Bible Reading: 1 Samuel 17:45-50
David said to (Goliath) the Philistine, "You come against me with sword and spear and javelin, but I come against you in the name of the Lord Almighty, the God of the armies of Israel, whom you have defied. This day the Lord will deliver you into my hands, and I'll strike you down and cut off your head. This very day I will give the carcasses of the Philistine army to the birds and the wild animals, and the whole world will know that there is a God in Israel. All those gathered here will know that it is not by sword or spear that the Lord saves; for the battle is the Lord 's, and he will give all of you into our hands."
As the Philistine moved closer to attack him, David ran quickly toward the battle line to meet him. Reaching into his bag and taking out a stone, he slung it and struck the Philistine on the forehead. The stone sank into his forehead, and he fell face down on the ground.
So David triumphed over the Philistine with a sling and a stone; without a sword in his hand he struck down the Philistine and killed him.
A Reflection
The story of David, the shepherd boy of Israel, slaying Goliath, the giant of their Philistine enemies, will be familiar to anyone who has ever attended Sunday School. The battle between these two armies was to be settled by single combat between their respective champions but for forty days there was a standoff as no one from Israel was prepared to face Goliath.
David’s attitude, though, was summed up in his words ‘Who is this uncircumcised Philistine that he should defy the armies of the living God?’ Against the odds he accepts the challenge and slays the giant, wearing just his shepherd’s tunic and with his shepherd’s slingshot. And he does it while uttering the words, ‘You come against me with sword and spear and javelin, but I come against you in the name of the Lord Almighty’.
We may not face physical giants like Goliath, but at some point in our lives many of us face giants of one sort or another. It may be a traumatic event in the past that leaves us feeling vulnerable today or a phobia which has no logical roots but is never-the-less very real, it may be a job we need to do that we need the courage to tackle or a relationship that has broken down that we are afraid to try and put right, or it may be something we have done wrong that we dare not admit to.
Jesus came to set us free from all that holds us back and to enable us to live in peace and not in fear. We don’t need anything special to deal with these giants; just like David we come to them as we are, but we come in the name of the Lord Almighty. We destroy them through prayer and through faith in the word of God, as Paul reminds us in 2 Corinthians 10:4-5,
The weapons we use in our fight are not the world's weapons but God's powerful weapons, which we use to destroy strongholds. We destroy false arguments; we take every thought captive and make it obey Christ.
Are there any giants lurking in your life, past or present? Could you face them today in the name of the living God, and see them destroyed through faith in Jesus and through prayer?
Pray:
Thank you Jesus that you came to set me free.
Give me the courage to face the giants in my life with faith in your power and authority.
Amen
Every giant will fall.