So, the challenge is to any Bible student to come to the story of the scripture is to. Keep it real. I mean, if you go to the story where Jesus raised people from the dead, and you know he doesn't always do this, you gotta face these things and find. an application that is meaningful enough to be useful to God. It has been useful over the centuries because countless multitudes have been saved.
Through these Bible stories. and many at the time that they took place. This is Cross-Reference Radio with our pastor and teacher, Rick Gaston. Rick is the pastor of Calvary Chapel, Mechanicsville. Pastor Rick is currently teaching through the book of 1 Samuel.
Please stay with us after today's message to hear more information about Cross-Reference Radio, specifically, how you can get a free copy of this teaching. But for now, let's join Pastor Rick in the book of 1 Samuel chapter 17 with today's edition of Cross-Reference Radio. 1 Samuel chapter 17, we will not get the entire chapter. but we'll get as much of it as we can. Probably one of the most exciting chapters in all the Old Testament.
Verse one Now the Philistines gathered their armies together to battle, and were gathered at Sokol, which belongs to Judah. They encamped between so called Ezeka and Ef Damin Efiz Damin. That's out of the way.
Well, the Philistines are likely the inveterate enemies of the Jews, looking to.
sort of even the score after taking the beating that was initiated some time back. through Jonathan, And we don't know how much time has passed. Israel has formed a standing army, they're much stronger. And uh here they are going to meet at the Valley of Elah. Verse 2.
And Saul and the men of Israel were gathered together. And they encamped in the valley of Elah, and drew up in battle array against the Philistines.
Well, Saul had At least a thousand with him initially before Jonathan. This started the battle before. Verse 18 will also give us an indication that they're Wait a se Large army here. That will provide witnesses for what we know is going to happen. There are going to be a lot of people.
Who watched David bring down the giant. Oh, did I spoil the story for anyone? We have this army of witnesses, and what really, what good is what we do if the glory doesn't get to God? That's what we're after. That is one of the prizes of serving.
The Lord Jesus Christ is bringing glory to Him, but it's a blood-stained road. And to think that Christianity is just this nice, smooth Bible study is to be. delusional. Uh it is uh it is loaded with stress. Faith is not easy.
One of the beautiful things about heaven is there'll be no faith necessary. It will all be done, all behind us. We will be in a matured. The most matured state of all as beings because of what Jesus has done and what we've gone through in this life. Verse 3 The Philistines stood on a mountain on one side, and Israel stood on a mountain on the other side.
With a valley between them.
So here we have the stalemate. The standoff. Neither army wanted to attack because it would have put them at the disadvantage of fighting uphill.
So they just kind of stalled there. Verse 4 now. And a champion Went out from the camp of the Philistines, near Named Goliath from Gath. whose height was six cubits and a span.
Well, it's Cubit, so it sounds like you know how you would measure a Martian. He was a cubit tall. All right, well, some people like that kind of humor. I guess they're not here tonight. But anyway.
Here, Goliath is certainly larger than Samson, but inferior to Samson. And uh he is Shows up and larger than life. He was very good with a heavy sword, just not good at dodging rocks, as we'll find out. But this height nine foot six inches thereabout.
Some of the modern commentators try to walk this back. They point to the Septuagint, to the scrolls at and to uh Josephus, the Jewish historian. But that doesn't, it's not consistent with other giants in the Bible. I'm not talking about those of Genesis 6 because I do not take the sci-fi approach to that verse. I believe those were.
People who were just enslaving everybody else, the giants in the land as far as their power, but as far as literal giants go. For instance, The king King Og of the Ammonites Uh he was uh his bed. We're not told how tall he was. We're told his bed was 13 feet long.
Well, you wouldn't, I mean, it wasn't just he just like long, you know, California king or something. He just was probably very tall. And most of the commentators don't walk that back when they get there. Only when they get to Goliath, do these modern commentators do that. Then there was an Egyptian who was seven foot five inches tall, in First Chronicles eleven.
Again, no one tries to walk that back.
So I'm not. I believe he was over nine foot tall. I believe he was scouted by the MBA, but But National Basketball Association for you soccer fans. Anyway, We that's all the humor tonight.
Now after this we're going to get There's no more laughing, please stop. All right, verse five. He had a bronze helmet on his head, and was armed with a coat of mail and The weight of the coat was five thousand shekels of bronze.
