Developing a Heart For God
1 Samuel 17 (David Vs. Goliath)
There are a lot of people these days who are full of fear.
Fearful of health problems,
fearful of failure,
fearful of physical violence,
fearful about relationships,
fearful about finances,
fearful about the future.
Psychologists tell us that our nation that is overloaded with fears.
Without even mentioning the obvious fears of terrorism or disease,
We also see every kind of phobia from autophobia to monophobia.
Autophobia is the fear of self.
Monophobia is the fear of being alone.
Then there’s automonophobia – the fear of being alone with yourself.
All kind of phobias.
There’s even cheriphobia—
cheriphobia is the fear of FUN.
The fear of having a good time.
Of course, many people think Christians have that phobia...
and I’m afraid some of them do!
Fortunately not at this church.
In fact,
(Some of us in this church suffer from Baptistophobia – fear of having to go back to the church we grew up in where everyone looked like they drank too much prune juice.)
Well David knew all about fear and the challenge of overcoming his fears.
In the 23rd Psalm he wrote...
Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil.
But I have to think that,
when David was facing Goliath he must have had at least a little bit of FEE-FI-phobia—
which, of course, is the fear of giants.
There was a good reason to be afraid of Goliath.
Let me just say that
Goliath would have been a very high draft pick in the NFL.
I’m willing to bet that with a guy like him,
even the Bengals could win a few games.
There’s a description of him in 1 Sam. 17:4
He’s over nine feet tall.
He had a bronze helmet and armor that weighed over 125 pounds.
His spear shaft was like a weaver’s rod,
and it’s iron point weighed 15 pounds.
Lets put that in perspective.
Anybody here ever throw the shotput?
High School Shotput 12 pounds,
In college or the Olympic its 16 pounds,
and these huge guys can throw it about 70 feet.
On Goliaths spear, just the tip alone weighed as much as a shotput.
That tip was attached to a shaft as big as a weaver’s beam.
That thing was heavy.
Now why does the Bible give such a detailed description,
of Goliath’s size and strength?
The whole point is to show how unevenly matched David was,
against this guy.
In fact,
have you ever thought about how this fight would sound
if it were being broadcast by ESPN.
Ladies and Gentlemen,
welcome to the Valley of Elah Arena for this afternoon’s feature event – Let’s get ready to rumble!!!
Introducing first, the challenger, fighting out of the Israelite camp,
he stands 5’6" and weighs 124 pounds.
He’s a poet and a musician,
he’s called a man after God’s own heart.
Wearing the white tunic,
here he is, DAAAvid!
His opponent,
fighting out of the Philistine camp,
he stands 9’9" tall and weighs 438 pounds.
He brings a record of 92 wins and no defeats – all victories coming by knockout and decapitation,
The heavyweight champeeeen of the world – give it up for, GO-LI-ATH!!!
Not a very even match.
This story is so well known that,
the very idea of "Goliath" has come to represent any force or challenge that seems to be impossible to overcome.
I did an internet search on david vs. goliath
and I couldn’t even find any listings that were about the actual bible story,
They were all things like,
a small high school basketball team taking on a huge school,
a little computer company competing with Dell,
a small businessman fighting the IRS.
Anyone facing impossible odds,
is facing a Goliath.
And the truth is,
all of us face "Goliaths" in our lives from time to time—
Let me give you 3 characteristics of a "Goliath"...
#1 A "Goliath" is a problem that is bigger than you are!
You look at it and it just seems impossible!
Just like Goliath was bigger than David,
our "Goliaths" are difficulties that seem more than we can handle!
#2 A "Goliath" laughs at you and defies your power to defeat it.
A "Goliath-size problem" says,
"You can’t conquer me!
You’re too weak and small to take on something as big as me!"
#3 A "Goliath" has a way of forcing you to rely on God.
If you’re facing a seemingly impossible situation then the best alternative you’ve got,
is to look to someone who is bigger than ANY problem– and that, of course, is God.
