Having Confidence in God When Facing Giants: 1 Samuel 17:32-58

Show Notes

Episode 506: 
In this episode, we discuss how Goliath, a giant over nine feet tall, challenges the Israelites and taunts them with his impressive armor and weaponry. Despite the fear instilled in the Israelite soldiers, David steps up to face Goliath, showcasing his unwavering faith in God. Jeff and Chris highlight key themes from the story, such as David's courage, his past experiences as a shepherd preparing him for this moment, and his refusal to wear Saul's armor, symbolizing the importance of staying true to oneself.

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You're listening to The Bible Guys, a podcast where a couple of friends talk about the Bible in fun in practical ways. Well, hey, good morning everyone. I my name is Chris. My name, yeah, my name is Jeff. I started my thought. That changed my thought in the middle of I was gonna say I'm Chris, and then I was like, no, I'm going to say my name is Chris. Okay, and I'm Jeff. Did you ever hear Brian Reagan talk about take luck? Yes, yes, take luck. He's trying to say take care and good luck and they mixes them. Yet. Yeah, that's so funny. I just did. Hey, welcome to the Bible guys. We are excited on a Monday morning to have you tune in or listen or whatever you're doing. And if we started off this strongly, you can only imagine how good the rest of the episode is going to be. It's going to be amazing. It's going to be so strong. Yeah. Hey, Desiree is kicking us off with a social media minutes, and so this is the time where we just you know, appreciate the comments that come in and are fun. By the way, please comment. We absolutely love your feedback. Yes, yeah, whether it's on the Bible guys, if it's. Nice, If it's nice, okay, otherwise we send all the negative ones to the complaint department. You know who you are, I know, but but no, seriously, Bible guys dot com. How else can they respond through YouTube? Yeah? Yeah, yeah, yeah, email email us in at info at the that's correct. Okay, so you want to take the first. One, okay, lyn B Hi Lynn Hi Lynn lynd B said, thanks guys for a great episode. I think you guys always show God's message. The main point is you guys are always pointing people to Jesus not to follow you but Jesus. And I really think you guys always do exactly that. Keep up the great job. Well that's one of the best. That's cool. Ever. Yeah, that's like the best one we've gotten. So that's that's a John the Baptist. Yeah, you may be the winner now, Lynn here it is good job, okay. Or in D that was really nice. It was very nice. Or in D says, awesome episode, gentlemen, gentlemen. I know he must be listening to the other podcast. Yeah, this is the Bible guys. Or awesome episode, gentlemen. Thanks for the explanations and making the Bible come to life. Your explanations are extremely easy to understand. God bless Uh. That's awesome, thank you. Also it's a compliment, but it's also says something about us. We explain things on an eighth grade level. Super nice, super nice, or you don't know, it's eighth grade level. Maybe orn's PhD level. Oh, maybe you don't know. And so everything's extremely easy for him. That's right, that's right, even the most complex, diverse that's depth, theological. Theory, relativity. Check that out on Saturday. Yeah, okay, uh. And then Bridget m says love when Chris sings good morning, Wow, there love love when Chris says good morning, sings good morning. Well, well, thank you, Bridget I guess I should do with you. Well, I think he's kind of good morning, good morning. We talk whole not through good. Morning, good morning to you. I don't know why I laugh every time, but every time you do that, I laugh. I don't know why I do it. Yeah, it's so funny. I just it's just in my brain. Well, you did it, like I don't know, a year ago, yeah, yeah, yeah, And then you got compliments and as soon as you get compliments, you can't stop doing it after that. That is not something, right now, that is not I kept doing it. I do not. I did not go that way. No, that wasn't it. I thought I thought I thought that would be. I thought that was it. That is not the reason why. Okay, I think it's because. I'm goofy, goofy. Yeah, because you're goofy, not like like not that goofy, okay, but the other yeah, just goofy. Yeah. So all right, Well that we get through that pretty quickly, Yes we did. And uh, it's okay because today we have a pretty epic big story story, maybe the biggest story, uh in the Old Testament. But exactly because it's the biggest story in the Old Testament, because it's Goliath. That's to be. It's gotta be. Now, you tipped our hand well on the didn't let us get to just drag people along and let them figure it out? Big story Cliath, it'sliethie okay. People on the edge of their seat, that's right. We were going to kind of just draw them along. And yes, okay, anyways, it's Goliath. David wins, he kills them. Spoiler alert, Okay, sorry to ruin the whole thing for you, For those of you that are going through this for the first time. There's no way, do you think. No, yes, no. Even in society, people used to phrases like like, that's a David Goliath story. It's the classic. I was a college pastor for a while and I mentioned, you know, the story David Gliath, and this guy in the room goes no, I had like thirty something. Yeah, but that guy have subscribed or listened to the Bible, guys, though. Probably