One of the defining features of my youth was this unshakable assumption: that the Bible belonged to us, to my family. Not officially, not in so many words, but in practice. We were the ones who took it seriously. We were the ones who read it closely, who built our lives around it, who were willing to follow it wherever it led, no matter the cost.
And with that assumption came a kind of dismissal of everyone else. The idea that people outside our circle might genuinely care about Scripture — or understand it in any meaningful way — was laughable at best.
Looking back, that position seems absurd — the kind of belief that can only be maintained when you’re ignorant of your own ignorance. We had a very limited window into other people’s lives, and the Bible is one of the most widely read, most argued-over, most culturally embedded texts in the world. It has shaped entire civilizations. It lives in churches and courtrooms, in literature and politics, in everyday conversation. It was and is, by any measure, massively important to many people far beyond the walls of our tiny community.
And yet, that wasn’t how we saw it. So whenever I’d hear an outsider use Bible references, I would wonder: Does this person actually know the story behind what they’re saying?
Often, the answer was no, because so much of the Bible is deeply seeped into our culture and our way of thinking about so many things — and, into the way that we talk. When we hear about “the forbidden fruit,” we don’t need to picture Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden, let alone contemplate the mysteries of free will and original sin. Because what we mean is: something we know we shouldn’t want, but do. We get that meaning without effort. Or when someone talks about “seeing the writing on the wall,” we definitely don’t think about King Belshazzar’s feast, or how shocked he was when — as you can read in the book of Daniel — a disembodied hand mysteriously writes a message of doom on his wall. We don’t need that context to recognize the meaning, which is that something is about to end, and not well.
Today, I’m going to share the story of one of the most commonly used biblical short hands of all time: David and Goliath.
When you hear that a contest or a game or some other faceoff was “a real David-and-Goliath situation,” you likely know exactly what that means. The long-shot team that pulls off the upset. The little guy with the audacity to take on the big corporation. The scrappy nation that fights off an empire.
In some ways, “David and Goliath” is the meme of all memes. We reach for it almost without thinking.
But the story itself is so much more than a meme for the underdog.
It comes from the book of Samuel, which is shortly after the book of Judges and the events from our last episode. And at long last — after descending into the chaos described in stories like “The Woman at the Door” — Israel has a king and is united as a kingdom. Kings are actually having a bit of a moment at this point in history, as the Israelites aren’t the only ones going from disparate tribes to kingdoms. And the King they end up with is a man named Saul. He’s from the tribe of Benjamin, which is the one that was almost completely wiped out in the last episode.
Anyway, as the story goes, God gives Israel a king. But this is still a new and somewhat fragile kingdom. And they’re still surrounded by enemies — including, most notably, the infamous Philistines, who are a seafaring people from lands to the west, along the Mediterranean coasts. Importantly for the Israelites, the Philistines are polytheists; they worship many gods. The conflict between Israel and the Philistines isn’t a single invasion so much as an ongoing struggle that goes on for decades. It’s a steady, grinding back-and-forth between two neighboring powers.
This is where the story unfolds, in a moment when the two sides are locked in a standoff. And the setting is dramatic: a battle in the mountains. Israel’s army is positioned up on one ridge, the Philistines up on another, and there’s a wide valley stretched out between them — a kind of natural stage for what’s about to happen.
And what’s about to happen is that: “...there went out a champion out of the camp of the Philistines, named Goliath, of Gath.”
This “champion” descends into the valley to issue a challenge to the armies of Israel. He cries out to them, taunting them, and he is enormous and terrifying. My old King James Bible says his height was “six cubits and a span” — something like nine feet tall. This giant of a man has a “helmet of brass upon his head,” body armor that weighs something like 125 pounds, and brass armor on his legs. He’s armed with this massive spear tipped with six hundred shekels of iron — about 15 pounds at the head of the spear alone.
Now, this is the early Iron Age. Not everyone has these iron weapons, and the Philistines have a real advantage here. So Goliath ventures forth from the camp of the Philistines with all of this superior military gear — and with his sheer size, he is a spectacle of force.
