FROM ZERO TO HERO
HEROES TO MODEL YOUR LIFE AFTER(DAVID)
I Samuel 17:1-11, 24-25, 32-33
ILL. Rudy the movie- small kid, no athletic ability, had a dream of playing football. Went to Notre Dame and wanted to make the football team. His family said he couldn’t do it, his friends said he couldn’t do it, his school said he couldn’t do it, but his heart was too big and his determination to great to be stopped.
He made the team and worked for 4 years as the practice dummy all the while his team mates who once laughed at him now had incredible respect for him. At the end of his career in his very last game he would ever play he got in for one play and made the wait worth it.
Rudy was a hero that day. His life has been an inspiration to millions of people who have been told your not good enough, your not big enough, your not strong enough, your not smart enough. So many of us have had to take that abuse. And maybe we have quit, maybe when someone told you weren’t good enough you believed it, but I want to tell you today that what they told you is a lie. You can be a hero that impacts millions of lives for Jesus Christ.
Today we are continue our series on how to go from zero to hero in our spiritual lives. It’s not about learning to be a hero in the world’s sense. That is temporary that doesn’t last. The world’s fame last for 15 minutes, but God’s heroes last for eternity and receive a reward incomprehendible compared to any shiny trophy.
Last week was week 1. We looked at the life of Abraham and how Abraham made up the first of four main hero qualities, sacrifice.
That to be a spiritual hero we must be willing to sacrifice anything or anyone the lord ask us to. There can be nothing in our lives that stands between you and God.
Today we are looking at one of my favorite heroes in the bible, David. David, to me, is God’s Rudy. He is our spiritual Rudy. He is the guy that when you read and study about his life you are thinking, not Rudy, Rudy, Rudy, but David, David, David. He is the underdog. He is the hero that nobody thought could do it. They thought he wasn’t big enough, strong enough, skilled enough. His family and his king doubted him. But David had something that these doubters couldn’t understand. David had unfailing courage in our Almighty God. His courage and faith would help bring him victory when everyone else thought all hope was gone. And courage in God is the second quality we must obtain to become a Spiritual hero for Christ.
I Samuel 17:1
The Philistines now mustered their army for battle…Saul countered by gathering his troops…So the Philistines and Israelites faced each other on opposite hills, with the valley between them. Then Goliath, a Philistine champion…came out of the Philistine ranks to face the forces of Israel. He was a giant of a man, measuring over nine feet tall! He wore a bronze helmet and a coat of mail that weighed 150 pounds. He also wore bronze leggings, and he slung a bronze javelin over his back… his spear was as heavy and thick as a weaver’s beam, tipped with an iron spearhead that weighed fifteen pounds. An armor bearer walked ahead of him carrying a huge shield. Goliath stood and shouted across to the Israelites, "Do you need a whole army to settle this? Choose someone to fight for you, and I will represent the Philistines. We will settle this dispute in single combat! If your man is able to kill me, then we will be your slaves. But if I kill him, you will be our slaves! I defy the armies of Israel! Send me a man who will fight with me!" 24 When Saul and the Israelites heard this, they were terrified and deeply shaken. As soon as the Israelite army saw him, they began to run away in fright. "Have you seen the giant?" the men were asking. "He comes out each day to challenge Israel. And have you heard about the huge reward the king has offered to anyone who kills him?32 "Don’t worry about a thing," David told Saul. "I’ll go fight this Philistine!" "Don’t be ridiculous!" Saul replied. "There is no way you can go against this Philistine. You are only a boy, and he has been in the army since he was a boy!” 1 Samuel 17:1-11, 24-25, 32-33
The Israelites have a big problem. The Philistines prepare for battle. The Israelites hear about this and they prepare themselves as well. Then it says that both armies faced each other on opposite hills. Every time I read this I think of Braveheart. Where you have William Wallace and his militia of Scotsmen ready to fight the evil English Empire. There is the famous FREEDOM screeming scene towards the end of the movie where for awhile the two armies just stare down each other. They taunt one another, yell
insults at each other, they even have the leaders from both sides meet in the middle, but in the end both armies run towards each other in battle.
In this story you have all of that except instead of the armies finally going at each other they decide to take a different approach. They send out their champion, Goliath to represent the entire Philistine Army. They say this will be the person that we will base our futures on. If he loses we will be your slaves, if he wins you will be our slaves. They have incredible confidence in Goliath. And why shouldn’t they. He was a huge beast of a man. Scholars believe he was anywhere from 8’6”-9’2” tall. This is not unheard of. The bible talks of other giants.
