1 Samuel 17: (1a, 4-11, 19-23), 32-49

[Now the Philistines gathered their armies for battle. And there came out from the camp of the Philistines a champion named Goliath, of Gath, whose height was six cubits and a span. He had a helmet of bronze on his head, and he was armed with a coat of mail; the weight of the coat was five thousand shekels of bronze. He had greaves of bronze on his legs and a javelin of bronze slung between his shoulders. The shaft of his spear was like a weaver's beam, and his spear's head weighed six hundred shekels of iron; and his shield-bearer went before him. He stood and shouted to the ranks of Israel, "Why have you come out to draw up for battle? Am I not a Philistine, and are you not servants of Saul? Choose a man for yourselves, and let him come down to me. If he is able to fight with me and kill me, then we will be your servants; but if I prevail against him and kill him, then you shall be our servants and serve us." And the Philistine said, "Today I defy the ranks of Israel! Give me a man, that we may fight together." When Saul and all Israel heard these words of the Philistine, they were dismayed and greatly afraid.

Now Saul, and they, and all the men of Israel, were in the valley of Elah, fighting with the Philistines. David rose early in the morning, left the sheep with a keeper, took the provisions, and went as Jesse had commanded him. He came to the encampment as the army was going forth to the battle line, shouting the war cry. Israel and the Philistines drew up for battle, army against army. David left the things in charge of the keeper of the baggage, ran to the ranks, and went and greeted his brothers. As he talked with them, the champion, the Philistine of Gath, Goliath by name, came up out of the ranks of the Philistines, and spoke the same words as before. And David heard him.]

David said to Saul, "Let no one's heart fail because of him; your servant will go and fight with this Philistine." 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." 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, 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. 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." 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!" Saul clothed David with his armor; he put a bronze helmet on his head and clothed him with a coat of mail. David strapped Saul's sword over the armor, and he tried in vain to walk, for he was not used to them. Then David said to Saul, "I cannot walk with these; for I am not used to them." So David removed them. Then he took his staff in his hand, and chose five smooth stones from the wadi, and put them in his shepherd's bag, in the pouch; his sling was in his hand, and he drew near to the Philistine.

The Philistine came on and drew near to David, with his shield-bearer in front of him. When the Philistine looked and saw David, he disdained him, for he was only a youth, ruddy and handsome in appearance. The Philistine said to David, "Am I a dog, that you come to me with sticks?" And the Philistine cursed David by his gods. The Philistine said to David, "Come to me, and I will give your flesh to the birds of the air and to the wild animals of the field." But David said to the Philistine, "You come to me with sword and spear and javelin; but I come to you in the name of the LORD of hosts, the God of the armies of Israel, whom you have defied. This very day the LORD will deliver you into my hand, and I will strike you down and cut off your head; and I will give the dead bodies of the Philistine army this very day to the birds of the air and to the wild animals of the earth, so that all the earth may know that there is a God in Israel, and that all this assembly may know that the LORD does not save by sword and spear; for the battle is the LORD's and he will give you into our hand."

When the Philistine drew nearer to meet David, David ran quickly toward the battle line to meet the Philistine. David put his hand in his bag, took out a stone, slung it, and struck the Philistine on his forehead; the stone sank into his forehead, and he fell face down on the ground.

Our Old Testament lesson is one of the most well-known of all bible stories: David and Goliath. This story is a permanent part of our culture, and we refer to it in all kinds of different contexts, from sports, to business, to warfare. Everyone knows what you mean when you call some situation a “David and Goliath” story. The moral is familiar: the small and motivated can bring down the big and arrogant.

  That’s fine, but for Christians, there is much more happening here. First of all, there is a shift in power: in fighting on behalf of Israel, David is taking on the role of king. The story of God’s people is taking a dramatic turn: God is choosing a very different kind of king, because the nation of Israel has a very different purpose from all other nations. 

   We also begin to get a glimpse of a theme which will repeat in all the accounts of the monarchy: for many of the Old Testament writers, it seems, people are just not meant to be kings over one another. It’s just not something we are good at. Kingship puts ordinary humans, like Saul, into impossible situations; they react badly, and the whole community suffers. David is about as good a king as you could hope for, yet kingship will take its toll on him as well, as we all know.  As my grandmother used to say, “There will be tears before bedtime.”

   The whole monarchy story cautions us against expecting too much of our fellow human beings, whom we make kings, or even the ones we elect as our presidents and prime ministers. We long for justice, equity, mercy, wisdom, peace. We can imagine, in bare outline, a world where those things are brought to their perfection. But at some point we realize, we can’t rely on fellow human beings to get us there. We need someone willing to accept leadership, without ever using it to his own advantage. We need someone willing to make the terrible sacrifices leadership requires. We need someone whose will is always aligned with the will of the Father. It’s too much to ask of a Saul, or a David, or anyone. For that, we need God incarnate. We need the Son.

