You're Going Down Goliath!

My little boys have a small obsession with the David and Goliath story.  It's the only Bible story they want to read, the only "movie" they want to watch, the only thing they want to "play", and often all they talk about.  I suppose this is a good thing.  :)  After all, David is described as "a man after God's own heart" and the story of him killing the giant is full of rich lessons for our hearts... #1. It doesn't matter how small you are vs how great your enemy seems, with faith in God, you can conquer!  #2.  God does not always (and actually rarely does) choose the most obvious or expected "hero" to accomplish his purposes.  #3.  It is possible to be a fierce, passionate, wild at heart warrior and at the same time be an artistic, poetic, tender-hearted lover of God.  And I'm sure there are several more points...  So, we've been talking about this a lot in our home and elsewhere...  Here are some little examples to give you an idea of their obsession.

While in the pool a few days ago, I kept feeling little rocks under my feet. I picked up a few and then asked, "Why are there rocks in the bottom of the pool?"  To which Titus quickly replied, "cause we killed Goliaf!"  Read 1 Samuel 17 if that doesn't make sense to you.

A couple of weeks ago Joshua was in the living room swinging his little blanket around his head and out flew a tennis ball...  It hit Titus right in the forehead, but instead of crying or getting upset, Titus dropped IMMEDIATELY to the floor and played dead.  Then Joshua ran around the living room yelling, "I'm a hero!  I killed Goliath!".

Last night we're in the checkout at Target and Joshua is chanting (loudly), "I WILL KILL YOU IN THE NAME OF GOD!"   It was funny and embarrassing... I mean, what do you say to people?   With the world as it is now, people usually frown upon talk of killing.  ;)  And it's not like we actually encourage killing people, especially in the name of God. We TRY to be law-abiding people. I guess I could've tried to explain it to the confused and slightly rattled college-age checker...but I didn't.  I just smiled at Joshua and said, "you go David!". 

All that said, it's created some very funny moments, great laughs, sweet memories with my little warrior boys.  But as I was sharing some of this with a friend, I was reminded of just how many God loving men in our culture have been encouraged to be wimpy...to be cowardly...to think that peace-making is the same thing as peace-keeping, and to even believe that Jesus was kinda wimpy because he loved children and was willing to minister to women... Oh man... that's all such a lie.  Jesus was, is, and will always be the greatest warrior of all time. Revelation 19 says that He will be riding a white horse, have eyes like fire, and a robe dipped in blood.  So, William Wallace you can move on over. ;)  Without going in to details or drudging up things I'd rather leave in the I HAVE AND WILL FORGIVE column, I have seen FAR TOO MANY church leaders who believe they are being Christ-like when they prefer to count church attendance, balance the budget, and strategize and sit on committees, rather than LEAD the sheep, STAND UP for the weak, or FIGHT for what's Spirit led, rather than sit comfortably in tradition.  And this is not just church leaders... how many men in general have we seen refuse to fight for their marriage covenant, fight for the hearts of their children, fight to go God's way and not the world's??? 

I'm honestly not sure how much can really be done with that mentality in our world today.  I don't plan to stand on the street corner and preach this stuff...  But what do I plan to do?  I plan to raise warrior-men.  Men who know how to love graciously, deeply, tenderly AND who also know how to FIGHT, to be passionate, to STAND UP, LEAD, NOT IGNORE INJUSTICE.... men who will believe that if God's on their side, they can KILL the giant. And you can bet, I've taught my daughters to be on the lookout for men like this to marry.  ;)