1 Samuel 17:12–23

Now David was the son of that Ephrathite of Bethlehem Judah, whose name was Jesse, and who had eight sons. And the man was old, advanced in years, in the days of Saul. The three oldest sons of Jesse had gone to follow Saul to the battle. The names of his three sons who went to the battle were Eliab the firstborn, next to him Abinadab, and the third Shammah. David was the youngest. And the three oldest followed Saul. But David occasionally went and returned from Saul to feed his father’s sheep at Bethlehem.

And the Philistine drew near and presented himself forty days, morning and evening.

Then Jesse said to his son David, “Take now for your brothers an ephah of this dried grain and these ten loaves, and run to your brothers at the camp. And carry these ten cheeses to the captain of their thousand, and see how your brothers fare, and bring back news of them.” Now Saul and they and all the men of Israel were in the Valley of Elah, fighting with the Philistines.

So David rose early in the morning, left the sheep with a keeper, and took the things and went as Jesse had commanded him. And he came to the camp as the army was going out to the fight and shouting for the battle. For Israel and the Philistines had drawn up in battle array, army against army. And David left his supplies in the hand of the supply keeper, ran to the army, and came and greeted his brothers. Then as he talked with them, there was the champion, the Philistine of Gath, Goliath by name, coming up from the armies of the Philistines; and he spoke according to the same words. So David heard them.

This section sets the stage for David’s epic battle with Goliath. There are a couple of details in the wording that are important to how this will play out.

First, it says that Goliath presented himself forty days, morning and evening. It most definitely does not say “from” morning “until” evening. Goliath did not stand out there in the hot sun all day. In fact, he didn’t stand out there in the hot sun at all. The Hebrew word translated as morning (הַשְׁכֵּ֣ם, ha-shkame) isn’t the normal word for morning (בֹ֖קֶר, bo-qer). Ha-shkame literally means “the early.”

Goliath is avoiding the heat of the day. He comes out twice a day and challenges the Israelites. Then seeing no response, he returns. Thus, his stamina is untested. His actual fighting skill is unknown too.

Second, notice the word keeper appearing twice in the last paragraph of today’s text. Samuel makes a point of noting that David was not being irresponsible, first with the sheep and then with his supplies. This highlights that there was nothing unusual or extreme in David’s behavior.

David is just being a good kid when he stumbles on the scene.

As we’ll see, David is the right person to fight Goliath. Here, he’s in the right place at the right time to hear Goliath’s challenge. All the pieces of God’s plan are converging.

God’s providential hand in events is rarely just last minute intervention.

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These weekday DEEPs are written by Mike Slay. The Saturday ones are written by Matt Richardson. To subscribe to the DEEP click here: https://www.ailbe.org/resources/community

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Scripture taken from the New King James Version. © Copyright 1982 by Thomas Nelson, Inc. Used by permission. All rights reserved.