Joseph Prince - The Cross: Your Redemption From Shame and Reproach
I want to share with you about how God wants to defeat the wrong mentality in our lives and how that you can watch out, whether this mentality is trying to creep into your life, amen? So let's go to the story of David hallelujah. 1 Samuel 17, "Now the Philistines gathered their armies together to battle, and were gathered at Sochoh, which belongs to Judah; they encamped between Sochoh and Azekah, in Ephes Dammim". Ephes Dammim. "And Saul and the men of Israel were gathered together, and they encamped in the Valley of Elah and drew up in battle array against the Philistines". Next "The Philistines stood on a mountain on one side, and Israel stood on a mountain on the other side, with a valley between them. And a champion went out from the camp of the Philistines, named Goliath, from Gath". Say "Goliath from Gath". Say "Gath". "Whose height was six cubits and a span".
Now, stop here. We're gonna look at what the Holy Spirit has hidden in this story. You know the Bible says the glory of God to conceal a matter, and it's the glory of kings, all of you, to search it out, amen? So, let's search out the meanings of the names here. First and foremost, we look at Goliath. Goliath means stripped. It also means exile, amen. He's from Gath. Gath means winepress, winepress. In Revelations 19, it gives you the meaning of winepress in terms of typology. Look at the last line, God himself treads, or Jesus himself treads, the winepress of the fierceness and wrath of Almighty God.
So, winepress is a picture, in type, of the wrath and the fierceness of Almighty God that he has reserved against his enemies, against everything that is of the devil, and against the devil himself. So, the picture of the winepress is a picture of God's wrath. So, you put them together, you have Goliath and Gath of Gath, a stripped exile because of the wrath of God. He's a stripped exile because of the wrath of God. But when he comes against you, what he wants to do is that he wants you to feel stripped.
Today, as we look back at the story of Goliath in 1 Samuel 17, it says that he went out from the camp of the Philistines. He was a Philistine. Now, what is a Philistine? A Philistine is, let me just show you the root name of Philistine, all right? Pahlash. In Hebrew it is from the root word "pahlash". Pahlash means to wallow or roll over in the dust, wallow or roll in the dust, this spirit of condemnation, this dusty spirit, this feeling that you're dirty. You know, when you have dust all over you you don't feel clean. You want to wash yourself with water, you want to bathe, why? Because it makes you dirty. This feeling of dust, that's the spirit of the Philistine. Well, we need to catch on.
Let's go on back to the story of Goliath here, David and Goliath, and we find Goliath described as a very tall man, six cubits and a span. Verse 5, "He had a bronze helmet on his head". Stop, what sort of helmet? Bronze. Now, you can see from the picture here that he has a bronze helmet, a judgment mentality. "And he was armed with a coat of mail, and the weight of the coat was five thousand shekels of bronze". In other words, his heart was closed in, fenced him, hemmed in by a judgment mentality, amen. It's all over his heart, all over his bosom. He has no love for people. His entire bosom is hemmed in by bronze, by a judgment. And not only that, the Bible says he had a bronze armor on his legs, all right? He stands in judgment, amen. Everything he does, wherever he goes, all right, it's to judge. "And a bronze javelin between his shoulders".
All right, so everything about Goliath was bronze. Bronze, that speaks of judgment. And that's the reason why it's so important for us to listen to the gospel of Jesus Christ. Bronze is something outside the presence of God. The bronze altar is made of bronze, but it's outside the Tabernacle proper. When you go into the Tabernacle, you don't see bronze anymore, you see gold. Gold speaks of divine righteousness. The farther away you are from God, as far as the east is from the west, the holy of holies and the bronze altar, so far has he removed our transgressions from us. The further away you are from God, the more judging you become. But the closer you are to God, the more you see divine righteousness covering one another, covering the other person, covering your spouse, covering your children, and you see them in righteousness. Hallelujah! Mmm, preach myself happy. Hallelujah.
Verse 8, next verse, "Then he stood and cried out to the armies of Israel, and said to them, 'Why have you come out to line up for battle? Am I not a Philistine?'" Am I not a wallower in the dust? "'And you the servants of Saul? Choose a man for yourselves, and let him come down to me. If he is able to fight with me and kill me then we will be your servants. But if prevail against him and kill him, then you shall be our servants and serve us".
