Eliab & Goliath, Chapter 4: A Conqueror Conquered

There was a crowd gathered outside the king’s tent. Men of various ages milled about uncertainly, waiting for orders that never seemed to be given. A few stood on tiptoe, peering into the middle of the throng to see what the excitement was all about. Eliab muttered a curse as he was jostled on either side. He wasn’t even trying to see what was going on - all he wanted to do was reach his tent!

“Eliab! Eliab! Come quick!”

Eliab’s brows rose as he turned toward the panicked shout. Shammah was pushing his way through the mass to reach his elder brother, his face pale and drawn. He beckoned urgently as he drew nearer, almost knocking another soldier over in his haste.

“It’s David,” he panted, without waiting for Eliab to ask what was wrong. “He says he’s going to fight Goliath!”

“What?!” Eliab’s voice rose a pitch. Was something wrong with his ears? “David? Fight that behemoth? What are you talking about?”

“He… I don’t know…” Shammah moaned. “He’s in front of the king’s tent, dressed in armour and everything. That’s what the fuss is about. Can’t you stop him? He’s going to get himself killed! And then what will we do? We can’t lose him to this… this giant! We can’t let him go to his death like this!”

“We can’t,” Eliab agreed grimly. Father would kill him if he didn’t try to do something to stop the foolish boy from getting himself killed. This was no game! He was a young upstart, but no one deserved to die this way. They had to knock some sense into him. He started forward, seizing Shammah’s wrist as they thrust their way back into the crowd. “Show me where he is. Come on!”

If the situation hadn’t been so serious, Eliab would have howled with laughter at how David looked. His helmet slipped down over his eyes even though he had pulled the straps as tight as they could go. The mail shirt that he wore hung loosely around him and came down to his thighs. Strapping young lad he was, but there was no comparison to a grown man. And he moved stiffly, looking down repeatedly at the armour he had donned.

“I can’t wear these,” he said, as Eliab and Shammah strode toward him. “I’m not used to them and they don’t fit!”

“And you shouldn’t!” Eliab snapped, resisting the urge to grab David by the shoulders and shake him until his teeth rattled in his head. “What madness is this? What grand ideas have you got in your head? Why are you doing this? Did you even spare a thought with how Father and the rest of us are going to cope if you die out there?!”

“I’m not going to die, Eliab.” David looked deadly serious. There was no fear in his face, only determination. “We can’t let this fellow insult God any longer. Our Lord is with us. He’s with me. He’ll help me, I know He will.”

“You can’t-” Eliab began, then snapped his mouth shut as David drew himself up to his full height. He looked stern. And wise. And kingly. He looked the same as he had on the hill that fateful day, when the prophet Samuel had come. A sense of peace swept over Eliab for the briefest of moments, but then it was gone. Yet incredibly, he now understood David’s confidence. If God was here to help and what Eliab had seen was true, then perhaps there might be a chance after all.

“Let him go,” he murmured, as Shammah stared at him in disbelief. “He’ll be all right.”

David smiled briefly as he pulled off the armour and helmet. He bent to the ground and searched it for a moment before coming up with five small pebbles, which he placed carefully into his pouch. He moved in closer to his brothers, arms outstretched. Eliab responded in kind and enveloped both his younger brothers in an embrace. They had not done this in so very long. His grip tightened briefly before he let David go. His younger brother didn’t gloat, but instead just nodded.

“Thanks, Eliab.”

“Go,” Eliab told David quietly. “And…” he swallowed heavily, suddenly unsure of himself. “Be safe. Come back to us.”

Eliab could not tear his eyes away from David as he made his way down to the valley, his figure dwarfed by that of Goliath. The descent seemed to last forever, as the silence stretched out across the whole valley. David seemed completely unperturbed, though Eliab’s heart hammered in his chest and he thought it might well leap out of his throat.

David was so vulnerable now. Almost as if he were one of his own sheep, walking unknowingly into a lion’s den to be slaughtered. Had the vision been real? What if it was simply his own envy that had caused him to give David over to the enemy?

Eliab’s mouth went dry as David finally reached the bottom of the valley. Beside him, Shammah clenched his fists until the knuckles whitened, clutching the hilt of his sword in a death grip. He trembled visibly, eyes riveted on the scene below. David planted his staff firmly into the ground in front of him and waited patiently as Goliath’s eyes fixed on him.

“My God is with me,” David had said. “He’ll protect me and help me.”

“God. Our God.” Eliab whispered in desperation, even as the words caught in his throat. He forced the next sentence out past the lump that had formed. “You have to watch over him. Please. Protect him! You can’t let him die!”

The silence stretched out as the giant scrutinized the young man in front of him. And then Goliath laughed sardonically, looking down his nose at David.

“Hah!” He bellowed derisively. “Am I a dog, that you come at me with sticks? Is this pitiful boy the best sacrifice that Israel has to offer?”

He spat in the ground in front of him, sweeping his spear in front of him so it pointed directly at David. “Come then, boy. I’ll feed your flesh to the vultures!”

