Just Because: The Story of Salvation for Children (14 page)

refusing to trust the Lord is like calling the Lord a

liar, and that was the choice they made.

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For forty years the Israelites walked around in the

desert. You can imagine that by the end of forty

years they were getting pretty tired of eating manna

everyday. One by one they died and were buried in

the desert, and their children grew up and trained as

soldiers ready for the battle.

During this time the Lord taught them about the

sacrifice for sins, the time when they would bring a

lamb, and He also told them to make a great big tent

with different rooms inside. This was like a temple,

but a temple which could be moved. Inside was a

secret place called the Holy of Holies, and it was

closed by a thick curtain.

Inside this place was a box, a beautiful box covered

in gold with two golden angels on top covering the

top with their wings. The box was called the ark of

the covenant, and inside were some manna and the

Ten Commandments. Inside the box God put His holy

power, and no one could touch the box after He put

His power inside or they would die. God didn’t want

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to kill anyone. But just as it is natural that your hand

gets burned in a fire, so it is natural that if a person

who is not perfect touches the box of God’s perfec-

tion they die. The box had big poles to carry it so the

men didn’t have to touch it. The Lord told them that

whenever they carried this box into the battle against

an enemy army they would win the battle, no matter

how big the enemy soldiers were.

So now the Israelites had a secret weapon, a

weapon no one could beat. I’ll bet the old devil was

worried about this because even his giants couldn’t

do anything against God’s secret weapon.

Now it was almost time to go to war and take

back the land the Lord had promised. Moses died

when he was 120 years old, and Joshua became the

leader of the Israelites. They came to the Jordan River

after forty years and were ready to go into Canaan.

The Lord told them not to be afraid. Joshua also sent

spies into the land. Some of them met a lady called

Rahab. She had heard about the Lord and believed

He was powerful. She asked the spies to save her

when they came into Canaan, and she helped them

hide in the city where she was living.

Well, they marched into Canaan, and their

enemies could not stop them. They came to the city

of Jericho. It had big walls around it. Some of them

had doubts about how they could win this battle and

get inside, but the Lord gave them the plan. He told

them to march around the city for six days. On the

seventh day they had to march around it for seven

times and then blow their horns and shout very loud.

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When they did this the walls came falling down, and

they went in and beat their enemies.

Even the Nephilim were no match for the Lord.

They fell down and died before the holy ark of God,

and some of them ran away to other places. The Lord

did not allow the Israelites to keep evil things which

had belonged to the Nephilim’s children because

those things were used to worship Satan. But some-

times the people didn’t listen to the Lord when they

saw something they really liked, and this made the

Lord angry.

After they had won the war and taken the Promised

Land the people lived there, but other people would

often come and attack them. God had told them to

destroy all the Nephilim people because they were

not natural, and they were always being evil. But

sometimes the people didn’t listen, and some of the

Nephilim children survived and fought against Israel.

The Lord gave Israel leaders; some loved the Lord,

and some did not. He gave them men like Samson

who was very strong. The Nephilim were BIG guys,

but Samson was only small. God made him stronger

than any giant, and everyone knew it must be the

Lord’s strength because he was only a little guy.

All the other countries had kings, and the Lord

was Israel’s king. But the people complained that

they wanted a king they could see, so the Lord gave

them a king called Saul. Now sometimes Saul was a

good king, and sometimes he did not obey the Lord

and did bad things. He was a good soldier but not a

man who truly loved the Lord with all his heart. So

the Lord chose a new king for Israel, a shepherd boy

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who truly loved the Lord with all his heart, a boy

called David. The Lord also chose special men to

speak for Him, and these men were called prophets.

The Lord sent the prophet called Samuel to the

house of David’s father, a man called Jesse. David had

many brothers, and he was the youngest. His brothers

were soldiers in Saul’s army, and they all stood in

front of the prophet Samuel. These guys were strong-

looking hunks, good for fighting and handsome, but

the Lord doesn’t choose a person for what he looks

like on the outside; He looks at a person’s heart. The

Lord told Samuel He had not chosen any of them to

be the king of Israel.

“Do you have any other sons?” Samuel asked

Jesse.

“Well,” said Jesse, “the only son I have left is just

a boy of fourteen who is out looking after the sheep,

but God won’t want him; he’s just a kid.”

“Go and get him,” said the prophet.

So they went and got him and brought him to the

prophet, and the Lord told the prophet, “Yes, this is

the one.”

So David went with the prophet to the palace of

the king, and there he grew up. David was a musi-

cian, and when King Saul got into a really bad mood

David would play his harp for him.

One day the king of another land came to take

over Israel. King Saul and all his soldiers went out to

fight them. Those other guys were called Philistines.

The Philistine soldiers were standing on one side of

a valley, and King Saul and his army were standing

on the other side.

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Out of the Philistine army strolled this great big

man. He was a child of the Nephilim, and he was

a giant called Goliath. Every day for forty days he

would walk down to the valley between the armies

and call out to the Israelite soldiers. He called them

bad names and said they were cowards and scaredy-

cats and yellow bellies and stuff. The worst thing was

that he would also say bad things about the Lord. He

had a really big spear and a very long sword and a

little guy to carry his other weapons.

