From the time he was five, Hudson Taylor was consumed by an intense passion to be a missionary to China. He dedicated every thought and action toward that desire. He learned Mandarin Chinese, studied medicine, corresponded with mission agencies, spent his money in mission training, and above all else, waited for God to send him.
The young man prayed as if it all depended on God and worked as if it all depended on Hudson Taylor. He was convinced that he would never make it unless he learned to depend on God for everything. Toward that end, he put himself under strict daily training. Her studied Latin, Greek, theology, and medicine while keeping up with his ordinary daily responsibilities. He flirted with the edges of financial disaster in order to allow God alone to meet his needs. He lived on a diet of oatmeal and rice and sent the savings to missionaries. Nobody would have questioned Hudson Taylor’s passion.
He set sail for China in 1853, filled with hope and excitement. When he arrived, he found that those who were supposed to meet his ship had either died or fled. Rebels had overrun Shanghai. There was fighting in the streets, hostility toward westerners, and not a friend in sight. His support system had evaporated. So there stood a young Englishman, Hudson Taylor, staring at the face of a giant named China. I can’t promise you that I wouldn’t have climbed right back on the boat and booked homeward passage.
But then I’m not Hudson Taylor, who not only stayed in China but committed to going further inland with the gospel. There had been missionaries around Shanghai, but no one had ever taken the Word of God to the vast, mysterious provinces of the hidden China. He faced illness, heartbreak, setbacks, hostility from the Chinese and from other missionaries, and — I’m certain — the occasional feeling of being overwhelmed. There were so many millions of unsaved people in China and so few missionaries. How could the lost souls ever be reached?
Taylor simply kept trusting God and facing down the giants. By the time he died, there was a significant and fruit-bearing Christian presence in China. Even the era of communism hasn’t driven our faith out of that country. Hudson Taylor was the superior of that giant too.
When have you felt discouraged or overwhelmed? When have you felt that all your efforts were for naught, that maybe it was useless to go on trying? It’s no fun to feel pint-sized when facing a giant. And that giant can take many forms. It could be one person or a group of people. It could be a problem. The giant could be financial in nature, or it may be something within yourself.
Anything that distracts from our focus on Christ, detours us from our service for Him, and drains us of our driving passion is a giant that must be slain. In order to live a life of purpose, passion, and meaning in response to God’s call, we must learn to take down the monsters that stand in the way of great accomplishments for God.
Who can show us how to be a giant-killer? My suggestion is that we couldn’t do better than the shepherd boy named David. He was a kid who knew nothing about military strategy, yet he went one-on-one with a grizzled warrior — a card-carrying giant. Goliath stood nine feet tall and had a snarling attitude to match. He had paralyzed Israel’s fighting force with his intimidating presence. He arrogantly mocked the children of Israel and their God. No one dared protest. With Goliath looming over them, this army — and the whole nation of Israel — was dead in the water.
Which giants have blocked your path to a life lived fully, all out for God? Which giant has robbed you of your passion for the Kingdom and the King? You many find them in this brief list of giant-sized problems that believers need to defeat so they can live passionate lives as believers.
Let’s list them and then look at them briefly one at a time …
Resentment
Fear
Discouragement
Loneliness
Worry
Envy
Guilt and shame
And then we will look at how to slay your giant.
Many different giants block your path to a life of passion for God and His purposes. A life lived passionately. You may find some of them in this “rogues gallery” of giant—sized problems to living a passionate life where you embrace each day fully and engage with all that the day brings your way.
1> Resentment
Your spouse forgets to pick up your package at the post office, and you sulk about it for hours. A church member sitting near you sings loudly and off key, and you can’t resist scowling at him. A friend hasn’t called you in several days, so you’re not going to call her either. We all get slighted. Ignored, offended, and hurt by other people. Resentment holds these offences like a sponge instead of letting them roll off our back by living in grace and forgiveness.
2> Fear
Everyone is afraid of something. Israel was pinned down in fear of Goliath. What strikes terror in your heart? Flying? Spiders? The threat of nuclear war? The death of your spouse or child? The loss of your job? To whatever extent you are immobilized by your fears, to that extent you will lack the full experience of passion in your life. Theologian Paul Tillich said, “Fear … has a definite object … which can be faced, analyzed, attacked, endured.” If you want to live a life wide open to all the opportunities God has and will offer to you, the giant of fear may be your first enemy.
3> Discouragement
It is difficult to move forward through life at any speed when we have lost courage or confidence. Things don’t go the way we plan, so we get discouraged and give up. We fail at a task or a relationship, so we shrink back from entering into the next one. Discouragement tends to pull in the sails and toss out the anchor. “If it’s going to be like this,” we mutter, “why go on?” The giant of discouragement must be brought down to live passionately.