he was sitting in church. All right, all right. Sorry with the spoiler fage fall fall. Okay, So anyways, we are reading, and if you don't know, first Samuel, chapter seventeen is where the story of Goliath is. And up to this point, Goliath has already been challenging the Israelites. He's just so you know, he's this giant guy. He's over nine feet tall. He's got a bronze helmet and a bronze coat of mail that weighed one hundred and twenty five pounds. Just his armor it's one hundred and twenty five pounds. He's got a javelin that's made that looks like a Weaver's beam. His shield is so big that his armor bearer had to go out in front of him carrying his shield. Yeah, and it said the tip of a spear weighed fifteen pounds. Yeah, yeah, just the tip of the spirit. Yeah. Just crazy. And he's out there mocking the people of Israel and he's challenging them to the idea that hey, instead of thousands of people dying in this battle, let's just out your champion to fight against me. Whoever wins, Yeah, that's the army that wins. And there's so there's so many things to learn in that because Goliath is saying to them with his voice, you are just the servants of Saul, and I am a warrior for my youth. And he's trying to tell, you know, he's trying to tell the people who they are. And then David comes along and says, who's this philistine that defies the living army or the army of the living God. Right, you know, so David has the right perspective, right, he said, we're not the servants of Saul, We're the servants of the living God. So that's whe're at we're going to start off. Then in verse thirty two, and we'll read to I think the end of the chapter. But here's just says David comes and he says, don't worry about this philistine. David told Saul, Saul's the king. I'll go fight him. Don't be ridiculous. Saul replied, there's no way you can fight this philistine and possibly win. You're only a boy, and he's been a man of war since his youth. But David persisted, I'd been taking care of my father's sheep and goats, he said. When a lion or a bear comes to steal a lamb from the flock, I go after it with a club and rescue the lamb from his mouth. If the animal turns on me, I catch it by the jaw and club it to death. I've done this to both lions and bears, and I'll do it to this pagan philistine too. Frize defied the armies of the Living God. The Lord who rescued me from the claws of the lion and the bear will rescue me from this philistine. Saul finally consented. All right, go ahead, he said, and may the Lord be with you. Then Saul gave David his own armor, a bronze helmet, and a coat of mail. David put it on and strapped his sword over it, and took a step or two to see what it was like, for he'd never warn such things before. I can't go in these, he protested to Saul. I'm not used to them. So David took them off again, and he picked up five smooth stones from a stream and put them into his shepherd's bag. Then, armed only with his father or with his shepherd's staff and sling, he started across the valley to fight the Philistine. Gliath walked out toward David with a shield bear ahead of him, sneering in content at this ruddy faced boy. Am I a dog? He roared at David that you come at me with a stick, and he cursed David by the names of his gods. Come over here, and I'll give your flesh to the birds of wild animals, Gliath yelled. David replied to the Philistine, you come to me with swords, spear and javelin, But I come to you in the name of the Lord of Heaven's armies, the God of the armies of Israel, whom you have defied today. The Lord will conquer you, and I will kill you and cut off your head, and then I'll give the dead bodies of your men to the birds and wild animals, and the whole world will know that there's a god in Israel, and everyone assembled here will know that the Lord rescues his people. But now with sword and spear, this is the Lord's battle, and he will give you to us. As Goliath moved closer to attack, David quickly ran out to meet him, and reaching into his shepherd's bag and taking out a stone, he hurled it with his sling and hit the Philistine in the forehead. The stone sank in and Goliath stumbled and fell face down on the ground. So David triumphed over the Philistine with only a sling and a stone, for he had no sword. Then David ran over and pulled Goliath's sword from his sheath, and David used it to kill him and cut off his head. When the Philistines saw that the champion was dead, they turned and ran. Then the men of Israel and Judah gave a great shout of triumph and rushed over after the Philistines, chasing them as far as Gath and the gates of Akron. The bodies of the dead and wounded Philistines were strewn all along the road from Shareem as far as Gath and Akron. Then the Israelite army returned and plundered the deserted Philistine camp. David took the Philistine's head to Jerusalem, but he stored the man's armor in his own tent. As Saul watched David go out to fight the Philistines, he asked Abner, the commander of his army. Abner, whose son is this, young man? I really don't know, Abner declared, Well, find out who he is, the king told him, and as soon as David returned from killing Goliath, Abner brought him to Saul with the philistines head still in his hand. Tell me about your father, young man, and he replied, his name is Jesse, and we live in Bethlehem. There you go, I'll tell you what. There are at least twenty sermons this