friday. Now here's your teacher, Pastor Gabe.

Thank you, Becky. We get to a.

Story today that is one of my absolute favorites and is actually the story that began the ministry of When We Understand the Text. Our first what video was a four-and-a-half minute video, though the first four videos were all four and a half minutes long, till we realized, you know, we don't have to spend this much time on these subjects.

We can shorten it up a little bit and they've all been 90 seconds ever since. But that first video was entitled David and Goliath, showing the story as we are truly meant to understand it in 1st Samuel chapter 17.

That video is still on YouTube. You can still find it, but it's under a new title now. It's Your David and Goliath is Your Problems because that's the way that we tend to view the story of David and Goliath.

We put ourselves in the place of David as though we're the hero and all of our problems are Goliath and every problem that we have has always been sent to us by Satan. And with enough faith, we can overcome anything just like David beat Goliath.

But that's not the way that we're meant to understand this story. And that's what we're gonna be looking at today as we come to the text. 1st Samuel chapters 16 and 17. And just to kind of recap where we were two weeks ago, we didn't read in 1st Samuel last week because it was Thanksgiving Day, so I read from the Psalms.

Two weeks ago we were in chapters 13, 14, and 15. And that's where we see Saul falling out of favor with God. And the first time that Saul really disobeyed, God said to Saul through Samuel that the Lord has sought out a man after his own heart and the Lord has commanded him to be prince over his people.

And that's foreshadowing regarding David. And then we see it mentioned again in 1st Samuel chapter 15 verse 28. After Saul did not do what God commanded him to in wiping out the Amalekites, he knows that he has sinned against God.

Samuel says that God has removed his favor from you. Saul reaches out to Samuel and tears his garment, you know, clutches onto his robe and ends up tearing his robe. And so Samuel says to him, the Lord has torn the kingdom of Israel from you this day and has given it to a neighbor of yours who is better than you.

And once again, this is foreshadowing David. So here in chapter 16, Samuel goes to the house of Jesse to anoint the next king of Israel who is David. He's grieving over Saul because God's favor has been removed from him.

And the Lord says to Samuel, how long will you grieve over Saul since I have rejected him from being king over Israel? Fill your horn with oil and go. I will send you to Jesse the Bethlehemite for I have provided for myself a king among his sons.

And Samuel said, how can I go? If Saul hears it, he will kill me. And the Lord said, take a heifer with you and say, I have come to sacrifice to the Lord. And invite Jesse to the sacrifice and I will show you what you shall do.

And you shall anoint for me him whom I declare to you. Samuel did what the Lord commanded and came to Bethlehem. The elders of the city came to meet him trembling and said, do you come peaceably? And he said, peaceably.

I have come to sacrifice to the Lord. Consecrate yourselves and come with me to the sacrifice. And he consecrated Jesse and his sons and invited them to the sacrifice. When they came, he looked on Eliab and he thought, surely the Lord's anointed is before him.

But the Lord said to Samuel, this is a famous verse, 1 Samuel 16, verse 7, do not look on his appearance or on the height of his stature because I have rejected him. For the Lord sees not as man sees.

Man looks on the outward appearance, but the Lord looks on the heart. Now, that's a verse that is often used to say that God believes in you when you don't believe in yourself. God sees something special about you that you don't even see about you.

And so you need to see yourself the way that God sees you. And it's just really a big pick-me-up self-esteem sort of verse, but that's not the way that we're meant to understand this. Throughout the scriptures, God is described as one who searches mind and heart.

In fact, we have this come up twice in the book of Jeremiah, Jeremiah 11, verse 20, Jeremiah 20, verse 12. The Lord of hosts judges righteously who tests the heart and the mind. And Jesus, in fact, says this of himself in Revelation 2 when he is addressing the church at Thyatira.

He says, I am he who searches mind and heart and I will give to each of you according to your works. In other words, God doesn't just know what you're thinking and what is on your heart. He also knows why you think it.

So when you are behaving righteously in front of people, is it genuine? Is it because you truly desire to glorify God and direct others to the Lord? Or are you just doing it so everybody else will see you as righteous?