4> Loneliness
God created us for intimate relationship with Himself and with others. We feel most alive and passionate when we are enjoying rich fellowship with the Lord, getting along well with family members, and having fun with friends. But we feel lost and cold when there is painful distance or division in our dearest relationships. The giant of loneliness scorns out attempts at living passionately.
5> Worry
British educator W.R. Inge once said, “Worry is interest paid on trouble before it falls due.” Most people worry about things that will never happen. What a waste of emotional energy! Worry levels a burdensome tax on our joy and passion. It’s difficult to charge into life enthusiastically every day when you are worried about everything that could go wrong. No wonder Paul exhorted us, “Be anxious in nothing, but in everything by prayer and supplication, with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known to God” (Philippians 4:6)
6> Guilt and shame
Psychologist and educator Lewis Smedes explained, “A person feels guilt because he did something wrong. A person feels shame because he is something wrong … We may feel guilty because we lied to our mother. We may feel shame because we are not the person our mother wanted us to be.” Unresolved guilt and shame are deadly to living a life of passion.
There are many more Goliaths in the army that lines up to challenge the passionate life. You may struggle against doubt, temptation, jealousy, procrastinations, anger, rejection, bitterness, hopelessness, or another equally debilitating giant of a problem. You may be hindered from a life of passion by old scars and still painful wounds inflicted by these brutes. If you hope to break through to the passion-filled life, you need to meet your Goliath head-on.
Most of us need our soul restored before we can become fully engaged in a life of passion. All the motivational pep talks and spiritual disciplines are hollow for the person who struggles with unresolved pain from the past and unconquered problems in the present. The path to passion for wounded people begins by choosing no longer to be your Goliath’s victim and to take whatever steps God makes available to you to heal the past and help you move confidently into the future He has for you.
So, let’s look at slaying your giants.
Do you feel small compared to your present-day Goliath? Perhaps you feel too weak or inadequate to put up a fight. Giants can be intimidating, as King Saul and the army of Israel know. But God has empowered us and equipped us to bring them down. Let’s take several points of instruction from David’s triumph over Goliath, as recorded in 1 Samuel 17.
1> Confront your giant
When Goliath, the jumbo-sized Philistine, taunted Israel and dared them to send someone to fight him, Saul and all the Israelites “were dismayed and greatly afraid” (Verse 11). King Saul had a history of being a mighty warrior. He should have picked up the gauntlet and confronted Goliath in the power of the Lord. Yet Saul, along with the whole army, stood there quaking in his sandals. Do you think God could have used Saul to slay the giant? Absolutely! But since the warrior-king was too fearful to confront Goliath, God had to look for someone else.
The first step to getting past your problem to a passionate life is to confront your giant head-on. Here’s a good place to start: Turn to a fresh journal page and identify in writing the giants you are facing. Write down their names: guilt, envy, fear — whatever they are. Describe them. For example, you may write something like, “I feel guilty for what I’ve done in the past” or, “I harbour resentment toward my spouse for his/her insensitivity toward me” or, “If I give myself fully to God, I’m afraid He might ask me to do something I don’t want to do.” Add specific example of how your giant has terrorized you. The more you get down on paper, the clearer your Goliath will be in your sight.
2> Remain consistent in preparation
David the shepherd may have been young, small, and inexperienced in military combat; but he was not unprepared for meeting Goliath. For one thing, the boldness and naïveté of youth was on his side. Remember some of the daredevil things we did as kids, when we didn’t know enough to be scared? Those were the days where it seemed easier to ask forgiveness after the fact than to ask permission ahead of time. As Pearl S. Buck has said, “The young do not know enough to be prudent, and therefore they attempt the impossible, and achieve it, generation after generation.” That’s probably where David was.
Long before his dynamic showdown with Goliath in the valley of Elah, David had defended sheep on the hillsides of Bethlehem. He explained to Saul that watching sheep had involved facing the occasional lion or bear; when some predator attacked the sheep, he simply killed it (see verses 34-35). David had learned courage when nobody was around to see it. It was his consistent integrity and commitment that prepared him to meet Goliath when that moment came.
As a giant-slayer, you prepare for battle by practicing consistency in your spiritual disciples, You must spend time faithfully and privately before God, poring over His instruction manual for spiritual battle — the Word of God. You must humble yourself in prayer before your “Commander in Chief,” just as Joshua did prior to the battle of Jericho (see Joshua 5:13-15). Don’t skip any of those routine steps hoping to jump ahead of God’s schedule. God desires to train you in private through consistent personal discipline.
