Slaying Your Giants

“Slaying Your Giants”

Introduction:

Dr. Howard, from Australia was a man that preached very strongly on the subject of sin. After the service, a member of the church came to counsel with him in his office. "Dr. Howard," he said, "we don’t want you to talk as openly as you do about man’s guilt and corruption, because if our boys and girls hear you discussing that subject they will more easily become sinners. Call it a mistake if you will, but do not speak so plainly about sin. "The minister took down a small bottle and showing it to the visitor said, "You see that label? It says strychnine -- and underneath in bold, red letters the word ’Poison!’ Do you know, what you are asking me to do? You are suggesting that I change the label. Suppose I do, and paste over it the words, ’Peppermint’; don’t you see what might happen? Someone would use it, not knowing the danger involved, and would certainly die. So it is, too, with the matter of sin. The milder you make your label, the more dangerous you make your poison!"

I want you to know today of the danger and struggle that we all have with sin. Sin is something that we all deal with on a daily basis. We are in a spiritual war, and the Devil tries to tempt us fall into sin, because it is sin that separates from God. We all have different struggles that we face, and I want you to know today that those struggles are possible to overcome and conquer.

I do not know where you stand in your struggle with sin this morning. Perhaps today you come here with a guilty conscience for things that you have done. Perhaps you feel unworthy of the God that has been so merciful and good to you. Perhaps you feel overwhelmed and trapped by certain struggles that you have been dealing with. Maybe those struggles have been a part of your life for a long time, and you just cannot shake that habit. Sin is tough to remove, and impossible to overcome without the help of God. Perhaps today you come calloused, perhaps your sin has been something that you have dealt with for so long it doesn’t even phase you. Perhaps you are self-deceived and you have convinced yourself that your sins are not that big of a deal. Perhaps you feel that your struggles are not that huge and that they are just little sins, and that you are not nearly as bad as some people. Perhaps you feel that you are not really a big sinner, but I want you to know today that we all have sin that we are dealing with. Right now if we were to all write a list of sins that are a part of our lives currently we would probably cover a lot of ground and maybe be shocked by what we saw. I want you to know today that we are not bound to our sin; we are not any longer enslaved to our sin.

Sin really hurts, or at least this morning I hope that we are real enough and honest enough with ourselves to admit that sin happens in our lives. It is never acceptable and justifiable, but we are sinners saved by grace. This morning though I hope that your sin still bothers you. I hope you feel conviction when you sin. You see, it is when we think that we are all right, when we think that we have conquered our struggles that we are actually on a slippery slope. The Scripture says, “Let he who thinks he stand take heed lest, he falls.

This morning our sins are giants, and they are a real foe that we must overcome, a real obstacle. This morning I want to do some giant slaying.

Text: I Samuel 17:32-51

We may not like David, stand in battle against a giant like Goliath, but everywhere we turn we face a different giant. Giants at work, giants at home, giants in the world, giants in the church, and giants when we are alone. Our giants are our toughest battles. If you look honestly today, you will realize you have some battles you may need to deal with.

I. Our Giants Can Be Intimidating

For David and the people of Israel I cannot imagine how intimidating that 9-foot giant must have been. Goliath stood tall over everyone else and the odds were against anyone defeating Goliath in battle because he was well trained. Goliath was so large that his armor weighed 125 pounds alone. The text tells us that David was just a boy and he was probably not the biggest fellow in Israel, in fact Saul’s armor was too big for David to use. Going into battle against such odds and against such a strong enemy must have been intimidating.