Goliath – You Know the Story, but How Much Do You Know of the Back Story?

Introduction

For those of you who are here this morning and haven’t been here this weekend, I’m Ralph Walker. I am from Tampa, Florida currently. And I’ve for almost 20 years served as the public relations and alumni director at Florida College. So I happen to know a number of you, either by your time at Florida College, if you were a student there or you were family and related to a lot of the people there. But for most of you’re new to me. This is my first time to be with this congregation. And I’m grateful both to Tony, my friend, and from many years back, and to the shepherds of this congregation for allowing me to be here. So let me just say if this has been a good weekend for you and you’ve benefited from what we’ve been doing together, thank those individuals.

And if it hasn’t been good, tell them, don’t tell me. All right, just let me go on thinking everything was good. Everything was good. let’s begin with a prayer. Would you join me, please? Lord, we’re grateful to be here, and we thank you for giving us a really wonderful day together. It’s a wonderful day because it is your day, but it’s not just your day as every day is, but this is the day on which our Lord was raised from the dead. We’re here to celebrate that. We’re here to celebrate him. And we’re here to tell you and show you by our devotion to your word that we’re yours. Thank you for loving us through Jesus. We know the depth of your love by the greatness of the sacrifice you and he made for us, and our hearts are filled with gratitude and humility.

We don’t deserve it, but we embrace it. And we’re thankful for your grace and your mercy. Thank you, Lord, for this time together this morning as we continue to look at the lives of people in your word who provide for us both positive and negative examples. Help us to be like the people who did right and help us to avoid being like the people who did wrong. Open our hearts to the word, open our minds to the truth, and we ask you to please hear us in the name of Jesus our Lord. Amen. All right. I am in 1 Samuel chapter 17 this morning, and while you’re turning there, 1 Samuel chapter 17, I want to consider some things by way of introduction. We’re all scared of something.

I guarantee you, all of us have a fear of something. And how we deal with the fear is probably a more important indicator of our character than what we’re afraid of. I grew up in Florida, and I’m somewhat embarrassed to say this to you, but I hate roaches. I mean, because I’ve had people say to me, why are you afraid of roaches? They can’t bite, they can’t hurt you in any way. But I’m telling you get a roach near me, and I don’t scream like a woman, but I do have to really control my initial desire to flee. You know, because they are nasty. Palmetabugs. We’re not talking about if you’re thinking, oh, those little tiny like German roaches or something like that no, we’re not talking about those.

We’re talking about roaches big enough you can strap them onto the bottom of your feet and move. They’re like animated roller blades or something. They’re big. We’re all afraid of something. And how we deal with our fear is really important. And I want to suggest to you that maybe the story we have heard from the time if we’ve been in church, from the time we’re small children, about David and his encounter with Goliath may not be quite as cut and dried and simple as it appears to be for most of us. So I want to talk to you about David and Goliath and the kind of confidence that I think David manifests and what the basis of his faith really is, because I think it’s a little different than perhaps what you’ve learned.

I grew up in Bible classes with Betty Lucan’s flannel boards.

Laying out this way, and there’s this little lump on his forehead, and he’s falling backwards, and he’s a giant, and David’s small. And I remember singing that song over and over and over again as a child. Only a little boy David, only a babbling brook. Five little stones he took. And around and round and round and round, and the giant came tumbling down. I remember all that. And then I went back and I read that story. And I got to thinking, it’s not quite that simple. It’s actually pretty complex. So let’s talk about that story today. First of all, I want to suggest some things to you that David is filled with confidence. I don’t want you to think that he is not very confident about what’s happening here.

1. Army to Army, Israel Is Ready to Fight

In chapter 17, you’ve got this giant. Well, first of all, let’s begin at the beginning. The Philistines gathered their armies for battle. And they were gathered at Succo, which belongs to Judah, and they camped between Succo and Azekah in Ephes Damim. Saul and the men of Israel were gathered and camped in the valley of Elah and drew up in battle array to encounter the Philistines. The Philistines stood on the mountain on one side, while Israel stood on the mountain on the other side with a valley between them. And then a champion came out from the armies of the Philistines named Goliath from Gath, whose height was six cubits and a span. Alright, I want you to notice a couple of things. First of all, as this story opens up, do you notice how much attention is being given to geography?

