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David Part 2
Sermons from Commons Church. Intellectually honest. Spiritually passionate. Jesus at the centre. Since 2014.
Welcome to the CommonsCast. We're glad you're here, and we hope you find something meaningful in our teaching this week. Hit the commons.church for more information.
Speaker 2:My name is Joel, and I am one of the staff here at Commons. I'm lucky enough to be on this team. And I haven't been up here as much recently, but I am grateful to be a part of this amazing team because we truly have some amazing teachers that creek around on this laminate stage every single week. But more than just being good teachers, we have some great pastors here at Commons, and we're all pretty lucky for that. Jeremy opened our David series two weeks ago.
Speaker 2:It's a little bit of the background on when David was chosen to be king of Israel. We had two different accounts of that story, each choosing to highlight a different reality in this historical narrative of David's early life. Jeremy spent some time both in that sermon, but also in an extremely helpful video that we posted later that week about the difference between reading these stories literally and reading them literarily. Discovering how the writers understood these stories and what they were trying to communicate to their audiences. And that really helps us all the time and today.
Speaker 2:Because today, we get to venture into this very famous story of David and Goliath. We are in one of the most well known stories of David's, potentially one of the most recognized stories in all of scripture, maybe even history. Everyone knows this story. If you grew up in church, you definitely knew this story. A lot of people that didn't grow up in church still know this story.
Speaker 2:It is iconic. On Netflix right now, there's actually a David and Goliath movie, and I watched it to help research and prepare for today. K. I actually didn't watch all of it because it's awful, but I tried to. You can ask Hillary, my wife.
Speaker 2:Eight spent minutes of it are in our continue watching queue. This is right around the time that she says to me, you watch a lot of weird things on here. And I said, no. I start to watch a lot of weird things on here. That is my pseudo endorsement of that movie.
Speaker 2:If you can make it further than eight minutes, you're a better Christian than I am, or you're just beyond board. I don't know. Regardless, this is one of the most well known David stories. I was thinking about how we talk about this story with kids a lot. This story basically tells children, trust in god, you can do anything.
Speaker 2:That lesson is important, And I obviously want my kids to have experiences where they learn that God is trustworthy. And I was also thinking about kids and how they always creep into sermons. And how I am more guilty of this than anyone. And now I know that there are people who maybe have been around here for a while that make jokes like, just wait till Joel starts teaching again, and every story is a Frank story. And you're right because that kid is a gold mine.
Speaker 2:But also, having kids so far for me has been so much less about what I am teaching them. So much more about what they teach me. About myself which is scary. Also about god. There are little walking lessons for me about how god sees us, sees the world, about how I treat god and others when I am weak or scared or selfish, about the limitless love and adoration that god must have for each of us.
Speaker 2:My question is, who has even thought much about David and Goliath since you were like seven? When my daughter was eight months old, I realized that my favorite part of eight months old, eight month olds is that they bang on things that are new to them when they discover them. So she would what is this? Some sort of stool? Dad, have you seen this?
Speaker 2:That's what they do. I love it. I love it. Maybe today, you can think of me as a cute, precious, little eight month old baby. And I'm gonna bang on this David and Goliath story a little bit.
Speaker 2:I'm gonna say, look at this. Have you seen this? There are some things I learned this week that are beautiful, and I wanna share them with you. I know we focus on David's bravery because of his trust in God, and that is maybe the first part of what the writers of this story want us to notice. And I think that piece is important.
Speaker 2:It forms part of the narrative of how David sees the world as he enters into this story. But that's not just it. Maybe this story isn't as simple as we thought, or maybe it is as simple as we thought and we just need to be reminded of some things today. Either way, wanna invite us into this story. I want us to be open to an invitation from god to notice some things in the secondary story lines, the secondary dialogues, secondary characters even that I think matter in understanding how God is revealed in these words.
Speaker 2:But first, would you pray with me? God of light, god of love. In these moments together, would you open our minds and open our hearts to see you in this story? As we walk through some familiar passages of a familiar story, would you be present to us in the familiarity? As we ask some questions and maybe sort through some of the history, would you reveal yourself in a way that is new to us today?
Speaker 2:Whether it's through something we hear, something we see, something we sense, or even something that we realize that we knew. Reveal yourself to us this morning, dear god. Amen. As much as I want to, I cannot read the entire passage of this story today. It's from first Samuel.
