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Today’s preachers might tell David the following when he inquired about fighting Goliath in a man-to-man combat to the death, which would decide the fate of Israel:
“You’re presumptuously meddling with something that’s too far above your head. We don’t think you’re reformed in your thinking; the sovereign God can take care of that giant. Leave it to the professionals. You’ll be killed needlessly, thus bringing discredit on the cause of the kingdom. It’s just boasting by that giant; you don’t want to get into some type of proud game of ‘I dare you,’ do you? You’ll be just as bad as Goliath by stooping to his level of violence and antagonism. It’s peace and reconciliation that we must have, not fighting and arguing. Who knows? Perhaps his religious beliefs have some value; how are you so sure that you’re completely right? Can’t we learn from others through common grace? Why be so exclusive; maybe we should live and let live with the Philistines. Any way, it’s political; why get tangled up in such?! God has no specific template as to how His people are supposed to be ruled. Perhaps we’ll get more evangelism accomplished if we’re persecuted under Philistine rule? ”
Goliath and the other Philistines had this thought perhaps: “If Goliath wins, we’ll control them entirely. If Goliath wins, our gods will control the Israelites’ god. We’ll prove to the world that our gods are greater than their god. If Goliath wins, we’ll at least embarrass the Israelites sufficiently to claim the moral victory and perhaps demoralize them till we can control them.”
David: “Thou comest to me with a sword, and with a spear, and with a shield: but I come to thee in the name of the LORD of hosts, the God of the armies of Israel, whom thou hast defied. This day will the LORD deliver thee into mine hand; and I will smite thee, and take thine head from thee; and I will give the carcases of the host of the Philistines this day unto the fowls of the air, and to the wild beasts of the earth; that all the earth may know that there is a God in Israel. And all this assembly shall know that the LORD saveth not with sword and spear: for the battle is the LORD’S, and he will give you into our hands.” I Samuel 17:45-7.
The theology of David, the anointed one, won the victory.