Well, you want to make postal jokes at this point. They're really hard to resist, but I'm not going to. I don't want to. offend on non postal workers either. I'm kind of in a giddy mood, am I not?
All right. S let's just get it together here. The Jews are lined up for war, and this giant struts out every day, and he verbally. Harassing them. He's heavily armed, he's got body armor, I mean real body armor.
and his nasty disposition about him. In contrast to his fellow soldiers, troops, his helmet is bronze. and you probably could make a lot of stew in his helmet. The Saul, King Saul has a bronze helmet also. They were rare.
This one, of course. was deemed worthy to wear a bronze helmet and Uh so he's not only big and strong, that's important because the weight of his armor Is over 130 pounds. Just the coat of mail and the spearhead that he's carrying. He's up around 140 pounds already, and that's why. After David killed him, They and took his armor, someone weighed it and made a record of it.
for others because it was quite impressive. 500 shekels, we're told that's about 125 pounds. Uh the spearhead uh is fifteen pounds. Imagine if that thing was slammed into you. Uh so Here we have this strong man who is also a very tall, because you can be of course very tall and not so strong.
In verse 6, And he had bronze armor on his legs and a bronze javelin between his shoulders. And so he has what we would call shin guards. made of a lighter metal, the bronze, They've invested in his appearance like they needed to do that. But you can imagine the sun beaming off of this guy. He's glowing.
Quite impressive. This javelin between his shoulders, it's sort of over his shoulders for him to grab and throw very quickly. It's just resting between. His shoulder blades And um Again, he's got a spear, he has a sword. He's got a javelin, so he's got three ways to kill you with uh weapons.
And then he He has this heavy body armor. Uh that uh you know uh Bulletproof vest is heavy and inconvenient, but 125 pounds of metal on you is no Not easy either. Verse 7 Now the staff was of his now the staff of his spear was like a weaver's beam. and his iron spearhead weighed six hundred shekels, and a shield bearer went before him, So Man-made armor will prove to be ineffective against. God-aimed missiles, the missile of David's smooth stone.
The armour won't be able to save him.
Now we read this story and we say, okay, what's the spiritual application to this? All right, so the armor of. Of the enemy of God's people. It's serious business. He's a deadly man.
And we say at the end, yes, but it cannot save him.
Well, in this case, it did not. But if we go out in real life and we expect the battles that we face to be smooth as David's, It's not most of the time going to be that way. This the helmet that he wore, of course, is not the helmet of salvation. It's not the breastplate of righteousness. We notice these things.
We may comment on them because we're looking for something. We want some lesson from God to apply to our own lives that we can use on the battlefield of our lives and not just read about them. In the history of this great man of God. At the end, we know we win, but what happens until we get to the end? It's that fight of that vicious fight oftentimes of faith.
In my life, there have been easy fights of faith, and there have been some very, very tough ones. The shield bearer, the esquire, He carried this man's heavy shield, To help preserve the enemy of the giant for when he's actually in going to engage in action against his opponent. And what We clearly, the story is telling us that the enemies we face in life can be. uh protected by immense shields.
Well, that's encouraging. Course it's not encouraging. The encouraging part is that I'm still called to engage the giant. And not just sit on the sidelines as the story goes, because. Were it not for David, nothing would have happened, nothing good.
And so Verse 8, keep hopefully bringing out things. I'll pause here and reading many of the commentators.
Some of them are a little flowery. And there's just idyllic language, it's like, ooh, that's beautiful, but it's not real.
So the challenge is to any Bible student to come to the story of the Scripture is to Keep it real. I mean, if you go to the story where Jesus raised people from the dead, and you know he doesn't always do this, you got to face these things and find. an application that is meaningful enough to be useful to God. It has been useful over the centuries because Countless multitudes have been saved. Through these Bible stories.
And many at the time that they took place. Verse 8 now. Then he stood and cried out to the armies of Israel and said to them, Why have you come out of the out to line up for battle. Am I not a Philistine? And you, the servants of Saul?
Choose a man for yourselves and let him come down to me. Nobody Couldn't choose anybody. All right, who any volunteers? And it's just nothing.
Well, the world is full of tough guys. I mean, really tough guys who are bad, also. And they have big mouths. and the giant, naturally impressive, spiritually unexciting. And you got to keep that in mind, or else we lose heart, we lose courage.