Oh, boy, you know, Peter, that great guy there is such a righteous guy. Look at the way that he behaves, the way that he acts. He's so godly. And that's exactly what you're after. You're after the praise of men rather than giving glory to God.

So God knows our intentions. He doesn't just know the things that we do and the thoughts that we think. He knows why we think them, the very intentions of our heart. And that's what God is saying to Samuel here.

You're looking at the outward appearance. And when Samuel sees Eliab, he sees a guy that's kind of like what he saw in Saul the first time he saw Saul. That's difficult to say too fast. Because remember, Saul was a tall guy.

He was 7 feet tall, taller than everybody in Israel. He looked like a conquering king. And so when Eliab, who is Jesse's oldest and fights in Saul's army, comes walking past, well, Samuel's going, yep, this is the guy.

Surely the Lord's anointed is before me. But God says, don't look at his outward appearance. You made that mistake with Saul. And he did not measure up to the king that needed to be a king after my own heart.

The Lord does not look upon man as a man does. Man sees the outward appearance, but the Lord looks on the heart. So when God says at the beginning of that verse, once again, 1 Samuel 16, 7, do not look on his appearance or the height of his stature because I have rejected him.

God is not just saying that I've rejected Eliab as king. He's saying I've rejected him outright. This man's heart is not with me. My favor is not upon him. You might consider it this way. Eliab was not a saved man.

He did not have a heart that was for the Lord. And so God rejected him on those grounds, not because his character was unqualified. I mean, maybe he even had a very integritous character, but it was because the intentions of his heart were against the Lord.

So God had rejected Eliab. So like I said, this verse has more to do with judgment than it has to do with encouraging somebody's self-esteem. Verse 8, Then Jesse called Abinadab and made him pass before Samuel, and he said, Neither has the Lord chosen this one.

And Jesse made Shammah pass by, and he said, Neither is the Lord chosen this one. And Jesse made seven of his sons pass before Samuel. And Samuel said to Jesse, The Lord has not chosen these. Then Samuel said to Jesse, Are all of your sons here?

And he said, There remains yet the youngest. But behold, he is keeping the sheep. Now remember, this is not going on in Jesse's house. This is going on at the sacrifice, where Samuel had invited him and his sons to the sacrifice.

David was not among them. And Samuel said to Jesse, Send and get him, for we will not sit down until he comes here. And he sent and brought him in, and he was ruddy and had beautiful eyes and was handsome.

And the Lord said, Arise, anoint him, for this is he. So David was a good-looking young guy, and he was somebody that was charismatic, that the people of Israel were going to follow, because they didn't look at the heart.

They looked at the outward appearance. Verse 13,. Then Samuel took his horn of oil and anointed him in the midst of his brothers. And the Spirit of the Lord rushed upon David from that day forward. And Samuel rose up and went to Ramah.

Now the Spirit of the Lord departed from Saul, and a harmful spirit from the Lord tormented him. And Saul's servants said to him, Behold, now a harmful spirit from God is tormenting you. Let our Lord now command your servants who are before you to seek out a man who is skillful in playing the liar.

And when the harmful spirit from God is upon you, he will play it, and you will be well. So Saul said to his servants, Provide for me a man who can play well and bring him to me. One of the young men answered, Behold, I have seen a son of Jesse the Bethlehemite who is skillful in playing, a man of valor, a man of war, prudent in speech, and a man of good presence, and the Lord is with him.

David as a Young Man and the Anointing of the Next King

Now let's just stop right there. Understand something about David. He was not a boy. And that's the way that we typically think of David, as a shepherd boy. So he was a little boy. And there are all kinds of pastors I will hear all the time say that David was somewhere between the ages of 8 and 12.

I hear this all the time. It's not true. David was not described in such a way. He was described as a man of war. He was a young man, not a boy. Tim Keller is one of those guys, by the way, who when he's talked about the story of David and Goliath, he describes David as a boy.

But at the youngest, we're talking about a young man who is 16 or 17 years old. At the youngest. May have even been older than that. But that's about the time frame or the age that you could think of or consider David as being.

