The Powerful Lessons From David in Ziklag

In this post, go through the life-changing journey of King David in Ziklag and discover powerful lessons that you’ll never find in other places. Learn the secrets to conquering discouragement, navigating disappointment, and submitting to the perfect will of God.

Brethren, have you been discouraged, disappointed, and depressed? Have you come to a point in your life where you simply want to give up and quit doing God’s will in your life? Well, brethren, let me tell you a story found in the Bible that teaches us how we should handle discouragement and disappointments in life. This is a story about King David and a city called Ziklag. Today, I want to share with you the powerful lessons we can learn from one of the darkest and lowest points in David’s life. Let’s pick up the story in 1 Samuel 27.

Be careful with what you tell yourself

​¹ And David said in his heart — during this time, King Saul sought to kill David. Although David was able to evade King Saul multiple times, Saul would wear him out. All the years of hiding took a toll on David and he finally gave in to disappointments, despair, and discouragements.

Notice, David said in his heart. The words you’re telling yourself have the power to influence your thoughts and actions. So, be very careful with what you’re telling yourself. Sadly, David here talks to himself instead of talking to Yahweh. As humans, it’s normal to get sad and disappointed, but what you do with those emotions will determine whether you will make the right decision or not. David here was making a decision without consulting Yahweh.

“Now I shall perish someday by the hand of Saul. There is nothing better for me than that I should speedily escape to the land of the Philistines…

So, what was David’s solution? To go to enemies, to go to the idol-worshipers, to the same people who have destroyed his people.

and Saul will despair of me, to seek me anymore in any part of Israel. So I shall escape out of his hand.”

No, Saul will not despair you. It is you who will despair yourself. You see, brethren, David didn’t realize that he had a greater enemy than Saul. If Saul commanded David to go to the Philistines, David would never have followed that order. Yet, we see that discouragement and disappointment drove David to the enemy.

So, don’t you ever underestimate the power of discouragement and disappointment in your life lest you let your guard down? It’s a big issue that can potentially cause you to make the biggest mistakes in your life. Just yesterday, a 33-year-old man committed suicide in Crocodile Park. This is just one example of how discouragement can cause people to make wrong decisions in life.

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Your decision can affect others

² Then David arose and went over with the six hundred men who were with him to Achish the son of Maoch, king of Gath.

Gath is the city where Goliath came from. By this fact alone, David should have already seen the red flags that his actions and decisions were wrong. Yet, David was blinded by his despair and went ahead with his decision.

³ So David dwelt with Achish at Gath, he and his men, each man with his household, and David with his two wives, Ahinoam the Jezreelitess, and Abigail the Carmelitess, Nabal’s widow. ⁴ And it was told Saul that David had fled to Gath; so he sought him no more.

Did you see that brethren? Your decision doesn’t just come with personal implications, but also a social implication. The decision of David caused hundreds of men to leave their homeland. These are not just men of war but also their families who came with them.

Sin begets sin

⁵ Then David said to Achish, “If I have now found favor in your eyes, let them give me a place in some town in the country, that I may dwell there. For why should your servant dwell in the royal city with you?” ⁶ So Achish gave him Ziklag that day. Therefore Ziklag has belonged to the kings of Judah to this day. ⁷ Now the time that David dwelt in the country of the Philistines was one full year and four months.

So, here, we are introduced to the place called Ziklag, which will be a place that David would never forget even if David only lived for for sixteen months.

  ⁸ And David and his men went up and raided the Geshurites, the Girzites, and the Amalekites. For those nations were the inhabitants of the land from of old, as you go to Shur, even as far as the land of Egypt. ⁹ Whenever David attacked the land, he left neither man nor woman alive, but took away the sheep, the oxen, the donkeys, the camels, and the apparel, and returned and came to Achish.

So, David lived a life of a bandit. David was killing and destroying the lives of many people without even consulting God and whether God approved of it or not. David was killing people for money and wasn’t doing it anymore for the honor of God. You can just imagine how low David has become.

 ¹⁰ Then Achish would say, “Where have you made a raid today?” And David would say, “Against the southern area of Judah, or against the southern area of the Jerahmeelites, or against the southern area of the Kenites.” ¹¹ David would save neither man nor woman alive, to bring news to Gath, saying, “Lest they should inform on us, saying, ‘Thus David did.’ ” And thus was his behavior all the time he dwelt in the country of the Philistines. ¹² So Achish believed David, saying, “He has made his people Israel utterly abhor him; therefore he will be my servant forever.”

