Meet the players: David and Goliath

One of the Bible’s most famous stories is the epic tale of David and Goliath. Many of us probably first heard it from a children’s storybook or in Sunday School. In fact, when you think of famous Old Testament stories, you likely think of Adam and Eve, Noah and the Ark, Moses and Egypt, and of course, David and Goliath. In the Bible, however, the account of what happened with David and Goliath takes us to a particularly tough time in Israel’s history. Prior to the famous showdown between the shepherd boy and a giant, as we’ve been reading about over the last few weeks, the leadership of the nation was in serious trouble. Saul had been appointed as the nation’s first king at the people’s demand. They believed that a king would bring stability and security in these dangerous times and make them “like all the other nations.” However, Saul had been disobedient to God’s commands and so he had been rejected by God, although he was still functioning as the people’s king. I said before that he was the king Israel wanted, but not the king they needed. So a new king had been chosen by God, a king chosen by God for God. Secretly, he had been anointed at Bethlehem by the prophet Samuel, and “the Spirit of the Lord rushed upon David from that day forward.”

This leads us to 1 Samuel 17, which we’ll cover at length this Sunday as we close out our Summer Scripture Series. Keep in mind that we’ll offer a Legacy Group this coming semester that will continue the study of 1 Samuel and possibly even get into 2 Samuel. If that’s something that interests you, we’d love to invite you to sign up at legacycity.church/groups. What I want to do over the next few paragraphs, however, is to simply build the foundation of the chapter so that we can dive right into the heart of the passage Sunday morning.

The chapter kicks off with a sense of danger as it says: 1 Now the Philistines gathered their armies for battle. (v. 1a) We know that this threat has been hanging over the entire narrative of 1 Samuel so far and will continue to be present for the rest of the book. In fact, (spoiler alert) Saul dies in conflict with the Philistines later in 1 Samuel 31. So the chapter starting this way almost feels like nothing new, just another Tuesday in Israel, right? The Philistines are gathered and ready for war. Sidebar: It’s worth noting that one reason (perhaps it was the reason really) that the people asked for a king in the first place was that their king might “go out before us and fight our battles” (1 Samuel 8:20). The people felt the need for a king because of the threat from their enemies. Saul is king and should be fighting this battle, but since we all know that story already, it will of course be David (the anointed future king) that fights and not Saul (the current lame duck rejected king).

The location of the Philistine armies is then given with some precision: 1 …And they were gathered at Socoh, which belongs to Judah, and encamped between Socoh and Azekah, in Ephes-dammim. (v. 1b) The Philistines were now further west than they had been in Chapter 14 and were clearly encroaching even further into Israel’s territory. Yet another nod to Saul’s failure as king.

And Saul and the men of Israel were gathered, and encamped in the Valley of Elah, and drew up in line of battle against the Philistines” (v. 2). It’s interesting to me that although the Israelite forces gathered to meet the Philistines on the battleground, we’re not told of any active leadership given by Saul. Not to make this a Saul-bashing post, but the evidence of his shortcomings is everywhere in the text. The grammar of these first two verses conveys a curious difference between the two sides. The Philistines “gathered” (v. 1, active voice); while Saul and the men of Israel “were gathered” (v. 2, passive voice). There’s no sign of active leadership among the Israelites; it would appear that Saul is just among those who “were gathered.”

To finish setting up the location and scenery of the story to come, the narrator tells us “And the Philistines stood on the mountain on the one side, and Israel stood on the mountain on the other side, with a valley between them” (v. 3). The Valley of Elah was a proper valley, with great views and vantage points on both sides. It would seem both armies have equal footing, with no advantages as far as geography is concerned.

That being said, here comes the advantage for the Philistines… (read in your best Bruce Buffer voice) “In the red corner, weighing in at 580lbs, standing 9 feet and 9 inches tall, fighting out of Gath, presenting the Ogre from the East, the Towering Menace, the Philistine Giant, the reigning, the defending Super Duper Heavyweight Champion of the Middle East: Goliath!” (*Cue the Philistine armies shouting and screaming and clapping for their champion…) This is what we see over the next few verses.