And no younger than that. Was a good looking young man. Was probably the envy of his brothers, as handsome as he was. And is a person who is known even among the king's servants. They even know of this shepherd David, who plays the harp extremely well, and they describe him as a man of war.

So his accomplishments and his skill physically has apparently developed for him quite a reputation. Perhaps these men even knew that David had manhandled lions and bears with his bare hands, which David talks about when he's addressing Saul in chapter 17.

These things were known about David. So again, he's described as a man of valor, a man of war, prudent in speech, meaning that he was he was just good with words. Whenever he talked, people listened to him.

Charismatic, like I said, and he was a man of good presence. That means he was good looking and people knew of him with that kind of reputation is good looking. Remember that Saul was described as the handsomest man in Israel.

And so now you kind of got a wicked queen versus Snow White sort of a thing going on. There's there's a new good looking person in town. That's that's David. And the Lord is with him. People knew that David was a man of God.

He probably wrote Psalms even before he became king as he's out there tending sheep and and and singing these songs. Now, something else about David being a shepherd, he didn't do this by himself as a as a person who tended the sheep.

He may have been in charge because he was the son of his father who owned the sheep. And so what he told the servants to do, they did. But David himself wasn't alone out in a field with his heart watching sheep.

There was nobody else out there with him. There were other servants that would have done the work of tending the flock as well. And we'll kind of see that as we go on here. So then in verse 19, therefore, Saul sent messengers to Jesse and said, send David, your son, who is with the sheep.

And Jesse took a donkey laden with bread and a skin of wine and a young goat and sent them by David, his son, to Saul. And David came to Saul and entered his service. And Saul loved him greatly. And he became his armor bearer, which, by the way, that's not a job you just give to a boy.

That's a job that somebody who can carry armor will do. And Saul sent to Jesse, saying, let David remain in my service, for he has found favor in my sight. And whenever the harmful spirit from God was upon Saul, David took the lyre and played it with his hand.

So Saul was refreshed and was well, and the harmful spirit departed from him. Chapter 17, David and Goliath. Now the Philistines gathered their armies for battle, and they were gathered at Soka, which belongs to Judah, and encamped between Soka and Ezekiel in Ephes Demim.

And Saul and the men of Israel were gathered and encamped in the valley of Elah and drew up in the line of battle against the Philistines. And the Philistines stood on the mountain on the one side, and Israel stood on the mountain on the other side with a valley between them.

And there came out from the camp of the Philistines a champion named Goliath of Gath, whose height was six cubits and a span. In other words, he was nine and a half feet tall. He had a helmet of bronze on his head, and he was armed with a coat of mail.

And the weight of the coat was 5 ,000 shekels of bronze. And he had bronze armor on his legs, and a javelin of bronze slung between his shoulders. The shaft of his spear was like a weaver's beam, and his spear's head weighed 600 shekels of iron.

And his shield-bearer went before him. He 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 a man for yourselves, and let him come down to me.

If he is able to 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 serve us. Now understand something about this taunting that Goliath was doing.

He addresses Israel as the servants of Saul, and then he says, Choose a man for yourselves, and let him come down to me. In other words, Goliath is saying, Saul's not a man. He's a little sissy girl hiding in his tent over there who won't come out and fight me.

So you pick a man, pick a guy who is a man who will come out here and fight me, since your champion's not going to come out and fight. Remember that Saul was a tall guy. The way that he is introduced to us in the story is that he was head and shoulders above everybody else in Israel.

He was the tallest man in Israel, seven feet tall, maybe even taller. So what you have here is the Philistine champion who is even taller than Saul. So it's kind of like the Philistines are saying to the Israelites, Look, we've got our own tall guy.

So why don't you send your tall guy out to fight our tall guy, and we'll see who's going to win. And Saul is chickening out. He's not facing Goliath on the battlefield the way that Goliath is challenging him to.

Now this is all a very common form of battle among those who are regarded as descendants of the Sea Peoples. It's an ancient civilization that lived along the Mediterranean Sea, and those who are descendant from the Sea Peoples include the Philistines, also the Greeks.

