Rarely, but once in a while, I preach from an outline which is not original to me. I purposed years ago, to be honest with you and to tell you when I feel led of the Lord to share another man’s message or outline. This is one of those occasions. I was blessed earlier this year with re-reading a chapter in a small book written by Pastor A.C. Dixon. Dixon was born in 1854, in Shelby, N.C., half way between Charlotte and Ashville. He pastored several Baptist churches including one in Ashville, before becoming the pastor of London’s Metropolitan Tabernacle 1911, after Spurgeon’s death. But perhaps his legacy is more permanently tied to a series of articles collected under the title: “The Fundamentals,” which were at the heart of the Fundamentalists controversy of the 1920’s. Today I am using Dixon’s outline which compares the faith of David to the power of Goliath.
“Then said David to the Philistine, Thou comest to me with a sword, and with a spear, and with a shield; but I come to thee in the name of the Lord of hosts.” Having spent quite a bit of time studying the importance and the nature of faith a couple years ago, we recognize that this is just a little chapter in history of the contest going on between faith and force. The secret of Goliath’s strength was his trained, brute force, assisted and protected by sword, spear and shield. On the other hand, the secret of David’s strength was simple, child-like faith in the Almighty God. I don’t know if Goliath had actually ever fought an enemy in hand-to-hand combat and won, killing the man. But David had exercised his faith in God in battle against enemies of his father’s sheep. David had exercised his faith, and he had learned to praise God for answering that faith, giving him victory.
We live in a day when various forces – physical, mental, financial, social, and scientific – are constantly defying God’s cause and challenging His people to combat. Abraham faced them when entering into the Promised Land; Moses faced them in Egypt; Daniel in Babylon. In the New Testament there was the constant struggle of Christ Jesus against the Sadducees and the Pharisees, followed by the Jewish and eventually the Roman persecution of the early church.
I’m not saying that they ever did, but the Davids, Daniels and Deborahs who try to meet physical force with physical force are going to be defeated, because God is not honored when they do. Daniel lived to be an honored and honorable old man, because he trusted in the “Name of the Lord.” And we just can’t imagine Daniel trying to physically wrestle a pride of hungry lions into submission. What could his friends do to cool the flames of the fiery furnace other than to trust the Lord? The Davids who meet the force of God’s enemies with faith in the omnipotent God are sure to conquer.
We see in David that FAITH must often STAND ALONE, while FORCE generally rallies FOLLOWERS.
The Philistines were evidently enthusiastic in their support of Goliath. All they had to do was set him loose, like a raging pit bull, and then step back to watch him work. But they were still right there hiding behind their hero. They were cheering him on; they were laughing with him in his taunting of Israel. They were patting him on the back when he returned to camp day after day.
David, on the other hand, had few sympathizers, until he had conquered his enemy and had no need of them. Saul discouraged him, and his brothers virtually took sides with Goliath. There was no one to fortify him; there were no cheer-leaders or brass band playing Sousa marches. God, and little David, stood alone – with Israel hiding behind their rocks and bulwarks. But David was not deterred by his lack of human support. He had the Lord, whom he had tested and proven before. He had the majority and the biggest on his team. Happy is the man who is willing – in a crisis of faith – to stand alone with God.
We learn here that FAITH CONTROLS some MIGHTY FORCES of its own.
David had skill with his sling, and he was not afraid to use it. But he may have been the only man in Israel, with a sling hanging from his belt. Real men don’t play with childish toys like pea-shooters, sling-shots and pop-guns. It is a fool who takes a slingshot to a gun fight, unless that fool is a representative of God.
David’s stature, armament, weapons and words were not things with which to inspire faith in others. Saul was anxious to give him greater strength by the addition of his armor, but it was the wrong kind of strength. Goliath, on the other hand, inspired his people with his strengeth, gigantic stature and splendid equipment. “He had an helmet of brass upon his head, and he was armed with a coat of mail; and the weight of the coat was five thousand shekels of brass. And he had greaves of brass upon his legs, and a target of brass between his shoulders. And the staff of his spear was like a weaver’s beam; and his spear’s head weighed six hundred shekels of iron: and one bearing a shield went before him.” Just to look at Goliath in his size and in his armor was to believe that he was invincible. On the other hand, David’s source of strength was invisible because it lay hidden in his heart. It consisted simply in his relationship to God and in the attitude of his soul. “I can do all things through Christ which strengthenth me.” David’s faith mastered all the forces of the universe. While Goliath’s force mastered only his misdirected dependence on his eye-sight and biceps. Goliath and the Philistines believed that their champion would conquer, because he had the indications of greater strength.
Dark is the day for God’s people when they allow the forces at their command to mold and measure their faith. Defeat is imminent when they can expect no greater results from God than they can see as naturally flowing from the forces at hand. So many have adopted Napoleon’s comment: “God is on the side of the strongest battalions.” Michael Angelo looked up into the domes of churches so often that he learned to look up all the time. It is said that even when walking the streets of Rome his face was turned upward. The man who looks up to God all the time will do a thousandfold more than the man who is admiring his own hands or tools. The man who looks only at his physical or mental strength is no stronger than that force, and there is always someone else bigger or smarter than he is. But weak forces wielded by God are strong as God Himself.