And in our time we have seen it as well. Robert Wadlow Jr. who died at the age of 22 in 1940 was 8’11” tall when he died and the doctors said he was still growing. Goliath was not only tall, but he would have been incredibly strong. The armor he wore weighed 150-200 pounds. He carried a spear with a 15 pound tip, plus a sword and shield that would have fit his frame. So this man would have been incredibly intimidating.
I can’t imagine most of us would have been jumping at the chance to fight this guy. But the Israelites needed a champion or they are going to die and go into slavery. They need a hero that will come and rescue them, and the obvious choice for that hero to me would be, who else, but their King. Saul was an experienced warrior. He himself was great in size.
I Samuel 9:2 says, “He had a son named Saul, an impressive young man without equal among the Israelites—a head taller than any of the others.”
They have their champion but he is scared. The Spirit of God has left him. He has been rejected as King by God. I Samuel 16:1, “How long will you mourn for Saul, since I have rejected him as king over Israel,…vs. 14 “Now the Spirit of the Lord had departed from Saul and an evil spirit from the Lord tormented him.”
The Israelites champion is worried. He doesn’t want to fight, so he begins to try and bribe his men.
17:25 says, “Now the Israelites had been saying, do you see how this man keeps coming out? He comes out to defy Israel. The king will give great wealth to the man who kills him. He will also give him his daughter in marriage and will exempt his father’s family from taxes in Israel.”
But no one bites. For 40 days the armies would gather on opposte hills. For 40 days Goliath would come down into the valley between the armies and defy Israel. He would shout curses upon them and God and cry out for their champion to come challenge him to a fight. And everyone was scared. The Israelites had lost faith in God. They had forgotten their covenant, their spiritual promise that God had made to them.
In Exodus and Deuteronomy we see God’s promise. Exodus 23:22 says, “If you listen carefully to what he says and do all that I say, I will be an enemy to your enemies and will oppose those who oppose you.” And Deut. 3:22 says, “Do not be afraid of them; the Lord your God himself will fight for you.”
God has promised them over and over, “if you trust in me victory will be yours.”
But they had forgotten that. If I could be honest for a minute with you this is me. I spent this week pouring over this passage and listening to God speak to me through it. I don’t know what you do for fun but man I love to read this book, it is incredible to read the same thing 100 times and on that 101st you’ll see something you didn’t see before.
But I want to be honest that as I was reaing through this this week I felt guilty.
ILL. Israelites had God, had covenant, but instead they just talked. Talked about being spiritual, talked about being God’s chosen, talked about the covenant, but when it came time to put their feet with their words they froze and they failed.
I’ve done that. I will be the first to admit that, and as your pastor I will always be the first to admit I have failed, when I don’t than you need to kick me because I’ve become to arrogant. I’ve talked a good game in my life. I’ve talked about how I love God, how I would die for him. I’ve gotten angry when people cursed him, but then a challenge would come where it was time to quit talking and to get walking and instead of putting faith to my feet, I turned and ran the other way.
And I’m ashamed of that. But I just praise God that He is a God of forgiveness and that he will take a sinner that has fallen and failed him, rejected him and pick me up, brush me off and direct me down the right path.
These Israelites had lost faith. They lacked courage. They needed a champion but their choice had become a coward in hiding.
So God comes to the rescue. God teaches us a great lesson about his power. As humans we read this story or imagine ourselves there and we get this imtimidating mountain of a man that would be incredibly scary to face. God sees a little hill. Where we see swords, shields, armor, God sees as decoration.
God teaches us all a lesson when David comes on the scene. God teaches us that it doesn’t take man’s armor, or man’s weapons. It doesn’t take physical strength, or incredible skill, all it takes is faith in one God.
David teaches us how to be spiritual heroes through his unflinching courage.
DEVELOPING COURAGE TO BATTLE THE GIANTS IN YOUR LIFE
1. Be faithful with the small things
Saul said, "Send me your son David, the shepherd”. 1 Samuel 16:19
At this point no one knows who this David is. David is from Bethlehem, which of course would be the birthplace of Christ. David is the youngest of 8 brothers. The 3 oldest brothers were the fighters. They were the military men that would follow Saul into battle. David stayed behind and tended to his father’s sheep. From the beginning God blesses David.
David is one of those guys that when you look at him you don’t go, “That is the man that will kill the philistine giant with one throw and who would become the greatest earthly king in history.”
If you were to be honest and look at him than you would probably see a gentle spirited boy, with a heart for God, a love for music, and someone who loved to throw rocks around. Nothing special. The bible doesn’t say he was great in size. He had no military training. He was not versed in how to be a king. David was simple. He was unexpected and that is what God likes. God loves to take the ordinary and make them extraordinary. God loves to take the small things in life, the people who everyone doesn’t give a second glance too who everyone rejects and make them the hero.