In fact, what we have uncovered from the Philistines, their pottery, their writing, some of these different things, look very, very similar to the Greeks. So in some way, shape, or form, the Greeks are related to the Philistines, and as they migrated around north and then west along the Mediterranean Sea, they would have come to, I mean, what is now the area that we know as Greece.

So the Philistines lived on that eastern shore of the Mediterranean Sea and became enemies of the Israelites back during the period of the judges and remained their enemies even during the time of Saul and David.

So here you have the Philistines fighting a battle the way that we know the Greeks fought their battles. You would have two huge armies that would face one another on a battlefield, and oftentimes there was some kind of valley in between.

One army would have a champion that would come out to challenge the champion of the other army, and these two men would meet in the middle and they would fight. And whoever won, it was presumed that the gods were on the side of that army.

So if the two armies were to go ahead and fight, then the one who had the winning champion is the army that was going to win anyway. So to cut their losses and prevent spending just massive amounts of money on a great big expensive war that was also going to lose a lot of soldiers, they would leave it up to the fight between these two champions in the middle of the battlefield.

And whoever won that battle was who won the war. And that's what's going on here between the Philistines and the Israelites. Goliath is coming out and he is challenging the champion of the Israelites to come out and fight him.

Now, the Philistines were fully in control of this situation. If they were to go ahead and do battle, if the Philistines were to actually just go ahead and engage the Israelite army, the Israelites would likely lose because the Philistines were definitely more powerful.

They had all the armor. They had the actual weapons where the Israelites were standing out there without armor and just had farming implements. The Philistines controlled all of the blacksmithing and they would not let the Israelites possess weapons.

Saul and his son, Jonathan, actually had the only weapons. But the reason why the Philistines don't engage is probably because they've had this encounter with the Israelites in the past and they lost big because the Israelite God was much more powerful than the Philistines made up gods, of course, because the Israelite God is real and the Philistines gods are not.

And so they've already experienced losses at the hands of the Israelites. So to go ahead and test and see which God is favored, whether it's going to be the God of the Israelites or the gods of the Philistines, let's have these two champions meet in the middle of the battlefield.

And that's going to decide who the victor will be, who whose God is actually more powerful in this particular encounter. So that's what Goliath is out there challenging. And that's the way that these kinds of wars were fought.

So verse 10, the Philistines said, I defy the ranks of Israel this day. Give me a man that we may fight together. Once again, mocking Saul with that address. When Saul and all of Israel heard these words of the Philistine, they were dismayed and greatly afraid.

Now, David was the son of an Ephrathite of Bethlehem in Judah named Jesse, who had eight sons. In the days of Saul, the man was already old and advanced in years. The three oldest sons of Jesse had followed Saul to the battle.

And the names of his three sons who went to the battle were Eliab the firstborn, and next to him Abinadab, and the third was Shammah. David was the youngest. The three eldest followed Saul, but David went back and forth from Saul to feed his father's sheep at Bethlehem.

For 40 days, the Philistine came forward and took his stand morning and evening. And Jesse said to David, his son, take for your brothers an epah of this parched grain and these 10 loaves and carry them quickly to the camp to your brothers.

Also take these 10 cheeses to the commander of their thousand. See if your brothers are well and bring some token from them. See, cheese is a biblical food. That's why I love cheese. Verse 19, now Saul and they and all of the men of Israel were in the valley of Elah fighting with the Philistines.

And David rose early in the morning and left the sheep with a keeper and took the provisions and went as Jesse had commanded him. So there, once again, David is just the one that's in charge of tending his father's sheep, but there were others that would have done that job as well.

And he came to the encampment as the host was going out to the battle line, shouting the war cry. And Israel and the Philistines drew up for battle army against army. And David left the things in charge of the keeper of the baggage and ran to the ranks and went and greeted his brothers.

As he talked with him, behold, the champion of the Philistine of Gath, Goliath by name came up out of the ranks of the Philistines and spoke the same words as before. And David heard him. And by the way, Goliath, Goliath is actually a common Philistine name.

They have excavated Gath and found out that that name Goliath occurs pretty regularly. It was it was a common name among the Philistines. Verse 24. All the men of Israel, when they saw the man, fled from him and were much afraid.