4 And there came out from the camp of the Philistines a champion named Goliath of Gath, whose height was six cubits and a span. 5 He had a helmet of bronze on his head, and he was armed with a coat of mail, and the weight of the coat was five thousand shekels of bronze. 6 And he had bronze armor on his legs, and a javelin of bronze slung between his shoulders. 7 The shaft of his spear was like a weaver’s beam, and his spear’s head weighed six hundred shekels of iron. And his shield-bearer went before him. 1 Samuel 17:4-7

This is a big man by all accounts. He would make NBA players look scrawny. How did he get so big? Some suggest that he’s connected to the account back in Numbers 13, when Moses sent 12 spies into Canaan and 10 of them came back and said that there were giants living there, so big in fact, that they felt like grasshoppers compared to them. It’s thought that these “giants” were possibly Nephilim, which is a whole other can of worms, but the short version is that some believe the Nephilim were the offspring of angels and humans, resulting in giants. It’s possible Goliath was a descendant of the Nephilim. Modern science also suggests that he had a pituitary disorder, causing some form of gigantism, making him unusually large. Either way, the bible says he’s one big fella. Then he speaks to the Israelites and issues a proposal.

8 He stood and shouted to the ranks of Israel, “Why have you come out to draw up for battle? Am I not a Philistine, and are you not servants of Saul? Choose a man for yourselves, and let him come down to me. 9 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.” 1 Samuel 17:8-9

Essentially, “let’s not have a huge drawn-out battle that decimates both of our armies. Instead, 1 v 1 me. Send out your best, strongest, most courageous fighter to face all 9 and a half feet of me. Winner takes all.” And by takes all, he means a lifetime of servitude and subjugation. He says this and then there’s what we can only imagine is a pause that lasted moments but felt like an eternity. You could hear a pin drop in the valley. No one moved an inch so as to not accidentally volunteer themselves.

10 And the Philistine said, “I defy the ranks of Israel this day. Defy is too weak of a word for the English translation of this Hebrew word here. It’s closer to “I scorn the ranks” or better yet, “I mock the ranks of Israel.” He mocks Israel and he mocks Israel’s God. Give me a man, that we may fight together.” 11 When Saul and all Israel heard these words of the Philistine, they were dismayed and greatly afraid. Give me a man. Choose your champion. Let’s go back a little, shall we? At the very beginning of the story of kingship, Samuel spoke to the people of “your king, whom you have chosen for yourselves ” (1 Samuel 8:18, 1 Samuel 12:13). The Israelites, in fact, had already “chosen a man for themselves.” His name was Saul!

It’s obvious that Goliath, like so many characters in this narrative, was not fully aware of the significance of his words, but as we hear them the irony sets in and we remember that Saul was the closest thing that Israel had to a Goliath. Remember what he looked like when the people chose him: “. . . when he stood among the people, he was taller than any of the people from his shoulders upward” (1 Samuel 9:2; 1 Samuel 10:23). And the prophet Samuel had said of him, “There is none like him among all the people” (1 Samuel 10:24).

As we have walked through 16+ chapters of this narrative, it makes sense to us (as the readers) that there’s really only one candidate in Israel who had anything close to resembling the necessary credentials to face the Philistine. And he was the one the people had (some time earlier) “chosen for themselves:” King Saul. But when he’s called out by Goliath, it says he and the people were dismayed and greatly afraid.

Verse 12 is a hard pivot. It takes us away from the battle in the Valley of Elah to another scene some 15 miles away in Bethlehem. Here, we’re going to meet the rest of the cast, the other main characters. But these are people we’ve already met in the last chapter, why do they get introduced again as if it’s the first time? There are several oddities like that in these two chapters, so much so that detractors of the Word of God try to use these as fodder for their “Bible is full of contradictions” debate. Goliath seems to be killed by two different people, the Bible introduces the family of Jesse twice in full, Saul knows Jesse and David in chapter 16, but then seems to not know them at all in chapter 17, David is described differently in both accounts. We won’t dig into these “discrepancies” here or on Sunday, but if you join the 1 Samuel Legacy Group, that will be on the agenda Day 1 🙂.

