If you would turn with me to 1 Samuel chapter 17, 1 Samuel chapter 17, we're picking up again our consideration of David, the man after God's own heart and the children, I'm sure remember the story we're going to be reading about tonight and maybe think in their imagination of this glorious victory that was given to this young teenage boy against Goliath. We're going to pick up our reading. for time's sake at verse 22 of chapter 17, and we'll read through verse 52. Let's hear the word of our God. And David left his supplies in the hand of the supply keeper, ran to the army, and came and greeted his brothers. Then as he talked with them, there was the champion, the Philistine of Gath, Goliath by name, coming up from the armies of the Philistines. And he spoke according to the same words. So David heard them. And all the men of Israel, when they saw the man fled from him and were dreadfully afraid, So the men of Israel said, have you seen this man who has come up? Surely he has come up to defy Israel. And it shall be that the man who kills him, the king, will enrich with great riches, will give him his daughter and give his father's house exemption from taxes in Israel. Then David spake to the man who stood by him saying, what shall be done to the man who kills this Philistine and takes away the reproach from Israel? For who is this uncircumcised Philistine that he should defy the armies of the living God? And the people answered him in this manner, saying, so shall it be done for the man who kills him. Now Eliab, his oldest brother, heard when he spoke to the men. And Eliab's anger was aroused against David, and he said, why did you come down here? And with whom have you left those few sheep in the wilderness? I know your pride and the insolence of your heart, for you have come down to see the battle." And David said, what have I done now? Is there not a cause? Then he turned from him toward another and said the same thing. And these people answered him as the first ones did. Now, When the words which David spoke were heard, they reported them to Saul, and he sent for him. Then David said to Saul, let no man's heart fail because of him. Your servant will go and fight with this Philistine. Saul said to David, you're not able to go against this Philistine to fight with him, for you are a youth, and he a man of war from his youth. But David said to Saul, your servant used to keep his father's sheep, and when a lion or a bear came and took a lamb out of the flock, I went out after it and struck it and delivered the lamb from its mouth. When it rose against me, I caught it by its beard and struck it, killed it. Your servant has killed both lion and bear, and this uncircumcised Philistine will be like one of them, seeing he has defied the armies of the living God. Moreover, David said, the Lord who delivered me from the paw of the lion and from the paw of the bear, he will deliver me from the hand of this Philistine. Saul said to David, go and the Lord be with you. So Saul clothed David with his armor and he put a bronze helmet on his head. He also clothed him with a coat of mail. David fastened his sword to his armor and tried to walk, for he had not tested them. And David said to Saul, I cannot walk with these, for I have not tested them. So David took them off. Then he took his staff in his hand, and he chose for himself five smooth stones from the brook, and put them in a shepherd's bag, in a pouch which he had, and a sling was in his hand, and he drew near to the Philistine. So the Philistine came and began drawing near to David. And the man who bore the shield went before him. And when the Philistine looked about and saw David, he disdained him for he was only a youth, ruddy and good looking. So the Philistine said to David, am I a dog that you come to me with sticks? And the Philistine cursed David by his gods. And the Philistine said to David, come to me, and I will give your flesh to the birds of the air and the beasts of the field. Then said David to the Philistine, you come to me with a sword, with a spear, and with a javelin, but I come to you in the name of the Lord of hosts, the God of the armies of Israel, whom you have defied. This day, the Lord will deliver you into my hand, and I will strike you and take your head from you. And this day, I will give the carcasses of the camp of the Philistines to the birds of the air and the wild beasts of the earth, that all the earth may know that there is a God in Israel. Then all this assembly shall know that the Lord does not save with sword and spear, for the battle is the Lord's, and he will give you into our hands. So it was when the Philistine arose and came and drew near to meet David that David hurried and ran toward the army to meet the Philistine. Then David put his hand in his bag and took out a stone and he slung it and struck the Philistine in his forehead so that the stone sank into his forehead and he fell on his face to the earth. So David prevailed over the Philistine with a sling and a stone and struck the Philistine and killed him. But there was no sword in the hand of David. Therefore, David ran and stood over the Philistine, took his sword and drew it out of its sheath and killed him and cut off his head with it. And when the Philistine saw that their champion was dead, they fled. Now the men of Israel and Judah arose and shouted and pursued the Philistines as far as the entrance of the valley into the gates of Ekron and the wounded of the Philistines fell along the road to Shearim, even as far as Gath