And the men of Israel said, Have you seen this man who has come up? Surely he has come up to defy Israel. And the king will enrich the man who kills him with great riches and will give him his daughter and make his father's house free in Israel.

And David said to the men who stood by him, What shall be done for the 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?

The same sort of address that Jonathan used to describe the Philistines as well as a derogatory term for the Israelites to call somebody uncircumcised. And the people answered him in the same way. So shall it be done to the man who kills him?

Verse 28. Now, Eliab, his eldest brother, heard when he spoke to the men 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, which is ironic that Eliab is saying this about David when God said of Eliab that he's rejected him because his heart was not with the Lord.

So it's really Eliab's heart that is far from God, not David's. And David said, What have I done now? Was it not but a word? You have a little bit of sibling rivalry going on here. And he turned away from him toward another and spoke in the same way.

And the people answered him again as before. When the words that David spoke were heard, they repeated them before Saul. And Saul sent for him. Remember that David was prudent in speech, what he said people listened to.

So he's talking to an entire army. And what he has said has made it all the way back to the king. Verse 32. David said to Saul, Let no man's heart fail because of him, your servant will go and fight with this Philistine.

And Saul said to David, You are 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. But 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 arose against me, I caught him by his beard and struck him down 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 this Philistine.

And Saul said to David, Go and the Lord be with you. Now, again, David was not alone out there in the field as he was tending the sheep. So there were witnesses to what David had accomplished. And this is why Saul's men described David as a man of war.

Then Saul clothed David with his armor and he put a helmet of bronze on his head and clothed him with a coat of mail. And David strapped his sword over his armor and he tried in vain to go for he had not tested them.

Then David said to Saul, I cannot go with these. They don't fit. Really? Because Saul was seven feet tall. David was not of the same height that Saul was and his armor didn't fit. So David took the armor off.

Verse 40. Then he took his staff in his hand and he chose five smooth stones from the brook and put them in his shepherd's pouch. His sling was in his hand and he approached the Philistine and the Philistine moved forward and came near to David with his shield bearer in front of him.

And when the Philistine looked and saw David, he disdained him for he was but a youth, ruddy and handsome in appearance. So Goliath hated this pretty boy that was coming out here to fight him. Whatever happened to Saul?

And yet there's there's this young guy, this young pretty boy that's going to come out here and fight me. And the Philistine said to David, am I a dog that you come to me with sticks? And the Philistine cursed David by his gods.

The Philistine 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. Now, Goliath is somewhat insulted here because he has asked for the champion of Israel to come and fight him, who's supposed to be Saul.

And instead, this youth has come out. And so it's as though like Goliath is perceiving this as Saul is mocking Goliath because it's as though Saul is trying to say, yeah, a youth could beat you. All right.

An unexperienced soldier. He's not even wearing armor. He comes out to you with a stick. And so that's the way that Goliath is kind of perceiving this confrontation here. Then David said to the Philistine, verse 45, you come to me with a sword and 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 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 into the wild beasts of the earth, that all the earth may know there is a God in Israel and that all this assembly may know that the Lord saves not with sword and spear for the battle is the Lord's and he will give you into our hand.

So Goliath was all about himself. David was all about giving the glory to God. And David was an even better taunter than Goliath, because Goliath says, I'm going to give your flesh to the birds of the air and the beasts of the field.

David says, I'm going to give the whole army of the Philistines to the birds of air and the beasts of the field. Not only is he going to beat Goliath in battle, he even beat him at the verbal game in the very beginning.

So verse 48, when the Philistine arose and came and drew near to meet David, David ran quickly toward the battle line to meet the Philistine. 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 he fell on his face to the ground. At that point, Goliath was dead. Not when David cut his head off. He was already dead. David cut his head off to show that he had accomplished exactly what he said he was going to do.

So the Philistines would see it. But it wasn't cutting Goliath's head off that killed him. It was the stone that struck his head when it says that the stone sunk into his forehead. It went through his forehead.

If you've ever seen a Greco-Roman sling slingsman, you can find them on YouTube. You can find these guys doing this stuff. They will sling stones that will punch through steel. So, yes, this stone actually went through Goliath's forehead.

