As I studied this passage, this week, I became aware of some high levels of anxiety and fear deep within my soul. When I say that the levels of fear and anxiety in my soul are high, I mean that they are maybe the highest they have ever been in my twenty-plus years of ministry. This is mainly due to things happening in the world around us, in our ministry, and in my personal life.

I indicated, in last week’s sermon, that I am often shocked, surprised, and grateful for God’s sovereign provision in and through the weekly rhythms of studying and preparing to preach his Word. The weekly rhythms of studying and preparing to preach the Word of God, through some of the most difficult seasons of life – whether it was some personal hardship I was experiencing, or difficulties we were experiencing in the culture at large, or trying times in our church family – that weekly rhythm of soaking in God’s Word has become the bedrock, the foundation, the only source of strength I have to continue standing when fear and anxiety become crippling.

I am certain you know what it is like to be overwhelmed with fear and anxiety. Fear and anxiety are the driving force of social media, news outlets, and consumer product sales. If you do not have this new thing, your life will be terrible. Or if you have this new thing, you will be sexy, accomplished, etc. If the other side of the aisle – politically speaking – wins, then America will be doomed. Or if your side of the aisle wins, America will be saved, and your way of life will be preserved. Fear and anxiety have become the bedrock emotions that drive our lives.

This exactly where we left off in our study of the big bully, Goliath, last week. Verse eleventells us that “When Saul and all Israel heard these words (abusive words of manipulation, intimidation, deception, and belittling), they were dismayed and greatly afraid.” When we find ourselves like Israel, we do not need a new thing, a better politician, or new friends.

We need a Savior and that Savior – for Israel then and for us today – comes from a place that we would least expect him to come from; he does not look like the Savior we want/need, he does not have the credentials we expect, he does not have the experience we expect, he does not do what we expect him to do, and he does not have the stature or the appearance that we would expect either.2 Look with me, and see how David – the little shepherd boy and Savior of Israel – enters the story amidst the constant harassment of the enemy.

12Now 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. 13The 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. 14David was the youngest. The three eldest followed Saul, 15but David went back and forth from Saul to feed his father’s sheep at Bethlehem. 16For forty days the Philistine came forward and took his stand, morning and evening.

17And 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. 18Also take these ten cheeses to the commander of their thousand. See if your brothers are well and bring some token from them.” 19Now Saul and they and all the men of Israel were in the Valley of Elah, fighting with the Philistines. 20And 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. 21And Israel and the Philistines drew up for battle, army against army. 22And David left the things in charge of the keeper of the baggage and ran to the ranks and went and greeted his brothers. 23As he talked with them, the Philistine of Gath, Goliath by name, came up out of the ranks of the Philistines and spoke the same words as before. And David heard them.

24All the men of Israel, when they saw the man, fled from him and were much afraid. 25And the men of Israel said, “Have you seen this man who has come up? Surely he has come up to defy Israel. And the king will enrich the man who kills him with great riches and will give him his daughter and make his father’s house free in Israel.” 26And David said to the men who stood by him, “What shall be done for 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?” 27And the people answered him in the same way, “So shall it be done to the man who kills him.”

28Now Eliab his eldest brother heard when he spoke to the men. And Eliab’s anger was kindled against David, and he said, “Why have you come down? And with whom have you left those few sheep in the wilderness? I know your presumption and the evil of your heart, for you have come down to see the battle.” 29And David said, “What have I done now? Was it not but a word?” 30And he turned away from him toward another, and spoke in the same way, and the people answered him again as before.

#1: THE CONSTANT HARASSMENT OF THE ENEMY (VV. 12 – 16)

In verses 12 – 16, we are given a description of David, his father, and his three older brothers who have followed Saul into battle against the Philistines. We would do well to remember that the three older brothers were not chosen by God to be the next king of Israel because “the LORD sees not as man sees: man looks on the outward appearance, but the LORD looks on [with or through his own] heart” (16:7).

David has been chosen, he has received the Spirit of the Living God (16:13), the Spirit of God has left Saul and, in its place, Saul has been given a “tormenting spirit” and David has been chosen to relieve Saul’s torment (16:23). We may presume that this is why the author says that “David went back and forth from Saul to feed his father’s sheep at Bethlehem” (v. 15).