Speaker 2:It's the whole chapter 17. It would take me about ten minutes to read the whole thing, and that's cheating. So what I'll do is I'll paraphrase it, then I'll refer to specific verses throughout, and we'll post those specific verses on the screen behind me. Basically, the Israelite army is on one side of the Valley Of Elah, and they are holding position in a bit of a standoff against the Philistine army on the other side. Goliath is a champion in the Philistine army, and he comes out every day for forty days, and he taunts Israel, and he invites someone to come and fight him one on one.
Speaker 2:The winner essentially taking the battle. He's huge, and he's loud, and he has this incredible armor that the story tells details about. And he has the entire Israelite army paralyzed with fear. David enters this story because his older brothers are in the army, and his father Jesse sends David down with some bread and some cheese and to get some assurance that his brothers are okay. David enters the scene and he sees what's happening with Goliath, and he cannot believe that one, no one is going out to fight him.
Speaker 2:And two, that the whole camp is in fact just frozen with fear. David asked some questions about why no one is going to try to fight the giant. And he clarifies again, and he asks again, and he clarifies again. And finally, he's brought before king Saul because his questioning got him noticed. David tells Saul that he thinks he can kill this giant.
Speaker 2:Saul says, no way. David brags about being able to defend his sheep from lions and bears. So eventually, Saul is convinced and he tries to dress David in his armor, but it doesn't fit. David says he can't wear it because he's not used to it. So David gets his sling.
Speaker 2:It's like a slingshot, but not like a slingshot. He picks out some stones, and he heads down to fight Goliath. Goliath mocks him and taunts him, and David claims that he's gonna win because Goliath has mocked the God of Israel. David swings one stone. It knocks Goliath down.
Speaker 2:It either kills him here or kills him when David comes over and cuts his head off. And scene. Paraphrasing this story that quickly does not do it justice because part of what makes this such a great story is how well it is told. There are great characters. It is paced really well.
Speaker 2:And out of nowhere hero comes in and saves the day. There's a beheading, etcetera. Just a couple of perspectives on Goliath because Goliath is clearly portrayed as arrogant in this story. So he obviously hasn't heard the old adage, the bigger they are, the harder they fall, which is your classic underdog threat. If you are the underdog, you say that every time.
Speaker 2:But it's also just physics. When we get to that part in the story, I can see Goliath stepping out, taunting the army again, and seeing young David come down the hill and being unsure if he's being mocked or not. Is this a joke? Do you even lift, bro? I'm sure that it was lost in the original Hebrew.
Speaker 2:I'm sure it's there somewhere. But what I'm sure that Goliath said is, what is this? A war for ants? The taunting that Goliath is engaging in is called flighting. It's this type of taunting that happened before a battle.
Speaker 2:It really was part of historical battles, but specifically when there was this type of proposed standoff between two champions. And I am assuming that Goliath seeing David would have intensified his taunting, intensified his flighting. Goliath would have stood about six foot nine. So not a fairy tale height like in children's stories or in some of the artwork, but six foot nine was really tall for that culture. But if we're honest, six foot nine is tall for any culture, especially my own personal culture.
Speaker 2:My two best friends are actually six foot four, and they're really mean to me about how short I am. So I am being completely honest with you about my biases entering this story. I already want this Goliath to go down just like Jeff. Now potentially, Goliath suffered from giantism. One of the effects of a pituitary issue like giantism is poor eyesight, sort of like a tunnel vision.
Speaker 2:And so Goliath's taunt to David specifically is, am I a dog that you come at me with sticks? Now this may just be a sick burn, but it also could just be that he does not see David's sling hanging from his hand. A veteran warrior like Goliath would have known that a sling like this is a dangerous weapon in the right hands. So the shepherd's sling just as he walks out hanging from his hand might have appeared to Goliath as no more than a stick. And we know from the story that his other hand was his staff, so it may have looked like sticks.
Speaker 2:Now both Philip Long, who is a theologian who writes commentaries, and Malcolm Gladwell, who is someone who loves history and writes really cool books, they both studied and landed on this idea that Goliath's vision was impaired as a result of his giantism. Gladwell has some other theories about some of Goliath's disadvantages in this setting. I might not be a 100% convinced on his arguments. He may be right. But if there's one thing that Malcolm Gladwell is 100% right about, it is that everyone loves a good underdog story.