It is a very deadly art. Verse 50. 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. Goliath was dead, wasn't even holding a sword in his hand.

Verse 51. Then David ran over to the Philistine, stood over him, took his sword, drew it out of his sheath, and killed him and cut off his head with it. Then the Philistines saw their champion was dead, and they fled.

And the men of Israel and Judah rose with a shout and pursued the Philistines as far as Gath and the gates of Ekron, so that the wounded Philistines fell on the way from the as far as Gath and Ekron. And the people of Israel came back from chasing the Philistines, and they plundered their camp.

And David took the head of the Philistine and brought it to Jerusalem. But he put his armor in his tent. He took Goliath's armor and put it in his tent. But he's got this head that he's carrying around with him and is now walking through the streets of Jerusalem with a giant's head.

As soon as Saul saw David go out against the Philistine, he said to Abner, the commander of the army, Abner, whose son is this youth? And Abner said, as your soul lives, O king, I do not know. And the king said, inquire whose son the boy is.

And as soon as David returned from striking down the Philistine, Abner took him and brought him before Saul with the head of the Philistine in his hand. He's still holding Goliath's head as he's coming before Saul.

And Saul said to him, whose son are you, young man? And David answered, I am the son of your servant, Jesse, the Bethlehemite. Now, the way that this story is most commonly interpreted is that we're David and Goliath is our problems.

And with enough faith, just like David had, we can do anything. But understand that no one could have beat Goliath except David. He was the only one who could do it. He did not just have faith, although he definitely had a lot of that.

He had skill. This wasn't David just going out there with a whole lot of confidence. And so therefore, I'm going to be able to bring this giant down because my confidence is directed in the right place.

And that is the Lord. No, David had such skill and he was so experienced in what he did that he knew without question and doubt that he was bringing that giant down. But David also knew that God is sovereign and David only had the skill that he had because God had given it to him and all the opportunities that he had to perfect this skill, even the opportunity that he had this day to face this giant and bring this champion to his death.

David absolutely knew without question that when he went out there to this giant, he was going to beat him. David had no doubt because of his skill as an accomplished man of war, again, just in the way that he was described.

So we cannot be in the position of David. None of us have the kind of skill, the expertise, the promise, the confidence, the faith that David had. We don't. David was a man after God's own heart. The spirit of the Lord was with him from the moment that David was anointed.

It was God's intention. It was God's plan that David was going to be the one to fight Goliath and was going to be the one to bring him down. So we can't put ourselves in the position of David. Rather, David represents the savior who is Christ.

And it is from the line of David that the savior is going to be born. God makes a covenant with David and says it is from your offspring that I will establish my kingdom forever. On your throne, I will establish my kingdom forever.

Makes the same promise to Solomon. And of course, we know that this promise was fulfilled through Jesus Christ, who would come about a thousand years later. He was a descendant of King David. So David represents Christ in this battle.

He does not represent us. Goliath represents sin and death, which we absolutely cannot conquer. Only Christ has defeated sin and conquered the grave. And it is only through Christ that we have been given eternal life.

David was the substitute for Israel, just as Christ is our substitute against the wages of sin, which is death. And it is only Christ who could go against that enemy and defeat it and win. And it is only through Christ that we also have conquered that enemy as well.

So if there's anybody that we are in this story of David and Goliath, we are the Israelites. We're the Israelites that are clamoring off to the side going, he's going to kill us all. OK, that's who we are.

If we're going to take any role in that story, that would be the exact place that we should be in. And Christ stepped in for us and defeated that enemy when we could not. And then it is through Christ that we have the victory.

That's how we are to understand the story of David and Goliath. And don't let anybody Narcissus the story any other way. What is Narcissus? Well, according to Chris Roseboro, who I believe coined the term, it's when you read yourself into the story like you're the hero.

That's Narcissus. But we're not meant to see ourselves in this story as a hero. David himself did not see him himself as the hero. He went out there to fight Goliath, to give God the glory. And that's what we're supposed to do in any and all circumstances, with every opportunity that we have been given, give glory to God for it is by his will that you even have your next breath.