Now, this is the defiance of Goliath, all right? Notice that although he had this javelin, and we know he has a huge sword, his main primary weapon is his words. The devil's weapon, long before he executes the sword of sickness and infirmity, or the sword of divorce and separation, whatever it is, or the sword of strife, he uses words. Words are his most powerful weapon, amen. And they are also ours, our most powerful weapon. The devil imitates God, don't forget that. God created everything, not by lifting his hand, by speaking, amen? And the devil uses words. So, here, the devil is through Goliath speaking all these words of defiance.
Verse 10, "And the Philistine said, 'I defy the armies of Israel this day; give me a man, that we may fight together.'" Notice the word, "defy". We'll come to that word again because many a times when the story of David and Goliath was preached, we preach in terms of fear, all right, and how to overcome fear. But actually this whole story is about defiance and reproach. And in a while's time, I'm gonna give you the definition of this word "defy" in the Hebrew, all right, and we'll see what the story is all about. "When Saul and all Israel heard these words of the Philistine, they were dismayed and greatly afraid". Next verse, "Now David was the son of that Ephrathite of Bethlehem Judah, whose name was Jesse, and who had eight sons".
And it goes on to tell you that Jesse, Jesse's three older sons, went to battle, all right? They were there in the valley of Elah. David was at home, taking care of the sheep. He was a shepherd boy, amen, 17 years old. And the father told him, "Come over here, David. All right, bring these ten cheeses, this parched grain and these ten loaves and bring them". And don't forget number ten represents, what? He's saying, literally to the captains of Israel's army, "Receive this gift as everything that I have". Amen, because ten is representative of the whole. And David brought the bread. It's a beautiful picture of God the Father sending his Son as a shepherd to bring us the bread of life, to give us true bread, amen, that lasts until eternal life.
So, David came on to the battlefield, the valley of Elah. And when he came, he was just on time to hear Goliath's taunt and defiance. Amen, he was there. He heard it, all right. The Bible tells us Goliath challenged Israel 40 days and 40 nights, amen. And when David was there, this is what happened, the Bible tells us, let's go on to verse 23. "Then as he talked with them". David talked with the people of Israel. "There was the champion, the Philistine of Gath, Goliath by name, coming up from the armies of the Philistines; and he spoke according to the same words. David heard them. And all the men of Israel, when they saw the man, fled from him and were dreadfully afraid". Verse 25, "So the men of Israel said 'Have you seen this man who has come up? Surely he has come up to defy Israel'".
You see the word "defy" again. "And it shall be that the man who kills him the king will enrich with great riches, will give him his daughter, give his father's house exemption from taxes in Israel". Hey, not bad for times like this, amen? Verse 26, "Then David spoke to the men who stood by him, saying, 'What shall be done for the man who kills this Philistine and takes away the reproach from Israel?'" Notice the word "reproach". "For who is this uncircumcised Philistine, that he should defy the armies of the living God"?
Now notice, David's concern was more that the devil was reproaching Israel. Remember I told you just now, the words defiance, defy, and the word "reproach". These are the key words in this story. You'll find them mentioned again and again. All right, "What should be done for the one who takes away the reproach from Israel? For who is this uncircumcised Philistine, that he should defy the armies of the living God"? You see, the threat, the real threat of Goliath was not in his height or his size. It was in his words of reproach, his words of defiance. That's how the devil comes against us. And by the way, the reason I had this highlighted is because the word "defy" and the word "reproach" are the same Hebrew words from the same root. Let me show you the words in Hebrew.
The word "defy" is keereph, the word "reproach" is kherpah. Kherpah is the root of keereph. They are both the same Hebrew words, all right? Kherpah is the etymology, or the root word of keereph, amen? In other words, this whole story is about reproach, reproach, reproach reproach, words of reproach. That's what the devil does when he comes against you. What is this reproach? If you look at the meaning, the word "reproach" here is reproach means reproach that's resting upon condition of shame or disgrace.
All right, let's go back to the story again in 1 Samuel 17, "Now Eliab his oldest brother heard when he spoke to the men; and Eliab's anger was aroused against David and he said, 'Why did you come down here? With whom have you left those few sheep in the wilderness? I know your pride and the insolence of your heart, for you have come down to see the battle.'" Sounds like some of our older brothers, huh? You see, it's one thing for the enemy to reproach us, it's another thing when your own brothers, your own. Your own family members reproach you, amen? What's the right response to all these things? The right response is the next verse. David says, "What have I done now? Is there not a cause"? Next verse, "Then he turned from him". Say it, "He turned from him". That's it. Don't respond, just turn away from the reproach. Turn away from the shame. Turn away from the accusations, amen? Praise the Lord.