one chapter. You know, like, I mean, think about it. I mean, you've preached on all of these, right, I'm sure, or at least you've heard of that. I think twenty two sermons. You find more truths than me I thought I find a lot of truths. Jeff, you me, you mean, okay, so uh so. So the first thing that stands out to me is, here's Saul parroting Goliath, right, So he has been so convinced that, you know, he's forgotten completely that God is with them and that God's going to win the battle and everything else, that he's repeating what Goliath said. You know, that's what That's what we do, don't we when the world tells us we're no good? You know, we listen to the voices of Sometimes parents are coaches, or people that don't believe in us. Maybe perhaps you've heard a promise from God and somebody around you uses logic over faith and they say, no, you can't do that. That's a that's a terrible idea. What are you thinking? That's crazy? And so what we do is we listen and we start to parrot that advice over the promises of God. That's what Saul's doing. And then what else stands out to you? All the soldiers were terrified, Yeah, and you know, these are fighting men, and Goliath is such an intimidating person and he's kind of, I don't know, his pr is kind of out ahead of him, and he's like, oh my goodness, everybody's terrified. But I think it's funny that David, who's not a professional fighter, he shows up and he's not thinking from a warrior standpoint. He's just looking at this giant going he's too big to miss. Right, right? Why are you guys afraid of this guy? And there's a note here in the Life Avabication Study Bible that talks about the fact that David saw a mortal man who was defying the God of the armies of Israel, right, and the soldiers forgot about God, forgot about who they were, their identity in God, and instead and the fact that God was one who always went and fought their battles for them, right, And instead they for some reason they think, well I got to fight this one. And they were terrified of what they could see. And David's like, Hey, if God's forest, this guy's too big to miss. Yeah, And I love that. Another sermon in there is here's David risking his life for a sheep, and it's just a testament about how much he puts himself into his work. I mean, think about it's a whole sermon on work isn't that. It's like here he is at his job, they're not. I mean, I guess they are his sheep, and they're connected to his prosperity, I guess. But really, ultimately he's so young. He's still a teenager at this point. It's you know, you know how it is when you're that age, how many people think like an owner. You know, when they work at a business. You know what Chick fil a kid or McDonald's kid who's sixteen's working there, you know, takes such pride in that business that they would do the same thing that an owner would. But here's the ones that are going to be successful when they're old, correct, That's who does that? That's right? And so what does he do? He risks his very life for the sheep and says, oh, I've done this with. A bear and a lion and the lions. Yeah, that's right. Multiple and then another sermon in there is the faith that he has. But I mean, think about just you know, he's like, hey, I know who I am. I'm I'm chosen by God to be king. The promises of God say one day I'll be king. Well I'm not king yet. Guess what I'm going to live. So I have no problem facing this bear and lion. This isn't going to be my end because I'm trusting in the promises of God. I sometimes think that. I sometimes think he's like, I know, I'm going to be okay, you know he is. Well, you're not going to get to heaven one minute early, right, right, right, So there's nothing to fear. Yeah, I love that the conversation that you were having about work. I did a message series one time called Hidden Valleys, and there's an old song that says hidden valleys turned shepherds into kings. And what David did in those valleys, those hidden valleys where he's walking around with his sheep, taking care of the sheep, set him up for the rest of his life. Right, So it was his faithfulness, it was his character. A number of the psalms, especially the praise songs that were written in the Book of Psalms, were written during that time before he was famous. His skill set with the sling. It's not like suddenly he was miraculously good with the sling, you know, laser focused and that accurate. He developed that skill. He became a great musician while he was in these hidden valleys, and nobody else could show him nothing. But he squared off with lions and bears, and he tested himself physically, and he did hard things. And I've talked about that before. One of the big challenges I had when I was in my very early twenties was to read this book called Do Hard Things, or I'm not sure if the book was called it, but that was the big theme. The subtitle was do hard things. And there's something to that. Challenge yourself and then you succeed. It stretches your capacity and you can do harder things now because you did hard things before. Right. Right. You lift heavier things tomorrow because you lift heavy things yesterday. Right. That's how your muscle builds all these things. And so he was not just sitting around on a rock, bored to death, mad that his dad seems to think that he's the lowest of the eight sons. He's not pitying himself. He's not like, oh, you know what, I'm a victim of my