In the past few weeks, I’ve examined one of the best-known stories in all of Scripture. People who don’t regularly read the Bible or even attend church are likely familiar with the story of David and Goliath. It’s a story of fear and courage … of having a purpose in life that motivates us to do what’s intimidating or scary … of conquering criticism and acting with confidence. It’s a story about overcoming our faintheartedness and the triumph of the underdog.
But in this final post, I want us to look at this story through a different lens. To explain—my brother is an ophthalmologist, and whenever I go to see him, he does all kinds of things to test my eyes. One of the things he does is put a contraption in front of them with different lenses and make me look through it and ask, “Is this one clearer, or this one?” I’m always scared of giving the wrong answer! But the result is he ends up finding the lens that will allow me to see most clearly. Our eyes change over time, and it’s only when you see through a better lens that you realize what you’ve been missing all along.
By the same token, in this post I want us to put on a different lens through which to look at the account of David and Goliath. Not that the lens we’ve been using is wrong or bad. It has served us well, and we’ve seen some things that are very worthwhile and beneficial to see. But we may not be seeing everything we’re supposed to see, or that God wants us to see. For I think there are other takeaways and understandings we can draw from this story by using another lens.
I’d contend the lens we’ve been using in previous posts is the standard lens—the traditional lens if you will. You may have seen a movie a while back called Facing the Giants. It’s a heartwarming, if somewhat predictable, story of a high school football coach of a perennially losing football team and their faith in the face of long odds. It’s an account of a man and a group of players facing obstacles and forces that are much bigger than themselves … of digging down deep and drawing on something they don’t know they have to overcome a variety of issues and challenges that are lined up against them.
This is the lens we typically use when we read the account of David and Goliath. The Philistines and the army of Israel are nose-to-nose and ready for battle, each on a hillside looking out across a valley. A Philistine soldier keeps coming out and sounding a challenge to a one-on-one duel. He’s inordinately tall, outfitted with state-of-the-art military equipment, and possesses an intimidating and antagonistic attitude. You can understand why the army of Israel was petrified. His goal was to intimidate and paralyze with fear, and he did a great job of it.
Then along comes David who’s not even supposed to be there. He’s not a member of the army. The only reason he is anywhere nearby is because his brothers were in the army and his father sent him to check in on them, deliver a care package, and bring back a report. When his brother Eliab sees him, he lays into David and criticizes him mercilessly. But David, as he learns about the situation—as he learns of the incentives King Saul has put in place to deal with this situation and as he witnesses Goliath’s insolence and disrespect for them and their God—finds himself feeling like he should step forward and do something about what’s going on. He refuses to accept that someone is defaming Israel’s God like Goliath is. Things progress to where he decides he will take on the giant and, lo and behold, he’s successful and fells him with a well-placed stone from his sling.
It’s hard not to be moved by what happened when we read this story. And it’s not difficult to look through this lens and make application to our lives. You and I are going to face giants—circumstances that are daunting and overwhelming. We’re probably going to be afraid at times, and there are some people who’ll think we aren’t capable. We may not appear to be up to the challenge, but with God on our side we can stand up to the giants in our lives.
I’m coming to believe this lens may not be the best lens through which to view the account of David and Goliath. It assumes the author of 1 Samuel 17 gave us this story so we’d emulate the example of David. And no doubt David is worthy of emulation! He acted in faith and trusted in God when everyone around him was reacting in fear and doubt. He trusted the promises of God when everyone else chose to see the obstacles as bigger than the promise. But the question we have to ask is: Did the author write this passage primarily to lift David up as a moral example for us to follow, or did he have some other purpose in mind?
The problem with this lens is we start to read the Bible as a set of moral examples to follow … as an encyclopedia loaded with stories about moral qualities we should emulate. And if we have this idea in the back of our mind, it’s very easy to see the Bible’s central message as “God blesses those who live morally exemplary lives.” If we’re not careful, we can start to make the various people in the Bible the hero rather than God.
Don’t get me wrong. David is praiseworthy here. His actions are heroic, but he’s heroic for a reason. The lens we typically use can obscure the underlying and foundational message of the Bible if we’re not careful. For the primary message of the Bible isn’t about me and what I must do; it’s about Jesus and what He has done. The main message of the Bible isn’t that God blesses morally exemplary people who get their act together and manifest courage in the face of daunting challenges. The main message of the Bible is that God, through His Son Jesus, has showered grace on unworthy people who don’t deserve it—who have let him down over and over again … that His love for us is so vast and limitless that He refuses to give up on us or write us off. So while I’m not saying we should throw this traditional lens off completely, I believe we can benefit from setting it aside and putting on another one so we can see some important things the writer wants us to see.
This new lens may seem strange and take a bit of time to get used to. But let’s see how it works. There are a couple of details in this story that are fairly easy to miss but help us really grasp what this story is about. The first is the wider context: What was the author trying to prove by giving us this account? As you look at this passage, you realize it’s not an isolated account buried alongside some other random events. Rather, the author has skillfully arranged these things in a specific order to communicate a message.
