“There is a great market for religious experience in our world; there is little enthusiasm for the patient acquisition of virtue, little inclination to sign up for a long apprenticeship in what earlier generations of Christians called holiness.” – Eugene Peterson
In the little town of Bethlehem, a man named Jesse had a son named David. As the youngest of eight brothers, David spent most of his days doing the unglamorous work of a shepherd. Long hours. Dirty conditions. Isolation. Pressure. Responsibility without recognition. Culturally, this was not abnormal. His job was so insignificant in the eyes of others that when the prophet Samuel arrived to anoint Israel’s next king, David was not even invited to the gathering.
David did not look like a king. But God had already been forming him like one.
Years later, David stood on edge of the Valley of Elah as Israel faced the Philistines. The story of David and Goliath is well known, even outside of religious circles. Everyone loves an underdog story. As I wrote in Biblical Principles for Resilience in Leadership, it remains one of history’s most enduring examples of unlikely victory.
But there is a detail we often rush past. David did not defeat Goliath by matching him blow for blow. He did not fight on the giant’s terms. He rejected Saul’s armor. He ignored his brothers’ contempt. He trusted the skills formed in the obscurity of a shepherd’s life rather than the tools celebrated in public.
Was God with him when he took out Goliath? Of course. But let’s not get it twisted; David’s skill was the fruit of long obedience. Years of unnoticed faithfulness prepared him for a moment that looked sudden to everyone else.
That realization has helped me make sense of my own journey through biblical higher education.
Looking back, I now know that if remote learning or nontraditional options had been available when I was in high school, I could have been an honor student. Years later, a score conversion of my GED revealed that I tested in the top quarter of students nationally. I had the ability. What I lacked was a method that fit how I learned.
Okay, I also lacked maturity, discipline, humility, and a host of other qualities, but for the sake of this post I’ll mainly blame pedagogy.
Within two years of leaving high school, I found myself on active duty in the United States Army. It was there that the itch for education returned. Part of it was peer pressure. Soldiers around me were earning degrees through tuition assistance. One completed a four-year degree in three years. Another earned both undergraduate and graduate degrees while serving. Most of the soldiers taking advantage of those opportunities were people of color, quietly reshaping their futures while the rest of us watched.
Another part of that itch came from seeing how the Army actually worked. Intelligence and integrity often mattered less than rank, fitness scores, and appearances. You could be physically elite and ethically hollow and still advance. I knew there had to be another way.
Three moments confirmed that conviction.
First, my company commander, Gerald Duenas, asked why I was not in college and suggested I consider becoming an officer.
Then my squad leader, Anthony Mitchell, told me plainly that I carried myself differently and thought differently than my peers.
Dr. Carlo A. Serrano, President