circumstances. My dad gives my brothers great opportunities. He never none of those things. He just kept refining his skills and getting better and better and better and better, and so then he shows up. So the hidden valleys thing. Hidden valleys turned him into a world class musician. He winds up playing for the king. Hidden Valley's turned him into a great warrior. The hidden valley when nobody else is watching, is what turning I think set him up to become a great king. And it references his character. There was a famous preacher used to say, the test of your character is what you do when nobody's watching. Right, that's awesome, and. There's something to that. David was great before he showed up this day. He didn't become great on that day. He was already great. That's great. And then another sermon hidden in here is Saul trying to give David his own armory. And David, which makes sense, by the way, that makes sense, right, you don't know what you're doing here. Use my armor. It works for me, it'll work for you. Yeah, and and and yet David says, hey, this isn't mine. And you know, I remember we used to use this analogy. I worked at a church where there were you know, bits of big church, several campuses, a lot of lead speakers, and what would happen is like, for instance, I would write a message and then somebody else would try to preach the message that I wrote, right and and but but then sometimes it just didn't work. The reason why I couldn't work is because it wasn't their message, It wasn't something, it wasn't theirs. They had to work on it to make it theirs. And so the analogy that we used to use is we used to say, hey, don't you don't have to wear Sal's armor. You just have to come back with Goliath's head right, right, and so just go out there and get the victory. So you don't have to be somebody else or not, you know, don't don't worry about wearing Sal's armor. Just get the victory. And so it's a pretty gruesome analogy, but it translates into our you know, our lives as well. Like your parents' faith doesn't have to be your faith, you know, you know, your faith can be your own faith, but you can have the victory yourself. And I'm sure that you know. There's more sermons in here, but one of the questions I'm going to ask David when I get to Heaven, because I believe we will be able to ask questions heaven, did you believe that. Yeah, as I'm going to ask him, I'm planning on it. Is it true that the reason why you chose five smooth stones was because Goliath had four brothers? Because I've always heard it in sermons. Yes, it's true that Goliath had four brothers. We find that out later, and so therefore we're connecting the dots, right. It doesn't say why we can't. We can't definitely say why. We don't know the heart's intent. God didn't include that. But there's a pretty strong chance that that's, you know, based on custom. You know, brothers were avenging their other brothers. Right, there's a pretty strong chance that the reason why he chose five wasn't because he needed five shots, but because he knew that Goliath had four brothers. Pretty cool. I think that's probably, yeah, very likely. Yes, it'd be one of my questions, one of your questions. Sure, I was just wondered because you know, I yeah, I also have a thing. Side note, this is a sidebark. I also have a thing. I have a thing where when preachers act like they know something when they don't, and I just can't stand it. You know. It's that whole scripture where it says don't add a jot or tittle right where preachures like, this is why he did it, And I'm like, what you meant to say was there's a really good chance this is why he did it because you don't know. You just you just correct yourself just a little bit, because we shouldn't add to God's word. Right. So I have this thing where I remember one time I listened to a guy preaching. He says, let me tell you why Jesus turned around. Is he turned around? Not because of this? Because of this? And after the sermon, I go, did you really just pretend to assume God's motives? Because that's kind of not in the scripture. Okay, so don't do that people, Well stop it, yeah, stop it, stop it. Yeah. And so then there's two things here for me. One, I love the description that Saul says, you're a boy, you're only a boy. Yeah. And Goliaths been a man of war since his youth, right right, So you ever, I remember when I was in high school, my best friend was so much bigger and stronger than everybody else. He was. He was a man among boys. You know, we were all about the same age. But I remember he could bench press three oh over three hundred pounds, and he didn't work out like he wasn't a muscle guy. He wasn't. He was just like I don't even work off right. He was just a monster of a human. His shoulders were like twice the width of my body. And he was just this incredibly strong guy. And his dad used to make jokes because all the all of his sons were big and strong like that. His dad was a truck driver and they were they were just all tough men. Uh And he said, oh, yeah, he's been manned strong since he was five, right, that's that's what you say. The first time every went over to their house, he and his brother pulled a uh the block of an eight cylinder Ford engine out of the out of the front of a truck, just the two of them. They both stand in the wheel well and they lifted it up, set it out of and yeah, they're just monster men. You know, it's teenagers. And