This audio is AI-narrated and may mispronounce some names and places.

1 Samuel 17:10, 26, 32, 37, 43, 45, 47, 49 (KJV)

Uncle Ricky: Well, hello there, little friends! Welcome to Sunday School on the porch. I’m Uncle Ricky. We’ve got a full porch today — Biscuit, the raccoon, is here, showing off as usual — and Olive, our sweet little dove, is perched right up there on the rail where she loves to sit. Say hello, you two!

Biscuit: Hello, friends! I’m Biscuit, and you caught me right in the middle of my exercising! One… two… three! I lifted a great big rock over by the creek this morning — all by myself! There’s not a stronger raccoon in the whole county!

Uncle Ricky: Now, Biscuit…

Biscuit: Well… maybe it wasn’t a great big rock. More of a medium rock.

Uncle Ricky: Biscuit.

Biscuit: Well — it was a rock, anyway! And I lifted it all by myself!

Olive: And I’m Olive! Hello, everybody! Biscuit, you ARE strong. But Uncle Ricky, what happens when something is just too big — too big even for somebody strong?

Uncle Ricky: Olive, that’s a perfect question, because today’s story is about a fellow who faced something much too big — a giant! His name was Goliath, and his story is in the Bible, in First Samuel, chapter 17.

Uncle Ricky: It happened in a valley called Elah, a long, long time ago. The army of Israel was camped on one hill, and their enemies, the Philistines, were camped on another hill, with the valley down between them. And every day, out of the Philistine camp stepped a champion named Goliath of Gath.

Biscuit: A champion? Like the strongest one they’ve got? Uncle Ricky, how big are we talking here? Bigger than a bear? Bigger than a tree?

Uncle Ricky: The Bible says Goliath stood six cubits and a span — in our measuring, that’s more than nine feet tall, taller than two grown men standing on each other’s shoulders! He wore a helmet of brass and a coat of heavy armor, and his spear was so big that its iron head alone weighed about fifteen pounds.

Uncle Ricky: And Goliath would shout across the valley — First Samuel, chapter 17, verse 10: “I defy the armies of Israel this day; give me a man, that we may fight together.” In other words: “Send out your best man to fight me — if he can!” Morning and evening, for forty days, that giant came out and shouted the same challenge.

Olive: Forty days?! That’s a whole lot of shouting. Uncle Ricky, did anybody go? Did the king send a soldier?

Uncle Ricky: Not one, Olive. The Bible says King Saul and all his men were dismayed and greatly afraid. Every morning they’d line up for battle… and every morning they’d hear that giant’s voice booming across the valley and tremble. Nobody — not one single soldier — would go down and face him.

Biscuit: Well… I don’t blame them! Nine feet tall! I’d have run straight home to my hollow tree! …I mean — after I lifted a few more rocks. For exercise, you understand.

Uncle Ricky: Ha! Well, hold on, Biscuit, because here comes the hero of our story — and he isn’t a soldier at all. His name was David. He was the youngest of eight brothers — just a shepherd boy who took care of his father Jesse’s sheep back home in Bethlehem. While his three oldest brothers were off at the battle, David stayed home with the sheep.

Uncle Ricky: One day, David’s father sent him to the camp with a sack of parched corn, ten loaves of bread, and ten cheeses for the captain. “Run,” Jesse said, “and see how your brothers are doing.” So David rose up early, left the sheep with a keeper, and ran to the army — just in time to hear Goliath come out shouting.

Olive: Oh no! David HEARD him? What did David do, Uncle Ricky? Did he tremble like the soldiers?

Uncle Ricky: He did NOT, Olive. David listened to that giant mocking God’s people, and his heart burned inside him. He asked the soldiers standing by — First Samuel, chapter 17, verse 26: “for who is this uncircumcised Philistine, that he should defy the armies of the living God?” Who was this fellow, David wanted to know, to shake his fist at the army of the living God?

Biscuit: Wait a minute, wait a minute. Is this going where I think it’s going? Uncle Ricky — did the shepherd boy say HE would fight the giant?

