The Weekly Encourager – February 16, 2018 – Lessons from David vs. Goliath

Guest writer today! I have not been able to write for a while, but my husband has been writing about what he's learning through his job search. Today I'll share his thoughts about the account of David vs. Goliath in 1 Samuel 17.  I hope we are all encouraged to fight our giants with God on our side!

Be Bold and Unafraid

“Saul replied to David, 'You aren't able to go against this Philistine and fight him! You're just a boy!' David replied to Saul, 'Your servant has been a shepherd for his father's flock. Whenever a lion or bear would come and carry off a sheep from the flock, I would go out after it, strike it down, and rescue the sheep from its mouth...Your servant has struck down both the lion and the bear. This uncircumcised Philistine will be just like one of them.'”

Fear saps the will.The longer the job search stretches on, the more you begin to think there is something wrong with you, people don't want you, that you are insufficient or defective. But this is not how David acted. When facing a difficulty, he stepped out and set things right, bold and unafraid.

 David knew that the past is prologue. We, too, need to learn to draw on our past victories and remind ourselves that there is something "there" there. As David drew a parallel between killing a bear, a lion, and Goliath, so we need to draw a parallel from a past job we've done well or a past difficulty we overcame, and our job to be. If we did it once, we can do it again.

Likewise, we have to overcome the discomfort of having to always put ourselves "out there", meeting new people, introducing ourselves, explaining our accomplishments, and all the rest. It's uncomfortable because we don't like bragging about ourselves, and we like to stick with who and what we already know. But when the bear drags your sheep out of your own field, you have to go after it! Take up your staff, run to meet your challenge, and snatch it back, right out of its very jaws, if need be.

 Be Yourself

“Then Saul clothed David with his own fighting attire... but he was not used to them. David said to Saul, 'I can't walk in these things, for I'm not used to them.' So David removed them. He took his staff in his hand, picked out five smooth stones from the stream ... took his sling in hand, and approached the Philistine.”

Especially when preparing for an interview, don't try to second-guess what people will ask you, or what you think they are looking for. Be ready with what you know, your own version of a staff and smooth stones, and then use them at the time they are needed, just as you always have in the past.

Try not to rehearse in your mind how the conversation is going to go: she'll say THIS, and I'll respond with THAT, etc. While it's good to have some sense of what will be discussed, being over-scripted is like wearing someone else's armor, shield, and sword. It can't help but come off as being clumsy and inept.

Have your OWN reasons for fighting for the job you are interviewing for, and be prepared to let your own stones fly when the time is right.

 Look With The Eyes Of God, Not Man

“When the Philistine looked carefully at David, he despised him….The Philistine said to David, 'Am I a dog, that you are coming after me with sticks?' But David replied to the Philistine, 'You are coming against me with sword and spear and javelin. But I am coming against you in name of the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel's armies ... This very day the Lord will deliver you into my hand! ... and all the assembly will know that it is not by sword or spear that the Lord saves! For the battle is the Lord's, and he will deliver you into our hand.'”

An extended job search is a crucible, a time of testing. If you are a sincere believer, it will drive you to your knees in prayer and supplication. At the same time, you are being bombarded with advice on how to build your job seeking network, how to craft the perfect resume, how to ace that interview, how to leverage the vast resources of the Internet, not to mention the anxious queries of all your Christian friends and family members.

All those things are swords, spears, and javelins. They are useful but not necessary instruments of God's plan of salvation. God can get you a job using nothing more than a casual remark, or a shared request for prayer. God wants you to be faithful in all the small things so you can experience to the full all the means of His grace.

God is in command of your future. The job you are getting is something he desires you to have so that you might do good works. It is not by stint of our attempting to be perfect that God brings blessings. He brings them because he loves us, He wants to deliver us, He delights in showing us grace.

God cares about relationships above all things, especially our relationship to Him, and our relationship to one another. It may be that God is getting you a new job because He wants you to be salt and light to someone. It may be that God is making you go through the experience of losing and finding a job so your own heart might be softened up and you can grow closer to him. 

We need to look with the eyes of God on our situation, not with the eyes of the world.

 Yes, You Have To Fight! But God Gives The Victory

“The Philistine drew steadily close to David to attack him, while David quickly ran toward the battle line to attack the Philistine....David prevailed over the Philistine with just the sling and the stone. He struck down the Philistine and killed him. David did not even have a sword in his hand.”

When we are confronted with something that must be overcome, then we must fight. We must gather up our courage, collect our smooth stones and advance right into the teeth of adversity. We should do all that we have prepared to do to get the job. But God gives the victory. Not us.

Look at it this way: if God did NOT want you to have a particular job, is there any power on heaven or earth who could thwart His will in the matter? Impossible! And the reverse is equally true. When Paul teaches in Romans 8:28 that "all things work together for good for those who love God", note he doesn't say that things will just fall into our laps. Rather, he says all things "work together" for good. We are to keep on working.

God delights in small acts of humble obedience. He delights in taking our puny efforts and achieving great things through them, not so much by them. He does so, I suspect, because he respects us as people made in his own image, people who make and do and create. We are not just puppets on a string. 

So, we must advance, boldly and unafraid, using our own gifts as God has provisioned us, seeing with the eyes of God, not man, trusting to Him the victory, and trusting that He will, indeed, work all things together for our good.