August 16, 2025
You know what it’s like to stare at a giant.
It might be the competitor who just underbid you by 30% and still somehow delivers. It might be the market dip that erased six months of revenue in a single quarter. It might be the technology shifting so quickly you feel one misstep away from irrelevance.
When the giant is in front of you, the pressure to gear up intensifies. Everyone has an opinion on what you must do to survive. In David’s day, Saul’s advice came in the form of armor: bronze helmet, scale armor, and a sword. It was the industry standard for fighting. You don’t go into battle without it.
David tried it. The Bible says he “tried in vain to go, for he had not tested them.”
It was heavy. Clumsy. Ill-fitting. It wasn’t his armor to wear.
Goliath, a literal giant, even had his armor bearer in front of him for protection (v41). David knew the battle wouldn’t be won by the weight of the metal on his shoulders, but by the God who had already proven Himself in the pasture where he never had any of that fancy armor to protect him. God was his armor bearer.
More specifically, its perceived security and protection.
Money is presented as the ultimate protection:
-Build a bigger business. 10X. 100X.
-Hit that magic number in the bank and you’ll be untouchable.
And so we suit up for battle.
We make safety the finish line. We try in vain to go in this armor and then wonder why we feel slower, less joyful, more anxious.
Money is a tool, but when it becomes your armor, it secretly demands your trust. It stops being something you steward for God’s purposes and starts being something you protect and chase at all costs. And that’s when the business that was meant to serve the King’s purposes becomes the cage that holds you captive.
David had a better weapon. He trusted in the Lord. His words to Goliath cut through every layer of fear:
David’s trust wasn’t in his sling any more than it was in Saul’s armor. The sling was just the tool in his hand. He brought 5 stones – he was prepared – not knowing how the Lord would deliver Goliath but trusting He would. The battle was the Lord’s.
For you, the sling might be a small, steady company. A local client base. A slow, deliberate growth model. The world may look at it and say, “That’s not enough to take down a giant.”
But if God has proven His faithfulness in what you already carry, why trade it for armor that will only slow you down?
The writer of Hebrews urges us:
It’s the race set before you. Not Saul’s race. Not the market’s race. Not the “10X” race the gurus are selling this month. Your race. And the race God marked for you will never require you to wear armor He didn’t give you.
You’re fighting someone else’s battle. And that’s not what you were made for.
“For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them.” (Eph. 2:10, ESV)
If you lost half your revenue tomorrow, would your peace evaporate? If your growth stalled for a year, would you feel like God didn’t “favor” you?
David knew what most of Israel forgot: the only secure place in a battle is under the care of the One who owns it. That’s why he could take off Saul’s armor in front of everyone, pick up a sling, and run toward a man twice his size. His trust was in the Lord’s mission, not in the world’s protection.
Maybe faith for you right now doesn’t look like adding another layer of armor. Maybe letting go of a growth target that was more about pride than obedience.
Refuse to wear the armor that the world says you need if you want to win.
Because if the battle is the Lord’s, your safety isn’t in the armor.