  

2 Corinthians 6:1-13

As we work together with Christ, we urge you also not to accept the grace of God in vain. For he says,

"At an acceptable time I have listened to you,

and on a day of salvation I have helped you."

See, now is the acceptable time; see, now is the day of salvation! We are putting no obstacle in anyone's way, so that no fault may be found with our ministry, but as servants of God we have commended ourselves in every way: through great endurance, in afflictions, hardships, calamities, beatings, imprisonments, riots, labors, sleepless nights, hunger; by purity, knowledge, patience, kindness, holiness of spirit, genuine love, truthful speech, and the power of God; with the weapons of righteousness for the right hand and for the left; in honor and dishonor, in ill repute and good repute. We are treated as impostors, and yet are true; as unknown, and yet are well known; as dying, and see-- we are alive; as punished, and yet not killed; as sorrowful, yet always rejoicing; as poor, yet making many rich; as having nothing, and yet possessing everything.

We have spoken frankly to you Corinthians; our heart is wide open to you. There is no restriction in our affections, but only in yours. In return-- I speak as to children-- open wide your hearts also.

In our reading from Corinthians, Paul continues his heartfelt defense of his ministry in Corinth, and as usual, he does it in a deeply theological way. In many ways, religion in the classical world was a real free-market affair: in the cities and bigger towns, teachers and representatives of hundreds of different mystery religions, or groups devoted to particular pagan gods, or religions from exotic parts of the empire would literally set up shop in the marketplace. A common strategy was to proclaim in public some of the main attractions of your religion, get people interested, and then offer to teach them more, for a fee of course. Clearly the most successful religions were the once who could create the most demand in the market, the ones who could attract the most people, willing to shell out their hard earned cash.

   By these standards, Paul is a failure. He has been beaten up, arrested, run out of town. He has not collected enough revenue to give up his day job, making tents. Some of the Corinthians are wondering why they should listen to someone who seems so unsuccessful. There may even have been Christian “superapostles,” questioning Paul’s authority.

   Paul continues to show the Corinthians, the world has changed. The world’s measures of success are no longer relevant. His willingness to endure suffering, his willingness to speak the truth in love to the Corinthians, are signs of his sincerity and success, not signs of failure. The ultimate proof of this is the cross. The cross, the event of God’s son suffering in an act of self giving, that is the way God has chosen to act decisively in the world. The cross is the sign that “This is the acceptable time”.  Paul is saying to the Corinthians, “Do not judge me by the world’s standards of success. Judge me by the measure of the cross. Judge me by my willing self-sacrifice; judge me by my endurance in suffering; judge me by my genuine pastoral concern. Judge me by the standards of love.”

  We often fall into the same trap of judging religious life by the wrong criteria: the success of an event is appraised by the number of people who came out; the success of a minister is judged by his ability not to offend. That’s just a fact about the way we are. But, we will always have Paul to remind us, there are other standards for success.

Mark 4:35-41

When evening had come, Jesus said to his disciples, "Let us go across to the other side." And leaving the crowd behind, they took him with them in the boat, just as he was. Other boats were with him. A great windstorm arose, and the waves beat into the boat, so that the boat was already being swamped. But he was in the stern, asleep on the cushion; and they woke him up and said to him, "Teacher, do you not care that we are perishing?" He woke up and rebuked the wind, and said to the sea, "Peace! Be still!" Then the wind ceased, and there was a dead calm. He said to them, "Why are you afraid? Have you still no faith?" And they were filled with great awe and said to one another, "Who then is this, that even the wind and the sea obey him?"

Our gospel is another familiar story, with more in it than the familiar ‘moral’. Mark is talking about new creation; nothing less. For Hebrew people, water represented disorder and chaos. Water needed to be channeled into its proper place in order to be life giving and good. Remember the story of creation: the Spirit hovers over the waters, and eventually the dry land emerges to give proper boundaries to the water.

   The same thing is happening here: water is threatening to envelope the world of the disciples, and plunge them into chaos. In the bigger picture, forces opposed to God are undoing the order of creation; they are threatening and corrupting the creatures of God. God, in love, commits to an act of new creation, and the agent for that is Jesus, his Son. On a stormy afternoon in Palestine, we see a sign that God is creating the world anew.

   Notice that for Jesus the opposite of faith is not disbelief. The opposite of faith is fear. Sometimes we overestimate the importance of our opinions and beliefs. For Jesus, faith is less about our acceptance of all the right beliefs, and more about our willingness to trust.