Faith is SIMPLE; it is always THE SAME, while force may assume different forms.
The bear which David killed was one kind of force; the lion was quite another kind and Goliath was still another. The skill which enabled David to kill the lion and the bear would avail him little in fighting the gigantic man. However, the same childlike trust in God was sufficient for each of them in their own time. Force, by constantly changing its form, sometimes deceives and overcomes us. But it doesn’t matter what form human strength or worldly strength might take, they are no guarantee of victory against an equal or greater strength.
Just before the Civil War the United States Government commissioned the building of a large wooden steamer. It was designed to become a major battleship – but it was made only of timber. At the time, the huge sum of a quarter million dollars was set aside for the project. But then someone invented a few funny-looking ironclad ships – metal ships, not wooden. In watching the ironclads in battle, it was determined that the wooden battleship was worthless. And what remained of it was sold for almost nothing. The ironclad was a new force which the wooden vessel could not resist. It was like the modern “arm’s race” which is an attempt to stay ahead of the enemy with bigger and greater weapons. But as David proves, through the ages there has been no force discovered which in God, using the forces at His command, cannot overcome.
The most dangerous forms of force are often the little things which meet us in everyday life. When we see the giants, we think of God and call for His help. “I have a huge problem here. I have no alternative but to seek the Lord for a solution.” But the little things – the little worries come to us in such a way that we are defeated without a struggle. Mighty Canaanite General, Sisera, didn’t think he had anything to fear in diminutive Jael with her soft words and her glass of milk – until he felt the nail being driven into his skull.
The Turks once conquered a German town, and while they were marching up one of its narrow streets, some young women threw from a window a dozen or more beehives. The bees did, with their little stings, what the German soldiers could not do, throwing the Turks into such confusion that they were easily put to flight. They knew how to fight men, but not bees. Faith in God will help us meet and overcome the insectile annoyances of life – as well as its giants. It doesn’t matter how the Devil’s the forces may change their forms, faith may be equal to every emergency
Faith which seems EXPOSED to danger, really PROTECTS.
But bruit force, which seems to be able to protect, really exposes to danger. Goliath, wrapped in his coat of mail, appeared to be safe, while David with only his invisible armor of faith seemed to be in danger. But David was the one who was really safe, and Goliath was in imminent peril. David reminds us that the place of greatest danger, if we are in the Lord’s will, is the place of greatest safety.
The lions’ den and the fiery furnace were for Daniel and his friends the safest places in Persia. John Huss preached at Prague in spite of the king’s command and was safe. But then he sought a safe conduct from the king to the Council of Constance. And under that promised protection he was taken and burnt at the stake. Adoniram Judson freely preached Christ, in spite of the rage of the heathen and was protected. But after his visit to the city of Ava to seek permission from the emperor to continue his preaching, troubles began, and eighteen months were spent in a horrible Burmese dungeon. We may stand bare-armed and bare-headed, but victorious before any or all the giants of evil on earth, if we come against them “in the NAME of the Lord of hosts.”
But does David always conquer Goliath?
Doesn’t force sometimes prevail over faith? Have there never been any believers falling before the forces of the enemy? Yes there have been those faithful and faith-filled martyrs, but their defeat was only apparent. The stones which fell upon Stephen hastened him into glory, and brought about the conversion of the young man at whose feet his murderers laid their clothes. When faith is involved, there will be victory through apparent defeat.
“In all these things we are more than conquerors through Him that loved us.” Study Romans 8 in its context, and you will see how believers may be “more than conquerors.” When we gain the victory, we are conquerors; but, when in our faithfulness to God, evil forces appear to over us, we are “more than conquerors.” The martyrs in Revelation were “more than conquerors,” and special mention is made of their receiving rewards.
And then there is the highest of all examples: Jesus allowed the forces against Him to conquer. They nailed Him to the cross, but the Goliath that struck Him down was himself killed in his attack. As Dixon put it: “The death of Christ was the death of death.” In just a few decades the hateful Jews were driven from the land, and a few centuries later the Roman Empire ceased to exist.
Unless the Lord returns to translate us soon, the forces at work in this world may strike us down. But eventually the last enemy to be conquered is death. And personally, by our death we shall conquer death. It will forever be in the rear-view mirror. To be with Christ is far better than any victories we might win here on this earth. Some day we shall rise, from either the grave or from our bedroom, pain and problem free, in glorified bodies to inherit the blessings God has graciously promised to us.
Dixon concluded his message with this bit of poetry reminiscent of Hebrews 11: “Thy saints in all this glorious war, Shall conquer though they die; They view the triumph from afar, And seize it with their eye” – that is “by faith.”