And he’s not calling out for a battle between armies, but for someone to come out and fight him, man to man.
“Choose you a man,” he says, “and let him come down to me.”
“If he be able to fight with me, and to kill me, then will we be your servants: but if I prevail against him, and kill him, then shall ye be our servants, and serve us.”
And when King Saul and all his army hear this challenge, they are “dismayed, and greatly afraid.” No one dares to fight him.
So, for 40 days, Goliath repeats this challenge, these taunts — and he gets 40 days of silence in response. The entire army of Israel is terrified, and even Saul — this warrior king famous for being head and shoulders taller than any man in Israel — he’s there cowering, too, day after day. Seeing this giant before him, he does nothing.
*****
While all of this is going on, miles away from all the drama and terror, there is a shepherd boy named David out tending his father’s flock of sheep. David is young and allegedly very handsome. (The text actually kind of harps upon this detail of how good-looking David is. He’s described as “comely,” and “of a beautiful countenance,” and “goodly to look to.”) He’s the youngest of eight brothers, and the oldest three of them are with King Saul at the front.
One day, David’s father loads him up with food — grain, and bread, and cheeses — and sends him to check on his brothers at battle. David gets up early in the morning and does as he’s told. He arrives at the camp just as the soldiers are preparing to fight, facing each other across the valley, army against army. And David, seeing this, runs into the ranks to find his brothers.
And while he’s talking with them, Goliath struts down into that valley.Just as he’s done so many other times, he repeats his challenge. And when the men of Israel see him? To a man, they turn and run.
But David is appalled. He says, “What shall be done to the man that killeth this Philistine, and taketh away the reproach from Israel? For who is this uncircumcised Philistine that he should defy the armies of the living God?”
And when his oldest brother hears David talking this way, he is furious. He comes over to David and starts dressing him down for speaking up. His brother asks David, Why are you even here? He says, “I know thy pride and the naughtiness of thine heart.” You just came to see the battle.
But David responds, “What have I now done? Is there not a cause?”
And David keeps speaking out to the other soldiers in the same way — speaking up against this Philistine, Goliath — seeming to try to stir up courage in this place where abject fear had taken hold. And these frightened soldiers are intrigued by this brave little shepherd. They ask him, Do you know what the king will do for the man who defeats Goliath? The king will enrich him with great riches, and will even give him his daughter to marry.
Pretty quickly, word makes it back to King Saul about this ruddy kid going around talking shit, and Saul sends for him. So young David — who I always imagine in his shepherd's tunic, maybe with a little rope around his waist for a belt — comes before King Saul, this warrior cloaked in his armor, who has himself refused to answer the challenge. And it’s the kid who says, “Let no man’s heart fail because of [Goliath]. [I] will go and fight with this Philistine.”
But Saul answers saying, No, you can’t go up against this Philistine. He tells David, “For thou art but a youth, and he, a man of war from his youth.”
Yet David refuses to back down. He says to his king, You’re right. I’m no soldier. I’m a shepherd. But I have fought before. David tells Saul a story about the day that a lion and a bear came and stole a lamb out of his flock. About how David hunted them down, and fought them, and rescued the lamb out of the lion’s mouth. “And when [the lion] arose against me,” David says, “I caught him by his beard, and smote him, and slew him.”
David declares, “The Lord that delivered me out of the paw of the lion, and out of the paw of the bear, he will deliver me out of the hand of this Philistine.”
So Saul relents. “Go,” he says, “and the Lord be with thee.”
But before he lets David go on his way, he offers him his sword and his armor. But when David puts it on, it’s heavy and unfamiliar, and he tells Saul, “I cannot go with these; for I have not proved them” — haven’t tested them — so he takes them off. Instead, David takes with him only what he knows: his own staff, his own sling, and his own little shepherd’s bag, which he fills with five smooth stones that he chooses from a nearby brook.
And he walks down into the valley.
