1 Samuel 17:38 “And Saul armed David with his armour, and he put an helmet of brass upon his head; also he armed him with a coat of mail.

1 Samuel 17:39 “And David girded his sword upon his armour, and he assayed to go; for he had not proved it. And David said unto Saul, I cannot go with these; for I have not proved them. And David put them off him.”

Hello readers, back with a new blog today. I thank you for taking the time to read this, and I hope this may just be a blessing to you from God’s word.

Today’s blog is ““watch out for what people are putting on you!” And you’ll see why the title is such… but this thought has to do with Saul’s armour which we tried putting on David, which he tried making David wear… like David needed it… when he didn’t and he put off quickly when he soon realized so.

We are in 1 Samuel 17 today, a most wonderful chapter in the Bible, because this is the chapter about David and Goliath, perhaps one of the most famous stories in all the Bible.

David was just a young man here, really little more than a boy, but he was a shepherd boy who looked after his father’s sheep. And we find out that David has a heap of older brothers who are soldiers in Saul’s army who are currently at war with the Philistines… and losing.

David has a father called Jesse, and Jesse needs someone to go and take food to his boys and the men at war. And David is the perfect guy to do it. He calls David in and tells him to go and deliver some supplies to the army and check up on how his brothers are going.

And so David goes, and he arrives at the front lines, and when he arrives, he sees what’s been going on for a while now, which is that the giant Goliath, the champion of the Philistines, regularly comes out to challenge the Israelites and their God to a fight.

And this is such a time, as David arrives, he hears and sees Goliath bellowing out to Israel, and he sees how afraid the soldiers are. And really that’s the scene we see today in modern Christianity, there are some serious giants out there challenging our God, whom many people are cowering in fear of.

But the thing is, David hasn’t been in Saul’s army like his bros and the others. He hasn’t already been trained, educated, learned and programmed to be afraid and defeated and not trust God… and he’s just “stupid” and “silly” enough to volunteer and go and whip this giant that everybody else is afraid of.

And this is the problem sometimes in our associations. Who we around and the programs we are in can really corrupt our walk with God if we are not careful. David has been out in the wilderness with the sheep, where he has learned to trust God… he hasn’t been infected with fear like the army of Israel has been, which has come from the leadership down.

And Saul is the leadership… he is king in Israel. Head and shoulders above everyone else… but he also has no answer for this giant. And so he and all Israel are terrified of Goliath, and they get a little upset when David basically asks “who is this guy challenging our God? I’ll go and beat him for you!” David saying that kind of makes them feel like cowards… who’s this kid?

But Saul hears about David saying he will go out and face Goliath, and he meets with David to have a chat. It’s a bit like a job interview. He doesn’t have to wait long for his interview, because there aren’t too many volunteers to go and take on Goliath. Saul meets David and says you’re just a kid, howon earth are you to stand a chance out there against Goliath?

And ordinarily… he wouldn’t. But David knows God, and God knows David. And so it’s not an ordinary battle, hence “the battle is the Lord’s”… and David is but isn’t an ordinary man, because he actually believes and trusts in the God of Israel. And that trust has already been proven out there in the wilderness, where he’s had run ins with wild beasts and gotten the victory.

And David knows one thing about God which we all are prone to forget. Which is that God is faithful. See David’s “Christianity” and faith is not theoretical, he’s been living in private, and now he’s going to live it in public.

And there are so many people today who talk about “my faith” and “my faith journey”… but it’s the faith of Christ that really is the only faith worth talking about. God’s faithfulness has been proven in the mind and heart of David… and that’s where this confidence comes from in his God.

What David had was something simple, gloriously simple, and God forbid we should ever be moved away from the simplicity that is in Christ. And really today, as we arrive at and briefly consider the point of this blog, relating to Saul’s armour, may we return to that simple childlike faith that David had.

You see, when Saul gave David “the job”… he also tried putting all his armor on him. And imagine the kid David clanging around in Sauls heavy armour… uhh yeah nah. And David wasn’t afraid to say nah. Because he said no, I don’t need this armour. But what can we learn from David’s armour for us today?

Well hence the title for this blog… watch out for what people are putting on you. If you’re a Christian, have other people put things on you which you don’t need on you and God didn’t place on you? Have people tried putting stuff on you supposedly to help you answer the call and fulfill the will of God in your life yet which is not ordained by God for you? You see, Saul thought David needed his armour… but David did not. And David didn’t take long to figure it out. And David already had armour… he had spiritual armour… Saul had physical armour.

And consider this armour Saul was trying to put on David. …If it wasn’t good enough for Saul to go out and fight Goliath… what need did David have for it? Juust think about that. People often put stuff on you as a Christian that is not even working for them. Saul’s armour was just a showpiece, designed to impress, but not fit for battle… and utterly useless for David.

I’ve thought hard about what Saul’s armour could be in my life. Because I have had people try putting stuff on me before which didn’t feel right, it didn’t sit well on me, it wasn’t proven, and I didn’t need it. Saul’s armour can often be things that people think I need to have to have a successful Christian journey… but which I don’t need at all. See, what we need is the armour of God. God is my armour as God was David’s armour. I don’t want to be trusting in myself and how educated, intellectual, studied, trained, programmed, and equipped man has or can make me. We need God!