No one in King Saul’s army would go out and

fight him because they were pretty scared. Let’s face

it—who wouldn’t be? Saul was a silly man who

didn’t use the ark of God because he wanted to think

he was the one who beat the enemies. But the Lord

sent David to the army camp, and when he heard

what this Goliath was saying he was very upset.

David was most upset that this giant was saying bad

things about the Lord, so he asked King Saul if he

could go down and kill Goliath.

The king didn’t want to let him go, but David told

him he knew he could win because the Lord was with

him. At first Saul tried to dress David in a fighting

suit, but it was too heavy so he took it off. “I don’t

need any of this stuff,” said David. “All I need is the

Lord God of Israel with me, and He will help me win

this fight.” Now that sounds like a guy who trusts the

Lord, right?

Now David had no spear, and he had no sword.

In fact he didn’t even have a big stick. But he had

a slingshot. This was a piece of string that looked

a bit like an eye-patch pirates wear, but it wasn’t

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for wearing. In the eye-patch part David would

put a stone, and then he would make the sling go

round and round. When he let the end of the string

go, the stone would fly very quickly through the air.

When he was a shepherd boy he used to practice all

day, because sometimes wild animals would try to

take the sheep, and he was a very good shot. When

Goliath saw David coming to meet him he started to

laugh and laugh.

“What’s this?” he yelled.

“Sending out children to fight me, are you? I’ll

chop this stupid kid up into little pieces and send him

back to you.”

Now young David stood before that huge

Philistine dude and told him this: “You come here

against me with a sword and spear, and you say

terrible things about the Lord God. But I tell you that

today the Lord will give your life to me. With His

power I will put you down and cut off your head, and

then He will give us victory over your entire army.”

Goliath stopped laughing. He looked angry,

furious, frightening. “You little fool, you think your

God will help you? You are as good as dead!” Goliath

came toward David, and the army looking at the scene

wondered how this little boy could possibly beat this

huge champion of Satan. But this was a fight between

the Lord’s servant and Satan’s servant. Satan chose a

BIG giant with natural strength, and God chose a boy

with faith, a boy who loved Him.

David put his hand into his pocket and took out

one of the smooth flat stones he had picked up from the

little stream in the valley. Now Goliath was wearing

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a suit of metal, and stones, swords and spears would

simply bounce off him; so his army was laughing at

this kid with his little slingshot. But there was a part

of his head that wasn’t covered in armour, and that

spot was right between his eyes.

David put a stone in his slingshot, and Goliath

laughed. He turned around to his fellow soldiers and

shouted, “The little fool is going to throw stones at

me. Ha, ha. I’ll chop him up.”

David twirled his slingshot. Goliath lifted his

mighty sword to chop him into pieces. David fired

the stone. Up, up it flew and struck Goliath right

between his eyes. The stone kil ed him instantly,

and he fel down stone dead. Real y, stone dead.

Goliath’s weapon-carrier took off like a cat with a

dog chasing it.

David walked over to the great dead giant, and

with all his strength he picked up Goliath’s great big

sword. He held it up and then let it drop and chopped

off his head. He held up the head in front of the

Philistine soldiers, and they were freaked right out.

They were thinking, if a boy can beat our strongest

man, what chance do we stand against their big guys?

So guess what they did. They ran away.

So God helped David, and Goliath was beaten.

God often uses people who don’t look like big shots

and who don’t seem to be special. He doesn’t usually

choose the most popular person or the best looking.

He uses people who love Him and people who are

not proud. The Lord looks at our hearts to see if we

are humble. He knows humble people will say it was

the Lord’s power that won the battle, and sometimes

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those people will do things we thought were impos-

sible. You don’t have to be big and powerful to do

amazing things for the Lord, Just Because He does

them through our faith, just as a fourteen-year-old

kid beat a giant.

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Now David was the man who wrote most of

the psalms in the Bible, and they are poems

and songs to the Lord. David became king of Israel,

and he taught the people to love the Lord. Like all

people he wasn’t perfect. Sometimes he did bad

things, even very bad things, but he would ask God

to forgive him because he was very sorry for what

he did. The Lord wil always forgive people when

they are truly sorry.

The Lord used David to teach the people about

Him, and He even used David to tell the future. In

many of his psalms David told things about Jesus,

who would come in about one thousand years’ time,

and in one psalm, number twenty-two, he even told

us exactly how Jesus would die on a cross. The Lord

knows exactly what will happen in the future, and He

told David what to write so we would know Jesus is

real and true.

Later David married, and he had a son. His name

was Solomon. Now Solomon became the richest king

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in the world, but he didn’t let his money stop him from

loving God. One day before he became rich he was

praying. The Lord asked him what he would like as a

gift. After thinking about it for a while he replied, “I

would like to be wise, Lord.” Because he didn’t ask

the Lord for money, like most people would have,

the Lord gave him wisdom, and he became the wisest