Speaker 2:Regardless of potential vision problems or how slow moving he may have been because of his size, Goliath's loss is unexpected. David and Goliath is this ultimate underdog story because no one expects a young shepherd to have a chance against this aged, experienced, very well armored veteran warrior. Now you may be asking, does Joel have an underdog story? Of course, I do. And it's a football story, so look out hashtag sports talk.
Speaker 2:Here we go. In grade eight, I played football. The first ever year that I played football. Our team was the Eagles. We were green.
Speaker 2:Our team was awful, really bad. I was the quarterback. May have contributed to why our team was awful. But like with any great quarterback, usually, the problem lies with the receivers or the offensive line, obviously. Because who wouldn't look at me as a three year old and think future star athlete.
Speaker 2:I got a helmet on backwards and half a pair of glasses there. Anyway, our team had not won a game all year. We got trounced every week for nine weeks straight. Our last game was an eighth grade doozy. I think we were down three nothing for almost the entire game.
Speaker 2:Near the end of the game, we ran this fake run to the right, and then I turned and ran left, and there was no one there. They all fell for the fake, including my team. But that's that's just kinda how we rolled. It's like how we really sold it, I think. So I was alone, and I was running more than half the field by myself on my way to score the winning touchdown.
Speaker 2:My friend and teammate Brad Shuttlesworth is the only one that caught up to me, and he actually caught up to me and we were high fiving each other as we ran and got closer to the end zone. And it was glorious because we scored, and we won the game. Best moment of my life. Easily. It was the last game of football I ever played.
Speaker 2:I retired. I retired a hero. Yeah. Oh, yeah. Back to our biblical underdog story.
Speaker 2:Everyone loves a good underdog story. Israel's king Saul is so terrified of Goliath that he offers a huge reward for the person that goes down there and kills him. Saul's offer to whoever kills Goliath is a huge deal. It's certainly enough that you would think even a regular soldier might risk taking a shot at Goliath for this. And maybe it helps us understand David's questioning and questioning and questioning when he arrives in verses 25 to 31.
Speaker 2:He asks several people several times, what's the deal if we take this guy out? They tell him it's this huge reward, money, a royal daughter to marry, freedom from obligation to taxes, a place in the royal court. The answer is the same every time he asks anybody, and yet he goes and keeps asking. He asks and he asks, and I picture him asking someone, and they tell him and he says, I'm sorry. What?
Speaker 2:Say that again? And he's so confused. He goes and asks someone else. He said, I'm just checking. That guy said that this is what we get, and he does this several times over and over.
Speaker 2:And somewhere in these moments, between all of David's questions, David's inability to understand why these men are so stuck in fear, There's a connection made, and David sees an opportunity for himself. I wanna reaffirm as we walk through these stories this summer that our intention is not to gloss over David's weaknesses or lionize his victories as Jeremy said two weeks ago. We will look at both plainly and honestly. And all that being said, until I read Joanne Hackett's commentary this week, I was worried that I was alone in wondering about David's arrogance throughout this whole story. But there is some consensus out there that this story can be seen not just as a story of God's faithfulness to his people, but as a deliberate act on David's part to prove his worth to the nation of Israel.
Speaker 2:Even something as subtle as this. When David was invited to meet with Saul after word got around that he was asking questions at the front lines, David ends up speaking first when he's given audience with the king. This is not normal. This is not acceptable. And in that same interaction, when Saul hesitates at David, when David says he can defeat Goliath, David brags with some very descriptive stories of fighting bears and lions while defending the sheep of his father's flock.
Speaker 2:And as Hackett goes on to say, furthermore, he's not simply a keen or lucky shot with a stone. Because after he stuns Goliath, he kills him with his own sword and cuts off his head. This is a deliberate attempt to display his power to Israel, to Saul, and to us. So, let us not kid ourselves. In some ways, this is a power play by David to show off for a nation as he prepares to become king.
Speaker 2:Also significant for me in this story, for me at least, is there's no direct message from God. No mention in the story that God has said to David or to anyone that this Goliath needs to be killed. God does not say go and slay the giant Goliath and you will prove to my people that I am faithful and just. So take that for what you will. But there is something to be said about the skill with which David uses this slingshot.
Speaker 2:It is absolutely amazing. Now his might have been an awesome shot, but I would argue that David's slingshot moment is only the second most memorable slingshot moment in history. Thank you to three seconds of the amazing race circa 2010. Okay. Yes.