Consider young Christians that answer the call to serve God, who go to Bible college, where they are “armed” for battle. They’re instructed what they need to do to to answer the call. How they are supposed to do it. How you do this. How you do that. And so rather than faith in God, like David had… They are armed with an education, with a process, with relationships, with networks, with contacts, with training… all so they can be confident and reliant in the flesh to serve God… when what they really need is faith in God, simple childlike faith in that what God has said, he will perform.

Here’s the truth… a lot of the armoury that Christians have is a replacement for trusting God. That’s what Saul had! He didn’t trust God… at all. And he was teaching David to rely on his armour… not on the God of Israel… and David went nah… not doing it this way. And I hope you don’t do it the way that people are trying to make you do it, and do it the way God wants you to do it according to the leading of the Holy Spirit through his word.

You may just find out that the reason why your Christian experience is such a drag is because you’ve been lugging Saul’s armour around and it’s weighing down heavy on you… and it just doesn’t… quite… fit. Because it doesn’t fit. We are trying to make stuff fit on people that isn’t made to fit them.

As I’ve been thinking about this thought I’ve thought about this line from Psalm 51, David’s prayer to God after his sin with Bathsheba and murder of Uriah, where he said “restore unto me the joy of thy salvation”. See, David longed to get back to the simplicity and purity of walk with God that he had tending the sheep out there by himself in the wilderness. And hopefully you today, can throw off what doesn’t belong on you and get back to the joy of being saved, and the first love you had for Christ.

Because as soon as Christians get saved, people try putting on and fitting things on to these young Christians which should not be on them. Yes you need armour. But you need the armour of God… not Saul’s armour… there is a difference. If you really want this good armour for the battle, God’s armour, spiritual armour for the spiritual warfare… read Ephesians 6… is that your armour, or have you been armed with something else entirely?

By the way, as I was thinking about this today before writing, I thought about David girding “his sword”… Saul’s sword … and I thought about these new Bibles that Christians were armed with… supposedly bigger and better when they came out and were sold to Christians, or you’ve gotta have this these days. The new Bibles were a shinier, flashier upgrade to the old King James Bible… but in David’s hand… it just didn’t feel right that sword. And hopefully you know when the sword just doesn’t quite feel right, and heed that warning in your spirit about these new Bibles… which are not proven, which are no good in the fight of faith.

Also, just think about this… why was Saul arming David anyway? Hint: it was so Saul could get the glory. Hmm, maybe that’s why people put stuff on you… so they can look good! For Saul, it wasn’t about God’s glory, it was about Saul’s glory. That’s why Saul later got upset about the song that women were singing about David after his victory over Goliath. And the big trap in Christianity is this self glory, praise me for how religious I am, praise me for my faith journey, praise my Christianity… when as Paul said… God forbid that I should glory, save in the cross of Christ.

And so I hope that you can identify Saul’s armour in your life. Have you been carting some of Saul’s armour around on you… perhaps for years? Is there stuff put on you, supposedly to help you fight the Christian fight… which is heavy and hindering rather than helping?

Remember, this armour was all about not trusting in God. If you’re going to live the Christian life, you’re going to need God’s grace, and God’s grace is only received by faith. The battle is not yours, it’s the Lords… and we are going to have to learn to trust God to do what he only can do. Only God can save a soul… I can’t. Trust God. Trust in the faith of Christ. He ever lives to make intercession for us.

At the risk of repeating, let me reiterate, that if Christians are putting stuff on you that doesn’t work for them… what makes you think it will work for you? Saul’s sword hadn’t done any cutting… why did David need it? Saul didn’t trust in his own armour… why should David trust in Saul’s armour? And if your Christian life has gotten a bit heavy as you’ve become more involved in church or ministry or whatever… maybe it’s time to re-evaluate what is on, and whether it’s been put on you by God… or by man.

It took some guts for David to say no to Saul. Imagine him taking the coat of mail of and throwing it down saying nah. Saul looked pretty impressive in his getup, how did that make Saul feel knowing his shiny helmet was expensive junk? Please… if you’re a Christian, just trust God… that’s not a cliché, but read your Bible and trust in the faithfulness of Christ… that’s what David had. Noone usually beats a lion and bear barehanded… that was divine deliverance. And God is still in that business, but people are so busy trying to have things in their control and trust in themselves and their armoury that they don’t trust God.

And you know what’s incredible? Saul’s armour didn’t save him in the end. Because a Philistine arrow found a gap in that armour in a later battle. There are holes in Saul’s armour! It’s not God’s armour, you need Ephesians 6 armour… that’s all you need… that’s real armour… make sure you have it! And if you want to see something incredible… actually track Saul’s armour to its final place! You’ll find out that when the Philistines killed him, they took his armour off his dead body… paraded it through town and then mounted it as a trophy in the house of their god! What a warning! David dodged a bullet here in putting off Saul’s armour and saying nah… I’ll go with trusting God… not the arm of flesh, not in your systems and processes and ideas and philosophies and strength and power and might which you reckon I need to get the job done but I don’t. I’m not using my life to make you good… I’m going to honour God with my life

Hopefully today you and I both think about armour that may be on us, stuff that may be on us, which was not put on us by God, but by other people, perhaps even well intentioned… but who’s stuff they put on us that’s meant to help us get from A to B will only hinder us and prevent us from realizing the victory that God has for us through simply trusting in the living Saviour. May we all be on the watch out for Saul’s armour, and put on the armour of God… the true armour of the Christian in the service of the King.

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