 'x' factor
We have a huge fascination these days with talent shows. I guess it has all come about because variety shows were proving too expensive for the TV companies so such Saturday night entertainment like Seaside Special (remember) or Sunday Night at the London Palladium (remember, remember) became a thing of the distant past. If you go to seaside resorts today many of those acts that appeared on the television back in those days are still plying their trade on a weekly basis.
A new format needed to be found where the general public were the stars and didn’t cost any thing and so along has come Big Brother, Pop Idol, The X Factor and Britain’s Got Talent. Of course they have now become so big that a few stars are becoming very rich on the back of it by seemingly not doing very much!
Back in David’s day it was soon discovered that this David who had slain the giant Goliath had definitely got the X factor all of his own. In fact, nothing had been known like it in living memory. King Saul and all his army had quaked and trembled with fear but along had come this youngster armed only with a slingshot and had single handedly delivered victory to Israel on a plate. And to cap it all off this new hero was good looking. A new song by the public masses, one with a wonderful catchy refrain soon caught on. It is recorded for us, not on vinyl, cd or mp3 but in scripture. In 1 Samuel chapter 18 v6-7 it says, ‘When the men were returning home after David had killed the Philistine, the women came out from all the towns of Israel to meet King Saul with singing and dancing, with joyful songs and with tambourines and lutes. As they danced, they sang: "Saul has slain his thousands, and David his tens of thousands." ‘
And so another giant rose up to confront David – one who physically wasn’t quite up to Goliath proportions but one who was actually head and shoulders above other people. It says in 1 Samuel 10 v23 that as he stood among the people he was a head taller than any of the others. But this giant had a king’s ego and it wasn’t submitted to God’s lordship.
We either submit our personal egos, ambitions, little kingdoms and desires to God or they can have a tendency to dominate us, drive us, control us and in Saul’s case destroy us. Let us be like David who loved God, put Him first and discovered a life worth living.
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