David didn’t worry about the enemy’s trash talk. He just removed the source of the problem!
What a lovely pastoral scene it is to observe someone feeding the birds and animals. Well, not exactly! Goliath says he intends to feed them with David’s flesh (1 Sam 17:44). But David is planning a much larger banquet: “This day I will give the carcasses of the camp of the Philistines to the birds of the air and the wild beasts of the earth, that all the earth may know that there is a God in Israel” (v 46). And it’s true. Around the globe the story of David and Goliath has been told, declaring that no enemy, no matter how big, is a match for anyone who stands with God. David’s unerring shot and beheading of Goliath with his own sword sowed chaos in the Philistine ranks. As they fled, the Israelite men pursued, slaughtering them all the way “to the gates of Ekron” (v 52), and then returning to plunder the Philistine tents. Meanwhile David transported Goliath’s head in the other direction, up to Jerusalem. How fitting that he should take it there, where some day his Greater Son at the place called Golgotha, or Skull Hill, would utilize the enemy’s own weapon to lay him low: “that through death He might destroy him who had the power of death, that is, the devil” (Heb 2:14). David’s victory and the response of the women as they sang, “Saul has slain his thousands, and David his ten thousands” (1 Sam 18:7), was sweet to Jonathan but bitter to Saul. He knew he was on the way down and David on the way up. But Jonathan? Didn’t he have the faith and prowess to face Goliath? Of course, he did. But God’s hand had restrained him so as to bring the boy David to the fore. Yes, “Out of the mouth of babes and nursing infants You have ordained strength, because of Your enemies, that You may silence the enemy and the avenger” (Ps 8:2).