Article: The Five Stones That Can Bring Your Giant Down | Jacob Varghese
We all might have heard the story of David and Goliath from the Bible a number of times. For 40 days, Goliath went towards the Israelites challenging them for a battle. A small shepherd boy heard this and decided that he would be the one to fight Goliath. His name was David, and he was one of the Israelites. Saul agreed that David would be the one to fight Goliath, and said: “Go, and the Lord be with you”.
As a Sunday school boy, I was fascinated on hearing how the huge giant fell with a tiny pebble thrown by a young boy. However, I also grew up the same way as most of us grow up in our Christian life letting the biblical stories remain just as stories. I failed to unravel the powerful messages that God has hidden in those real life incidents for some time, but I later realized the essence of those stories and learned to apply it in my everyday life.
We all have our own Goliaths in our everyday lives. Our waking thoughts are often related to those things that worry us the most. Thoughts of anxiety, fear, stress, boredom, depression, disease, and the list go on and on. They seem huge, dominating, and overpowering. They become the giant in action – the Goliaths in our lives. These problems may seem much bigger than our God. And we the children of God, like the Israelites, start our day with fear filled in our hearts, weak both in spirit and body, and let the giant overpower us. The Bible tells us that the Israelites were also in a similar situation.
Goliath, a Philistine nine-footer, had been threatening them for forty days, daring that one among them should come and fight him. Goliath shouted to the Israelites. He told them to choose a man to fight him. No one wanted to fight the giant. Goliath shouted to them every morning and every night for forty days. None of the Israelites would fight him. David’s brothers were in the Israelite army. Jesse sent David to take some food to them. David saw the giant, and he heard Goliath shouting. He saw that the men were afraid of Goliath, so David said that he would fight the giant. His brothers were angry. They said David should be taking care of the sheep.
David knew the size doesn’t matter. David knew that God would help him. He picked up five stones. He took his sling and went to fight Goliath. Goliath saw that David was young. He was angry and shouted at David and made fun of him. David shouted back and said God would help him kill Goliath. Goliath came to David to fight. Then David put a stone in his sling and threw the stone. The stone hit Goliath in the head. Goliath fell to the ground. David took Goliath’s sword and cut off his head. The Philistines saw David kill Goliath. They were afraid and ran away. God had helped David kill the giant. King Saul saw David kill Goliath. Saul made David a leader of his army. God blessed David and his army won many battles for King Saul.
When David confronted Goliath who had armor and a javelin, all David had was a staff, sling and 5 stones. We can apply the same principle and the same level of thinking to our life and the challenges we are facing. All that we need is to pick up five stones and make five strong decisions. That is all it takes to send Goliath out of our life when he tries to put us into difficult battles of our life. What do these five stones represent?
David remembered how God rescued him in the past from the jaws of the lion and the bear. That made it easier for him to believe that the same God could bring down this huge giant in no time. It is the Stone of Faith or Stone of the past experience of our life. None of us can deny that God has miraculously delivered us several times in the past. So as David did, we need to pick up the stone of the past and increase our faith. Another stone is a stone of prayer. David was a prayer warrior. Through the psalms we read how He turned to God when He encountered troubles. David was always ready to fight as he was prior-prepared by prayer. As he prepared to fight Goliath, I am sure he said a quick word of prayer to the mighty God, though the Bible does not record this. So, whenever we are faced with our Goliath, we need to pick up the stone of prayer and be ready to fling it at our Goliath.
Another one is the stone of priority and courage. David saw God’s reputation as his first priority. In this incident, David had been sent by his father to deliver food for his brothers at the war camp. Though David was a little boy, he saw a more important task at hand when he heard the Philistine defy the name of the God of the Israelites. We can feel the courage and zeal in his voice as he asks the crowd, “Who is this uncircumcised Philistine that he should defy the armies of the living God?” David realized that someone had to stop the giant from defying God, and he was willing to put his life on stake. Likewise, we also need to pick up the stone of courage and priority to make sure that God and His word dominate our lives, and Goliath has no place in our lives.
In this incident we see David took time to speak up for his God before making his move. He says to Goliath, “You come against me with sword, spear and javelin, but I come against you in the name of the Lord Almighty. This is the stone of passion and obedience. All those gathered here will know that it is not sword or spear that the Lord saves; for the battle is the Lord’s and He will give all of you into our hands. We are called to bring down every voice that denies Christ, to silence every tongue that slanders His Name. It can be the most difficult thing to do at that time, but we need to encourage ourselves and obey.
David chose five stones by the river, not just one. Why did he do that? We do not know as the Bible does not record anything about it. I think he might have suspected a few more giants to come out from the Philistine army and to continue the fight after Goliath fell. In any case, it shows the stone of the leading of the Holy Spirit and his persistence to stick to the end and win the entire battle at any cost.
Sometimes just one prayer may not do. One session of looking back to the past and counting our blessings may not help. We need all the five stones of Faith, Obedience, Courage, Prayer and Holy Spirit to deal with the giant, Goliath in our life. It is for sure that the giant will fall sooner or later. We need to just keep going and never give up. Our greatest Goliath can fall to the ground when the God of David is with us. Instead of running away from our problems like the Israelites, let us march forward in the battle like David with the stones of Faith, Prayer, Priority, Passion, and Persistence.
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