The unheard story of David and Goliath.

"I can stand brute force, but brute reason is quite unbearable. There is something unfair about its use. It is hitting below the intellect."

Oscar Wilde

Into the silence of my early Sunday morning solitude I introduced a "Ted-Talks." The link is below:
http://www.ted.com/talks/malcolm_gladwell_the_unheard_story_of_david_and_goliath.html

Malcolm Gladwell's provocative retelling of this Sunday School classic was as unexpected as it was thought provoking. I ended his Talk feeling a tremendous sympathy for this doddering giant who was so vastly outclassed by his agile opponent.

This unnaturally large man with such a profound lack of vision was vastly outclassed by the quick-witted adolescent who didn't care a fig for the traditional way to behave in such a situation. Goliath depended upon tradition to ensure he could get close enough to his opponent for things to unfold the way he expected them to. When slavish submission to ritualistic war was followed then the gladiatorial conflict was perfectly staged to his advantage and he was monumental in his prowess. But take the traditional way of doing things from him and he was a defenseless infant blundering in confusion and near sightedness into offering himself as a giant target for this tradition-less child-man before him.

The whole thing reminded me forcefully of how 21st Century Christianity in the western world acts towards its perceived opponent. It lumbers up with a childlike gait, looming large in the landscape, seemingly invincible, yet profoundly challenged.  As long as its opponents stick to the traditional way of doing things then it is as invincible as it seems. Tradition says we should get really close and trade blows with heavy objects until one of the warriors is bludgeoned to death. Subtlety was certainly not a part of Goliath's repertoire and it isn't a part of much of Christianity's repertoire either.

Have you lumbered up to your erstwhile philosophical opponent and bludgeoned them with Sin, Sacrifice and Shame? Does victory in this "Spiritual War" demand that your metaphorical adversary be willing to walk into your reach and play by your rules? Must they stand there and accept the blows of your cumbersome sequence of attacks, never moving out of the way of your well telegraphed blows because that is the way you are supposed to do it?

The average post-modern Disconnected or Unconnected Millennial is the agilely intellectual David, with perfect vision, who is glad to trash Tradition if it offers them the  safety to take potshots at what they perceive to be the giant myopic monstrosity of the tradition-bound christian establishment.
Goliath hadn't a snowball's chance in hell of successfully defeating such a well prepared David. Perhaps the unarmored youngster who led Goliath unto the field of battle might have been more successful, but tradition never allows for such obscenities to occur. What would the ghosts of Goliath's ancestors have thought if he had come prepared to use the same modern methods to ensure success?

I feel sorry for the giants in our story. Myopic, outdated, and unarmored against their unexpected adversary, they have no hope of success and no means to use the new methods even if they could force themselves to accept the concepts and complexities that created this novel way to win a war. For large, nearsighted giants make for very poor marksmen.

Do you feel sorry for the giants in your life?