“You come against me with sword and spear and javelin, but I come against you in the name of the Lord Almighty, the God of the armies of Israel, whom you have defied.” David countered, his voice ringing out clearly and steadily. Eliab’s jaw dropped at his audacity and his bravery as David squared his shoulders, looking Goliath in the eye. “This day the Lord will deliver you into my hands, and I’ll strike you down and cut off your head. This very day I will give the carcasses of the Philistine army to the birds and the wild animals, and the whole world will know that there is a God in Israel. All those gathered here will know that it is not by sword or spear that the Lord saves; for the battle is the Lord’s, and he will give all of you into our hands!”

Goliath was pounding towards David even before he had finished, roaring with rage. Eliab heard himself cry out in agony, certain that he would see David stabbed through the chest before his very eyes. But David did not retreat before the mad rush. Instead he met it head on, drawing a stone from his pouch and fitting it into his sling in a single smooth motion. He whirled the leather above his head in a blur of motion as Goliath drew closer.

And closer. And closer.

David let go.

The stone flew.

Goliath fell.

Silence.

The Philistines had erupted into cheers as their champion had started forward while many in Israel had screamed and turned away from the macabre slaughter that was surely about to take place. But now both nations collectively held their breath as Goliath lay face down in the sand, unmoving. David darted forward with the same speed that had served him so well in his bouts with Eliab, and drew the Philistine’s massive sword.

He raised it above his head and brought it down in a massive sweep, severing Goliath’s head in a single clean blow.

And then David turned back toward Israel, and his face lit up in a brilliant smile.

The men beside Eliab suddenly surged forward, screaming their battle cries as the Philistines turned and ran. Chaos reigned as Israel pursued their fleeing enemies, cutting them down one by one. Eliab wildly scanned the throng for David. Where was he?! Had any of the Philistines tried to take revenge for Goliath? They had to protect him!

“There!” Shammah shouted. “Eliab! That way!”

They found themselves struggling against the tide of Israelites, but both brothers plowed through the crowd with a strength born of fear. They soon reached Goliath, and David was still standing over his prize, watching the Israelites pursue the Philistines. The men flowed around him, caught up in their excitement. No one paid any heed to Eliab as he grabbed David’s shoulders, frantically patting him down and looking for any sign of injury.

“I’m fine, Eliab!” David protested. “He didn’t hurt me!”

Eliab pulled his brother to him, almost smothering him. Tears ran down his cheeks unchecked, tracing lines down his dust streaked face. Shammah’s eyes were also wet as he joined them, silently wrapping his arms around them.

“You’re crushing me,” David choked out. “Let go!”

“You’re crazy,” Eliab spluttered, jabbing an accusing finger at David as he released his younger brother. “Do you have any idea how worried we were?! What were you thinking?!”

“God was with me.” David said gently. “I knew he’d keep me safe. I had nothing to be afraid of. And you didn’t either.”

“He’s not even visible.” Eliab sighed wearily, dashing the moisture from his eyes. “What makes you so sure that you’re not conjuring things from your own imagination? How are you so confident?”

“My imagination could never come up with such grand ideas.” David chuckled, but then he frowned thoughtfully. “I honestly just… know. This isn’t something I could think about on my own. God is always nearby. I can feel Him. He speaks to me, not just in words, but through things that I do. Through the Law. Through the records and words that were kept by our forefathers. Through the covenant and His promises. He is real, Eliab. Not visible, but He’s always around. And He always keeps his promises.”

“He’ll keep his promise to make you king too, then.”

Eliab hadn’t meant to sound bitter, but he did and he knew it. There it was, out in the open. All that bottled up resentment and angst and pride, released in a single sentence. He hung his head, waiting for a scathing reply.

It never came.

“I don’t know what He has in store for me.” David confessed, and now he looked like the young man that he was. “He hasn’t told me anything, and I don’t know His plans. It’s… kind of confusing. And also kind of unsettling at times. But Eliab… this is bigger than just me. This battle was never about me or us. God was with me because he wanted to bring glory to Himself. And He’s bigger than anything you or I could dream of. There’s no one else I could follow with such certainty through an uncertain future.”

He didn’t ask for this.

Eliab absently patted David on the shoulder, even as he considered that rather startling thought. All the glory seemed to go to him even when he never sought it out. Perhaps it went to him because he never sought it out. Wasn’t it written in the scriptures that God worked through the humble?

Had his pride gotten in the way all this time? He had longed to be king. Desired to distinguish himself on the battlefield. Wanted to prove he was better than David and the rest of his brothers. But it had all amounted to little. Perhaps the only person he was fighting in this war was himself.

Perhaps David had the right idea after all.

“We should go home,” Eliab said tiredly, as they stared around them. The valley was empty now except for the bodies of some of their enemies, and they stood alone beside Goliath - once mighty, now fallen to something greater than he. “Father will be glad to see you.”

“I’d like that.” David smiled, his shoulders sagging in relief. “It will be good for you to come home, too. We’ve missed you.”