12 Now David was the son of an Ephrathite of Bethlehem in Judah, named Jesse, who had eight sons. In the days of Saul the man was already old and advanced in years. 13 The three oldest sons of Jesse had followed Saul to the battle. And the names of his three sons who went to the battle were Eliab the firstborn, and next to him Abinadab, and the third Shammah. 14 David was the youngest. The three eldest followed Saul, 15 but David went back and forth from Saul to feed his father’s sheep at Bethlehem. 1 Samuel 17:12-14

This is the same intro we got last chapter; David is still tending the farm but is splitting time between home and the front. 16 For forty days the Philistine came forward and took his stand, morning and evening. Forty is always a significant number in scripture, so no surprise it shows up here in this pivotal moment in Hebrew history.

17 And Jesse said to David his son, “Take for your brothers an ephah of this parched grain, and these ten loaves, and carry them quickly to the camp to your brothers. 18 Also take these ten cheeses to the commander of their thousand. See if your brothers are well, and bring some token from them.” 19 Now Saul and they and all the men of Israel were in the Valley of Elah, fighting with the Philistines. 20 And David rose early in the morning and left the sheep with a keeper and took the provisions and went, as Jesse had commanded him. And he came to the encampment as the host was going out to the battle line, shouting the war cry. 1 Samuel 17:17-20

This takes up to where we’ll begin on Sunday. Jesse sends his son to run a simple errand which leads to one of the most memorable moments in the Old Testament and honestly history itself. The story of David and Goliath transcends scripture and Christianity and is known the world over as if it were a piece of pop culture trivia. It’s used as an inspirational tale to encourage people to stand up to bullies or the proverbial “giants” in their lives; it’s seen as an underdog story, one where the smaller, weaker, less talented, person or team is pitted against a much bigger, better rival…but you’re saying there’s a chance! Both of those are sweet sentiments, but not what God intended when these events unfolded and the story was subsequently added to Scripture. We’ll get into the exposition Sunday morning 10am at the movie theater. Hope to see you there!

SELAH.

*Cover Art: David and Goliath by John August Swanson, hand-printed serigraph, 2005

Enter Saul Stage Right

Once again, we want to use this platform to bridge the gap between two sermons as we walk through 1 Samuel. Last Sunday, Pastor Brandon Henson from Anchor Church took us through 1 Samuel 8; and next Sunday, Pastor Robbie will start in the middle of chapter 10. So let’s find out what happens in the meantime.

When we left off last week, Samuel had laid out the negatives and dangers of Israel having a king (other than God as their King of course). But even when presented with 8 verses worth of compelling warnings against an earthly king, Israel still demanded one because they wanted to be like all of the other nations (1 Samuel 8:20). They ignored Samuel and doubled down on an earthly king that will “ judge us and go out before us and fight our battles” - which incidentally is exactly what God has done and wanted to do for them. Instead of forcing his agenda, the Lord relents and allows Israel to choose a path that will lead to much destruction and devastation over the coming centuries.

This brings us to chapter 9 where we meet the second of three main characters from 1 Samuel: Saul.

1 There was a man of Benjamin whose name was Kish, the son of Abiel, son of Zeror, son of Becorath, son of Aphiah, a Benjaminite, a man of wealth. 2 And he had a son whose name was Saul, a handsome young man. There was not a man among the people of Israel more handsome than he. From his shoulders upward he was taller than any of the people. 1 Samuel 9:1-2

We start the section with a man named Kish who, like Elkanah in 1 Samuel 1:1, was essentially a nobody. Not only that, but Kish belonged to the tribe and the land of Benjamin, which was the smallest of Israel’s tribes. The author is setting us up with the same info as Elkanah in chapter 1, and like chapter 1, we’re being shown that God does not need our fame, fortune, and influence to raise up a leader. The author transitions quickly to Kish’s son, Saul, who by all accounts was an impressive young man. We was tall and good looking, and the literal translation of verse 2 would imply that “There was not a man among the people of Israel better than he.” Since most of us are aware that Saul becomes the king that Israel was asking for in the last chapter, it seems like he’s a great choice so far.