and Ekron. So far, a reading this evening of God's holy, inspired, infallible word. Well, beloved in the Lord Jesus Christ, are there giants today? Yes. Maybe not of the kind and character of Goliath in size and physical nature, but there are those occasions in the life of believers and the church of those seemingly undefeatable or unconquerable objects, ideas, things, spiritual forces that are at work in our world today. There are, without question, spiritual forces wickedness, as Paul calls it, in high places that are out to get every one of these children who are here with us tonight. And they are also, as it were, aiming their forces at us who are older, who are parents or grandparents. I suspect there will be parents who perhaps lay their head on their pillow at night and in sorrow, look back at how much they have failed in regarding training up their children in being warriors like this son, David. Perhaps there have been giants that have come across your paths as you sought to bring up your children and they seemed impossible. Perhaps you're bringing up children today and there's all kinds of forces and things that are pushing against what you're trying to teach them and trying to be faithful in bringing before them. And it seems impossible to overcome all the obstacles of the information, of the ideas, of the depravity that is facing our children today. And there are those who are in their own lives struggling with your own giants, addictions, enslavements, perhaps more properly called, to sin, lust, covetousness, power, control. That unless you have these things and they seem like impossible to be defeated, to humble ourself, to rely on the Lord's strength. It seems we've tried it again and again and again with no victory. I'm convinced that part of the problem we have little victory in the circumstance of fighting our giants today is because we are either trying to do it in our own strength or we're looking at the outward circumstances of our life rather than at the reality that David saw with the eye of faith. And so tonight I want to consider this history together with you of David and Goliath. We're going to do it under the theme of David defeats Goliath with three thoughts. First, the background, then the battle, And then with application I want to look at the blessings that are ours even today. So in order to understand the applications that I'm going to try to set before you, three or four of them tonight, we need to understand the context of this history with the children of Israel. We know their history, we looked at that often through the life of Joseph. The children of Israel, having had their beginning with the fathers Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, had been in slavery in Egypt for a number of years. Yet God had promised Abraham that his seed would live and receive as an inheritance Canaan. where these Philistines and others of enemies of Israel were still dwelling while they were in Egypt. Yet God was faithful to his promise. He led them out of their enslavement and their bondage and servitude to the Egyptians, a picture of our own state by nature to sin and slave that he brings us out and After 400 years, he brings them free and leads them through the wilderness with a strong hand and with Moses to go before them. Then later after they came into the land, God gives them judges to rule over them. And then in chapter 14, you will see that because of King Saul's foolish curse, that he said to anyone in his army as they were defeating the Philistines, that they couldn't eat anything. It actually hindered the Israelite army from actually conquering the enemy. Saul here in his foolishness, and Jonathan his son recognizing it, they did not defeat the enemy. And we know Saul by his disobedience, which we saw last time, was disqualified from being king. And God anointed another man, this David of whom we are going to hear. David, a man after God's own heart. So where do we find David even after he had been summoned? We saw that briefly the last time that he'd been summoned to play and calm the vexation of King Saul's heart and to bring some measure of peace. Well, we know that he went back and served in his father's pastures and the sheep in his care. And so what we read in this chapter, what happened at the beginning of it, is that Jesse, the father of David, sent David to go bring some food to his brothers. Now we know that Jesse had eight sons. Three of them were in the army, and David was home with four of the others. They could have been sent to bring this food. You heard a sermon on providence this morning. Do you recognize that all the events of our lives are so ordered in every detail? Though we make choices, we make decisions to do things. Jesse made a decision to send David. What if he hadn't? Would we be looking tonight at this story of Goliath and David? I don't know. But the fact is, in the common, ordinary events of daily life, in God's providence, David is sent to bring this food to his brothers. And he obeys immediately. And there's many like little instances, I won't point them all out, but as you read this chapter again, maybe this week, you will see there's all these little instances of God's providence leading the way, each person making their own decision along the way, culminating, as it were, in this climax of God gaining the victory over his enemies. Well, the armies of Israel and the Philistines were pitted against each other at this time in the Valley of Eilat. There were mountains on both sides and the