The Bible says of Jesus… He said: I'm the good shepherd, who lays His life down for the sheep; but a hireling runs away when he sees the wolf coming. A hireling is just in it for what he can get out of it; but the good shepherd lays his life down.
Notice what David did. In the place where he was serving, there was conflict - a lion, and a bear. Have you ever been to the zoo, and stood outside a lion's cage? Get as near as they will allow you. I remember doing that, and I began to walk up and down, and I realised that he was running up and down with me! I looked, and I thought: there's only bars separating me from death! I could see the lion was looking at food! He was looking at a meal; and I was looking at a lion.
It says the lion came against the lamb, and David ‘rose up’! To hit the lion, you've got to throw a stone from a long way off - which is possibly what he did. But we also know that he got into personal, hand-to-hand combat, because he said: “when it rose against me, I took him by the beard, and I killed him”. That's personal combat with a lion; and that's no mean feat! How on earth did he get the courage to do that? I think it came out of his relationship with God, and the anointing that he tapped into.
The call upon David's life was to wage war. Where did he learn to wage war? It wasn't all these years later. He was learning when he was 17. By the time he was 17, he had physically got stuck into a lion, and killed it. He had physically laid into a bear and killed it! I don't think we've ever thought about what a bear does, and how close you've got to get, to a bear. A bear has got mighty paws, that can sweep you away, just like that. It's not an easy task to kill a bear, hand-to-hand.
What would you and I feel? I think I would just explain to dad that we lost a couple of the sheep! Fear would grip you! Look dad, you've got to understand… it was a lion! I was by myself! But there was something developing in David, that was greater. It was an opportunity for him to prove, and develop courage, in the face of fearsome conflict.
You may not have to face a lion, or a bear; but the Bible likens the devil to a lion - coming to roar against you, and intimidate you. I'm sure that even at your young age, you have lions and bears in your life. Lions try and intimidate you; bears try and crush you. Have you thought about the circumstances and situations where you face intimidation? Something frightens you, where you face being crushed by the words that people spoke, or the things that people have done, the way they have treated you? Do you have courage growing in your heart to arise and defeat those things?
He said: the Lord delivered these things. The Lord delivered me out of the hand of the lion, and the bear. He had a deep trust in the Lord, and he grew in his ability to face things, and conquer them. That's what God is wanting to teach us to do!
For you, perhaps the thing you've got to face, is just a conflict with a person. Maybe you've got to put something right, that was wrong. This year you'll face some lions; you'll face some bears; you'll face things that will challenge you, frighten you; but will you have a testimony - the Lord delivered me out of them!
You'll never be significant in a public arena until first you've developed in private; and in the place that was private, David did these things.
1) He developed a devotion to the Lord, and an ability to draw the presence of God around his life