Flannelgraph Faith: David - Facing the Giant

2017-08-06 

Pastor Jonathan Falwell 

Memory Verse: 1 Samuel 17:47 NKJV

Then all this assembly shall know that the Lord does not save with sword and spear; for the battle is the Lord’s, and He will give you into our hands.

Today, we continue in our Flannelgraph series and talk about one of the most popular stories of the Old Testament. The story of David and Goliath. This is a story of human power defeated by the power of God. A story all of us have been inspired by in our lifetime.  But there are lessons that we can also walk away with from this story. And these are lessons that we can use in facing the giants in our own lives.

1. The greatest challenge in life is rarely the actual challenge

* If David had listened to the crowd, he would have never walked onto that field

* If David had listened to his brother, he would have no confidence

2. Facing opposition while doing God’s will should be expected

* David walked into a wall of opposition when he said he could defeat Goliath

* Eliab – a brother who thought David was useless – 1 Samuel 17:28

* Soldiers – who thought David was a joke

* Saul – a King who thought there was little hope

* We see the same type of opposition in our own lives

3. Your success or failure is directly related to how you handle that opposition

* So Many Christians Never Achieve The Maximum Potential In Their Lives    Because They Never Conquer The Thing That They Fear The Most

* Recognize that it is in God’s power that we find our victories

* David responded to his brother in 1 Sam. 17:29 – IS THERE NOT A CAUSE!

4. Depending on God’s power in the face of your biggest giant is always a winner

* Goliath lost this battle because he trusted in himself

* David won because he trusted God alone

* God didn’t simply hand Goliath over to David and Israel, He made them fight the battle

– 1 Samuel 17:51b …And when the Philistines saw that their champion was dead, they fled

When we depend solely on the power of God in our lives, and His sufficiency, we will walk through the battlefields of life in victory.

2 Corinthians 3:5 Not that we are sufficient of ourselves to think of anything as being from ourselves, but our sufficiency is from God