1 Samuel 17:1a, 4-11, 19-23, 32-49
Sermon preached by Rev. Donald Ng at the First Chinese Baptist Church in San Francisco.
When things are bigger than life, we could become afraid. It’s hard to comprehend things that are bigger than life and are beyond our understandings. When the San Francisco Giants are winning, they can be intimidating to the opposing team. Then there are giants that we are not afraid of like the loveable Green Giant on our canned corn or even the giant in Jack and the Beanstalk. And sometimes we say when someone stands above everyone else in character and stature, “He’s a giant of a man in his time.”
There are things in our lives that appear to be larger than we are able to deal with. Fear dominates our lives. There are some people who are afraid most of the time. Psychologists have listed over 700 phobias—more than enough fears to keep us worried all the time. There is acrophobia—the fear of heights; claustrophobia—the fear of closed spaces; agoraphobia—the fear of open spaces. How about arachibutyrophobia—the fear of getting peanut butter stuck to the roof of your mouth? We could have “Baptistphobia”—the fear of being a Baptist—just made that up. Our fears seem bigger than we are. Fear can be like a giant in our lives.
David and Goliath
The story of David and Goliath is one of the most familiar in the Bible. Our children know this in Sunday school. The story is often referenced in sporting events as the underdog team triumphs over a more powerful foe—Remember the Titans in football, Sea Biscuit in horse racing, Miracle on Ice in ice hockey and Fever Pitch before the Red Sox finally won the World Series.
The story of David defeating Goliath is a small step forward in the larger story of David’s ascension to the throne of Israel and his later kingship as he is introduced to, and earns the favor of King Saul.
The setting is that Israel is at war and is not faring well. The chief cause of their military misery is Goliath, the 9 feet tall, legendary and fearsome champion of the Philistines who defeats them by day and taunts them by night. No one, it appears, is his equal. That is, no one is his equal until David comes along. His appearance is where the drama of the story lies, as David is slight of stature, too young for battle, and untrained in the ways of war. David’s job was to tend the family sheep and to bring chesses sandwiches to his brothers who were fighting at the frontlines. No one, including David’s family, the soldiers, or Saul believes David can succeed, and yet desperate to escape their plight, they send David forth. Because David was chosen by God for this very task, he slays the Philistines with his sling shot and stone in the Valley of Elah.
From this story, we see the contrast between human expectations and simple faith in the Lord. By all human standards, David is unfit for the task at hand. When the king sends David, Saul first tries to arm him with his armor and weaponry. It was too heavy and David couldn’t move in them. If he continued to look at things from the standards of the world, David would not prevail by might. His only hope is confidence in the Lord, a confidence that neither Saul—nor anyone else—seems to share.
Secondly, despite all these understandable concerns, David remains undaunted. Why? He has never had armies and armor to protect him. Instead, he has spent most of his youth trusting the Lord and trusting in the apparently meager gifts with which the Lord has bestowed him: sling and stone and a sure eye and steady hand. The Lord taught David in various past life experiences when he killed both lions and bears and wondered how little difference it is to slay a Philistine like Goliath. He was undaunted.
The third point in this story is the meager tools David uses to carry out his mission. He is untrained, as we noticed, with spear, sword, or shield. Instead, he took with him only his sling and five smooth stones that he chose from a nearby stream. What a contrast! What could five smooth stones and a sling do against the mighty Goliath? In David’s hand, and by the Lord’s guidance, quite a lot! For David killed Goliath, the first of his many battles. How often, I wonder, do we underestimate the gifts we have been given as small or insignificant?
Giants Kept Coming
Unless you’ve read the rest of the story, you may have assumed Goliath was the only giant David ever faced. Not so. 2 Samuel 21:15-22 reports that in David’s later years, he had to deal with some other gigantic opponents.
One incident took place when David was king, and Israel and the Philistines were again at war. A Philistine giant named Ishbi-benob, whose spear tip alone weighed more than 12 pounds, sought to kill David. But Abishai, one of David’s soldiers, stepped in and slew the giant. After this, David’s men began to worry about their king’s safety, telling him, “You shall not go out with us to battle any longer, so that you do not quench the lamp of Israel” (2 Samuel 21:17).
But that did not put an end to the wars with the Philistines, and over the course of the next battles, David’s men faced and killed Goliath’s giant brother (2 Samuel 21:19, cf. 1 Chronicles 20:5), and two other super-sized men.
With David, the giants kept coming.
Our Giants Keep Coming
Most of what frightens us is not nearly so huge as Goliath, but we know about being afraid. According to most polls the second greatest fear of Americans is death. The number one fear is public speaking! So if somebody says, “I’d rather die than give a speech,” it sounds silly, but she may be telling the truth. These personal giants keep us from leaving our houses.
The giants keep coming and so it is with us. No matter how massive or vicious or powerful the giants we faced earlier proved to be, and no matter how soundly we defeated them, almost nobody goes through life with just one giant to face.
Perhaps your first giant was a temptation of some kind, one of the yearnings for something forbidden that was so strong that it captivated your attention and overpowered your will. Certainly David faced this particular giant himself in the person of Bathsheba. According to the expectations and standards of the world, we are to give into temptations especially those that would make us feel good and satisfied. It may be sexual temptations like David and Bathsheba or obsession to possession or eating too much. The world will always want you to live according to its standards but like David who had a simple faith and confidence in the Lord, we are to have faith in the Lord too. David prevailed not by the might of the world, but his only hope was confidence in the Lord.