Our first interaction with Saul (vv 3-10), involves him and a servant searching for his father’s lost donkeys. One verse in particular stands out as interesting considering all that we’ve already read and experienced.

5 When they came to the land of Zuph, Saul said to his servant1 who was with him, “Come, let us go back, klest my father cease to care about the donkeys and become anxious about us.” 1 Samuel 9:5

There have been several father/son relationships we’ve seen thus far; Eli and his sons and Samuel and his sons. In both of those situations, the sons strayed far from their father, with scripture even calling Eli’s sons as “worthless.” In this passage though, Saul’s concern for his father (more than for the donkeys) is honestly a welcome contrast to the failure of Eli’s and Samuel’s sons to care about their fathers. Once Saul declares his intent to return home without the donkeys, his servant suggests going to meet a man of God in the nearby town. It takes a little convincing, but Saul agrees.

They enter the town (possibly Ramah) to find the seer. At this point, alarm bells should be ringing. Who have we heard called a “seer” before? Samuel. Where did the end of chapter 8 take place? Ramah. Worlds are colliding!

14 So they went up to the city. As they were entering the city, they saw Samuel coming out toward them on his way up to the high place. 1 Samuel 6:2

Confirmed, Samuel is the man of God, the “seer” that they are looking for. Donkeys lost, Saul sent on a search and recovery mission with a servant that has somehow heard of a holy seer in the lands they were searching in, and they arrive in the city conveniently at the same time Samuel is coming through. In case you thought any of this was coincidence, God dispels that notion in the next few verses.

15 Now the day before Saul came, the LORD had revealed to Samuel: 16 “Tomorrow about this time I will send to you a man from the land of Benjamin, and you shall anoint him to be prince over my people Israel. He shall save my people from the hand of the Philistines. For I have seen my people, because their cry has come to me.” 1 Samuel 9:15-16

God’s sovereignty on display. That’s what we’re seeing. We’re also seeing the boundless love of the Father. Even though Israel is asking for something they already have in God (a King), even though they are asking for a lesser, fallible leader so they can blend in with the world around them, even though they are asking for something that Samuel has already warned will ultimately harm them - God still hears their cry and provides deliverance from their enemies. Saul is going to be that leader and he’s going to deliver them from the hands of the Philistines.

The rest of the chapter describes the initial interaction between Samaul and Saul. Samuel recognizes Saul as God’s appointed man, and invites him to a feast as the guest of honor. Saul goes from searching for donkeys in the countryside to being the guest of honor at a priestly feast.

27 As they were going down to the outskirts of the city, Samuel said to Saul, “Tell the servant to pass on before us, and when he has passed on, stop here yourself for a while, that I may make known to you the word of God.” 1 Samuel 9:27

Samuel was about to make known to Saul, for the first time, the word of God. We see the significance of the events here in 1 Samuel 9 only when we see that the word of God was at the heart of it all. Saul was oblivious to this, but God had said to Samuel, “Obey their voice and make them a king” (1 Samuel 8:22a). Then he had said, “Tomorrow . . . I will send you a man from the land of Benjamin” (1 Samuel 9:16). Everything that happened in this chapter was according to the word of God. We know that Saul will become Israel’s king by the word of God, and he will be required to listen to and obey the word of God as king (1 Samuel 12:14; 15:1).