How much courage do we need? Enough to get to the victory. That's how much we need. And the slapping around that we take in the midst of that is that's the battle. That's why sometimes I cringe when I hear people talk about prayer warriors, because it's nothing.
Romantic about war, physical or spiritual. And the giant, as I mentioned, impressive. The Jews could not choose a man good enough to face him. any more than they could choose a king good enough to rule over them. The champion, God did supply the champion to face the giant.
He's done it many times in the scripture. He supplied Esther and Mordecai.
Well, really, Mordecai started the whole thing, but Esther was certainly she became one of the heroines of the scripture. And then, of course, there is our Jesus, who is Our champion. And now verse nine. If he is able to fight with me and kill me, then we will be your servants but if I prevail against him and kill him, then you shall be our servants and serve us. Dreadful consequences It's not a game.
This really happened. still happens to some degree in some way to us at some point in life we are faced with something that offers dreadful consequences and we are either going to face it or be enslaved by it. And Yeah. This uh now I don't know really what would have happened. Probably if they sent the giant champion of the Jews out and he was slain, the Jews probably would have just ran for their homes.
Um or they would have stood and fight, which was not very likely.
So it's an awful picture we have here. Verse 10. And the Philistines said, I defy the armies of Israel this day. Give me a man that we may fight together. This is the voice of the flesh.
It is belligerent. It is looking for a fight against the spirit. And it's not going to quit. It has to be beaten into place. It is ready to fight the spirit to the death.
Unfortunately for this giant David will hear these same words when we get to verse 23. which will seal the fate of this man. who, when he got up in the morning in his tent, He'n put his big sandals on. He didn't realize it would be the last day of his life. Because of those words when David after David hears them.
Verse eleven When Saul and all Israel heard these words of the Philistine they were dismayed and greatly afraid.
Well, how many times do we hear Jesus say, fear not? And how many times in life do we not seem to hear him say that to us?
Sometimes he does.
Sometimes I've heard him still worry about this. I have this. And other times, I'm waiting. I'm waiting. Say it, please.
Say, I've got this. And nothing, it's just the fight. But this here, verse 11, Saul and all Israel heard these words of the Philistines, they were dismayed, they lost heart, they're greatly afraid. Saul is helpless here, as king. He's not head and shoulders over Goliath.
He was afraid it is the most common adjective applied to salt. That he's afraid. We covered this in chapter 10. We'll cover it briefly again. He was always afraid of the wrong thing.
Well, the right thing according to the flesh. not the spirit. When he was called to be king he's hiding amongst the stuff. And that's a more accurate Jewish term than equipment to stuff. Because it involved more than just it was just all sorts of things.
He was afraid in chapter 13 of the Philistine hordes. In chapter 28, again, which will be the last time he faces the Philistines in battle, it will be clearly stated he was afraid then. He was afraid of his own army. We get to chapter f fifteen. Afraid of a coup in chapter 22.
He's afraid here of Goliath, twice that will be brought out. He's afraid of David by the time we get to chapter 18. And at his death, is so afraid of The Philistines, he's afraid of death. He's uh he's just this kind of man. Why?
Because he had no instinct for God. He just wasn't interested in God. That's how he lived his life, and the record is here, bears it lay it right out. In contrast to David, who's said to be afraid of only two things, of course, he had other fears. Traffic on the way home.
Things like that. But re and seriously speaking of David, He was afraid of a situation he got himself into with King Achish of the Philistines, when he had to play like he was crazy to get out of that jam. that he brought on himself. But Saul was the cause of that. Real truly And then the other time we're told David was afraid, was of God.
Second Samuel chapter six. This is when he's moving the Ark of the Covenant. David was afraid of Yahweh that day. And he said, How can the ark of Yahweh come to me?
Well, that caused a lot of. Introspection, a lot of heart searching on David's part spiritually before God. He took on a spiritual event. And he did it the wrong way.
Someone died. It doesn't happen too much in churches nowadays. And we're gr grateful of that.
Well, Saul could only see trouble. That's what the Bible's telling us about this man. We're going to read again as we move through Samuel. We're going to read about Saul was afraid. Saul was afraid.
Saul was afraid. That's how he lived his life. Who wants a throne like that? Goliath said, You're the servants of Saul, and that's what they were: servants of Saul. They were all afraid together.
Fear is contagious. It spread through an army of men, it spread through a family. spread through an individual's body. Panic. We want to, as best we can, ready ourselves for these things.
