O Goliath, Where Art Thou?
O Goliath, Where Art Thou?
You may not like the answer
This week, the lectionary continues the saga of 1 Samuel that we’ve covered the past few weeks (here’s one, two, three in this series). Today, we begin David’s story in earnest with the epic battle of David and Goliath. The lectionary also brings us Christ stilling the storm, which bears some similar themes. The disciples in the boat in the storm face a symbolic spiritual battle not just for their physical lives, but for their souls. This is also David’s terrain.
When Allusions Fail
There are too many “David and Goliath” references in our culture to name. Sports teams, movies, books, we could go on and on. We probably don't even clock it when someone mentions D&G. Apart from stories about Jesus, it might be the most culturally well-known story in the Bible. Yet I don’t think we really appreciate what the story is trying to tell us.
I’ve been reading a new book on whistleblowing in medical ethics by Dr. Carl Elliott, a bioethicist and philosophy professor at the University of Minnesota, called “The Occasional Human Sacrifice” (so far it’s excellent). Elliott references the David and Goliath motif a few times when talking about whistleblowers who have gone against the leviathans of research institutions, the federal government, and other organizations (I don't talk about it much in this newsletter, but I’m reading the book because I was a whistleblower on a study at Johns Hopkins University, which led to a long series of events in which I found myself giving a public comment during an FDA meeting a few weeks ago). Elliot’s book both speaks to me and for me, as well as challenges me to reflect.
Part of the challenge of us seeking David and Goliath stories is in seeking the cleanliness of champion narratives. As Elliott says, while the Hollywood depictions of whistleblower stories can be inspiring (like All the President’s Men and Watergate), it does not always turn out so well. Life is more complicated. Sometimes it’s more tragic. Sometimes David doesn’t win. Sometimes, David isn’t really David, and sometimes David acts more like Saul, and all whistleblowers are still sinners in need of grace.
The problem with how we talk about David and Goliath as a culture is at least twofold. One problem is that our cultural references focus on the tactics of David (that slingshot! those shepherding skills!), or the secret vulnerability of Goliath (weighed down by armor! cocky!). There is definitely truth to both; they work on that level of analysis in diagnosing why underdogs win. But as several different podcast chats pointed out this week, the fact that we focus on this aspect of David and Goliath reveals the more fundamental problem that we tend to make it a story about us. While we can find ourselves everywhere in the sinners of Scripture, it is primarily a story about God.
This, then, is our Goliath—the human tendency to focus our attention on ourselves.
What About Me?
As tempting and popular as it is, the main takeaway of David and Goliath is not about how we can tactically defeat the Goliaths in our lives. It’s not only because we aren’t King David (and we may not win), but because when we make the story about defeating Goliath, that is, ironically, the exact battle Goliath wants. That is fighting on his terms.
In last week’s discussion about Saul and Saul’s failed kingship, we saw that Saul’s sins aren’t the point, it’s what Saul’s sins shows about his broken relationship with God. Likewise, David’s skills aren’t the point, it’s how they speak to his strong relationship with God. And yet it is hard for me (and I imagine for many) to read this story and not want to read myself into the story, instead of using it as a moment to wonder, well, how is my relationship with God?
Perhaps a bigger spiritual Goliath is a subconscious defiance of a relationship with God, even or especially when we think we are fighting his battles. This can show up on the battlefield of “the flesh” within, or sark, a term Paul uses not only for our vulnerable human bodies, but the inner spiritual forces that pull us away from God even as we yearn to do good. This is not the only place where evil exists, for Goliaths roam the world outside us too; Paul would say in Ephesians that evil shows up not only in “the flesh” but also in “the world” and “the devil” (Ephesians 2). But these outer realms of evil exercise their power even greater when we are not vigilant on the spiritual battle within, pulling us away from faith despite ourselves. O Goliath where art thou? Goliath, thou art in ourselves.
But this, too, feels a bit simple and reductionist (not that that’s ever stopped me). Maybe this paradigm of an “inner Goliath” is more symptom than diagnosis. Maybe the true Goliath is the annoying part of the human mind that can’t stop returning to gaze upon itself over and over, even when we try hard not to. Maybe this is why worshipping God can be as much about obedient discipline as passion. And maybe that’s too simple, too.
If there is an inner Goliath, its mantra seems to be a self-reflexive, “What about me?” This is what David’s Goliath does himself over and over. Here are some of his lines (1 Samuel 17):
“Am I not a Philistine?”
“Choose a man for yourselves, and let him come down to me.”
“Fight me, and if you kill me…”
“Today I defy the ranks of Israel!”