Now in this story,
Goliath challenged the army of Israel
to send somebody out to fight him.
and the obvious guy to face Goliath was Saul.
Because Saul was a big guy too.
The Bible says He stood head and shoulders above all the Israelites,
But Saul was not eager to take on Goliath.
In fact it says in verse 11 that Saul and his army were terrified and deeply shaken.
Since Saul didn’t want to fight Goliath,
he offered a compensation package.
He said, "Any soldier in Israel who fights Goliath,
I’ll let you marry my daughter I’ll give you great wealth and I’ll even give you tax-exempt status for the rest of your life,
which of course probably wouldn’t have been for very long.
But nobody would volunteer.
So for 40 days Goliath kept up this challenge,
and he’s taunting and making fun of the Israelites.
Meanwhile, 10 or 15 miles away in the little town of Bethlehem, is David, who at this point has already been secretly anointed as the next king
by the prophet Samuel,
but nobody except his family knows about it so David has gone back to shepherding.
But on the 41st day of Goliaths challenge,
David’s father tells him to take some food out to the battlefront because three of his older brothers are there in the army.
And that kicks off this story of a skinny young teenager,
who is going to take on a task that nobody else would.
On the 41st day,
the history of Saul and Goliath and David and Israel would change forever because of a little shepherd boy with a skinny body but an unbelievably bold heart.
This is really a story of the building of a bold heart.
How did David get to be the way he was?
I think everybody in this room wants to live with a bold heart.
I think all of us would like to show the kind of courage that David does in this story.
But when you look closely at this story,
one of the things you’ll discover is it takes time to grow a bold heart.
David’s boldness had to start being built a long time before this 41st day,
this challenge of Goliath.
The truth is,
when you face your moment of crisis,
when you face your Goliath moment — you will not be able to just develop a bold heart out of the blue.
It doesn’t happen that way.
If you wait until you’re facing your Goliath,
you probably won’t do too well.
A bold heart needs to get built over time,
God used the situations of everyday life
to build in David a bold heart.
So I want to look this morning at four stages,
four sets of circumstances,
that cause you either to lose heart or enable you to develop a bold heart.
The first way to develop a bold heart like David’s, is ---
1. Learn From Everyday Challenges.
By everyday challenges,
I basically mean, problems.
Now, nobody likes problems,
but they provide us with an opportunity to develop a bold heart.
All those years that David was on his own guarding sheep,
he was building a bold heart.
He talks about this in verse 34,
David is explaining to Saul
why he’s ready to take on Goliath,
and he says:
Verse 34
"I have been taking care of my father’s sheep," he said. "When a lion or a bear comes to steal a lamb from the flock, 35 I go after it with a club and take the lamb from its mouth. If the animal turns on me, I catch it by the jaw and club it to death. 36 I have done this to both lions and bears, and I’ll do it to this pagan Philistine, too, for he has defied the armies of the living God! 37 The LORD who saved me from the claws of the lion and the bear will save me from this Philistine!"
Imagine you’re David.
You’re in a field watching sheep — they’re not even yours; they’re your dad’s sheep —
and a bear comes along.
And you have no gun.
You have a big stick.
What would you do?
David could have run.
The only one to see him would have been the sheep,
and they’d never talk.
Nobody ever would have known if David had run except David and God.
But David stayed,
and David fought,
and David learned.
What did he learn?
Notice what David says in verse 37.
David doesn’t say,
"I learned that I could defeat lions and bears."
He doesn’t say,
"I learned my own sufficiency."
He says,
"I learned that God,
who delivered me from lions and bears,
can deliver me from this challenge too."
David says, "I’ve learned that---
God can deliver me from any challenge I run into,"
And I want to tell you something, folks.
You can hear "God is faithful" a thousand times,
And you can read "God is faithful" in a hundred books,
But you will only come to believe it and to really know it deep down,
when you test it out in real life,
in your life.
You’re really no different then David was.
Lions and bears come against you on a daily basis.