And Scripture is telling us fear is a very real opponent. Be good to be ready for it. And David was ready, incidentally. He doesn't just show up with his hands in his pockets whistling a tune. I'll have a shot at the giant.
There's a lot to the story. We'll come to it. But when the flesh sees the work of the devil, it becomes Fearful and powerless when it looks just at what the devil is doing, what the devil is getting away with, it has no option. The flesh will panic. The spirit May be nauseated.
But it will fight. It may get knocked down and have to regroup, but it will get up and it will fight. And that's what God is looking for. Christ wanted that from his disciples. or else he would not have sent them to their deaths.
And he promised them that was they were they would be persecuted. There's no glory in being terrified, and there's no You know, we face, we have a righteous indignation that's suitable to our personality. Me, I like the idea of making the enemy pay. When I can. It's not easy.
It's easy to say it. It's another thing to do it. try to work hard for the king. to make it count against the enemy. Walking, living life, saying, Well, we don't want to get the devil upset.
He's already upset. He's gonna come at us anyway. The giant's confidence killed the confidence of the Jews. He was so cocky, so arrogant, who would dare come out against him? There's somebody that was just not interested, not interested in his confidence, had his own confidence, his righteous indignation fueled him forward.
This confidence of the giant left the people in dread, these warriors, these men of war. Discourage. Faith does provide the antidote, but Depending on the strength of the poison. The antidote's not cheap. And it'd be good for us to understand that when Paul said these words, none of these things move me, nor do I count my life dear to myself.
He had already been beat up several times. He knew what he was saying when he said this. We read these words and we say, I want to be a man like this when it's my turn to have to face death. Or something else. I mean, you know worse things than death.
is a slow death. Surviving. Cannibals who nibble. Ah! Mm-hmm.
There are slow deaths. And Paul adds to that, he says, I count my life, nor do I count my life dear to myself.
So that I may finish my race with joy. How do you do that when you think God is letting you perish? He did it. It's it's it's not magic. It's faith.
And he says to testify to the gospel of the grace of God. What grace of God? You're dying for Him. That's how the flesh thinks. Jim Elliott said ye he is no fool who Oh, I just forgot the quote.
That's why you write them down.
So I'll just make it up. You won't know. He is no fool to let go of that which he cannot keep for that which he cannot lose. goes the quote And if you don't know who Jim Elliott is, it's good to familiarize his book, um Uh I don't know we should carry it in a chapel store. It's worth reading.
Uh verse twelve.
Now David was the son of That Ephraithite of Bethlehem, Judah, whose name was Jesse, who had eight sons And the man was old, advanced in years, In the days of Saul, Now certainly the historian has compiled this information from various records and From the witnesses that were involved. And he's writing back, and he says, Jesse, it was in the days of Saul. David, the son of Jesse, has likely gone through a growth spurt. since Samuel anointed him. When he came running with his cheeks all ready and his head red hair, and he's just this young, handsome lad, the first impression he made on Samuel And well, he's probably gone through a growth spurt, we'll get to that.
You know, he's been playing in the King's Court a few times, going home back and forth. Verse 13. The three Oldest sons of Jesse had gone to follow Saul To the battle? The names of his three sons who went, To the battle were Eliab and The firstborn next to him Abinadab. and the third, Shama, Now, why don't you mothers name your boys those names?
But Anyway. These men, uh, these brothers of David, uh, they were strong men. But it was natural manhood. That's all they had. There was not the spiritual strength that was.
Had become innate, if you can say it that way, in David. According to numbers one, only men twenty years of age and older Were to be numbered for war, but we don't read of them being restricted if they were younger. Otherwise, David would have been a violation of the law to send him onto the battlefield. He's not part of the Standing Army, he's an errand boy at this point. Diakonos in the Greek.
the errand boy for the Lord. is the bondservant. Dulos. And then there is the diakonos, deacon, get our word deacon from that. We're just errand boys for the Lord and happy to be so.
Mm. Um Thanks for joining us for today's edition of Cross-Reference Radio. This is the daily radio ministry of Pastor Rick Gaston of Calvary Chapel, Mechanicsville, in Virginia. Currently, Pastor Rick is in the book of 1 Samuel. If you'd like to listen again to this or other messages or share it with someone you know, please visit crossreferenceradio.com.
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