“Am I a dog, that you come to me with sticks?”
“Come to me, and I will give your flesh to the birds.”
Me, me, me. This is our Goliath minds at work.
It’s also what the disciples say in the boat on that stormy sea, “What about us, Jesus, don’t you care about us?” (Mark 4:38). And after showing his love in action, Jesus then says, “Why are you afraid, why so little faith? Can’t you see this isn’t about you? I’m here.”
As for David, maybe David becomes king partially because he doesn’t make his “David and Goliath” story about himself—and he’s in it!
Faith in Ourselves, Faith in God
I talked about spiritual tradeoffs a few weeks ago. One trade we are always being offered is to trade faith in ourselves for faith in God.
When I say “faith in ourselves” is something to trade, I'm not condemning a quest for healthy confidence, self-esteem, or anything like that with those who struggle with it, or those who have been taught that any self-regard is unholy. David has these traits in spades. He is able to accurately and proudly appraise his abilities: “I fought this, I fought that, killed that lion, slain that bear, yup, I can do this.” But how does he talk about these battles? Not he, but “God saved me from them.” David has healthy confidence in what he can do, his faith is in God is one that lets him see himself how God sees him.
The kind of “faith in ourselves” I'm suggesting we trade is less an overt “faith” than more a force of attention. My partner and I just watched the movie Inside Out 2 yesterday, in which all the characters are emotions, personified as living in the control panel of the mind—Joy, Sadness, Fear, Disgust, Anger. The sequel introduces a few new characters, including Anxiety. While Anxiety is a useful emotion for us and helps point us to potential issues, Anxiety is a force driven by self-examination. When it's overrun, it tries to control everything.
I don't want to suggest anxiety issues are trivial, or moral. Christ seeks to heal those who struggle, and treating these issues are often not a simple formula but a lifelong challenge. If we struggle with anxiety disorders, it's not a litmus test on one's faith in God, as some toxic and overly simplistic theological messages might imply.
In fact, even for those of us who merely struggle with perpetual low-grade anxiety, it can be an outright tragedy. We know in anxiety that there's a problem, but Anxiety (character or not) can only try to fix itself through more anxiety.
Eventually, an anxious “faith in ourselves”—as an object of attention, the human condition towards self-worship—actually does turn into Goliath, either paradoxically as a crippling doubt in ourselves, or an outsized egoic maniac.
And so we Christians instead must trust (sometimes again and again and again) that instead of doubling down on things we can control, our surest foundation is doubling down on faith in God. A God who gives us the freedom to do whatever we know needs to be done with whatever tools we have. A God who gives us the wisdom to ask him if this a battle that needs fighting. A God who gives us the courage to stand up. And a God who tells us that actually, sometimes, our battle isn’t really about you anyway. So we can relax.
When Goliath Comes
So when Goliath comes, we can use tactics, sure; David does use some. But David says, “It’s not about the weapons, I come to you in the name of the Lord.” And so the most fundamental spiritual battle against the inner Goliath of self-attention is one of the most common words and powerful commandments in the Old Testament, “Remember.”
When we see Goliath in the valley, let us not focus on how we can be more David-like, or how to take down Goliath, but to serve God and to seek to do his will and have faith that the rest will take care of itself. This doesn’t mean life will be easy at all, but more as Paul says to the Corinthians as “servants of God”:
Through great endurance, in afflictions, hardships, calamities, beatings, imprisonments, riots, labors, sleepless nights, hunger; by purity, knowledge, patience, kindness, holiness of spirit, genuine love, truthful speech, and the power of God; with the weapons of righteousness for the right hand and for the left; in honor and dishonor, in ill repute and good repute. We are treated as impostors, and yet are true; as unknown, and yet are well known; as dying, and see--we are alive; as punished, and yet not killed; as sorrowful, yet always rejoicing; as poor, yet making many rich; as having nothing, and yet possessing everything.
2 Cor 6:4-10
The question for Christians today is just as it was for the early Christians, less “How can I beat Goliath?” and more “How can I bear witness to God?” And “How can I remember God is here right with me, in the boat, always?”
Jesus wasn’t asking “You’re professional fisherman, why don’t you have faith in yourselves to get out of this storm?” The question was, “Why don’t you have faith in me?” Because it wasn’t about the disciples, and it wasn’t about David, and it certainly wasn’t about Goliath. It’s about our relationship to the Holy One who is always with us. Rather than seeking ourselves, or seeking to defeat our enemies, or even seeking to defeat the enemy within ourselves, let us seek God instead. The rest will follow. And the rest of the rest will fall.