1 Then Samuel took a flask of oil and poured it on his head and kissed him and said, “Has not the LORD anointed you to be prince over his people Israel? And you shall reign over the people of the LORD and you will save them from the hand of their surrounding enemies. And this shall be the sign to you that the LORD has anointed you to be prince over his heritage. 1 Samuel 10:1-2

Samuel does as the Lord commanded back in 1 Samuel 8, and he anoints a king. And specifically, he does what God asked in 1 Samuel 9, and he anoints Saul the Benjaminite. This is certainly a shock to Saul, who understands his heritage; he’s a nobody from nowhere, not “royalty material.” So Samuel prophesies about a few signs that Saul will experience that will confirm God’s intentions. First, two men will meet him at Rachel’s tomb to tell him that the donkeys are safe. Second, three men will meet him at Bethel to offer him bread. Thirdly, a group of prophets will meet him at Gibeah.

9 When he turned his back to leave Samuel, God gave him another heart. And all these signs came to pass that day. 1 Samuel 10:9

God confirms to Saul his intention and fulfills all of the signs that Samuel spoke. The Spirit of God rushed upon Saul and he experienced the power and presence of the Lord. All of this will set us for next week, when Saul is finally proclaimed King.

The Ark Narrative

We’re going to attempt to briefly bridge the gap between 1 Samuel 4:22 and 7:3. Of course, we encourage you to read the passage for yourself because there’s no substitute for the Word of God. But we do hope this post might help with understanding.

Starting in 1 Samuel 5, this is the second episode in the “ark narrative” and we find the Philistines in a situation they cannot control. First, they’re celebrating their victories over “the Lord” back in 1 Samuel 4, when they defeated Israel twice (killing 34,000 men) and then captured the Ark of the Covenant, which they knew to be the manifestation of the Hebrew God. They wanted to put an exclamation mark on their victory by putting the ark in a trophy case, so to speak.

Then the Philistines took the ark of God and brought it into the house of Dagon and set it up beside Dagon. 1 Samuel 5:2

They take the ark into the temple of their god, Dagon, in Ashdod. It appears their victory over the Lord isn’t as complete as they thought though, because on two successive nights, the idol of Dagon falls over in the presence of the ark (vv. 3–5). Furthermore, the inhabitants of Ashdod are afflicted with tumors (vv. 6–7). This leads to the ark’s being removed to Gath, only for the epidemic to spread there also (vv. 8–9). God is displaying his power in a very immediate and uncomfortably personal way to the Philistines. Once again the ark is moved, this time to Ekron, where the inhabitants have heard of the curse that seems to come with it, and they instead advocating returning it to “its own place”

9 But after they had brought it around, the hand of the Lord was against the city, causing a very great panic, and he afflicted the men of the city, both young and old, so that tumors broke out on them. 10 So they sent the ark of God to Ekron. But as soon as the ark of God came to Ekron, the people of Ekron cried out, “They have brought around to us the ark of the God of Israel to kill us and our people.” 11 They sent therefore and gathered together all the lords of the Philistines and said, “Send away the ark of the God of Israel, and let it return to its own place, that it may not kill us and our people.” For there was a deathly panic throughout the whole city. The hand of God was very heavy there. 1 Samuel 5:9-11

The hand of God was heavy there. There’s an irony here that the hearers and readers of this story can pick up on. Israel knew that God had defeated them, not the Philistines, but the Philistines were convinced it was their military acumen that won the battles. God is showing us through these events that it was indeed his sovereignty that led to Israel’s defeat, and now that he’s judged Israel, he’s taking a moment to judge the pagans and their pagan worship practices. The Philistines’ disrespectful treatment of the ark transforms what they had viewed as a trophy of their victory into a scourge for which no one has room. In what should be a victory tour, it’s almost a parody because the roles of victor and vanquished are reversed. By humbling both the Philistines’ god and the Philistines themselves, the Lord leaves them (and the Israelites) in no doubt as to who is truly in control of all human affairs and how powerfully he can act against those who offend him.

In this contest between Yahweh and Dagon, the Lord makes it abundantly evident who is the victor. Honestly, it’s not even a real contest, as we see the Lord’s superiority effortlessly displayed. Israel’s God shows himself to be still a “man of war” (Ex. 15:3), able to defeat all opponents. He is the one whose hand is strong to save and whose intervention is irresistible (Ps. 89:13). The Lord receives glory for himself through the situation, just as he did in Egypt (Ex. 14:4, 17–18).