Speaker 2:That's a giant slingshot, and it's a watermelon. No. She doesn't die. That's just your classic backfire right there. This is from The Amazing Race.
Speaker 2:This is my wife's favorite show where we agree that we would never enter together because we'd either lose on the first leg or kill each other long before then. Yeah. Okay. That's probably enough of that one. But we have to point out David's skill and his arrogance with that sling in that stone.
Speaker 2:David confidently enters this contest knowing what he's good at, knowing what his strengths are, and where Goliath's weaknesses are. And then, of course, we have the whole beheading, which would have maybe been a part of a normal ancient warrior culture, but this chapter closes with David bringing Goliath's head with him back to Jerusalem. Yes, Like a trophy. No. Not like a participation.
Speaker 2:Everyone gets a gold medal trophy. Not like that kind of trophy. Again, it is a show of dominance. Maybe a show of arrogance, but it's a very show a very human show of claiming kingship in a story that is at least partially about someone confident enough to do something like this on a stage like this. So maybe this is partially David's overconfident, arrogant, hey, check this out guys moment.
Speaker 2:But what else is happening here? Is his brothers, the rest of the army, they are truly freaked out. What is going on in the Valley Of Elah right now is incredible. The entire army of Israel is completely paralyzed by fear because of Goliath. And they are paralyzed because of his size, because of his armor, and because of his arrogance.
Speaker 2:And that's it. He hasn't even killed anyone in front of them. It's not like he's rambled through entire platoons of the Israel army and they've seen it with their own eyes. All we can understand from this storytelling is that it is simply his size, his armor, and his arrogance that have put Israel into a petrified trance. Verse 11 says on hearing the Philistines' words, Saul and the Israelites were dismayed and terrified.
Speaker 2:The story says that Goliath issued his challenge for forty days in a row. Obviously, the number 40, we're supposed to notice it. It's a foreboding of danger. There's the 40 of the flood in Genesis eight, forty years of Philistine rule in Judges 13. It's a significant number in this story.
Speaker 2:It's meant to add a level of menace to Goliath's taunts, Also, a level of salvation to the story. David arrives. He kills Goliath right after this has happened for forty days. The writers want us to notice this. And again, in retelling the story, it adds to the nuance and to this hero epic of King David.
Speaker 2:Now, when David gets his audience with Saul, the first thing that David tells Saul in verse 32 is, don't be dismayed. Don't be terrified. Don't lose heart. It's the opposite of what the story says they all felt back in verse 11. And I have to believe in the intentions of the writers of this story.
Speaker 2:Honestly, this verse echoes one of the most common phrases in our English translations of both the old and new testaments. Do not be afraid. I can hear David saying this as a strong and future king. I can also hear David saying this as a calm confident shepherd. And this helps us draw conclusions and comparisons to Jesus as the new David.
Speaker 2:On one hand, Jesus as the good shepherd and David's early life as a shepherd are intended to parallel. David's life as a shepherd, even the way he describes it himself, fits with this image of Jesus caring for sheep. The image of a shepherd that will stop at nothing to rescue a sheep, to search for, and to find, to keep from the clutches of evil, which is beautiful in its own right. But notice this in verse 22. David left his things with the keeper of supplies, ran to the battle lines, and asked his brothers how they were.
Speaker 2:I think this comparison is amazing. Jesse, David's father, sends David to be present and to see how his brothers are and David runs to the battle lines. And God the father sends Jesus on their behalf to come to where we are and to be with us and to see how we are. I didn't notice this until later in the week, but it's now my favorite piece of the story. And honestly, this simple verse speaks volumes to me about being a pastor.
Speaker 2:Also, good questions are seemingly very important. David asks his sort of innocent questions. In verse 26, who is this man that is defying the armies of the living God? What exactly is doing this to you? It's a good question for them to consider.
Speaker 2:Good questions matter. Good questions can initiate change. Good questions can invite hope. David gets a meeting with Saul because his questions and his questioning make their way to the king. Appointed question opens the door for Saul to send David towards this game changing confrontation with Goliath.
Speaker 2:So I'm curious what it looks like in a faith community to create space for good questions of each other or to be open to questions from others as well as asking good questions of ourselves. There is always room for remaining critical or even cynical. It can be good if it causes us to ask good questions. But if it squashes a holy imagination of something, it's not healthy cynicism. There's room for doubt in the same way.