soldiers likely were crouched in the foothills and up the sides of the mountains, there was about a mile span in between these two mountains. And that's where they were stationed, particularly the Israelites in fear of the giant, who had come out from the center of the group of the army of the Philistines. And you can read of that in the first part of this chapter. I came out morning and evening and he was mocking with the God of Israel, defying Jehovah. You remember the judges? Samson, the Philistines. took down the temple, demonstrated their gods are nothing. Remember later when the ark even is brought in to the temple of the Philistines and is fallen on its face in the morning. The Israelites, and the soldiers in particular, the men, ought to have been in a rush to meet Goliath. And instead, they followed their leader, Saul, in fear, cowering behind one another when this Philistine came. We read, as David was inquiring about this from his brothers, that it was 40 days that this had already happened. And in scripture, 40 is often a period of time of testing. God was testing who, who is on the Lord's side. Who will go forth in my name? Remember, as we sang, that God had demonstrated already with Samson and with the ark, the falling of their idol on his face before it, that God, if they relied on him, would grant the victory. But from a human perspective, from what you see with your eyes, This giant was enormous. Likely 10 to 11 feet in height. He carried the fiercest of weapons, a bronze javelin. Now some of you maybe have put a deck together with your dad or maybe helped him put some poles for a fence. His spear was like a four by four. with a head probably of 20 to 25 pounds. He had a bronze helmet, a heavy coat of mail, bronze leggings. Goliath did not intend to die. He was dressed to kill. And after 40 days, I wonder how close of that mile distance he had gotten. to the Israelites. Several times in this passage, the writer indicates that the Israelites were sore or greatly afraid. The indication of that word is their spirits of courage sank. Who could fight a monster like this? And as you and I think about what we are faced with, what challenges we may have that we seem not to overcome for the glory of God, for the extension of His kingdom. What is it? I'm not looking down at you tonight. Don't imagine. I'm preaching to myself. I have as many or perhaps more obstacles than you, but we all do. We all have these certain kinds of Goliaths that just stand in our way and we look and we see and we're cowering in fear. We're not moving forward. We're not lifting up the sword of the Spirit in prayer coming against these giants. Now it was commonplace in those days that When two armies would gather like this together in a field, they would send out their choicest men. And often it would be whoever would win that small skirmish, the others would then have to submit to the outcome of that event. And so fewer lives would be lost and they would be brought into subjection in this way. Now, while David is hearing this giant talk, He's witnessing his brothers and those in Israel and even the king retreating and backing away. And as they're doing this, they're even talking together about what the king had promised to give to the man who would dare to go out into the field against Goliath. As I read the passage, I don't think David was so much interested in what Saul was offering as much as he was shocked to hear that even Saul had to provide a prize. I think what disturbed David most was this man defied his God. Verse 26, they said to him, have you seen this man has come up, surely he's come up to defy Israel and it shall be the man who kills the king will get rich and with great riches and give him a daughter and his father's house will be exempt from taxes. David does say what will be done to this man, but then he goes on to say, verse 26, for who is this uncircumcised Philistine that he should defy the armies of the living God? David is saying, my God is the living God. Goliath's God is dead. He's an idol that falls on his face. We've seen it in our history. We're a reformed church. What have we seen in our history? What has God done and defeating giants for the church. We need him to do the same today. I fear that we are kind of in many ways held hostage, held captive in fear to all that's happening around us. I need to preach this to myself tonight as much as you. The key to David's confidence I find here already in verse 26. This man has defied my God. The Lord had promised to give us this land. The Lord will fulfill his word. What promises has he given to you? As a believer, if you're in Christ, What promises has he given to his church? Do we know them and do we plead them and do we act according to them? David says, by faith as it were, why do you all stand here and let the name of God be thrown to the ground? David's not seeking his own honor, but God's. And he's asking the question, is there no one who takes up the challenge of this man who defies our God? But what we find, children, is that David doesn't first have to overcome Goliath. He has to overcome his brother. Because suddenly, out of the word work, as his brother hears about what David's doing and asking these questions, he's getting upset at David. And he comes to David, he says, what are you doing here? You're supposed to be back home, taking care of the father's sheep. You're a prideful son. Go back home. David, though he's reviled, he doesn't revile his brother in return. He doesn't even say anything back. He