Now, we may also presume that David has become increasingly aware of the bully during his trips back and forth between Saul and his father’s house or it is possible that what happens next is his first trip. Either way, verse 16 tells us that “For forty days the Philistine came forward and took his stand, morning and evening.” The bottom line is that the bully has been abusing, manipulating, coercing, intimidating, and belittling God’s people, multiple times per day, for forty days.

This bully is an enemy of God and his people. He has been harassing them, and defying God constantly, for forty days. Let that sink in. Forty days of deception. Forty days of manipulation. Forty days of intimidation. Forty days of coercion. Forty days of belittling. Forty days of abuse. Forty days of constant harassment. Who does this sound like? It sounds like Satan does it not?

You can always identify the source of the fruit you see in someone if you listen to their words long enough. They are either words spoken directly from the Living God, or they are words spoken directly from – the deceiver, the father of all lies, the accuser of the brethren, the roaring lion who comes to steal, kill, and destroy, the enemy who seeks to devour the people of God – Satan himself.

Out of the abundance of the heart, the mouth speaks. Your heart is either filled with the Spirit of the Living God, or it is filled with Satan. Your words will prove what soil your heart is made of. Anyone who uses their words to coerce, manipulate, intimidate, belittle, or provoke God’s people, only proves that Satan is the source of their daily nutrition.

#2: THE ABUSIVE WORDS OF THE ENEMY (VV. 17 – 23)

Speaking of words (specifically abusive Satanic words), in verses 17 – 18, David’s father sends him to the front lines with some gifts for his brothers and their commander, and he asks David to bring him news of how his brothers are doing.

Then in verses 19 – 23, after leaving his father’s sheep with an under shepherd and upon arriving to the front lines, David leaves his baggage with the baggage keeper and begins to greet his brothers when the author tells us in verse 23 that “the Philistine of Gath, Goliath by name, came up out of the ranks of the Philistines and spoke the same words as before. And David heard them.” David heard the bully’s abusive words for the first time. He heard them clearly for the first time.

David may have known about Goliath – generally speaking – if he was going back and forth between Saul and his father’s sheep. But it is also possible that he had only heard rumors of the big bad bully up until this point. Maybe he had not been to the front lines of the battle yet. Maybe David had been tending to Saul somewhere in the background far away from the front lines. Either way, as he enters the front lines of the battle, he hears the big bad satanic bully clearly. 

What would that moment have been like? I surmise that it would have been similar to when our ears and our eyes are opened to the work of the enemy in our lives and in the world around us. Something we were previously blind to or unable to hear clearly, suddenly becomes crystal clear. We hear the enemy clearly for what he has been saying, and we see what he has been doing with greater clarity than ever before.

We see and hear with absolute clarity – this is called the gift of illumination or the gift of spiritual eyesight that is given by the Spirit of the Living God – and we see and hear the enemy, the bully, the abuser of God’s people, with astounding clarity. And the question is, “What will we do with our newfound eyesight and our newfound hearing?” We can either rise up and fight the enemy with the strength of the Spirit or we can shrink back in fear and anxiety just like the bully wants us to.

#3: THE WIDESPREAD FEAR AMONG THE NATION (VV. 24 – 27)

Speaking of fear and anxiety, we come back to that theme in our next section of the text. David has just heard the satanic bully clearly with his own Spirit filled ears for the first time. What will he do? What is everyone else doing? What is the response? Verse 24 says that “All the men of Israel, when they saw the man, fled from him and were much afraid.”This is widespread fear and anxiety completely taking over the nation of Israel.

What will David do? Will he flee in fear of the enemy? Will he go back and hide in the baggage like Saul did? Of course not! First thing David does is he listens to the words of those who are afraid, and they say to him, in verse 25, “Have you seen this man who has come up? Surely, he has come up to defy Israel. And the king will enrich the man who kills him with great riches and will give him his daughter and make his father’s house free in Israel.”

The main gist of what these fear-filled people are saying is that there is a satanic bully who cannot be beaten, and the king has offered a reward to anyone who does beat him. Instead of standing up to the satanic bully himself, the cowardly king with the tormenting spirit offers to handsomely reward the fellow who does his job for him. The reward offered here is a reward of personal gratification. Your life will be better if you do this thing; you will be wealthy, married, and free.