I mean, the story opens up, it doesn’t just start, and there was a battle that took place. It opens up with, and here’s where the Israelites were, and here’s where the Philistines were, and between them was a valley. I want to tell you, that’s all important to the story. I’ve been to the Valley of Elah. I was there just a few weeks ago. First trip I’ve ever made to the holy lands, and I stood in that valley, and I saw those two hills. They’re not tall mountains, they’re sloping hills that come down to this riverbed and this valley, and the Philistines are on one side, and the Israelites are on the other side. And it says the Israelites drew up in battle array. That’s pretty descriptive.

So you’ve got all these soldiers, and they are all in place. First thing that comes to my mind is Lord of the Rings, Helm’s Deep, the second movie in that series. And you’ve got all the all the forces of men and elves and dwarves on one side, and they’re up there in Helm’s Deep, and there, and then out on that field come the orcs. And they’ve got their swords and their axes and their shields and their helmets and their marching and you hear it clanking. They’ve come up in what’s called battle array. And you’ve got these two armies, and they’re ready to face each other. Don’t forget this. This is really important. Israel is ready to go to war. They’re ready to face the Philistines. It isn’t a matter of they’re cowering against the whole army.

2. Goliath Is a Killing Machine

If it’s army against army, they’re ready to take them on. Don’t forget that. Army to army, Israel is ready to fight. And then in verse 4, four verses into this, we’re introduced to the character, Goliath. And he steps forward out of the ranks of the Philistines and comes down in that valley and looks up into the faces of all those Israelites who are at this point are ready to go to war. And then he issues this challenge. And we’re given this description of this man.

Through that door.

Many of the helmets of this time would have been iron. He’s got bronze on his head. That’s not only really heavy, but it’s really bright. So he’s got this bronze helmet, and he was clothed with scale armor, which weighed five thousand shekels of bronze. Our best guess is he’s got a hundred and fifty pounds of armor on his shoulders and body. Just think about that. I mean, think about this. Think about a boxer going into a ring, and he’s fighting another boxer, and they’re given their weight, you know, weighing in at this corner, six foot with this arm reach and this weight. And just before they ring the bell, they bring up a hundred and fifty-pound boy, young man, and they put him on the back of one of the boxers.

He’s clutching him around the neck, and he’s it looks like what you’ve got is a boxer and a guy who’s come to a chicken fight. Imagine how hindered you would be. And add to that, I mean, this man is nine feet tall. He’s not very mobile. He’s nine feet tall. He doesn’t run, he doesn’t run foot races. He’s got a hundred and fifty pounds of armor on him. Now, I gotta tell you, that’s that’s imposing that he psychologically, that’s imposing because he can put that on and still claim to beat anybody. It’s like the old idea, you know, I can beat you with one arm tied behind my back. He’s at a disadvantage with that armor in terms of his mobility. And then it says he had a he had bronze greaves on his leg, so he’s got shin guards and thigh guards with probably an opening there for his knees for mobility.

And he has a bronze javelin slung between his shoulders. So sticking up behind him is a tall point of this javelin that he can throw from a distance. And then it says the shaft of his spear was like a weaver’s beam, and the head of his spear weighed six hundred shekels of iron. Weaver’s beam.

That’s how big it is. Now imagine how difficult it’d be to throw that for us, but not for his big hands. But the really amazing thing out of all this, the thing that really brings me up short, is how heavy the head of his spear was.

I can hold a bowling ball like this. I can hold a 16-pound bowling ball like this. But put it about a foot out on a on a rod, and it becomes really heavy, and put it further out, I can’t throw that. I can hold a bowling ball and I can roll a bowling ball. But I’m going to tell you people that are in third row and fourth row back, if I said, I’m going to hit you with this bowling ball by throwing it, you wouldn’t have to worry about anything. Sixteen pound bowling ball is not an easy thing to launch. And now think about how he’s got this on the head of a spear. It’s way out there. 16 pounds. And he’s throwing that. I mean, he’s imposing.

This guy is a killing machine.

And he walks out. And in front of him is his shield bearer. He’s got so much accoutrements on him for war, he doesn’t even carry his own shield. It says his shield carrier walked before him. So here comes this tank lumbering out of the ranks of the Philistines. I can just see this.

They may be doing the, you know, the banging the shields thing, get ready. Or they might be getting ready to do war chants. I’m sure they’re not yelling at the Philistines. We got spirit. Yes, we do. We got spirit. How about you? I’m sure it’s not that. But they’re probably shouting and they’re yelling and they’re getting ready for battle. And they’re really strapping it on and they’re pumping themselves up. They’re amping up for the battle. And then in all that, out walks the Philistine ranks part. And here comes his shield bearer, walking with his shield, and behind him, Goliath. And he marches down into that valley by himself. I mean, think of what confidence he has that they’re not going to rush him. And he issues his challenge.