simply asked the question, what have I done? Is there not a cause? Isn't there a reason someone should raise the question of why no one has gone out to meet this filthy heathen mocker? Has not my father sent me? And in God's providence, I am here. Is there not a cause? And David keeps asking this question until finally the king, after all the talk is going around the Israelite army, finally Saul hears about David who's raising these questions. And then we read in verse 32, when he's called before Saul. Then said David to Saul, let no man's heart fail because of him. Your servant will go and fight with this Philistine. Now remember David, children, remember David is anointed. He knows he's going to be the next king. There's no reason to go out and to make a name for himself. That's not his objective. He could have walked away. God would fulfill his word. But again, God's providence in bringing David here, whose heart is a heart after God's, and God was defied, was mocked, was ridiculed. David was humble. Notice he says, thy servant. So he classifies himself, not as someone who stands above Saul being anointed to be the next king, but simply as a servant. He was a subject of the king. And David's eyes here are on the Lord. Saul, King Saul's eyes, all he could see was the stature, even though he was the tallest in all Israel, all he could see was the stature of Goliath and his armor. And it seems, as you read this account, that when Saul has David state this before him, it's almost like, in himself, Saul kind of chuckles to himself. You, David, go to fight this Philistine? You're but a youth, and he's been fighting since he was a youth. Saul sees the battle with human eyes. David sees it with spiritual eyes. How do you live life? How do I live life? With natural eyes? Fleshly eyes that only see the here and now and all that gets our attention? Or do we have spiritual eyes? Eyes of faith that are fixed on our King. Saul says to David, you're not able to go against this Philistine. But then we read that eventually Saul agrees to let David try and he gives him his coat of armour. Here I think we have a great example of Saul and David. Saul wanted to rely on his strength, his armor, his understanding. And David is relying on the Lord, that's it. David was gonna go forth in the strength of the Lord But actually David too was gonna be the one who went out and fought the battle. It wasn't like David is gonna stand there and call down some kind of fire from heaven and destroy Goliath. No, God was going to be in David to accomplish this very task of bringing down this giant. Now, how is God going to use weak? Broken clay pots, as we are, as Paul says in 1 Corinthians 5 and 6. How is God going to use us to bring down giants in our lives? The same way he did with David. He's not going to somehow miraculously bring them down without any involvement of the person who has believed in Christ and trusted in Christ. David here as a believer is relying on the Lord and going forth to the battle. And so every believer has been filled with the Spirit of Christ. The resurrection power of Christ dwells within us. And the same call that lies upon David, lies upon every believer. Is to go forth into the battle, into the circumstance, into the challenge that we face. with the same dependence upon God and do it. Paul says, we then as workers together with him. He says again in Philippians, for we are laborers together with God. And yet he says in the same breath as it were, for it is God which works in you both to will and to do of his good pleasure. At the end of the day, Who that won this victory against Goliath? It was God. God directed precisely in his providence that stone, no matter how good David's slinging of the stone was, it is God's providence that brought it right there where it would land to the appropriate strength to knock this man out and bring him to the ground. You read he was, dead and he cut off his head. So if we ask the question, how is Goliath going to die? It's certainly we could say God's going to kill him, but not without David. Or we could say David will actually kill him, but not without God. We could say it this way. If David goes with his stone and his sling in the name of the Lord, there is nothing that can prevent Goliath's demise. He went forth with anticipation, with expectation, no doubt on the promises of God. The Philistines will be driven out of the land. Paul said, I have planted, Apollos watered, but God gave the increase. They labored with expectation. And that's how we labor. That's how we as parents labor, with the children God has given to us. We don't say, oh, there's so many giants, so many difficulties, so many challenges in bringing up children today. We kind of throw up our hands and say, I can't help it. No, no. All the defying of the enemies and the culture in which we live and the ideas that are pressing in to the lives of our children and seeking to lead them astray and to lay hold on them and destroy them. Parents, rise up in the strength of the Lord our God and fight this battle. And David, probably to encourage himself as well, but also to demonstrate to the others and to Saul, God had been with him before. And he brings this up here. When I was tending my father's sheep, and you know, David writes this psalm, the Lord's my shepherd, I shall not want, and so on. He sees that God has given him this responsibility. He gave him as a child even to tend to the sheep, to protect the sheep, to care for the sheep, to lead the sheep. God is training