Maybe you have a difficult project at work,
and you could procrastinate,
or bail, and get away with it.
Or you could pray,
"God, with your help, I’m going after that lion." And your heart will get a little bolder.
Maybe you face a parenting challenge.
Maybe one of your children has some behavior problems
and it’s going the wrong direction,
and it will take energy and time and patience to deal with it,
and there’s a part of you that’s tempted to just ignore that bear,
because that’s a lot easier.
You can take the easy route if you want to,
and just ignore it, a lot of people do.
Or you could say,
"God, with your help,
I’m going after that bear." And your heart will get a little bolder.
Maybe you have a difficult marriage,
and you’re tired of working on it,
it’s a lot easier to just let things go,
and settle for second best,
just let that bear have a few sheep,
and maybe nobody will notice.
Or you could pray,
"God, with your help,
I’m going after that bear I’m married to."
Maybe you’re dealing with a health problem,
and you’re tired of praying about it,
or asking others to pray,
and you have a hard time believing
that God would really heal you anyway.
You could just give up,
and give in, that’s what most people do.
Or you could say,
"God, with your help,
I’m going after that bear." I’m not going to give in to this health problem,
I’m never going to quit praying,
And your heart will get a little bolder.
You see, it was in everyday moments when nobody was watching in an unglamorous job as a shepherd that David, day after day,
built his bold heart.
If he’d waited until he faced Goliath,
he would have run with everybody else.
But he didn’t.
He took on everyday challenges — and God was faithful.
And David’s heart got real bold.
And it works the same for you and me.
That’s the first way you build a bold heart — you’ve got some everyday challenges.
If you run, you will lose heart.
If you face them,
God is faithful,
and you’ll have a bolder heart.
In Paul’s words,
2 Cor 9:25
"Everyone who competes in the games goes into strict training. They do it to get a crown that will not last; but we do it to get a crown that will last forever. Therefore I do not run like a man running aimlessly; I do not fight like a man beating the air. No, I beat my body and make it my slave so that after I have preached to others, I myself will not be disqualified for the prize...."
In other words,
the final victory is won or lost
in the daily discipline of following God.
In the Rose Bowl years ago, Michigan was playing UCLA,
its tied up 14-14 with 7 seconds to go,
Michigan sends in its field goal kicker named Dave Kaiser.
Kaiser makes the 41 yard field goal,
and Michigan wins 17-14.
And of course as Dave Kaiser comes back to the bench his teammates are jumping up and down,
and celebrating with him.
Coach Daugherty said: "Nice going, Dave,
but I noticed you didn’t watch the ball after you kicked it.
How come?"
Kaiser replied, sort of sheepishly,
"You’re right coach,
You see, I forgot my contact lenses back at the hotel.
so I couldn’t actually see the goal posts!"
so I was looking at the referee,
to see if the kick was good.
The coach was shocked and at first pretty angry that Kaiser hadn’t even told him about his contact lenses.
But after he thought it over he changed his mind.
Why shouldn’t Kaiser kick without his contact lenses?
Kaiser was a disciplined kicker and had practiced for long hours.
He knew the angles and the distance to the goal so well,
he didn’t even need to see the goalposts.
That whole process of kicking the ball was programmed into his body and mind by the every day discipline of practice.
And in that moment,
when the ball went through the goal posts,
discipline paid off.
Now think about David.
He had no military career.
All he’d ever done, is tend sheep and spend a lot of time worshiping god.
So where was his training?
That was his training!
Spending time with God everyday,
worshipping him,
getting to know him,
and letting God help him with the challenges of everyday life.
That was his training.
That’s how you develop a heart like David’s.
Now in this story we see a second area in developing a heart for God.
2. Overcome Criticism and Opposition.
David comes on to the battlefield,
and he sees Goliath there.