He stood and shouted to the ranks of Israel. He said to them, Why do you come out to draw up in battle array? Am I not the Philistine? And you the 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, we’ll become your servants. But if I prevail against him and kill him, you shall become our servants and serve us. And then he says, I defy the ranks of Israel this day. Give me a man that we may fight together. And it says, when Saul and all the Israelites, or all of Israel, heard these words of the Philistine, they were dismayed and greatly afraid. Why Saul mentioned first? Well, first of all, because he’s the king, and that makes him the general leading this battle.

But secondly, you remember the one thing that made Saul different from all the other Israelites when he became king. He’s head and shoulders above all the people. Now he didn’t come close. He doesn’t come close to Goliath. He’s about the biggest they got, though. He’s pretty successful in battle against the Philistines in other situations. So I’m sure all the Israelites are looking at him.

And Saul’s taking a step backwards and looking, and they’re in dismay. Now, these men who just minutes before were ready on the sound of charge to rush down into that valley and clash with a Philistine army coming from the other direction. Now they’re all looking the other way. Some of them are whistling. You know, they’re not ready. They are in great dismay about Goliath. And it then the story shifts. And it talks about David. It’s like, meanwhile, back on the farm, and there’s David, you know, and he’s watching the sheep, and you’re trying to figure out if you’ve watched movies, you know there’s going to be some connecting point here, but I don’t get what it is yet. And his father says, David, take some food to the Philistines.

3. David Exhibits Incredible Confidence

And he’s been going or to the Philistine war ground. Take it to Israel and take some food to your brothers, because there are three of them that are in the army of Israel. And David goes, and he’s going coming, going, coming. And on this particular, he’s going back and forth, but on this particular day, he happens to arrive at the time that Goliath is offering his challenge to the Israelites. And you know the story. I’m not telling you anything you don’t know about the story. It’s not a spoiler alert to say David will win and Goliath will die. You already know that. But David exhibits incredible confidence that nobody else in his forces exhibits. Why? All the others, including Saul, are absolutely frightened into paralysis by Goliath.

But not so David. When David hears him offer that challenge, he says, Is there somebody going to take this guy on? Why? Well, there are a couple of reasons why. If you look at verses 34 through 36, and I know we’re jumping ahead, but I’m trying to put it all together for you in chronology. David’s confidence is there as soon as he hears this giant speak. It says, David said to Saul, Your servant was tending his father’s sheep. When a lion or a bear came and took a lamb from the flock, I went out after him and I attacked him. I rescued it from his mouth. And when he rose up against me, I seized him by his beard and struck him and killed him.

And this uncircumcised Philistine will be like one of them, since he’s taunted the armies of the living God. Now I want you to notice a couple of things about David’s level of confidence. First of all, it’s based on past experience. He has been successful against really impressive foes. Lions and bears.

Putting himself on the line in this particular battle. He’s saying, I can do this because I’ve done that. He’s not just sitting around bragging about what he might have done. But more than his confidence because of what he’s done is his confidence in who he belongs to. He is confident in his God. He believes he can do this because he is on the Lord’s side. But even in all that confidence, I want you to remember something. David is aware that he can miss.

There’s no indication there on this scene, and there’s no indication David doesn’t know who Goliath is. It’s not a matter of, well, his brothers might come out and fight me, and I need five stones, one for each of them. I think he has got five stones because he could miss.

Verse 26. Then David spoke to the men who were standing by him, saying, What will be done for the man who kills this Philistine and takes away, listen to the wording, the reproach from Israel. Who is this uncircumcised Philistine that he should taunt the armies of the living God? David’s anger and indignation are about God. It’s not about, hey, are we gonna let them talk about us that way? Not in our house, not in our valley. It’s much more, this is about our God. We’ve got a God. And this man is taunting not just us, but our God in these circumstances. And then you’ve got that statement at the end of verse 36 that I just read. He has taunted the armies of the living God.

And verse 37, the Lord who delivered me, the Lord who delivered me from the paw of the lion, from the paw of the bear. He will deliver me from the hand of this Philistine. And then in verses 46 and 47, when David speaks to Goliath, he says, This day the Lord will deliver you into my hands. I will strike you down and remove your head from you, and I’ll give the dead bodies of the army of the Philistines this day to the birds of the sky and the wild beasts of the earth, that all the earth may know what? That I’m a great warrior? No. That Israel is not to be played or toyed with? No. That the earth may know there is a God in Israel.