3> Consider the cost
Author Ray Bradbury said, “:Living at risk is jumping off the cliff and building your wings on the way down.” Taking on a menacing giant involved some risk. After all, this is war. In fighting for what is rightfully yours, you will still be under enemy fire. People have wondered why David carried five stones in his pouch when he needed only one to fell Goliath. Perhaps he would not presume that his first shot would do the trick. He probably expected some kind of battle, slinging stones, dodging Goliath’s big javelin. He was confident about victory, but he may have approached Goliath wondering if he would be wounded in the skirmish. At some point the shepherd boy considered the cost and took the risk.
If you want to achieve great things in your life, you’s better be ready for risk-taking. Theodore Roosevelt said, “Far better is it to dare mighty things, to win glorious triumphs, even though checkered with failure, than to take rank with those poor spirits who neither enjoy much nor suffer much, because they live in the gray twilight that knows not victory nor defeat.” If you’re a Christian, you know that the “gray twilight” he’s talking about isn’t mysterious or elusive. It’s called lack of faith. We can risk the cost of battle because Jesus promised, “All things are possible to him who believes” (Mark 9:23)
When you go to war against your giants, it probably won’t be easy, and you likely won’t dispense your problem with one shot. You may be in for a long battle. It may get worse before it gets better. You may take a hit or two along the way. But if the skirmish gets you past this giant and on the road to the passionate life you desire, it’s worth the risk.
Giants That Kill Our Passion – Part Four
Blog for November 4, 2020
We are looking at the life of David and his fight with the giant Goliath and pulling out some personal observations to help us fight and defeat the giants in our personal lives. Giants that stand in the way of living passionately.
So, in review…
1> Confront your giant
2> Remain consistent in preparation
3> Consider the cost
There are three more observations that will help us in our battle against giants in our personal lives…
4> Be courageous in battle
King Saul attempted to equip David for battle by outfitting him in his own battle armour. You need to remember that Saul was a big man, at least a head taller than his peers (see 1 Samuel 9:2), but David was just a kid. After trying to walk in the armour, David declined the offer. He didn’t need armour and a big sword when defending his sheep. His strength and protection were in the power of the Spirit. David announced, “The Lord who delivered me from the paw of the lion and from the paw of the bear, He will deliver me from the hand of this Philistine” (1 Samuel 17:37). So he courageously marched into battle with the five small stones and one big God.
There have been times in your life when you have seen God knock your big problems down to size. Reflect upon those victories. Replay them in your heart and mind. Take courage and “be strong in the Lord and in the power of His might” (Ephesians 6:10). As someone has said, you plus God equals a majority. No giant can withstand you when you are led an empowered by God’s Spirit.
5> Be a champion for God
When you step out boldly to confront your giant, you join the ranks of God’s army of champions. David is in that brave band, as is Moses, Joshua, Gideon, Samson, Peter, Paul, and countless numbers of heroic warriors in the pages of the Bible.
But be aware that when you move out as God’s champion, you may be criticized by others, even those closest to you. Some family members and friends may feel threatened as you step out in the Spirit to pursue your passion. When David showed up on the front lines and began inquiring about Goliath, his own family shot him down. His eldest brother said, ““Why have you come down? And with whom have you left those few sheep in the wilderness? I know your presumption and the evil of your heart, for you have come down to see the battle” (1 Samuel 17:28). Instead of lauding David’s courage, his brothers chided him for abandoning the sheep.
Like David, silence your critics with your courage, determination, and trust in God. The Spirit-empowered shepherd boy strode confidently into battle armed with a sling and five stones. The first stone flew and found its mark. Goliath toppled like a felled tree, and Israel enjoyed a great victory and new freedom to be God’s people in their world.
The same God who brought victory to an underdog shepherd boy stands ready to help you conquer your giants and to free you to the passionate life He created you to enjoy. Like David, you have a choice before you: You can remain paralyzed by your pain or problems, going nowhere; or you can face them, overcome them, and follow your passions.
6> Don’t give in to the giant of false humility
There are a few confused saints among us who have taken the notion that Christians should not desire success. Imagine David saying, “Oh, but God wants me to be humble, and I’d look so pompous challenging giants.” I suggest you read these words from Erwin Raphael McManus and take them to heart:
“It is important to note that ambition is not wrong. In fact, the Bible never speaks of ambition itself as negative. Ambition is a God-given motivation. One of the great tragedies among many followers of Christ is the loss in ambition after coming to faith. They have become convinced that any personal ambition is dishonouring to God. I have met some who have gone as far as to only do the opposite of what they desire because they were so persuaded that any passion to achieve had to be rejected and overcome. The simple reasoning is “it can’t be God’s will if I want to do it.” (Erwin Raphael McManus, Uprising — A Revolution of the Soul, page 38)
If you want to do it, and it’s something you know Good wants done, then ambition is just another gift God has given you for the task. Ambition can be a very important element of your passion. So, move forward and don’t be so critical of yourself. Move forward to the glory of God, and you’ll begin the see the giants fall in your life.