He asks those who are standing near,
Verse 26
"What will a man get for killing this Philistine and putting an end to his abuse of Israel?" he asked them. "Who is this pagan Philistine anyway, that he is allowed to defy the armies of the living God?" 27 And David received the same reply as before: "What you have been hearing is true. That is the reward for killing the giant." 28 But when David’s oldest brother, Eliab, heard David talking to the men, he was angry. "What are you doing around here anyway?" he demanded. "What about those few sheep you’re supposed to be taking care of? I know about your pride and dishonesty. You just want to see the battle!"
Now these are all cheap shots at David.
David had been sent by his father.
He didn’t come on his own,
it wasn’t his idea.
He was just being obedient.
But Eliab criticizes him unfairly.
Now, how do you respond to that?
Well, David could have a lot of time and energy fighting his own brother,
defending himself,
and arguing his case.
I would have been tempted to do that,
but David doesn’t,
David knows who the real enemy is.
he knows this is not the story of David and Eliab — this is the story of David and Goliath.
Look at verse 29.
This is all David says,
29 "What have I done now?" David replied. "I was only asking a question!" He walked over to some others and asked them the same thing.
David doesn’t react to the criticism, and fight,
he just turns away and goes to someone else.
He doesn’t give in to Eliab,
he doesn’t say, you’re right, I’m a bad person.
but he doesn’t go get the slingshot either.
He just brushes it off.
He just doesn’t allow unfair criticism to have any power in his life.
He gets on with his mission.
He just says,
"God has something for me to do,
and I’m not going to get sidetracked."
And each time he does that,
his heart gets a little bolder.
So, let me ask you: How do you react to criticism?
How do you handle it?
All criticism falls into 1 of 2 categories: either it’s accurate or it’s inaccurate,
And it’s just such a simple thing to deal with it.
If it’s inaccurate,
just dismiss it and move on, turn away,
you don’t have to defend yourself and fight.
If it’s accurate,
then fix what needs to get fixed and then move on.
But either way,
don’t let it cause you to lose heart.
I see people all the time that get sidetracked by criticism and opposition,
and they lose their focus
they lose their effectiveness
they lose their joy and their peace.
The fact is criticism isn’t necessarily bad.
If its true, you need it,
and if its not true
then it’s a great opportunity for developing a bold heart.
But the worst thing you can do
is wasting precious energy fighting the wrong enemy.
We may have difficult people in our families,
but they’re not the enemy,
even if they do criticize you.
If David wasted his time fighting his brother Eliab,
he would have never gotten to Goliath.
You build a bold heart by overcoming criticisms and obstacles.
There’s a third test that David meets.
You build a bold heart when you 3. Resist Pressure To Conform.
Look at verse 38.
It’s kind of a funny scene.
King Saul agrees to let David go up against Goliath
and it says,
Then Saul gave David his own armor--a bronze helmet and a coat of mail. 39 David put it on, strapped the sword over it, and took a step or two to see what it was like, for he had never worn such things before. "I can’t go in these," he protested. "I’m not used to them." So he took them off again. 40 He picked up five smooth stones from a stream and put them in his shepherd’s bag. Then, armed only with his shepherd’s staff and sling, he started across to fight Goliath.
So what happens is,
Saul gets out all his best stuff,
his championship armor,
and he puts it on David,
and David can’t even walk.
The problem is, "Saul wears a 52 long,
David is like a 36 short."
So David has to do a real bold thing.
He has to tell the king,
your way is wrong for me.
I know better what I need.
Remember, Saul is the king,
and he’s an experienced warrior.
and David is just a lowly subject,
a teenage shepherd boy,
who’s never been in a battle in his life.
It would have been very easy for David to say,
"You know, Saul knows more than me.
He has been at this a lot longer.
I’ll do it his way."
But David knew something really important.
He tells us in verse 47
the LORD does not need weapons to rescue his people. It is his battle, not ours…
You see, David knew that when he went to face Goliath,
there was going to be nobody with him, but God.
Saul was not going to be there then.
David’s brothers were not going to be there.
His dad, Jesse, was not going to be there.
David was going to be alone.
When you go to face Goliath,
although you may have wonderful friends in your life,
and loving family members,
in a very real sense when you go to face your Goliath you stand alone.
