Did you ever notice that David choose five smooth stones when he went out against Goliath? (I Sam. 17:40) What was he thinking? That he’d miss with the first? Or that Goliath would wait around for him to throw the others? Fat chance of that. Rather, David was aware of a spiritual principle that was about to play out as soon as he cast the first stone.

You see Goliath had four giant brothers. These were the lords of the Philistines who reigned in those days from Gaza, Ashkelon, Ashdod, Gath and Ekron (Joshua 13:3). We meet these five monsters again after they had taken the Ark of the Lord into Ashdod where the god Dagon is crushed, and then into Ekron where an offering of “five golden tumors and five golden rats according to the number of the Lords of the Philistines” is made in order to hold back the plagues from these five cities (1 Samuel 6:4).

When David comes to meet Goliath, he is all too aware that once Goliath goes down, his four scary brothers will soon be looking...