In the beginning of Chapter 16 God sends Samuel the prophet to anoint the new king who would take Saul’s place. God says it will be one of the sons from Jesse’s family. So Samuel goes to Jesse’s home.
Samuel tells Jesse to get his sons together. They don’t know it but he is going to anoint one of them as the next king. So the brothers except David come to the sacrifice and Samuel, who doesn’t know which one is the next king, begins to guess…
I Samuel 16:6, “6 When they arrived, Samuel saw Eliab and thought, "Surely the LORD’s anointed stands here before the LORD." 7 But the LORD said to Samuel, "Do not consider his appearance or his height, for I have rejected him. The LORD does not look at the things man looks at. Man looks at the outward appearance, but the LORD looks at the heart." 8 Then Jesse called Abinadab and had him pass in front of Samuel. But Samuel said, "The LORD has not chosen this one either." 9 Jesse then had Shammah pass by, but Samuel said, "Nor has the LORD chosen this one." 10 Jesse had seven of his sons pass before Samuel, but Samuel said to him, "The LORD has not chosen these." 11 So he asked Jesse, "Are these all the sons you have?" "There is still the youngest," Jesse answered, "but he is tending the sheep." Samuel said, "Send for him; we will not sit down [a] until he arrives." 12 So he sent and had him brought in. He was ruddy, with a fine appearance and handsome features. Then the LORD said, "Rise and anoint him; he is the one." 13 So Samuel took the horn of oil and anointed him in the presence of his brothers, and from that day on the Spirit of the LORD came upon David in power. Samuel then went to Ramah.
No one thought it could possibly be David until he was last. God chooses the small things the little things in life to make great and the ones we expect, the things we think should be great never are.
We know God chooses the small things but the point is to be faithful in the small things. What do I mean by that? I mean that so many times we think the little things we do don’t matter. The little jobs or the little talents we think we have will never mean much. You know whatever gift you have, whatever talent you have is not given to you by coincidence. Its not an accident that you can sing, or that you can build, or that you can write, or paint, or repair, or pray, or preach, teach, or help, or care for others. Those may seem like small things that we put off, that we say aren’t worth pursuing, or that God couldn’t use those.
David’s small things were playing the harp and throwing rocks from a sling. In and of themselves they seem like simple hobbies, but these were his gifts that he stayed faithful to practicing. When Saul is tormented by the Spirit he calls upon David in Vs. 19 to come and play his harp. Every time David would play his harp it calmed the king down and the spirit would leave. Because of his faithfulness to this small thing David was able to get close to the king, to develop a relationship with him, and to please him to move up in the king’s ranks.
And of course another seemingly small thing was throwing the rocks from the sling. It was practicing this for years that would help defeat the giant in one throw. Be faithful in the small things, because what we see as simple, useless talents, God sees as giant killers.
2. Be mindful of past victories
David is called by his father to take food to his older brothers on the battle field. Still at this time David is seen not as a great warrior or future king but he is the errand boy. Saul uses him to play his harp, he is used to watch sheep and to run errands for his father. He arrives to the battlefield with food for his brothers and when he begins to talk to them he hears the curses of Goliath and the insults from the Philistines. He hears Goliath’s challenge, then in vs. 25 is when we see the Israelites talking about Saul’s great reward for the one who kills Goliath. But David is not interested in a reward.
David is angered at this person who would dare talk against his God. Saul sends for David because he hears about a person who is inquiring about going against this giant.
17: 32, “David said to Saul, Let no one lose heart on account of this Philistine; your servant will go and fight him. Saul replied, You are not able to go out against this philistine and fight him; you are only a boy, and he has been a fighting man from his youth.
When I read this I think of this arrogant teenage kid that sees the challenge and it’s king of like he is saying, “Alright I’m here there is nothing to be afraid of I will whip him.” But it isn’t like that. David has pure confidence not in himself but in God alone.
But David persisted. "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, 35I 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. 36I 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!
David doesn’t back down. The Spirit of the lord is on him and he knows through faith he can defeat this giant. Saul rejects him looking only at his outward appearance and thinking there is no way you can win. But remember God uses the unexpected and rejected to bring victory. Saul can’t see what God wants to do. But David knows that with God’s power it doesn’t matter who he goes against he will win.
To convince Saul to let him fight David refers to his past victories. David would have had to use his skill with his sling to ward off animals that were trying to kill his sheep. David had to prove that he was not just a boy but that he had the courage to truly do what he was volunteering to do. These past victories are reminders to him of what God has done faithfully for us.
We face challenges all the time and it can seem like every challenge is new and every challenge is something that we don’t think we will be able to overcome but David sets an example for us that we need to remember our past victories. We need to remember what God has done for us because that will give us faith for the future.