him in all of this. Teenage years of David's life. To be a king. As he trained Joseph. Children, young people, teenagers. God's training you. You can be like David. But you see, it's not about you. It's about our God. And David simply brings up these matters of the lion and the bear to indicate, God helped me do this. He's going to certainly help me do this. Literally, you could translate verse 37 to say, the Lord that delivered me out of the paw of the lion, out of the paw of the bear, he's gonna deliver me out of the paw of Goliath. And you see, David's confidence here is not in the fact that he has already killed a lion and a bear, but that God helped him. All of David's confidence and trust was in the Lord. And if you have been used of God, if you have seen his hand at work in your life, in your marriage, in your family, in the church, take that as an encouragement to press on in this battle. Because it must have been an astonishing wonder to David that God would use him in this way. And it will be astonishing wonder to us if God uses us to defeat any kind of Goliath. David was confident looking at what God has done for him before he goes into the battle looking to the Lord again. Saul says to David, go to the battle. There's nothing too short for the hand of God. At least Saul had enough sense to say, will the Lord be with you? God keep you. And yet Saul's eyes wasn't with his words. He still was fearful. He probably sent David into the battle wondering, I wonder how this is going to go. He first tried to clothe David with his own armor. It didn't work. David realizes he needs the Lord alone. He relies on the talents God had given him as a shepherd. In prayer tonight, I pray that Each one in the church would be equipped with the talents that God has given to us. You read Paul in Corinthians and other places, everyone in the body of the church has been given talents, gifts, abilities to be used for the whole body. David is using the simple talents and gifts he's been given. And so he picks up five smooth stones. How come five? Well, I don't think we're given the answer for sure, but it could possibly be one of two things. He may have thought, I may need more than one to accomplish what I'm going out to do, or it could be that he knew there were four giant brothers to Goliath who also would need to be killed eventually. He could have been, as he was, a prophet going forth with this in mind. But whatever the case was, either case, it speaks to us of David's faith and confidence in God and trust. As David went to meet the Philistine, the Philistine curses David. Possibly even cursed in the name of the Lord. He said, come to me and I will give your body. I'll give you to the fowls of the air and the beasts of the field. And David's answer is one of faith, of confidence. No, Goliath, you come to me with what man sees, a sword and a spear and a shield, but I come to you with a stone and a sling? No, I come to you in the name of the Lord of hosts, the God of the armies of Israel who you have defied. Goliath, I'm going to take your head from you. And it's your body that's going to be fed to the birds of the air and the host of your comrades as well. And notice at the end of David's little speech, he says, and all this assembly will know that the Lord does not save by sword or spear for the battle is the Lord's and he will give us, give you into our hands. And then we read, children, young people, an interesting little phrase. David ran. He's not cautiously approaching Goliath. He runs to meet him. And as he runs, he reaches into his bag and draws out a stone, and he slung it, and it smote the Philistine, we know, and it sunk into his forehead, and he fell on his face to the earth. And what does David do? What he said he was going to do. Having no sword in his hand, he takes Goliath out of his sheet and cuts off his head. There are two more things I want to notice before we go to a couple points of application. Look at verse 54. We didn't read that, but it says here, David took the head of the Philistine and brought it to Jerusalem, but he put his armor in his tent. I believe this is another act, although there's different interpretations of this. I believe this is another act of faith on David's part. Later in David's history as king, there were Jebusites who were still in part of Jerusalem, even part of Zion. And I could see David here at this moment, after this battle is complete, he is taking this head of the defeated Goliath and he brings it as it were up to the doors of this city and saying, I'm coming for you. the enemies of the living God will all be defeated. Now we can sit and talk about this story, a wonderful story of the Old Testament of David and wonder how does that really apply to us today? And we need to remember the same God of David lives. The second thing here is that David gives glory to God. It says that he brings the armor to his tent, but the likely interpretation would be that he brings this armor to God's tent, the tabernacle. David probably didn't have a tent here. He was with the sheep, remember, before he even came. And David comes, as it were, before the Lord with his armor he had taken from the enemy, with the victories of battle, and he gives it back to the one who gave it. I am confident for David that this victory humbled him greatly. Remember, it was a man after God's own heart. We have no reason to be lifted up in our victories, in our victories over sin, but there ought to be rejoicing. There ought to be an encouragement of others of how