You and God, against the challenge.
When you’re going up against the real Goliaths in your life,
your friends and family aren’t strong enough to make you win.
Only God is strong enough.
And David understood that though Saul was trying to help,
Saul’s help would really keep him from doing his mission the way that God had prepared David to do it,
that Saul would try to turn David into kind of a miniature version of himself,
using his weapons.
And David was not called to be a little Saul.
We live in a world that just puts pressure on us,
like Saul put it on David.
There’s pressure on you,
to conform to the people around you.
Maybe people at your workplace gossip,
or constantly criticize,
or fudge on their work hours,
or do something else unethical,
and you feel pressure to fit in, and conform.
God longs for people that have a bold enough heart not to be squeezed by the world.
who have a bold enough heart to say, "No” to all that.
Maybe you know somebody who doesn’t know God and needs desperately to have someone love him and pray for him and share his or her faith with him.
But because of pressure,
you’ve just shrunk back,
God’s looking for somebody whose heart is bold enough to say,
"I’m going to share my life and my faith with you.
And I’ll do it in a sensitive manner,
but even if you do reject me, It won’t kill me, I can handle it."
Paul says, in Rom. 12
"Don’t let the world squeeze you into its mold."
God just loves it when people follow him with hearts that are bold enough to withstand the pressure that this world puts on us.
The last circumstance we see in this story of David,
the fourth stage in building a bold heart.
4. Stay Faithful in the Crisis Moments of Life.
David goes out to fight Goliath.
Look at verse 41.
41 Goliath walked out toward David with his shield bearer ahead of him, 42 sneering in contempt at this ruddy-faced boy. 43 "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. 44 "Come over here, and I’ll give your flesh to the birds and wild animals!" Goliath yelled.
He was just trash talking here.
Just think, pro wrestling.
Same big talk before the match starts.
But David responds differently.
He didn’t say,
"Goliath, I’m bigger and tougher than you are."
No. Look at verse 45.
David shouted in reply, "You come to me with sword, spear, and javelin, but I come to you in the name of the LORD Almighty--the God of the armies of Israel, whom you have defied. 46 Today the LORD will conquer you, and I will kill you and cut off your head. And then I will give the dead bodies of your men to the birds and wild animals, and the whole world will know that there is a God in Israel! 47 And everyone will know that the LORD does not need weapons to rescue his people. It is his battle, not ours. The LORD will give you to us!"
Lets go ahead and finish the story.
48 As Goliath moved closer to attack, David quickly ran out to meet him. 49 Reaching into his shepherd’s bag and taking out a stone, he hurled it from his sling and hit the Philistine in the forehead. The stone sank in, and Goliath stumbled and fell face downward to the ground. 50 So David triumphed over the Philistine giant with only a stone and sling. And since he had no sword, 51 he ran over and pulled Goliath’s sword from its sheath. David used it to kill the giant and cut off his head. When the Philistines saw that their champion was dead, they turned and ran. 52 Then the Israelites gave a great shout of triumph and rushed after the Philistines, chasing them as far as Gath and the gates of Ekron.
Goliath had been through a lot of battles before.
He had been a fighting man since his youth,
but he had never faced something like this before.
Imagine Goliath’s shock.
Here’s a skinny kid — no armor,
no sword, no javelin, no spear,
He hurls a single rock,
and it’s all over.
Goliath never expected that.
He was ready for a lot of stuff,
but he never expected that.
In fact,
Do you know what the last thought of Goliath was,
just as the rock hit him?
"Nothing like this ever entered my mind."
Jim Croce wrote a song in the mid 70’s that went like this… You don’t tug on Superman’s cape.
You don’t spit into the wind.
You don’t pull the mask off the ol’ Lone Ranger,
and you don’t mess around with Jim.
But one day,
Jim insults another man by the name of Slim and Jim found out that you don’t mess around with Slim.
In this story,
Goliath found out that you don’t mess with someone with the Spirit of God on their life.