When David approached Achish, David needed to convince him that he was not an enemy. So, he told him a half-truth lie. David said that he was an enemy of Israel, which is true by the way, but he didn’t provide the whole truth of the matter. So, he told a half-truth lie to deceive Achish. 

So, to convince Achish that David was not an enemy, David lied and said that he raided villages of the Israelites when in truth, he was raiding villages of the Geshurites, Girzites, and Amalekites, which are most likely allies of the Philistines. What’s more, when David did this, he would kill all the men and women in those villages because he was afraid that if someone survived, they would tell it to Achish and he would be exposed. So, every time David raided a village, it was a massacre.

I Samuel 27 gives us a background of what will soon happen in Ziklag, which would serve as a turning point in David’s life.

David rejected by the Philistines

Then, as we read in 1 Samuel 29, one day, the Philistines gathered their armies to fight against the Israelites. Achish was so convinced that David was on their side that he asked David to join their army. Because of the lies that David gave, he was forced to say yes. If he would say no, Achish would suspect that he was a double agent.

The lesson here is clear brethren, sin begets sin. Small sins lead to bigger sins. David was probably thinking, oh, a little lie won’t hurt. Just this time, I’ll lie so I can have a place of refuge in Philistine. However, to protect that little lie, David needed to make more lies until he was caught in a dire situation, where he needed to lie even more just to protect himself.

Tragedy in Ziklag

However, the other Philistine rulers didn’t trust David and Achish was forced to send David back to Ziklag. So, now we come to 1 Samuel 30. Let’s start reading verse 1:

​¹ Now it happened, when David and his men came to Ziklag, on the third day, that the Amalekites had invaded the South and Ziklag, attacked Ziklag and burned it with fire, ² and had taken captive the women and those who were there, from small to great; they did not kill anyone, but carried them away and went their way. ³ So David and his men came to the city, and there it was, burned with fire; and their wives, their sons, and their daughters had been taken captive. ⁴ Then David and the people who were with him lifted up their voices and wept, until they had no more power to weep. ⁵ And David’s two wives, Ahinoam the Jezreelitess, and Abigail the widow of Nabal the Carmelite, had been taken captive.

David’s actions in the past months have caught up with him. The Amalekites had most likely made this move as a revenge for David’s raid in their villages. You can just imagine the reactions on the faces of David and his men as they approached Ziklag. They could see smoke from afar and they knew something was not right. As they came near Ziklag, they confirmed what they feared the most, Ziklag was no more, and worst of all, their families had been taken captive. 

Strengthen yourself in the LORD

You can just imagine the anguish, the sadness, and pain this has caused them. We have here grown men, men of war, crying like babies. They cried and cried until they can’t cry anymore. And so, what do sad people do, they find people to blame and the only person they can blame is no other than David.

⁶ Now David was greatly distressed, for the people spoke of stoning him, because the soul of all the people was grieved, every man for his sons and his daughters.

All the closest friends of David, his loyal men, the only people who stood by his side were now turning against him. This is actually a wake-up call for David. Sometimes, when we are deeply engrossed with our sins, when we are trapped in the spider web of sin, God will allow a tragedy to happen to bring us back to our senses.

So, David did something that he should have done long ago. We read in verse 6:

But David strengthened himself in the LORD his God.

What a powerful and life-changing decision for David! Instead of talking to his heart, David now talked to God. Instead of looking at himself, David now looked at God. Instead of making his decisions and following his own will, David now asked for God’s will in his life.

Brethren, that is what we are all supposed to do with our lives. When life gets us down, when life gives us a lot of disappointments and discouragements, there’s one thing we must do and that is to obtain our strength from God.

You see, God never intended us to simply go through our Christian walk by ourselves. We can never do it on our own. David learned this the hard way but now, we learned that lesson from his life.

Do you know why you are tired? Because you are doing it on your own. When we draw our strength from God, we can go where others can’t go. We can do what others can’t do. We can achieve what others can’t achieve.

In spite of the weaknesses, sins, and wrong decisions of David, he would later on become the greatest king of Israel. He was called a man after God’s own heart. He established the Kingdom of Israel and God promised Him salvation and even a high office in the coming kingdom of God. Do you know how David achieved all these? It is because he strengthened himself in Yahweh.

So, whenever you are tired, whenever you are disappointed and discouraged, remember Ziklag, remember David, and remember to strengthen yourself in Yahweh.

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