David Versus Goliath

Slingshot

Practice using sling (tennis balls, not lead bullets, for shot). See if you can hit a target. Get a feel for the place and the weather.

Reading from the book pt 1

1 In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. ² He was in the beginning with God. ³ All things came into being through him, and without him not one thing came into being. What has come into being ⁴ in him was life,^[a] and the life was the light of all people. ⁵ The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not overcome it.

⁶ There was a man sent from God, whose name was John. ⁷ He came as a witness to testify to the light, so that all might believe through him. ⁸ He himself was not the light, but he came to testify to the light. ⁹ The true light, which enlightens everyone, was coming into the world.

¹⁰ He was in the world, and the world came into being through him; yet the world did not know him. ¹¹ He came to what was his own,^[c] and his own people did not accept him. 

Story of David and Goliath

Samuel 17

In the story, Goliath is a mighty giant of a warrior. Like the Nephilim or the Jotun of Northern climates. His spear had a head the weight of a bowling ball and a shaft like weaving beam. His armour weighed as much as a young woman. Morning and evening he challenged any Israelite to face him in single combat and to claim victory in the war…

 ²⁶ David said to the men who stood by him, ‘What shall be done for the man who kills this Philistine, and takes away the reproach from Israel? For who is this uncircumcised Philistine that he should defy the armies of the living God?’ …

³¹ When the words that David spoke were heard, they repeated them before Saul; and he sent for him. ³² David said to Saul, ‘Let no one’s heart fail because of him; your servant will go and fight with this Philistine.’ ³³ Saul said to David, ‘You are not able to go against this Philistine to fight with him; for you are just a boy, and he has been a warrior from his youth.’ ³⁴ But David said to Saul, ‘Your servant used to keep sheep for his father; and whenever a lion or a bear came, and took a lamb from the flock, ³⁵ I went after it and struck it down, rescuing the lamb from its mouth; and if it turned against me, I would catch it by the jaw, strike it down, and kill it. ³⁶ Your servant has killed both lions and bears; and this uncircumcised Philistine shall be like one of them, since he has defied the armies of the living God.’ ³⁷ David said, ‘The Lord, who saved me from the paw of the lion and from the paw of the bear, will save me from the hand of this Philistine.’ So Saul said to David, ‘Go, and may the Lord be with you!’

https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=1%20Samuel%2017&version=NRSVACE

David faces down Goliath with five smooth pebbles from a river, and a sling. This will loose a bullet that hits like a .44 magnum, but still if David were to miss he had no sword. His first shot avoids goliaths helmet and fells him, then using Goliaths own weapons David kills him and takes his head as a trophy. The war is won.

Longing and Lament

It is easy to feel overwhelmed, if not because of particular catastrophes then from a stream of  24/7 news, voices in the supermarket queue, and chats with acquaintances. What can we do in the face of such Giant threats? Do we blame ourselves and regard our lives as worthless in dismay or do we look for a super hero saviour with a magic bullet that will make everything better? That is one possible response to the story of David and Goliath, if we read it as an onlooker.

The Church in the west, especially in the modern era, has had a tendency to separate matter from spirit, humanity from creation and to then either represent nature as a vastness to be overcome and tamed, or raw resources to be managed. Both of these approaches overlook that our being is within the natural world. John uses the contrast between light and darkness, but the light is always there in the world, and the darkness does not slacken it.

Prayer of intercession based on Ephesians 4:7-16[1]

There is no pain in our hearts or in our planet that you do not know,
for you have touched the lowest places on earth.

Silence

Teach us to grieve with you, O Christ,
the loss of all the beauty that is being killed.

Silence

There is no place in the heavens that cannot be touched by your resurrection presence,
for you fill all things.

Silence

Give us strength in your victory over death to grow into your way of love,
which does not despair but keeps sowing seeds of hope and making signs of wholeness.

Silence

In Christ all the parts of the body fit together
joined and knitted together by every ligament with which it is provided.
Each part working together, promotes the body’s growth,
building itself up in love.

Silence

Teach us to recognise our interconnectedness with all things.
Teach us to grow with each other and all living creatures through love.

Amen.

Hold a hazelnut in your hand (shell some too if you like!)

From Meditations with Julian of Norwich

I saw that God was everything that is good and encouraging. God is our clothing

that wraps, clasps and encloses us so as never to leave us.

God showed me in my palm a little thing round as a ball about the size of a hazelnut.

I looked at it with the eye of my understanding and asked myself:

‘What is this thing?’

And I was answered: ‘It is everything that is created.’

I wondered how it could survive since it seemed so little it could suddenly disintegrate into nothing.

The answer came: ‘It endures and ever will endure, because God loves it.’

And so everything has being because of God’s love.

Hazelnuts in their shells are about the same size as a roman slingshot bullet. Faith the size of a mustard seed is all that is needed though! What if instead of thinking of ourselves as separate from creation, or alienated in from God and in need of salvation, we thought of God as a creator who is creating us. The artist is never entirely separate from their art, and this can be a whole world of pain! There is a longing for the work to be finished, complete, and revealed. Every attempt leads towards this, and the longing gives worth to all the scrunched up pieces of paper that are discarded. All the slingshots which miss the target are not wasted. Even better news is that we can be Davids. Any of the warriors in the Israelite armour could have taken the challenge, but they didn’t. It was a shepherd that stepped forward, unencumbered by the preconceived ideas of how warfare should be carried out. Vulnerable to being called dishonourable, if it were not that he was laughed at because of the inequality in size.

Reading from the book pt 2

¹² But to all who received him, who believed in his name, he gave power to become children of God, ¹³ who were born, not of blood or of the will of the flesh or of the will of man, but of God.

¹⁴ And the Word became flesh and lived among us, and we have seen his glory, the glory as of a father’s only son,^[d] full of grace and truth. ¹⁵ (John testified to him and cried out, ‘This was he of whom I said, “He who comes after me ranks ahead of me because he was before me.”’) ¹⁶ From his fullness we have all received, grace upon grace. ¹⁷ The law indeed was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ. ¹⁸ No one has ever seen God. It is God the only Son,^[e] who is close to the Father’s heart,^[f] who has made him known.

https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=John%201&version=NRSVACE

Sending out

As autumn progresses, look for hazelnuts. For signs that God is with you.

Almighty God and Father,

you have so ordered our life

that we are dependent on one another:

prosper those engaged in commerce and industry

and direct their minds and hands

that they may rightly use your gifts in the service of others;

through Jesus Christ your Son our Lord,

who is alive and reigns with you,

in the unity of the Holy Spirit,

one God, now and for ever.

All  Amen.

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[1]     Adapted from “The Iona Worship Book” Creation Liturgy, The Iona Community