Goliath sees David approaching, and he seems almost amused at first. The giant moves toward him with that huge iron spear. And he clocks David, who is coming toward him without armor, without a sword — a young man who is “but a youth, and ruddy, and of a fair countenance.” And when Goliath sees this whole picture? He disdains David. He calls out, Am I a dog, that you’re coming out to me with a staff instead of a sword?
Goliath curses David by his gods, and says, “Come to me, and I will give thy flesh unto the fowls of the air, and to the beasts of the field.”
But David answers, “[You come] to me with a sword, and with a spear, and with a shield: but I come to [you] in the name of the Lord of hosts, the God of the armies of Israel, whom thou hast defied. This day will the Lord deliver thee into mine hand; and I will smite thee, and take thine head from thee; [...] that all the earth may know that there is a God in Israel.”
And without hesitation, David starts running right at his enemy — and as he runs, he reaches into his bag, pulls out a stone, puts it into his sling, winds up…and lets it fly.
Before Goliath can do anything to stop it, the stone flies through the air and sinks directly into his forehead.
The Giant is stopped in his tracks, and he falls — face first — into the dust.
And in a cinematic flourish — one that’s often left out of children’s story books — David runs over to the dead body of this giant. He stands on his body. He takes the Philistine’s own sword. And he cuts off his head.
In this moment, it’s as if a spell has been broken. When the Philistines see that their champion is dead, the entire army turns and flees. Meanwhile, the Israelites — who had stood fearful for 40 days — find their courage all at once and pursue the Philistines, and slaughter them.
All the while, King Saul is standing back and watching all of this unfold, and he says to the head of his army: “Whose son is this youth?” But no one can tell him.
However, this is an origin story. And before long, the whole nation would know his name.
And of course, all these thousands of years later, so do we.
*****
David and Goliath has become a short hand for not underestimating an opponent — or yourself — just because one appears to be smaller or weaker or lacking in some seemingly-essential competitive edge. But at its core, it’s a parable of human courage.
What strikes me now, reading it again, is the way that fear spreads through Israel’s army. How each day, it washes over them again, paralyzing them. Diminishing them. Solidifying them in their inaction.
Until someone shows up with this audacious — you might even say ludicrous — courage.
And courage is absolutely worth celebrating. It’s worth valuing. It’s worth our admiration. It’s among the best traits in the best of us. Stories like this, that seek to instill the sacredness of courage, are definitely something we as a society still need.
It’s something I want to pass on to my little ones. Something that I believe the world is often in short supply of.
But it’s also complicated.
It’s no surprise that my family loved this story. It was emblematic of exactly how we saw ourselves: a tiny church, exalted to victory again and again over every giant that stood against us. The people, the politicians, the courts, the culture — every opposing force was cast in the role of Goliath. We thought we were the ones willing to say — defiantly, even when we were surrounded by crowds that were often violent, at times thousands strong — what everyone else was too cowardly to say.
And while I’m appalled by that message now, I can still see that there is something to that posture. There is admirable bravery in being willing to stand up and say publicly — unmasked and in the real world, at great personal cost — what you believe to be true. Even when you know that people don’t want to hear it. Even when you know that they will mock, and dismiss, and resist, even attack you.
In our case, though, moral courage was paired with something that I no longer value: moral certainty.
After I abandoned that certainty, though, I faced a question: How do we embrace the bedrock value of a David-like courage — the courage to stand up in the face of danger, the courage to oppose a gathering mob — while still balancing that courage against the temptation to fall back into a close-minded certainty? To avoid thinking that “I am the one who knows the truth, in a den of liars? That I alone, my team only, can see in a world of the blind?”
I do not want to be a wishy-washy, intellectually anxious coward who allows the giant’s terror — and the fears of those around me — to put me in the army that flees and hides from the Philistine. But how do I summon that kind of courage again, knowing that I’ve used it before in ways that I now regret?
How do I navigate that tension and help my children do the same?
I’m not sure exactly. But I’m also grateful for a different sort of courage that I had to embrace as I lost my certainty: the courage to admit when I’m wrong.
And that happens to be the theme of the story that we’ll share next time.