If you go back to the beginning of 1 Samuel, you see Israel didn’t have a king and began to cry out for one. They wanted a designated leader so they could be like the nations around them. God granted their request, but before he did so, he said to his prophet Samuel:
And the Lord told him: “Listen to all that the people are saying to you; it is not you they have rejected, but they have rejected me as their king. 1 Samuel 8:7 (NIV)
As you continue reading, you realize God gave Israel a king whose name was Saul. Early on he showed some real promise but, after a while, instead of humbly obeying God’s commands he began to get himself into all kinds of trouble. In chapters 13-15, there’s a mounting sense of tension as he makes one bad decision after another. He does things his way, even if what he does is a complete rejection of God and his ways. It gets so bad the prophet Samuel eventually said,
But now your kingdom will not endure; the Lord has sought out a man after his own heart and appointed him ruler of his people, because you have not kept the Lord’s command.” (1 Samuel 13:14, NIV)
And later,
Samuel said to him, “The Lord has torn the kingdom of Israel from you today and has given it to one of your neighbors—to one better than you. (1 Samuel 15:28, NIV)
There’s an escalating sense of apprehension surrounding the fact God has rejected Saul in favor of a better king. And in chapter 16, Samuel anoints David to be Saul’s successor. A new and hopefully better king is on the way, even though he hasn’t taken the throne yet.
That is what sets the stage for the scene we discover in chapter 17. The Philistine and Hebrew armies are gathered at the Valley of Elah and Goliath, the Philistine champion, is challenging and intimidating the Hebrew army. In ancient times, rival armies would sometimes agree to let selected individuals from each side decide a conflict. This reduced casualties and other costs. They were called ‘champions’ and they’d represent their people. Their victory would be attributed to the whole army but, if they lost, so would the defeat. For obvious reasons, each side would pick who they believed to be their best soldier to go to battle. So that’s what Goliath and the Philistines are proposing. And after than a month, no one from the Hebrew side had stepped forward and accepted the challenge.
Back then, people also believed that the god of each nation would accompany their side’s representative into battle so, whichever champion won, that god would be vindicated. That’s why, when David arrived on the scene, he’s so bothered about Goliath’s taunts and insults. Not only is there the “Who’s going to step up and take this guy on?” issue, but there’s also the fact David isn’t fond of having his God mocked and treated with contempt.
But the thing I’d have you notice is v. 8 which says,
Goliath stood and shouted to the ranks of Israel, “Why do you come out and line up for battle? Am I not a Philistine, and are you not the servants of Saul? Choose a man and have him come down to me. (1 Samuel 17:8, NIV)
It should have been Saul’s job to accept the challenge on behalf of Israel. After all, if you’re the king, you’re the leader. And if you’re the leader, you go first—that’s rule one of leadership. You don’t ask others to do something you’re not willing to do. If there’s a sacrifice to be made … if there’s courage to be expressed … if there’s a challenge to be embraced, you go first. But, instead, Saul was cowering in fear. That’s the example he was setting for his army, and that’s the same kind of behavior they were demonstrating. Then David—the one who was recently anointed as Saul’s successor—stepped into the situation and responded with faith and trust in the Lord. This is where that new lens begins to come into focus. The author is not simply saying, “All of you should muster the courage you need to face life’s giants.” Instead, what the author is saying is, “Israel needs a better king, and David is that guy!”
David went into battle as a representative of the Hebrew people—as their substitute—and won the victory they couldn’t win for themselves. Because of his actions, the god of Israel was vindicated and the forces of evil were defeated. David came in weakness. He was so unimpressive that nobody would think God could triumph through him. When he walked out to take Goliath on, Goliath responded by belittling him—by cursing at him and being insulted. On the surface, David went almost as a sacrificial lamb, but God used his apparent weakness to destroy the enemy and David’s victory was credited to all of them. David stood in the place of many and through his trust in God and obedience to what the Lord wanted him to do, brought salvation to Israel.
When you look at the story of David and Goliath through this lens, things look quite different. No longer is this a story about us summoning the courage we need to take on the giants in our lives. Instead, it’s encouraging us to recognize our need for a better king—someone who can fight the battles we can’t win so his victory can become our victory. We need someone to step in and be our substitute … our champion. We need a king like David! We don’t need to try harder so we can triumph. We need a substitute who will come in weakness and win for us the victory we can’t win for ourselves.
I think that’s a very important lens through which to view the account of David and Goliath. It’s a bit confusing, only because we’re used to seeing this account through the other lens. But I think the use of this lens enables us to pick up on a valued and much-needed insight—namely that you and I need to embrace God’s ultimate king who has triumphed and won the victory on behalf of His people.
But there’s one more lens that will help us see things even more clearly. Israel needed a better king, and that king was David. But now an even better king has come—a Son of David who won the victory we couldn’t win for ourselves. God’s anointed king has come and although, like David, he appeared weak and insignificant, he fought on behalf of his people and triumphed over the forces of sin and death. Jesus is the true and better David! He stands as our substitute—the one who stepped in and took on the dark and deadly forces that were lined up against him and brought salvation to his people.
When we see the account of David and Goliath through the lens of Jesus, we realize it’s not about trying harder. This account is pointing our eyes toward one who is our true and better king … who stood alone in the battle nobody else could win and brought salvation to His people. It’s about the one who came not in strength, but in weakness and served as our substitute … who triumphed on our behalf … who did battle with the giants that can really kill us—the forces of sin and death—and emerged victorious … a king whose victory has become the victory for all those who trust in Him, even though we did nothing to help bring it about. It’s about One who courageously went to the cross and, in the process of dying and rising from the grave, vindicated God’s name and established Him as the real and true God for all of humanity. What David did for the nation of Israel at that moment in time in a military sense, Jesus has done for each of us in a spiritual sense. And so, just as the Hebrew army celebrated in the wake of David’s victory and rose up and courageously waged war with the forces that had been so intimidating, so we are to manifest that same courage and show that same fearlessness when it comes to engaging with this world and the people in it on the Lord’s behalf. For we have a king who has fought the ultimate battle, paid the ultimate price, and won the ultimate victory. When we are in relationship with him, His very spirit dwells within us. And greater is He that is in us than He that is in the world.