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33. David's Battle
with the Giant.
In his youth and
longer, David was a bold man who entered into his destiny with a fresh
mind. But as long as his understanding heart kept him from sin, God kept
him from disaster. The Philistines waged a new war against Israel, and
David's three eldest brothers were with the army. Old Jesse sent David
to the camp to look after the brothers - one almost thinks of Joseph
again - and gave him food for them and ten fresh cheeses for the captain.
You can use anything in war.
When David came to the camp, to the wagon castle, he heard that the
whole army had marched out and was standing against the enemy, and the
giant had appeared again. For there was a terrible giant named Goliath
in the army of the Philistines. The giant was six cubits and a
handbreadth high. His head was armed with a metal helmet and his chest
with metal armour. His shield-bearer walked in front of him. He came out
every day and asked them if anyone had the heart to fight with him.
David left the vessel he was carrying with the baggage in the camp and
ran out to the army and saluted his brothers. David saw the giant with
his armour and his long spear and sword, and listened eagerly as the
people talked together about the reward the king had set for anyone who
killed the giant, as if he had a desire to do so. His brother Eliab
reproached him for having nothing to do here. ‘I know your presumption
well,’ he said to him, ’and the deceitfulness of your heart. You have
come to see the quarrel.’ Older brothers love to stand in for their
younger siblings in the absence of their parents and to help their
inexperience with advice and warnings, and they do a good, God-pleasing
work if it is done with consideration and love. But Eliab did his
brother wrong and did not speak to him as brothers should.
David did not listen to him at all. He turned away from him to one of
the people. ‘What have you said? What will the king do who kills the
giant?’ They said to him, ‘Whoever kills the giant, the king will make
him rich and give him his daughter and free his father's house.’ So
David approached the king and said he would slay the giant. The king did
not like it. He said, ‘You are still a boy, and the giant is a man of
war from his youth.’ But when David refused to abandon his plan, the
king finally had him put on a helmet, armour and a sword. But David did
not accept. Lightly dressed as he was, he went to meet the monster with
his shepherd's crook and a sling, only to find five smooth stones in a
brook.
The giant was amused when he saw the brown shepherd boy approaching. ‘Am
I a dog,’ he said, ’that you come to me with a stick?’ - David said,
‘You come to me with sword and spear and shield, but I come to you in
the name of the Lord, the God of Israel, whose army you have mocked.’
With these words he put a stone on the sling, and before the giant could
reach him with his long sword, David hurled the stone at his forehead
with such force that he fell down dead or unconscious. Then David took
his sword and cut off his head with his own sword. When the Philistines
saw that their strongest man had been overcome by a boy, they fled in
great terror, and the Israelites pursued them to the gates of their
cities and captured their entire camp.
From that time on, Saul took David into his house and would not let him
go. But Jonathan, Saul's valiant son, loved David, and his heart was
knit to David's heart, and they made a covenant together, and each loved
the other as his own heart. Jonathan took off his coat, because David
was wearing only a shepherd's garment, and gave it to David, along with
his belt, his bow and his sword. Saul also gave him his daughter Michal
in marriage. All the wars that Saul had to wage, David fought wisely and
happily and became increasingly popular with the captains of war and
with the people.
But when he was at home and the restless and anxious thoughts about the
old king came to him, David played him something on the harp.
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