Amidst the fear and the hypocrisy, David speaks for the very first time in our story in verse 26, by asking two questions. Remember, David listened with Spirit filled ears first. Then he speaks for the first time by asking two questions. The first question is indignant. The second question is even more indignant. In the original language they both carry the sense of indignation or holy anger laced with sarcasm.

The first indignant question in verse 26, is: “What shall be done for the man who kills the Philistine and takes away the reproach from Israel?” David, by asking the question this way, is indicating that nothing should be offered to the man who defeats the satanic bully other than the reward of knowing that he has just honored God by removing Israel’s shame. That should be reward enough. The believer does not obey God or seek to honor God for personal gain. We seek to obey and honor God because he deserves the glory for his power at work in an obedient individual.

The second indignant question in verse 26 is: “For who is this uncircumcised Philistine, that he should defy the armies of the living God?” This question indicates David’s frustration with the current set of circumstances. A satanic bully has shown his ugly face, and all Israel can do is run in fear while trying to locate someone who will face the bully for personal gain. Israel is too afraid to take the gloves off and deal with this bully once and for all.

David basically turns an indignant question into a rhetorical argument. This is the enemy that caused you to run in fear? This is the enemy that none of you will face? This piece of pagan filth is the one you are allowing to defy the armies of the living God? You are more concerned with personal gain than the glory of God? And of course, the people are so dumbfounded by David’s questions that they resort to repeating themselves. 

You got to love David in this moment! You have to admire his tenacity! Everybody is running for the darkness in fear, and little David, the shepherd boy who plays the harp, is the only one who is willing to ask the right questions and to stand up to the bully even if he must do it alone. David’s courage is absolutely astounding here.

All of Israel’s fighting men along with Israel’s failed king, are acting out of fear as they tap out of their God given calling while running from the abusive, Satanic bully. But not David! David begins to flex. But not everyone buys in. Out of all the people you would expect to be in David’s corner, his own brother takes the side of the Satanic abuser and begins to unleash his own stream of ungodly abuse against David.3

#4: THE UNGODLY JUDGMENT OF THE BROTHER (VV. 28 – 30)

Once Eliab, David’s older brother, hears his indignant questions, he gets angry with David, but it is not a holy, righteous anger. The proof is in his words. Eliab confronts David and says in verse 28, “Why have you come down? And with whom have you left those few sheep in the wilderness? I know your presumption and the evil of your heart, for you have come down to see the battle.”

Eliab’s ungodly judgment of his own brother is so disgusting. First, he questions David’s motives. Next, he belittles him with the snarky question about the “few sheep” indicating that he is merely a little shepherd boy with a couple of sheep who knows nothing about the things of war. Then he claims to know the evil intentions of David’s heart as though he can see as clearly as God does despite the fact that he is among those who are refusing to deal with the bully in a God honoring way.

Yeah! I am definitely convinced that Eliab is seeing and speaking clearly. He is certainly speaking from a heart that is full of the Spirit of God (sarcasm intended)! Long story short, Eliab is a pile who should have kept his mouth shut rather than presuming to be God!

David’s response to his brother’s ungodly, abuse is to simply say in verse 29, “What have I done now? Was it not but a word?” In other words, “All I did was ask a couple of questions and now you are leveling your abuse against me?” Then he basically shrugs his shoulders, does not give his betrayer of a brother a second thought and continues to move throughout the ranks of Israel with his questions while receiving the same response.

The bottom line is that David will not be detoured. He has been anointed by the Spirit of the Living God. Forty days of constant harassment will not detour David from his calling. The bully’s abusive words will not detour David from his calling. The widespread fear throughout the nation of Israel will not detour David from his calling. His own brother’s betrayal will not detour David from his calling. David is resolute that this filthy pagan will not be allowed to bully God’s people any longer; his defiance of God will come to an end on day forty-one!

APPLICATION…

By way of application, we should notice that this passage has been a story of contrasts. First of all, we can easily see the courage of David contrasted with Goliath’s constant harassment and his abusive words along with Israel’s widespread fear and David’s older brother’s ungodly judgment.

