David was fleeing without arms. He told the priest, "I have neither brought my sword nor my weapons with me, because the king's business required haste." Gill calls this "still continuing his lie," since the real reason for his haste was that he had escaped through a window at night (1 Samuel 19:12). Both Gill and Matthew Henry think David may have had Goliath's sword in mind. Gill says "he knew the sword of Goliath was there, and perhaps had a principal view to it"; Henry says, "Probably David had an eye to that."

The priest answered, "The sword of Goliath the Philistine, whom thou slewest in the valley of Elah, behold, it is here wrapped in a cloth behind the ephod: if thou wilt take that, take it: for there is no other save that here." David said, "There is none like that; give it me" (1 Samuel 21:9). Later Doeg told Saul that Ahimelech "gave him the sword of Goliath the Philistine" (1 Samuel 22:10), and Saul charged the priest with giving David "bread, and a sword" (1 Samuel 22:13).

The sword recalled a day when the LORD had given David victory. Before he faced Goliath, David had said, "the LORD saveth not with sword and spear: for the battle is the LORD's" (1 Samuel 17:47). Gill thinks the sword "might serve to strengthen his faith in God, as often as he looked upon it." Matthew Henry says it would be "a great support to his faith, by bringing to mind that great instance of the particular care and countenance of the divine providence respecting him."

Yet the story does not stop there. David took the sword and fled to Gath, Goliath's own city, where he was soon "sore afraid" (1 Samuel 21:10-12). The weapon could remind him of God's help, but it could not take the place of trusting God.