Taming The Giants In Your Life

INTRO.Don’t you just love to hear a good story? I think everyone loves a good story. Where is the best place to go to get a good story?? Movies or TV!

Name some of your favorite movies or TV shows.

There are a couple big differences between these movies and tv shows and the stories we find in the Scriptures. First, most of these stories had no purpose and, secondly, most of them were just made up. The many Biblical stories we read in the Old and New Testaments are not just there for us to read, memorize and enjoy. It is good to read and enjoy these stories, but Biblical stories are always designed to teach principles to live by not just to tell a story.

Probably one of the most favorite Biblical story we remember is the story of David and Goliath because we like pulling for the underdog. That’s probably why Rocky and Rambo movies were so popular. Sylvester Stallone was definitely in situations where he was the underdog. David was certainly the underdog in this situation because he encountered, according to Scriptures, a nine foot nine inch champion clothed in an armor that weighed 125 pounds. This Goliath from Gath dismayed, discouraged and scared the people of God.

READ I SAMUEL 17:38-47

Everyday when you are confronted with nine foot nine situations and circumstances that you can’t handle, it is discouraging, isn’t it? When you are over-run with tests, problem=s with you parents or siblings, when relationships are rocky, when depression has overcome your mind, it’s makes you dismayed. Goliaths have that ability of changing the way you feel. When you run into difficulties of life, those things that threaten and defy, you become dismayed. When we encounter these situations or giants they try to discourage, defeat, and steal the joy out of our living.

There are at least four main principles that we can gain from the story in I Samuel 17 that can help tame the many giants in our lives no matter what form the giants take.

I. THE FIRST PRINCIPLE IS, "DON’T GO LOOKING FOR GOLIATHS, BUT BE READY WHEN THEY DO SHOW UP.

A. David’s motives for going to the Valley where the Israelites and Philistines were was simply to carry food to his brothers who were in the army.

1. We see in I Samuel 17:17-18, "Then Jesse said to David his son, ’Take now for your brothers an ephah of this roasted grain and these ten loaves, and run to the camp to your brother. Bring also these ten cuts of cheese to the commander of their thousand, and look into the welfare of your brothers, and bring back news of them.’"

2. David wasn’t searching for trouble, he was just trying to help somebody.

3. All David was trying to do was serve his brothers.

4. He was trying to do something right.

B. David, as he was assisting his brothers, overheard Goliath challenge the army of Israel.

1. Verse 23 says, "As he was talking with them, behold, the champion, the Philistine from Gath named Goliath, was coming up from the army of the Philistines, and he spoke these same words; and David heard them."

2. Notice David, minding his own business, overheard Goliath’s challenge.

3. David was doing the will of God and his father Jesse’s will when he overheard Goliath.

C. We can only face the Goliaths in our lives when we don’t create them ourselves.

1. Some of us have created our own Goliaths in our lives.

a. We have created our own messes in life.

b. We have created circumstances and situations that are tearing our lives apart and we are wondering where God is.

2. James says in James 1 that we count it all joy when we encounter various trials, not when we create various trials.

D. The first thing we must do is to make sure we are not creating the Goliaths in our lives.

1. Most of the messes we find ourselves in today have nothing to do with God but has everything to do with us.

2. ILLUSTRATION:

"Tokyo, Tokyo, Tokyo"

A fifth grade boy who had heard a sermon on persistence in prayer was praying by himself in his room one night. As his dad passed his door, he heard the boy praying over and over again, "Tokyo, Tokyo, Tokyo." The next day, the dad asked his son what we was doing. The boy replied that he had given the wrong answer on a test for the capital of Mexico, and he was praying that God would make Tokyo the capital of Mexico.

I think the boy was a little unclear on the concept, don’t you? But sometimes, we do the same. We want God to adjust to us rather than our seeking what God wants and adjusting to Him.