"He turned away from his brother toward another and said the same thing; and these people answered him as the first ones did. Now when the words which David spoke were heard, they reported them to Saul," to king Saul. And y'all know the story. King Saul summoned for David. David came before King Saul and King Saul probably laughed and said, "You want to go and fight against this Philistine"? David says, "Let no man's heart fail because of him. Your servant will go and fight with him".
And you see, what his brother interpret as pride was actually faith in the living God. He was the only one who really had a good opinion of God. The rest did not believe when they go out, God will fight their battles. David was the only one, amen? It wasn't pride, it was true humility because true humility is based on faith, amen, a good opinion of God. Now, you know the story, Saul said, "You're just a young boy. He's a warrior from his youth, all right, you cannot fight with him". And David narrated a story of how a lion came and took a lamb and he fought against a lion. Then a bear came later on, and he also fought against the bear.
And this is what David said, "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. Saul says to David, 'Go, and the LORD be with you!'" Next verse, "So Saul clothed David," can you believe it? "With his armor, and he put a bronze helmet on David's head; and he also clothed him with a coat of scales, bronze scales". Amen? So, you know the story. David says, "I cannot walk with these for I have not tested them. So David took them off". Hallelujah. Praise God. And how did David go? Verse 40, "David took his staff in his hand; he chose for himself five smooth stones from the brook, put them in a shepherd's bag, in a pouch which he had, and his sling was in his hand. And he drew near to the Philistine".
So, he had a shepherd's staff. He had a shepherd's bag, shepherd clothing, and he had a sling in his hand. He went as a shepherd. Let's take a look at this picture here, all right? There David with the staff in his hand, the sling and a shepherd's bag. He went as shepherd. I have a Word from the Lord for all the shepherds and all the pastors that are watching. Your job is to meet the Goliath in your people's life, the judgment mentality, and send forth that judgment, amen, to judge the judgment mentality, amen, to remove it from their lives, to kill that judgment mentality in Jesus's mighty name, amen. We are not to create a judgment mentality in our people. We are not to have a judgment mentality. We are called by God as pastors to destroy the judgment mentality, amen? That's your calling, pastors, it's a high calling, amen. David went and one of the five smooth stones is that of a shepherd, amen. David went as a shepherd, hallelujah, and he judged the judgment mentality.
Now, because of time, y'all know the story, he met Goliath and Goliath was laughing because he says that "what is this a boy has come up to meet me? Am I a dog that you meet me with a stick, with a shepherd's rod"? All right, you know the story. Goliath came against David. David took out his sling, put the stone inside and one little stone went up, up, up, penetrated the bronze helmet. That must be some force, man. I'm telling you penetrated the bronze helmet, sunk into his forehead, the Bible tells us. Make sure that the mentality of judgment is judged thoroughly right at the root of its mentality, amen? And this giant, this mighty, proud giant that has come to make you feel stripped so as to carry you away exiled, all right, by persuading you to believe that you are under God's wrath, this giant, this teaching that gives you that kind of mentality fell down face first, fell down as if to do obeisance and homage to the entire children of Israel, and most of all, to the God of Israel.
Hallelujah. God will cause the judgment mentality to bow before you, amen? Hallelujah? You know, you look at Goliath, the number six is stamped all over him. He's six cubits plus. There are six pieces of armor, and his spearhead weighed 600 over shekels so you have 666, spirit of Antichrist. Any spirit that negates Jesus Christ and Jesus is not central to the message, any teaching or preaching that sort of like push aside the finished work of Jesus is a spirit of Antichrist. Anyone that tells you that you can receive healing, you can receive by your obedience, by your works, and negate the cross where all these things take place and all these blessings come on you, they may not know it, but they're operating under a spirit of Antichrist. But in these last days, that spirit is coming down. Hallelujah. Can I have a good amen? Thank you, Jesus.
