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Just what does it take for the people of God to rise up and proclaim, “You shall go no further!”

1 Samuel 17 recounts the story of David and Goliath. It is one of the most well-known stories in the Old Testament.

The church of Jesus Christ is under assault from a band of ‘giants’, in the form of governments, social media and bureaucrats operating in an anti-Christ spirit. If we don’t discern this, we are indeed slumbering!

As I tap on the keyboard today, we have just finished praying for the Victorian Elections. The Canberra Declaration, Australia Prays and a band of intercessors across Australia cried out to our Lord for our precious brothers and sisters living in the most totalitarian state in our nation, run by a man and government whose purposes and plans are quite evil at times.

Tomorrow is the mid-terms in the United States of America; there’s much at stake, and one cannot deny the implications of a further grasp for power by the Democrat Party. As goes America, so goes the world. We certainly see the Biden Administration for what it is. Biden’s Department of Justice demonstrates the adage that people who desire power should never be given it!

Australia’s Goliaths

Since Covid, we have been strong-armed by virtually every politician who has had the means and opportunity to do so. Sadly, to our shame the church was caught up in the rush to ‘protect granny’. It was a lie, and many fell for it, allowing us to be put in chains and cages without parole. Victoria is the harshest, followed by Western Australia, Queensland and the rest of the despots singing from the same book of doom.

Giants are not fake, but real, just like Goliath; but they are also defeatable!

There is a cost to battling them, but ‘Is There Not A Cause?’

As the Victorian elections rapidly approach, we must all ask ourselves this question, and come out of our cages, our hiding places, designed to keep us thinking that if we shut up, the enemy will leave us alone. Cowardice never works. We have the evidence playing out before our eyes.

Cowardice didn’t work for the Israelites either — hence David, the man of the hour called for a time such as that. This is our hour!

Selected verses, 1 Samuel Chapter 17, Amplified Bible

4 and a champion went out of the camp of the Philistines named Goliath of Gath, whose height was six cubits and a span (almost 10 feet)

5 And he had a bronze helmet on his head and wore a coat of mail;

6 he had bronze shin armour on his legs and a bronze javelin across his shoulders.

7 The shaft of his spear was like a weaver’s beam; his spear’s head weighed 600 shekels of iron; and the shield-bearer went before him.

8 Goliath stood and shouted to the ranks of Israel, “Why have you come out to draw up for battle? Am I not a Philistine and you servants of Saul? Choose a man for you and let him come down to me.

9 “If he is able to fight with me and kills 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.”

10 And the Philistine said, “I defy the ranks of Israel this day; give me a man that we may fight together.”

11 When Saul and Israel heard those words of the Philistine, they were dismayed and greatly afraid.

12 David was the son of Jesse, who had eight sons.

13 These three eldest sons had followed Saul into battle…

14 David was the youngest; the three eldest followed Saul

15 But David went back and forth from Saul to feed his father’s sheep at Bethlehem.

23 … Behold Goliath the champion, the Philistine of Gath came forth from the Philistine ranks and spoke the same words as before, and David heard him,

24 and all the men of Israel, when they saw the man, fled before him, terrified.

26 and David said to the men standing by him, “What shall be done for the man who kills this Philistine and takes away the reproach from Israel? Who is this uncircumcised Philistine that he should defy the armies of the living God?”

28 Now Eliab, his eldest brother, heard what he said to the men; and Eliab’s anger was kindled against David; he said, “Why do you come here? With whom have you left those few sheep in the wilderness? I know your presumption and the evilness of heart, for you came down that you might see the battle.”

29 David said, “Come on, what have I done now? Was it not a hard question? (Is there not a cause?)”

31 When David’s words were heard, they were repeated to Saul, and he sent for him.

32 David said to Saul, “Let no man’s heart fail because of this Philistine. Your servant will go out and fight with him.”

42 And when the Philistine looked around and saw David, he scorned and despised him; he was but an adolescent, with a healthy reddish colour, and a fair face.

43 And the Philistine said to David, “Am I a dog, that you should come to me with sticks?” And the Philistine cursed David by his gods.

44 The Philistine said to David, “Come to me and I will give your flesh to the birds of the air and the beasts of the field.”

45 and David said to the Philistine, “You come to me with a sword and a spear and a javelin; but I come to you in the name of the Lord of hosts, the God of the ranks of Israel, Whom you have defied.

46 “This day the Lord will deliver you into my hand; and I will smite you and cut off your head; and I will give the corpses of the army of the Philistines this day to birds of the air and the wild beasts of the earth; that all the earth may know that there is a God in Israel.

47 “And all this assembly shall know that the Lord saves not with the sword and spear; For the battle is the Lord’s and He will give you into our hand.”

The rest, as they say, is history.

A question that needs to be raised: do we have a few Eliabs in our lives? Saying we are presumptuous for standing up for righteousness?

When we see the decline of our country, the world, and in particular, Victoria, it is sometimes difficult to grasp the enormity of evil we see rising. The last few years have shaken us to the core and in all fairness, many have been shaken out of their spiritual slumber.

Well, we’re certainly awake now!

Just like Goliath, our enemy is empowered by our fear and hesitation, our lack of resolve. But Goliath saw David as a joke and because of this underestimation, he fell. So too can the prayers of the righteous be underestimated!

Mighty may be the effect of the faithful people of God who plant a spiritual stake in the ground and declare: you shall go no further!

That’s what 25 hours of prayer, praise and worship was about. It’s what we shall continue to do. After all, that’s why we’re here, and is there not a cause?

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Image: “David and Goliath” (1600s), Guillaume Courtois/Wikimedia Commons