And that all this assembly may know that the Lord does not deliver by sword or by spear, for the battle is the Lord’s, and he will give you into our hands. Couple of things about that are really impressive is how many times he talks about the Lord, not Israel, not Israel, not him. Not I got this, I can beat you. He does have confidence in himself. He mentioned that about the bear and the lion. But he is confident he can win this battle because he is the Lord’s. And this is about God. He is no different. He is no different than Hezekiah when the Assyrians have come against this city and surrounded Jerusalem. And Hezekiah takes this letter from Rab Shaki and he lays it out before the Lord.

It says he laid this letter out before the Lord. And he says, basically, if I may paraphrase, Lord, are you going to let him talk about you like that? It’s not about us. It’s not about us. I’m going to tell you, I think that’s a really important message for us today. I’m going to pause and give you something for us today. I think Christianity is going to experience a hostility in this country we have not seen in decades.

And it is one thing for preachers and teachers and shepherds of God’s people to get indignant when laws start becoming restrictive to what we are by saying we don’t have to put up with this. This isn’t right. We’re righteous people. Why are they punishing us? I’m going to tell you, if we focus our hearts and our eyes and our minds on what this is doing to us, we’re going to be lost. It is not about us. It is about our God. It is about what laws and governments and entities do to the God we worship. And if we can keep our hearts and our minds and our prayers focused on that, and not what it means to us. Not what it means to us. But what it means to God and how God is perceived by others.

I believe God is much more likely to answer those prayers than ones that say, God, are you going to let this happen to us? This isn’t fair to us.

4. An Israelite Is Not Ready to Fight a Philistine

I want to go back. I want you to remember Israel is ready to fight Philistia.

But an Israelite is not ready to fight a Philistine. You see a difference in those two? Do you? Okay, folks, I need a little feedback here. I can read this. I can read this. I can read this. I cannot read this. That one I don’t read. Notice the army of Israel is ready to go to battle with the army of the Philistines. But when Goliath says, give me one man, they all back off. I want to tell you, there is a sense in which when we’re together like this, we’re together here, we’re ready to take on the world.

It’s important for you to serve the Lord in your schools, in your workplace, in your homes, in your neighborhoods, in your community and government. It’s important for Christians to be the people they are. And when we’re all sitting here like this and we’re all together and nodding our heads and we’re together in heart, it’s easy for us to say, yes, we draw up in battle array when we are here. But isolate us. Take one of us and put us in a community meeting where people are spouting rhetoric that is not biblical when they’re accusing Christians of being intolerant because we cannot accept certain sins in the lives of others. Put us in that situation where everybody around us is nodding their heads. Yeah, that’s right, those Christians.

How then will we respond? Most of Israel looked away. Nobody wanted to go one-on-one with God. Nobody wanted to step out from the group and it all depend on you. I’m going to tell you, don’t let that happen to you. Young people, you’re in a classroom, and some teacher starts spouting off something about alternate lifestyles, or hedonistic lifestyles, or recreational use of drugs, or how intolerant some people are, and how ignorant Christians are, and how anti-science Christians are.

Okay, let’s get it. We’re good to go. We got all our armor on. We’re ready to go into battle. The spears are ready. The swords are sharpened, the armor is on, and they get ready, and they walk out to the edge of that mountainside, that hillside, and look down into that valley, and then here he comes again.

Give me a man that we may fight. And in the morning the Israelites go back. And in the afternoon they come back out, and there’s Goliath again. Give me a man. That’s day one. I’m not going to go through all that, but I can guarantee you if I did that for 40 days, 80 times, on the 80th time, you’d be ready to kill me. Because it would get old. They’ve heard that for 40 days. Twice a day. And no one has responded. Goliath doesn’t go away. Let teachers, let teachers, let community people, let your neighbors say things about our God, say things about morality, say things about God’s people, and just live with it in silence, and you will live with it in silence.

5. Nobody Thinks David Can Win

First of all, nobody thinks they can beat Goliath. Nobody thinks Saul can beat Goliath. And nobody thinks David can beat Goliath. So you’ve got this statement. You are not able to go against this Philistine to fight with him. You are but a youth while he has been a warrior from his youth. Those are the words of Saul. That’s probably not the best thing to say. Imagine a coach on the sidelines of a football game, and your team is really getting stomped. I mean, they’re getting beat like a tied up goat. And the coach goes over to one of the guys, he goes, Somebody’s injured in there. I’m going to put you in. Listen, just don’t embarrass me. Okay, try to stay alive and on your feet.

