Facing Our Giants

I’m sure most of us know the story of David and Goliath. Many of us were told this story from a young age. We read about it in our picture Bibles and maybe even acted it out in Sunday school. I want to encourage you, if you have not read it in a while, head on over to 1 Samuel 17 and revisit this incredible story. I got to thinking about this story and was amazed where my thoughts took me.

The Story

Here is David and according to 1 Samuel 17:33, he is “only a boy.” The Bible does not give the exact age of when David stepped out onto the battlefield, but according to my research he was probably somewhere around  the age of 15. I want us to try to wrap our minds around this picture for a moment. Here we have this 15 year old child with faith in the Lord far beyond what many of us can even fathom. I can only imagine the thoughts that were whirling around in King Saul’s mind when he handed over the fate of the entire nation to a 15 year old kid! I’m sure he could only figure he was nothing short of crazy for even considering such an insane proposition. Not only that, I’m sure his advisers as well as every Israelite were probably thinking that their king has just lost his mind and should be checked into a mental institution! I’m sure these thoughts would cross my mind at least once or twice, how about you?

The Avenues of Thought
Now that we have established the thought process of every person that surrounded David on that day, let’s talk about the thought process of David. There really are two avenues  of thought that we could look at. The first avenue of thought that could have been going on inside of David may very well have been one of extreme confidence in his God. An avenue of thought in which he remembered what God had done for him in the past and anxiously anticipated what God had planned for the future. Faith by definition is believing that God is going to stay true to his character despite the circumstances we may find ourselves in. For David, God had always provided a way to defeat his “giants,” for example, the lion and the bear from his childhood. So, since God always stays true to His character, then He surely would deliver David from this giant as well. In this avenue, David probably did not think about questioning God partly because of his past experiences with God’s deliverance and partly because he was still young and I believe still had a sense of child like faith about him. For whatever the reason, we tend to question more the older we get. It’s as if we lose sight of the child like faith and doubt and unbelief begins to sneak in. I tend to think David had not yet reached the stage that he questioned God’s faithfulness. He had no reason. God had always proven Himself faithful. I find that this particular avenue of thought is the one I typically lean towards when reading this story, but there is another avenue that I tend to forget even exists.  

The other avenue involves the understanding that because David is human, he is going to have to wage war with his mind long before he will ever wage war on Goliath. This avenue would probably sound something like this… “I must be crazy. I can’t believe I’m going to do this. I am going to do this. I killed a bear. I killed a lion. I can kill this giant. I must be losing it. Look how big he is. I am just a boy. He is a giant! My God is so much bigger than this giant.” Can you see the internal battle that must have been going on inside David’s mind?  Many of us are not much different. I know I constantly find myself in these ping pong games with my thinking; the going back and forth between believing that God is true to his character on one side of the table and the questions and doubts on the other side of the table. Just like David, we have to wage war on our minds long before we can ever wage war on the giant that is physically standing right in front of us.

Our Mental Giants
When I look at these two different avenues of thinking. It helps me to gain a better perspective of these impressive bible stories. It helps me to better relate to the characters in these stories. Sometimes I feel like the heroes in these stories were almost not human, as if they were somehow angelic. They did these great things and had such great faith. How could I, one who wavers in my faith, and questions things even put myself in any of these situations? I would fall flat on my face in failure. But when I start to think that they were human just like me. I realize they had some of the same struggles that I have. They fought some of the same battles of the mind that I fight.

There was nothing special about David. God did not give him a super power in order to defeat Goliath. He was human, no different than myself. Yes, his giants were physical giants. Some of mine have been physical as well, but he also had to face the giant of his own mind, just like I do. God is working out in each of us our mental giants. He will often times use the physical giants in our lives to teach us how to win the war against our mental giants.

Lord, I thank you that we are no different than David. I thank you that just like David, you are working in us on the battle with our mental giants. You desire for us to not only win the war against the physical giants that are staring us right in the face, but you desire for us to win the war against the mental giants as well.  Help us in the times of battle to remember that you stay true to your character. Help us to not forget the amazing things you have done for us in the past, because it can be so easy to forget where you have brought us from when we are faced with a giant right in front of us. Lord, I thank you that no matter what challenges we face, you are always faithful!