When we have lived long enough through the years and may have escaped the clutches of the giant of temptations, it’s reasonable to think that we have fought that battle enough to be done with it. But we know it almost never is. That particular giant may not return, but there will be likely others. And we have to take all giants seriously because the goal of each seems to be our destruction.
If, early on, we battle a giant called temptation, we may, in midlife battle one called discouragement, and later on, one called bitterness or loneliness. Or, we may face the soul-crushing depression that follows a marital breakup or the death of a loved one or the self-destructive behavior of one of our children. We may face the terror of life-threatening illness, or as is certainly possible in today’s economy, the loss of our job and the evaporation of the resources we expected to carry us through our later years. When these giants that come associated with the different phases of life, we would need to remain undaunted as David was. With no armor or spear or Blue Shield of California protecting us, we would need to learn how to trust the Lord.
And like David who only had meager tools to work with namely his sling and 5 smooth stones, we would need to find the right stone from the right slingshot to bring down these giants. Maybe the right stones can come from the brook of medicine or counseling or friendship or courage or hard work or prayer.
Sometimes we may need to admit to the fact that we don’t possess the right stone ourselves. David took care of Goliath by himself, but he needed the help of his troops with the subsequent giants. Our troops include our friends and family who stand by us, professionals whose services and skills can help, our faith community and the event of healing that comes with time away from the giant.
There are also times when the right stone is helping somebody else fight their giant. We can find help for ourselves when we actually help others. Another thing that may help us in dealing with giants is to remember that frightening though they are, our giants can shape us for the better. The giants in our lives can shape us and help us to mature and become better persons.
David is not the only biblical character who faced giants in his life. Job had three giants to overcome. The first was losing his children and his possessions. The second was losing his health. The third was the realization that he didn’t deserve anything that had happened to him, while his friends assumed he was getting what he deserved. Job didn’t really overcome any of those three fearful giants until he heard from God and saw the larger picture.
Jesus, too, had plenty of giants to face. After his baptism and hearing the affirming words from heaven, Jesus had to go wrestle giant temptations in the desert. And after defeating those, other giants kept coming. Jesus was challenged with the reality that, “Birds have nests and foxes have dens, but the Son of Man doesn’t even have a place to lay his head.” Jesus saw the cross looming and expecting someone close to him to betray him. And finally, Jesus faced the crucifixion that left him hanging on the cross for three hours. And after the resurrection that brought glory to God, Jesus still had to face the giants of disbelief, suspicion, and persecution to his followers.
For us to face the giants that seem to keep coming in our own lives, we can take Jesus seriously when he tells us to pray, “Give us this day our daily bread.” Did you know that the only scripted prayer that the Amish people pray is the Lord’s Prayer? And when the Amish parents whose children were murdered in the Nickel Mines school slaying, their understanding of the phrase in the Lord’s Prayer, “Forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors,” called these grieving parents to forgive the killer immediately. These bereaved parents also had to fight the giants of grief and resentment and anger every day. The Amish community found strength from their prayer and their community that made it possible for them to defeat these horrible giants.
Giants Facing FCBC
All of us can identify the giants that keep coming in our personal and family lives. But the church face giants all the time too. Let me identify some for you.
Later this afternoon, we’ll be voting to approve the recommendation to call Visal Sok as our new Associate Pastor. Visal’s fresh ideas and youthful leadership will undoubtedly challenge and may even threaten our familiar and comfortable ways. You may become afraid of how God is leading him and our church into new and different worlds to do ministries.
With the expected opening of the new City College campus in Chinatown, our classrooms will stand empty during the weekdays—mornings, afternoons, and evenings. We are facing the gigantic challenge of how to utilize our facilities to expand and enhance our church’s mission. We invite you to discern with us on how best to use our church facilities to do God’s work in Chinatown.
Based on many indicators, the city is moving toward the decision to activate parking meters on Sundays and at least beginning at noon on Sundays. This is a huge giant that we’ll need to face since it may affect our ability to come to church to worship, attend SS classes, and to meet for meetings and fellowships afterward. Will we allow this giant of parking costs destroy our church’s ability to thrive and continue to be faithful servants in Christ?
What Are We Afraid of?
What are you afraid of? Most of our fears are less ominous than David’s, but we do have some Goliath-sized worries. We live in a frightening world. We are frightened about what will happen to our children. We are frightened for the people we love. We are afraid of what will happen to us. Nobody knows the fear we feel inside. The people we love may die too soon. We have figured out that angels do not keep good people from getting hurt. Bullets, cancers, and disappointments hit saints and sinners alike. Sorrows forever threaten to overwhelm us. God does not promise that we will not have trouble. Goliath keeps coming back.
But when we decide to leave the supposed safety of the sidelines, then, like David, we will discover that God will give us courage and hope. If our love for God is greater than our desire for security, then in a world where people are increasingly afraid of one another, we will love courageously. Where people think first of how to stay away from any danger, we will act like family even toward those who are afraid to love us back.
The giants may keep coming; they may damage us and there may be some losses. But, with God’s help, we as a beloved community of God and with the right stones, ultimately will prevail.
Courage becomes a way of life. We learn that courage is not the absence of fear, but the faith to confront our fears. If we take a step into our own Valley of Elah, God will give us the courage to take another step. God is bigger than our fears and the giants that keep coming.
Let us pray.
O God, the giants that are set to destroy us are less powerful than you and your love for us. Teach us to have a simple faith and confidence in you, inspire us to be undaunted and be steadfast, and show us as your faithful community to use the necessary tools and the right stones to persevere. We pray in the name of Jesus Christ who defeated the giant of death in order for us to have everlasting life, Amen.