But there’s no way you’re going to be able to stop the onslaught of this other team. Get out there.

You can’t do this. Nobody thinks David can do it. His brothers don’t think it. Of course, you may say, well, of course, they’re older brothers. Older brothers never think younger brothers can do anything. Their words would have been probably, yeah, you go on out there because we don’t need you anyway. You know? It’s just one less mouth to feed in the household. Nobody thinks David can win. But I want to tell you something. That is where David’s faith comes in. You and I have misunderstood this story. Look, you ever played the game Rock, Paper, Scissors? Everybody’s played that. So you go one, two, throw. One, two, scissors. One, two, rock. One, two, paper. And each one of them can beat one other, but is susceptible to the other.

The rock can crack or break the scissors. The scissors can cut the paper, and the paper can cover the rock. Now I will tell you, I never understood how a rock is diminished by paper over it. But in the game, that’s the way it works. Each one can beat one other, but can’t beat both. I never allowed dynamite in rock, paper, scissors. Ancient warfare was much like that. There were three elements to an army in ancient warfare. There was infantry, there was cavalry, and there were slingers or projectile warriors. Projectile warriors would have been those who can fire arrows or launch javelins, and particularly in Israel’s case, sling stones. Like a slingshot, but much more effective than that. Slingers or projectile warriors had very little armor on them because they didn’t need it.

They needed mobility and you never got close enough to the army that you were going to be injured. You stayed way back and you fired from a distance, whether it was an arrow being pulled back or a sling. Infantry, on the other hand, went hand to hand. They were very heavily armored, but it made them slow. You’re slow when you’ve got all that armor and you got a helmet. You’re limited in your vision. You’re made for close-up warfare. And then you have cavalry. Cavalry are swift, but they’re not as heavily armored. And here’s how the game works. One, two, infantry can be cavalry. Horses won’t rush a massed group of men. They’ll pick off the sides, but they won’t rush.

They’re fast enough to get to them, and the projectile warriors are wide open, and cavalry will go through them like a knife through butter. One, two projectile warriors love infantry.

Well because they’re swift moving. But an infantryman is just a sitting duck in a projectile warrior. They’re just out there ready to be taken down. Your cavalry, gimme the projectile warriors. I will make mincemeat of them. But don’t give me infantry. I can’t take them. Your infantry? Oh, give me the cavalry. Bring them on, because we’ll kill their horses and kill the riders after them. Each one of them can beat one other, but not both. I’m going to tell you, David, if you really understood ancient warfare, you would have bet on David. Goliath is infantry. He is slow. Do you remember what he says to David when David comes out against him? You remember what he says? He says, Come to me, and I will give you to the birds of the air and the beasts of the field.

Why does he want him in close? Because that’s how infantry fights. You come to me, boy. But David rushes forward and keeping his distance, slings that projectile. And you may say, can a projectile really do that much damage? The research I’ve done, you can do. All you have to do is get on the internet and look up projectile warriors or look up slingers. And you’ll get this same information I’ve got. Xenophon, who was an ancient historian, said Rhodian slingers. When I say slingers, we’re talking about guys that use slings. They put a little stone in a pouch and it’s got two long leather thongs, and you get up round and round and round, you get that going fast enough that when you release one of those, only one of those thongs, that projectile comes out.

You get good enough, you can throw it at the same place every single time.

Slingers from Rhodes were so good they could hurl a projectile farther than a Persian archer could fire. So you got archers against projectile warriors. The Rhodians would say, oh, bring them on. We’ll take them down one after another. Turkish slingers could hit small shield sized targets at 650 feet. Six hundred and fifty feet. And how fast? Seventy miles an hour. Now you say, well, baseball players throw, pitchers throw baseballs faster than that. Yeah, but that’s a large projectile. Make that thing small enough and put it at 70 miles an hour, and you know what? Tell you.

Came from Spain and went to South America. They talk about a Peruvian slinger who broke a Spaniard’s sword at a hundred feet. He was a hundred feet away. He slung a projectile, and the Spaniard’s sword broke. So here’s what’s happened. Remember the famous scene in Indiana Jones?