And the Philistines called for the priests and the diviners and said, “What shall we do with the ark of the LORD? Tell us with what we shall send it to its place.” 1 Samuel 6:2

Chapter 6 takes us into the third episode in the story of the ark, which serves to further assert the status and power of Yahweh. For seven months the Philistine lords resist acting on the evidence that the curse afflicting their land has been sent by the Lord. Eventually, and with great reluctance, they call for the advice of their religious experts as to how to return the ark to Israelite territory. They are advised that the ark should be accompanied by a guilt offering of five golden tumors and five golden mice to appease the God of Israel (6:2–6). Additionally, the Philistine clergy propose a test to ascertain whether all that has happened in the land has been a matter of coincidence or whether the superior power of the Lord really has been at work (6:7–9). They are hoping it was all coincidence so they can save face and not have to acknowledge the power and diety of the Hebrew God. Special arrangements are made for transporting the ark using cows that have never before drawn a cart and that are separated from their newly-born calves. When the cows hauling the ark ignore their natural instincts and head away from their young and pull the cart in the right direction without any overt guidance, it‘s demonstrated beyond doubt that the God of Israel is indeed active.

11 And they put the ark of the LORD on the cart and the box with the golden mice and the images of their tumors. 12 And the cows went straight in the direction of Beth-shemesh along one highway, lowing as they went. They turned neither to the right nor to the left, and the lords of the Philistines went after them as far as the border of Beth-shemesh. 1 Samuel 6:11-12

When the ark reached Israelite territory at Beth-shemesh, the people there were harvesting their crops, and stopped to celebrate the return of the ark.

14 The cart came into the field of Joshua of Beth-shemesh and stopped there. A great stone was there. And they split up the wood of the cart and offered the cows as a burnt offering to the LORD. 1 Samuel 4:14

Right away, they sacrificed the cows to the Lord to celebrate the ark’s safe return. However, it’s not all smooth sailing; 70 men of Beth-shemesh violate the sanctity of the ark and are struck dead by the Lord for their impiety. In response, the terror-stricken people of Beth-shemesh call on the people of Kiriath-jearim to come and take the ark there (6:19–7:1). Just like the Philistines, the Israelites have to learn to fear, respect, and obey the Lord and everything connected with his presence.

20 Then the men of Beth-shemesh said, “Who is able to stand before the LORD, this holy God? And to whom shall he go up away from us?” 1 Samuel 6:20

The people of Beth-shemesh illustrated a certain level of spiritual obtuseness. “Who is able to stand before the LORD, this holy God?” reveals a genuine awareness of the majesty and sanctity of God. Yet they perceive that their inadequacy and guilt render them unfit to be in the presence of God (Ps. 130:3). However, rather than seeking to repent and change their own condition, they instead ask, “And to whom shall he go up away from us?” This response should remind us of one shared by many in the New Testament: “They began to beg Jesus to depart from their region” (Mark 5:17).

1 And the men of Kiriath-jearim came and took up the ark of the LORD and brought it to the house of aAbinadab on the hill. And they consecrated his son Eleazar to have charge of the ark of the LORD. 2 From the day that the ark was lodged at Kiriath-jearim, a long time passed, some twenty years, and all the house of Israel lamented after the LORD. 1 Samuel 7:1-2

The men of Kiriath-jearim respond positively, and the ark is brought “to the house of Abinadab on the hill.” The men bring the ark to Abinadab because he is possibly a priest, although the text isn’t clear on that. Obviously, though, the people of Kiriath-jearim adopt a more reverent attitude toward the ark, consecrating Eleazar (son of Abinadab) as its custodian. The ark stays there, about 8.1 miles (13 km) northwest of Jerusalem, probably until David takes it to his capital (2 Sam. 6:2–4).