Uncle Ricky: That’s exactly what he said, Biscuit. Word reached King Saul, and Saul sent for him. And young David stood before the king and said — verse 32: “Let no man’s heart fail because of him; thy servant will go and fight with this Philistine.” Saul looked him up and down. “Thou art not able,” he said. “You’re just a youth — and Goliath has been a man of war since HE was a boy.”

Olive: But Uncle Ricky, David was just a shepherd. He didn’t even have a sword! What made him so brave?

Uncle Ricky: Oh, Olive — David told the king all about it. Out in the fields, a lion had come and taken a lamb from the flock, and David went after it and rescued that lamb. A bear came, too, and David fought it off just the same. And David said — verse 37: “The LORD that delivered me out of the paw of the lion, and out of the paw of the bear, he will deliver me out of the hand of this Philistine.” You see, little friends? David wasn’t trusting in himself. He remembered what GOD had already done for him — and he trusted God to do it again.

Biscuit: A lion AND a bear?! And here I was bragging about a rock. Go on, Uncle Ricky — did the king let him go?

Uncle Ricky: He did! “Go,” Saul said, “and the LORD be with thee.” Then Saul dressed David in his very own armor — a brass helmet, a heavy coat of mail, a big sword. But David tried to walk in it and couldn’t. “I cannot go with these,” he said — he had never worn such things. So David took them all off. He went out to meet the giant the way God had always helped him before: just as a shepherd.

Uncle Ricky: David took his staff in his hand, and down at the brook he chose five smooth stones and put them in his shepherd’s bag. And with his sling in his hand, that shepherd boy walked out into the valley toward the giant.

Olive: Five little stones. Against a spear and a sword and all that brass! Oh, Uncle Ricky, my feathers are all in a flutter!

Uncle Ricky: Mine too, Olive. Goliath came out with his shield-bearer marching in front of him, took one look at this young shepherd boy with no armor at all, and he was insulted! — verse 43: “Am I a dog, that thou comest to me with staves?” And he threatened David something terrible. But David was not afraid, and what David said next is the very heart of the whole story — verse 45: “Thou comest to me with a sword, and with a spear, and with a shield: but I come to thee in the name of the LORD of hosts, the God of the armies of Israel, whom thou hast defied.”

Biscuit: Ohhh. David DID have something bigger than a sword. He had the LORD on his side!

Uncle Ricky: You’ve got it, Biscuit! And David kept right on — verse 47: “And all this assembly shall know that the LORD saveth not with sword and spear: for the battle is the LORD’s, and he will give you into our hands.” Say it with me, little friends: the battle is the LORD’s!

Olive: The battle is the LORD’s! I love that, Uncle Ricky! But what happened next? Did David run?

Uncle Ricky: David ran, Olive — but not AWAY. The Bible says David hastened, and ran TOWARD the giant! He reached into his shepherd’s bag, took out one stone, put it in his sling, and swung it with all his might — verse 49: “And David put his hand in his bag, and took thence a stone, and slang it, and smote the Philistine in his forehead, that the stone sunk into his forehead; and he fell upon his face to the earth.”

Biscuit: One stone! ONE! And down he went — timberrr! Nine feet of giant, flat on his face!

Uncle Ricky: That’s right, Biscuit. And when the Philistine army saw their great champion fall, THEY were the ones who ran away — and God’s people won the day. A shepherd boy, five smooth stones, and a great big God.

Olive: Uncle Ricky, I think I learned something. David was little, but God is BIG. So I don’t have to be the biggest or the strongest. I just have to trust Him.

Uncle Ricky: Olive, you couldn’t have said it better. That is our Sunday School lesson, little friends. Whatever looks too big in your life — a hard day, something scary, something you think you can’t do — remember David. You may feel small, but you never face it alone, because the battle is the LORD’s. God helped David, and He will help you, too.

Uncle Ricky: Now let’s pray together. Dear Lord, thank You for David, and for showing us that You are bigger than any giant. When we feel small or scared, help us to remember that the battle is Yours, and that You are always with us. Thank You for loving us. We ask it in Jesus’ name — amen.

Biscuit: Amen!

Olive: Amen! …And Uncle Ricky? Next time Biscuit wants to lift a rock, I think I’ll just watch. From a safe distance.

Uncle Ricky: Ha! Good plan, Olive. Goodbye for now, little friends — and remember: the battle is the LORD’s!