Where he’s fought off all those other guys, and then all of a sudden in front of him is one last guy, and he’s got those swords, and he’s spinning them all, and he’s got that imposing black outfit, and he spins them all, and Indiana Jones looks like, oh no, and then he just pulls a gun and shoots him. I’m going to tell you something. David brought a gun to a knife fight. The Philistine wants close-up combat. Come on, come to me. And David says, I don’t need to come to you. You’re dead. He pulls a sling and kills the Philistine. So here’s the point. The point isn’t, I can’t believe David killed Goliath. David should have killed Goliath. But here’s what is amazing and magnificent about David.

David went out there when nobody thought he could do it. David went out there when no other slinger went out there. You know, it would be easy for David to say, hey, a slinger ought to be able to kill Goliath. He’s infantry. It’s not that he’s too big to kill, he’s too big to miss. But all the other slingers in Israel, and there were many of them. There were 700 slingers in the tribe of Benjamin. Did you know that? 700 left-handed slingers in the tribe of Benjamin. So they had other slingers, but all the other slingers saw him, and they were taken by his size, and they were taken by the fact that nobody else in the ranks of Israel would go. And peer pressure kept them from fighting Goliath, but not David.

David’s greatness is not in the fact that he’s a slinger. And it’s not in the fact that he killed lions and bears. It is not in the fact that he went up against the biggest man we’ve ever heard of in history. It is that he went up there when nobody thought he could win but God.

So he takes on the giant.

6. What Do We Learn from That

And then I want to offer three lessons, and we’re done. First of all, Goliath is not carrying his own shield. He’s got a shield bearer in front of him. So sometimes, and I will tell you, I remember seeing those pictures as a kid. Goliath got this shield on his arm as he’s flying backwards, sword in one hand, shield on the other. He didn’t have that shield. There was a shield bearer there that was going, oh. And secondly, it was not the she, it was not the projectile in his forehead that killed Goliath. He did not die from the projectile. Go back and look at the story with me. It says, He took from his bag, verse 49, a stone and slung it. And he struck the Philistine on his forehead, and the stone sank into his forehead, so that he fell on his face to the ground.

Thus David prevailed over the Philistine with a sling and a stone, and he struck the Philistine and killed him, but there was no sword in David’s hand. Now that’s important to know. The striking was not the striking with the projectile. Because it says he ran and stood over the Philistine and took his sword and drew it out of its sheath and killed him and cut off his head with it. Now that’s not a huge point, but for you Bible class teachers, just make sure you get that right. Goliath falls unconscious to the ground from the sling. But it says David killed him, but he didn’t have a sword himself. Remember, he wouldn’t carry Saul’s armor. He killed him with his own sword, drew Goliath’s sword, cut off his head, and thus the battle was secure.

So what do we learn from that? Number one, faith is ignoring current thinking. I’m just going to tell you, faith is ignoring current thinking. The world will never. The world at large will never parrot God’s wisdom. So ignore current thinking. Faith is trusting God in the face of current thinking. Faith is believing I can kill Goliath. But even when no one else thinks I can kill Goliath. Goliath included. Nobody thought he could do that. Number two, faith is strengthened by past victories. It is important when you’re going into a situation to hear the successes of others and to remember your own successes in the past. I’m going to tell you something. I think there’s a place for testimonies among God’s people. There’s a place for that.

Somebody’s going through a difficulty with their children. Their children are abandoning the faith and you don’t know what to do. I think there’s a time to recall. I remember though, I remember that time brother and sister so-and-so talked about in class what they did when their children were losing their faith, and they brought them back. I need to remember that. I need to hear those stories. I need to hear success stories about marriage. I need to hear success stories about the workplace. I need to hear from the person who says, we need to tell each other. I lost my job. They wanted me to do something that was immoral and dishonest. I told them I couldn’t do that. They wanted me to work every Sunday. I told them I cannot work when the Lord wants me to be at his table, and they fired me.

And we go, oh, that’s bad. And you say, no, it wasn’t bad. Because I’m still here. I’m still standing. And the Lord has blessed me by what has happened. We need to hear those stories, folks. David’s past successes are what enabled him to come against that great giant. And the third thing is, and the most important lesson, I repeat one more time for you. David is successful because it is all about God. It’s not about David. And it’s not about Israel. And it’s not about Goliath. It is about God. Everything we do must be about God. It’s not about this church. I don’t mean to say that’s not important. I don’t mean to say that’s not important. When I say it’s not about, I don’t mean exclusively, but it is primarily about God.

Conclusion

Keep him as a focus. And the projectile warrior will always beat the infantryman. We’ll stand adjourned, let the classes come in.