that's what I think of is, you know, he's man strong since he's a boy. So it's not that he's saying you're a boy and he's a man. It's that you're still only a boy and he's been manned strong since he was a kid, right, because it says since he since his youth. So that's when the end of the chapter also really speaks a lot about Samuel. So what we didn't cover in chapter sixteen about Saul, Yeah, yeah, I said Samuel, I'm sorry about Saul. In chapter sixteen, the Bible talks about how Saul had some mental instabilities, really struggled, and they would bring in musicians. David was one of the musicians that got brought before King Saul to play to bring peace to Saul. His beautiful music. He's playing on the harp and it would calm Saul down, right, So he played in Saul's court for an extended period of time. She has to be pretty good. Yeah, yeah, he well, he was world class at what he was the best in Israel, one of the best because he's playing before the king. But at the end, it goes when you get to the end of it, as as David goes running out to the to the Philistine, Saul says, as David watched, As Saul watched David go out to fight the Philistine, he asked Abner, the commander of the army, Abner, whose son is this young man, and Abner the general goes, I don't know, so we should find out. So David's been in front of Saul on many occasions, and Saul still doesn't know who he is, right, he's just so narcissistic. Now, yeah, he's so self centered. He's so just wrapped up in his own problems and his own struggles. He's not noticing or recognizing other people around him at all. But now you know, if David wins this fight, he's gonna his family will be free from taxes for life, and he gets to marry the king's daughter. So at this point he's going, hey, we should find out who that kid is, Right, he's gonna be He's gonna be my son in law. And it turns out he'd been around him a lot. But you know, it's just the kind of leader Saul was. Saul was pretty much wrapped up in his own thing and not paying attention to who was around him or the people he was serving. And another sermon is it says that David ran out to meet Saul or to goodliath I. Mean favorite phrasing the whole story. Yeah, yeah, yeah, he runs around. Yeah, he has no fear whatsoever. Yeah. And then Goliath says, am I a dog, right that you have sent this this? And so so here's Goliath. That's that's a sermon on over confidence, right, it's a sermon on not leaving the power of God. God's not going to come through, right, I'm going to defy God. So you know, Goliath has all those kinds of attitudes. It's like, you know, who is this God of Israel's He's a nobody, right, So so you know, he doesn't believe that David's gonna, you know, be even a threat. And then uh, and then David what does he say? He says, today, let me tell you what's going to happen. And so David prophesies and he has so much confidence. He's like, this is this is exactly what's going to happen. I think of that Tosh talking. They're both yeah, because he's like, I'm going to feed your body of the dogs. That's nothing. I'm gonna feed you and your people to the dogs. It rids me. That movie. Everything roused me of a movie. But there's a Jack Reacher with Tom Cruise and he's going up against five men and he and he goes, he goes, uh, pay your bill before they take him outside, and he goes, uh, what do you mean. He goes, I'll pay when I come back, and he goes, you won't be able to. So so Tom goes out faces five guys and he goes, remember you wanted this. This is your last chance to back out. And he goes, what are you talking about? He goes, it's five against one. He goes, it's three against one. He goes, Once I take out the leader, which is you, he is, I'll contend with two or three other ambitious wing men, and the last two they're gonna run. You know why they always run. That's what he says. That's that's really what what David's doing here. He's like, he's like, I'm gonna cut your head off, and I'm gonna I'm gonna you know, all these things are gonna happen. So and it does happen exactly the way you know that that David predicts. And uh and then. Let's not look past the fact that uh, that strikes fear into the other uh, you know, members of the army, and they run. So think about this, Think about how the odds were so unbelievably against David that when they saw that they weren't just fearful of David's sling. Why were they fearful. They were fearful, fearful because the things that they had heard about the army me of the Living God, they're actually true. Right, They're not afraid of a teenage boy with a piece of leather in his hand, no, right, they're aware of the fact that we just lost to the God of Israel, right. Yeah, And so then they run and God strikes fear into their hearts and they run. And it just goes to show you that when when we sit back, it's not our job to defend God. We don't have to defend God. We don't have to stand up there and you know, convince everybody else that God is real or worthy to be praised. We just have to serve God. And then eventually they're going to see the evidence of God, and then you know, God will be seen. God's going to show himself. You know, we just serve God and allow God to do the convincing. R that's good. Yeah, Oh wow, we're out of time, so that there's. A lot more even in here, tons. Yeah, so we don't have time for it. But it's a great chapter, and hopefully we'll see you next time on the Bible Guys.