When you face a new obstacle you can look back and remember how God brought you through a tough time, how he brought someone into your life at just the right moment, how he provided for you vocationally, financially, emotionally, physically, and you can rejoice and know that because he has done it before surely when you take courage in his name as David did you can be bold and know he will do it again.
Be faithful in the small things, be mindful of past victories.
3. Be yourself (you are a creation of God)
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, 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. 1 Samuel 17:37-39
Saul wan’t getting it. He was still thinking in the flesh. He is thinking that if this boy is going to fight this giant and win he would need the best armor in all of Israel which of course would be the king’s armor. Saul tried to put his armor on David, but it didn’t work. It didn’t work because Saul’s armor did not physically fit David. Everything was too big, and David could not move well with Saul’s armor. Also, it didn’t work because Saul’s armor did not spiritually fit David. Armor, military technology, or human wisdom would not win this battle. The LORD God of Israel would win this battle.
Often, people try to fight with another person’s armor. They see God do something wonderful through someone else, and they try to copy it without really making it their own. This is never how God’s work is most effectively done. God calls us to be who he made us to be. His child, his creation, we are each unique in look, talent, skill. We can’t try to copy someone else because it won’t work for us. Instead we have to look at who God created me to be. He didn’t create us to be like another human, but to be like Him.
Our world is always looking for something to copy. There is always the next big idea to grow churches or businesses, the next great author comes out, the next great technology, the next great sports star and everyone is looking to be like everyone else. God said I made you unique. Your not supposed to be like anyone else. Your supposed to just trust in me and simply be who you are.
ii. David did not face Goliath unarmed. He had much better armor than Saul’s. Saul had a bronze helmet, but David had the helmet of salvation (Ephesians 6:17). Saul had a coat of mail, but David had a breastplate of righteousness (Ephesians 6:14). Saul had a sword, but David had the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God (Ephesians 6:17). David had the whole armor of God! (Ephesians 6:11).
He didn’t need man’s armor to win. He just needed God. He didn’t need to be like someone else but he just needed to be who he was created to be.
Be faithful in the small things, be mindful of past victories, be yourself, don’t try to imitate someone else because the armor just won’t fit…
4. Be confident in God’s power
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. 46Today 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! 47And 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!"
That is pure confidence. It’s awesome. This point here is so big to me. This is the one that matters. All these other steps can be done while you are standing on your hill and the enemy is on theirs. The first three steps can all be talked up. The first three can be bragged about on the hill top. “I was faithful in using my talents for God’s kingdom, I did this and I’ve done that with my gifts, I have faith that God will bring me through this because he has in the past, I don’t need man’s armor I just need God’s armor. I don’t need to try to follow what someone else did. That is all talk.
This is the point where you have to backup what you are talking. David doesn’t just say God will hand the giant over, he doesn’t just say he will be the one to do it, he doesn’t just talk about how God will kill the giant, he leaves the hill top and walks down to the valley and stairs the enemy straight into the face.
I love this illustration here in the story. You always hear the expression about being up on the mountain which is being in happy happy joy joy spirit land or being down in the valley, where there is challenge and hardship, faith testing and all that. And no one wants to be down in the valley, But I love what David does here. Not only does he talk a good game up on the mountain top, he wants to make sure the enemy hears him so he willingly goes down to the valley to get into the enemy’s face.
As Christians we are always waiting for the next big problem to come into our lives. It always happens that when great things are happening all of a sudden Satan will come into the picture. He tries to bring challenges and faith test to see if we truly are who we say we are. He challenges us to back up our talk.
(we believe in God, a lot of times instead of backing up our talk we cowar for the enemy, we are like the Israelites and we freeze up, we don’t know what to do, we panic. Somebody has hurt us, or we lose our job, or we don’t have any money, or we are physically hurt, or God feels like a million miles away or whatever. Go down to the valley and tell Satan to get out of God’s way. Hang on mountain top because I’ll be right back.
5. Be Thankful
Then the Israelites gave a great shout of triumph…1 Samuel 17:52
Simple as that. When God has brought you through the valley of life be thankful, when God has protected you from your giant, be thankful, when God has provided for you in time of need, lift his name up. It is not by our talents, or our abilities, or our intellect, or our strength that we succeed, it is by God’s power and God’s power alone and when we overcome we must forget the temptation to say man look what I did, and we need to say Glory to God.
How can you develop courage to defeat the giants in your life? Be faithful in the small things, be mindful of past victories, be yourself, be confident in God’s power, and be thankful. Do these 5 things and you are well on your way to being the Spiritual hero, the spiritual giant that God desires for you to be.