I am sure that you can remember times in your life where the harassment of the enemy would not let up. Or maybe you have experienced seasons where the abusive, antagonizing, belittling, intimidating words of the enemy caused you to curl up in the fetal position. Or maybe you have experienced the excruciating pain of the ungodly judgements and slanderous lies of someone who should have been in your corner.

You have probably felt the overwhelming panic and fear of a moment or two like that. In those moments, moments where the harassment feels like an all-out attack that never stops, or moments where all you can hear is the antagonizing, the belittling, and the intimidating words of an enemy, or the moments where you have been unrighteously judged by a slanderous deceiver who should have been your friend, in those moments, you probably felt crippling fear and you had a choice to make.

Will you be courageous as you face down your opponent? Or will you cave in and back away from the fight in front of you? Will you stand courageously, or will you surrender like a coward and give into the enemy who requires the payment of your very soul as the price of admission into his deadly carnival of evil games? Satan, sin, and Death – our most formidable enemies – love to play games that require the admission price of your soul. Courage is what is needed when the enemy bares his sharp teeth.

True courage is never displayed in times of peace and ease; true courage is always displayed during times of war and opposition. Courage is not the absence of fear in the face of constant harassment, or abusive words, or ungodly judgments that get tossed around like so much confetti during a party. True courage is displayed amidst and despite those things. And make no mistake, we are not talking about the Western version of toxic masculinity or the kind of macho bravado that characterizes much of what we see in Hollywood.

We are talking about true spiritual courage that is clothed in godly humility, immoveable faith, and relentless truth. When the constant harassment, the abusive words, and the ungodly, slanderous judgments of our friends who have become enemies cause us to fear, we, in that moment, have a decision to make as to whether or not we will continue to courageously follow Jesus in obedience to his calling, or we can shrink into the shadows of the darkness where Satan, Sin, and Death can get their grimy little fingers dug deeply into our hearts and souls.

We can either follow our crucified, risen, and returning King courageously or we can surrender to the enemy. The reality is the contrasts do not just end with David’s courage. David is actively courageous for sure. But that courage is also contrasted with the Bully’s aggression and Israel’s passivity. Aggression and passivity do not honor God. But righteous, godly action does honor him.

We are not called to shrink back from evil because of fear. We are not called to handle bully’s with kid gloves. We are also not called to match the enemy’s ungodly aggression with more ungodly aggression. We are called however, to take violent action against Satan, Sin, and Death.

This is no easy path to walk because our enemy is absolutely relentless in his harassment of God’s people. But take heart, because we have a Great King to look up to!

CONCLUSION…

In conclusion, we would do well to take courage in the courageous life of another King a few thousand years after David. He came from an unexpected place – Bethlehem. He had unexpected parents – a virgin and a carpenter. Can anything good come out of Nazareth? – they asked. Jesus also faced forty days of war with a bully named Satan in the wilderness… and on day forty-one he overcame that bully. 

He did the same thing again on day three after the crucifixion. On the day of his crucifixion, no one would have believed that he was in fact exerting all the courage a human could ever muster, for the sake of the entire world, to defeat our greatest enemies. So, whether you are facing a bully right now or if you have been the bully at some point in your life, rest assured, the justice that is required to make things right was unleashed – like David’s stone – onto the body of Jesus as he died in our place.

Satan, Sin, and Death have no dominion over a blood-bought son or daughter of God. If you have trusted in Christ and his work at that cross, then you have also been endowed with the power of the empty tomb. Satan, Sin, and Death are no match for a blood-bought believer who is walking in full surrender to the Spirit of the Living God.

You can resist Satan, and he will flee from you. You can fight sin actively (not passively or aggressively) and it will relinquish its hold over you. You can stand against the fear of death knowing that death only opens the doorway to eternity with Christ who is your Savior.

You can literally face Satan, Sin, and Death with your head held high, full of resurrection courage, with the bloody cross and the hope of eternity in view, and like David, and  along with Jesus, you can say, “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” (17:45 – 46). – Amen!!

1 Unless otherwise specified, all Bible references are to the English Standard Version Bible, The New Classic Reference Edition (ESV) (Crossway, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers, 2001).

2 John, Woodhouse, 1 Samuel: Looking for a Leader, Preaching the Word Commentary, (Wheaton, Illinois: Crossway, 2008), 313 – 323.

3 Ibid., 321 – 322.