Speaker 2:Fear is clearly supposed to learn a lesson from this story today. What about hurts or deep wounds? I think we can agree that there is no way around these things. They are a much as much a part of life as breathing can be at times. I think in the least trivial way imaginable, David and Jesus would ask us questions in an invitation to honestly wrestle with those things in a safe community that would share the burden and share the burden of not losing a grip on a hopeful imagination.
Speaker 2:The good questions to me are a beautiful reminder of the invitational nature of Jesus. It's not about telling us and it's not about ruling us. It's about inviting us to participate in the divine in ways we never thought of. Sometimes to do that, we need to be asked questions that seem to come from out of nowhere or don't make much sense on the surface or maybe questions that are too sharp or too direct for us to imagine asking ourselves. But I'm also very interested in how David and Jesus seem to have the ability to see things that we don't always see.
Speaker 2:Because, yes, David is arrogant, overconfident. We already said, let's not kid ourselves because on one hand, this is a strategic power move by David. But let's also not kid ourselves about the relationship that the shepherd David had cultivated with God that allowed him to have a different imagination of the world. Whether it is in the heat of a battle or in the quiet tending of sheep in the wilderness, David's hopeful imagination of what could be was being formed and forged, and he was allowing God's spirit to dictate that imagination into a holy or a hopeful imagination of the world. This idea of a holy or a hopeful imagination is about seeing the world and its circumstances the way Jesus might.
Speaker 2:Jesus' imagination is so graceful. His imagination paints humanity as being full of life and hopefulness with a holy intentionality in the way we live. My son, Frank, is four, and he has an imagination of himself as a big kid. And one day, was leaving the house, and I had to put them both in the car, Frank and Penny. Penny's one, and so I had to carry her in the car.
Speaker 2:I said, Frank, wait here on the sidewalk. I'm gonna put Penny in, and then I'll put you in. Says, no, dad. I'll just get in myself. And I'm like, no, that's ridiculous.
Speaker 2:Stay wait here. It's safe on the sidewalk. So I'm putting Penny in the car and climbing. He's like, dad, can do it. And I'm like, no, don't do it.
Speaker 2:So I'm putting Penny in. And Frank walks over to the side of the car and opens his own door and climbs up into the car, climbs into his seat, puts on his car seat harness and buckles all five buckles, tightens it. And the whole time, he's just staring at me. He's just like I couldn't see what Frank was capable of. I did not have an imagination for that yet.
Speaker 2:Our imagination of what we're capable of or our imagination of the good or the healing that we're capable of. Sometimes we can't see that because of a giant made of fear that is right in front of us. Or some seemingly impenetrable armor of a bad situation. Or the taunts of voices that are not God. We can respond to that invitation to see things differently and pattern our lives around the hope of Jesus.
Speaker 2:Maybe we can begin to see a different imagination of what God hopes for us or what God hopes for our situations or what God hopes for us to not fear and not be afraid of. Eugene Peterson in his book Leap Over a Wall says the moment that we permit evil to control our imaginations, dictate the way we think, shape our responses, we at the same time become incapable of seeing the good and the true and the beautiful. David enters this contest knowing what he's good at and where Goliath's weaknesses are. And those things combined with a profound and God formed imagination seem to tip the scales incredibly in his favor. So my prayer today is this, whether you were in a season where you seem to be tending sheep or you're just in a field and things seem to be okay, or whether you are in a season that feels like a battle or anywhere in between.
Speaker 2:May you continue to discover who you are, who you really are as created in God's image. What your gifts and your strengths are, And how to find a gap in the armor of whatever might be paralyzing you. Or whatever evil or hurt seems to be standing in your way. And may you receive Jesus's invitation toward a holy imagination to see yourself as he sees you and to be in the world in the ways that he would hope you can live in it. Let's pray.
Speaker 2:God, you invited David into a reforming relationship with you that would end up shaping his imagination of both himself and the world around him. Today, God, would you help this story remind us that you are present with us in our strengths? Despite our weaknesses or despite our arrogance. Whether we are in a season like the middle of a battle or a season that seems like an open field. Can you invite us to yourself?
Speaker 2:To your ever loving presence that has the capacity to form a different, a holy, or a hopeful imagination of ourselves, of our circumstances, and the world that we are called to live in. Amen.