the Lord has helped us. Well, what are the applications we can draw from this story tonight? Well, the first I want to give is to us as families and particularly to children because it's an interesting story to children as well. There's a spiritual battle being waged in our world today over the hearts and the minds of all of us, in particular our children and the children of this world. Not just the children here. You remember when Jonah went to the city of Nineveh, and God says, why would I destroy this city if they repent? There are so many here who don't know their right hand from their left, meaning they're children. God cares for children, even of unbelievers, if you will. There are many children in this world today. that are going to grow up in a totally distorted, twisted, deviant, devilish culture in society. That's what we're facing when you look on TikTok, you look on Facebook, you look anywhere. Why is there so many in comparison to years before that are now woke and have crisis in their teenage years about who they are even in regard to their bodies. It's because the God of this world has made such inroads into our culture and into our society and the believers and the church of God silent. No, we're not completely silent. We're grateful for those who speak. We're grateful for churches that are faithful. That's all a blessing. But are we doing and going forth as David did with confidence in the Lord our God? Do we even recognize the battle lines that have been drawn in our world today? I'm assuming that when you have children born into the covenant community, you bring them here to be baptized. They're set apart, they're marked to be devoted to the Lord's service. But parents, that is not a given. The enemies of God, the living God, the one who makes covenant, the enemy of this God is your enemy. He has a passion and a hatred for you and your children. And so when you make the promise before the church and before the living God, we will bring up these children in the fear and admonition of the Lord to the best of our ability. Is that what we're doing? There's many giants that oppose this. Are you disciplining your children? Are you teaching your children? Because by nature, our children, though having the sign of the covenant, need to come to a knowledge of him who makes this promise personally. And the world will seek to draw away the children's hearts into their service. If you talk to the armies of Israel that day when David came there, what do you suppose the excuses would have been for not going out to meet Goliath? All of them would center around, I think, his appearance, fear, someone else can do the job. But when David came, it wasn't about him. It was this man defied my God. God had promised victory, driving out the Philistines and the Amorites and the Moabites and all these disparate groups of people. But Israel had to do it. And as parents, God promises us great blessing. I will be a God to you and to your seed after you. But how are you engaged in that warfare, in that fight for your children that God has given to you? David doesn't rely on the armor of King Saul, but on the abilities God has given to him. Whatever abilities God has given to you and to me, we're to use those. Pray God would multiply them and use them. Open your mouth, speak to your children, speak to your grandchildren about the Lord, about the victories he's given you. Overseemingly, perhaps to you might seem insignificant, but if it's been a struggle and he's helped you through, he's helped you to overcome, he's helped you to put this sin to death or that sin. Have you told your child that? Have you told your teenager that? And besides that, not only as parents, are we as a community, as a church body, are we doing that to one another? Men with younger men, women with younger women? David called to mind, God helped me when I saw the lion. God helped me when I saw the bear. He gave me to defeat them. And he will give me to defeat now this new foe. And we can learn from history. History of this church, history of the Reformed church, history of the church. From the Old Testament, David and Goliath, till today. God is faithful. And so we must take courage from the fact that God has given to us these precious gifts that we are called to defend to watch over to the best of our ability with God blessing us. Application number two, young people. It's likely that David was 17 or so. And you can see what a life of faith David had already at that age. Many times there are young people that I've met I know by experience, I was one. You grow up in the church. You know the truth, perhaps even better than many in other churches. But you think about God as someone, something you're going to serve later, somewhere down the road. It doesn't really relate to today. I have my life to live. And the giants come, and you're surrounded by many things in life. And with natural eyes, it's all you see, and you're distracted, and you're drawn away. But this calling of this passage tonight to you, young friends, is to be like David. Serve the Lord from your very youth. Put him to the test, if I may put it in that way. Try his faithfulness. If he has promised and you have trusted in him and you turn from your sins and you humble yourself before God and you plead his promise, I challenge you. He will be faithful. We need, the church needs, young men like David. God can accomplish his purpose without anyone. He can do it without me, he can do it without you, but he will use, use in me, and young people. to