The summary of the whole story is here in verse 45.
David says,
45 "You come at 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." 47….. the LORD does not need weapons to rescue his people. It is his battle, not ours.
I used to work in New York city And near the RCA building on Fifth Avenue.
in the entrance of that building is a huge statue of Atlas,
the muscular giant, who
with all his muscles straining,
is holding the world upon his shoulders.
There he is,
the most powerfully built man in the world,
and he can barely stand up under his burden.
But on the other side of Fifth Avenue is St. Patrick’s Cathedral,
and there behind the altar is a another statue, of Jesus as a boy,
maybe 8 or 9 years old,
and with no effort at all,
he is holding the world in one hand.”
Who would you rather have
holding your world together?
The truth is,
we have a choice every day.
Who are we going to trust?
Who are we relying on to defeat our giants?
Who are we counting on to carry our burdens?
When that crisis moment comes,
am I going to continue to trust,
and place my burdens in God’s hands,
and depend on him.
Am I going to let the crisis get me down,
and defeat me,
and make me give up,
and get discouraged and depressed,
or am I going to immediately turn to God in faith,
and say to my giant problem,
"You come at 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."
….. the LORD does not need weapons to rescue his people. It is his battle, not mine.
When that crisis moment comes,
will you stay faithful and fight the battle in God’s strength,
or will you run?
I believe that every follower of Christ
actually needs to occasionally stand toe-to-toe with a "Goliath."
Just so we have an opportunity to grow in faith,
and we have an opportunity
to depend on God alone,
because the problem is too big for us.
So what "Goliath" are you facing?
Maybe it’s your job.
Maybe it’s becoming unbearable – And you’d change jobs in a heartbeat if you could,
but it’s just not that simple.
Or maybe your " impossible situation" is the financial picture in your life right now.
You’re in debt and you’re not sure how you’re going to dig your way out.
I know several people in our church
are facing Goliath in the area of their health,
and they’re overwhelmed, and worried, and unsure of the future,
It’s not enough to come at the Goliath of cancer with chemo or surgery or radiation alone,
but it’s possible to come in the name of the Lord God Almighty,
and sickness has no answer to that.
Your Goliath could be your marriage,
or the challenge of raising your kids.
Or for others,
maybe your "Goliath" is that one sin or habit that’s got you by the throat and you can’t seem to free yourself of it no matter how hard you try.
I don’t know what you face today,
but I do know this.
It’s in the same category as a sword, spear and javelin.
Because David said,
"You come at 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,
Your goliath, your seemingly impossible problem,
is nothing that the Lord God can’t handle,
and its his battle,
if you’ll let him fight it for you.
What God did for David,
God can do for you.
And I also know this about your Goliath: I know that if you let your Goliath intimidate you,
if you let him convince you that you’re helpless,
if you run away day after day like the Israelites did,
then you will die a little every day of your life.
You’ll lose heart.
and your life is too precious to God,
and the battle is too important for you to go down that road.
But, if you turn, and you face your Goliath with one small stone and confidence in God,
then your Goliath doesn’t stand a chance because, one little stone in the power of God is stronger than anything this world can throw against you.
You see folks,
this is not just a story about David’s courage or David’s skill with the sling or David’s willingness to take a risk.
This is a story about God.
And the story of your life is not a story about your courage, or your skill or your willingness to take a risk.
But your life is, if you’ll let it be,
a story about God and the power that God wants to unleash
in your life, in your battle.
God is still in the business of delivering bold-hearted Davids from giant Goliaths.
So, I want to ask you to commit right now, this week,
that you will live with bold confidence in God.
the kind of confidence that,
when that ugly Goliath raises his head, you say this to him,
“This day the Lord will hand you over to me,
and I’ll strike you down and cut off your head.”
Now you can’t do that alone...
in your own power,
But God never asked you to do it alone.......
He’s saying right now,
Let me do, what you can’t do.....
Trust me.... Put your faith in me...... Depend on me.