Let me bring this to a close. The Bible says, let's drop down all the way to verse 52, "Now the men of Israel and Judah arose and shouted, when he saw the giant fell, the men of Israel and Judah arose and shouted and pursued the Philistines as far as the entrance of the valley and to the gates of Ekron. And the wounded of the Philistines fell along the road to Shaaraim, even as far as Gath and Ekron". All right, notice they pursued them all the way to the gates of Ekron. "And the wounded of the Philistines fell along the road to Shaaraim even as far as Gath and Ekron". All these have meanings, amen.
Notice, gates of Ekron. And we're about to find out what Jesus meant when he said to Peter in Matthew 16, Jesus says, "I will build my church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against the church". Notice he used the plural, the "gates" of hell. Have you ever wondered what are the gates of hell? You're about to find out, amen. Here notice the words "gates of Ekron" is plural. And the Philistines fell along the road to Shaaraim. Shaaraim literally means double gates, all right, double gates, okay? And they, back again, "Even as far as Gath and Ekron". Gath and Ekron means winepress. Ekron means uprooted, amen? And one gate that has been successful against the church for many, many years now, it's a long, long, time, all right, but it's coming down. Hallelujah. Can someone say, "amen"?
All right, that gate is the gate of God's wrath, which is actually is the devil impersonating God as angry. He goes about as a roaring lion, amen. The Bible said the King's wrath is like the roaring of a lion. So, the devil goes about as if to roar as if God is angry with you. Anytime you feel like God is angry with you, you have just been roared at by the devil. All right, God is not angry, but he makes you think God is angry. It's a stronghold. It's a gate the devil has, all right, that gate came down. Ekron means uprooted.
Another gate is the sense of being uprooted. Those who tell you, "Today you are righteous, tomorrow you may not be, you are righteous until your next sin" is doing nothing but promote this gate called uprooted. In other words, you're always feeling like God is angry with you and you are being uprooted. You're always feeling uprooted like an exile, uprooted. You know, instead of feeling like a son or daughter of God, you feel like you're just a servant. Anytime you can be uprooted, you can be uprooted, that's a evil gate that is coming down in the last days, amen. Hallelujah.
This double gate, all right, that makes God's people feel that God is angry with them and that they're always uprooted, those who teach that once you are saved, you can lose your salvation, as if the salvation of the blood of Jesus is like the blood of bulls and goats, which can even cover the sins of Israel for a year, but the blood of Jesus can hardly cover for one day. It is always until your next sin. Those who teach that you can lose your salvation are all promoting the gates of Ekron uprooted. Thank God the gates of hell shall not prevail against the church, amen? Hallelujah. Praise the Lord.
All right, back to the story, bringing this to a close. "Then the children of Israel returned from chasing the Philistines, and they plundered their tents". Verse 54, "And David took the head of the Philistine". You know the story when Goliath fell, David had no sword. David jumped on Goliath took Goliath's own sword and decapitated Goliath, cut off his head. The Bible says the greater David, Jesus Christ. Through death, death is an instrument of the devil. It's a weapon of the devil. But Jesus used the weapon of the devil. Through death, Jesus conquered, destroyed him who had the power of death, amen.
So, the same way David cut off Goliath's head with Goliath's own sword, amen? What the devil meant against you, God will use it to defeat the enemy, amen. Praise the Lord. And the Bible says he brought it to Jerusalem, but he put Goliath's armor in his tent. And, you know, it always puzzles people if they read closely, why would David bring Goliath's head to Jerusalem? Now, I've said it for many years now that the place where Jesus was crucified is called Golgotha. Gol from Goliath, Gath, Goliath of Gath, Golgotha. Yes? It means the place of the skull, but who's skull? David brought it to Jerusalem because David, most likely God showed David that he's to bury the skull of Goliath in this place.
And rabbinical tradition tell us it is by the road, and that's where calvary is today, Golgotha is today. It's by the main road that goes all the way to Damascus, that cross through Jerusalem. That's where he was crucified. When Christ was crucified, I believe he was crucified right over the place of the skull. It's a beautiful picture that the greatest son of David, Jesus Christ, who came from the line of David, the greatest son of David will conquer a greater Goliath and crush his head in our lives, amen, thus fulfilling the promise of God to Adam and Eve that their seed will crush the serpent's head. Hallelujah. Friends, this is what it's all about, amen? God wants to remove the spirit of shame out of the church, the spirit of reproach, amen.