go forth into this battle. We don't know how long the Lord will tarry, but he is coming, but we're to be found faithful. You too, young person, can come like David to know by a living and experiential faith, this quiet trust that David had when he heard God defied, his heart was stirred up and he spoke. And you may have family members and even church people who say, oh, just calm down. You're all fire. They're all zeal with little knowledge. It's sort of what they did with David here. They continue to cling to God, seek to know his will. You see, David didn't know God simply historically. He didn't simply know God about reading of the deliverances of God of Israel. He didn't just know God theologically because he had some part of a Bible. No, he knew God personally, experientially. You read the Psalms and this language of the Psalms even is a reflection of the man after God's own heart. The Lord is my shepherd. I will not lack anything. I'm sure when David went to go to the bear and the lion, he was crying out to God for help and for deliverance every step of the way. But he went forth in the Lord's strength. And the third application here, when we look at this history, we see that God indeed leads his people. There was a line in the sand in this valley. you could say, down the center. There's a line in the sand, in some respects, between this body and the world. The valley in which this battle was taking place was known as Ipis Demo. It means the boundary of blood. We will not be fighting the battles, the spiritual battles, that are all around us without shedding of blood. Not literally. In our own battles personally and fighting against sin, I need to die. In other words, my blood needs to go. It's a battle. We don't like to die. The same is true for church, for a people bound together as one body in one place and the church of God throughout the world. And what we find today in the world, I fear, is that many ideas and many teachings are trying to find their way into the church to compromise her witness. The world mocks with the church, mocks with the things that we hold to be true, mocks with our inconsistencies, mocks with those leaders who have fallen, and encroaches further and further. But here in this history, what we have set before us, what Paul says, we do not fight a warfare with carnal weapons. For though we walk in the flesh, he says, we do not war after the flesh, for the weapons of our warfare are not carnal, but mighty through God to the pulling down of strongholds, casting down imaginations, and every high thing that exalts itself against the knowledge of God. And we bring into captivity every thought to the obedience of Christ. That's our battle. That's your battle. That's my battle. Taking every thought captive as we go into this week to the obedience of Christ. It's a spiritual battle. Paul lays that out in Ephesians 6. You can read what he says, our armaments are. And we need to take heed lest we fall. But every believer has the promises of God. of victory. He will bring about distressing circumstances as Goliaths to tempt us, to cause us to fear, to run away. But he has given us and promised victory because Christ is the great victor. He's the greater David. He went the way of the cross. He shed his blood in behalf of those who, like the fearing Israelites, didn't go forward. And yet he has shed his blood also for them. And he's entered the grave, but the grave could not keep him. He broke forth with power and authority and is now sit down at the right hand And our eye in this passage tonight, we are reminded ought to be upon him. In his resurrection, he, as it were, had cut off the head of the serpent and he placards it on the wall for everyone to see Christ. And we are called to then go forth into the battles that God gives us, knowing that our God, our Christ, is victor. Now in the Old Testament, of course, those who were circumcised, it was a mark that the land was theirs, not because they earned it. They were circumcised before they came into the promise. The same is true for us. Coming in by way of covenant, by way of baptism and water of baptism, God is calling us to renounce this present world, to deny ourselves, to take up our cross, to look to Jesus who has gone before us, who has gotten the victory over sin and death, and to go forward in his strength. And sometimes, friends, the little foxes, the little lions do more damage than the great Goliaths. That little word of gossip, that little white lie, that little glance of lingering needs to be killed. Is there any giant in your life that is mightier than Christ's power and victory in death and resurrection? Not only has he risen from the grave, he has ascended on high, and he sits now, the great David, at his father's right hand. governing all the affairs providentially of the affairs of men and of this present world to accomplish His glory. Where's your part? Where's mine? Rise up and slay the giants. Let's pray. Merciful and gracious God, we come tonight recognizing we have no strength, we have nothing that would enable us in ourselves to gain victory. Yet, Lord, we come to you for strength, for confidence and encouragement through this passage to put to death those things which are hindering the progress of your gospel truth and sanctification in our own lives and in the life of the church as a body. And so bless us, we pray. Help us as parents and help us as young people to take to heed, to heart those things that we have heard tonight. And so bless us, we pray in Jesus' name, amen.