Mike Bickle discusses the pivotal moment in David's life at Ziklag, emphasizing how this crisis revealed God's delight in David despite his failures. He highlights that David's ability to recover all stemmed from a deep-rooted understanding of God's love and mercy, which he cultivated over the years. Bickle encourages believers to strengthen their relationship with God during trials, as these moments can lead to significant breakthroughs and restoration. He illustrates that even in our darkest hours, God's gentleness and compassion can lead us back to Him, allowing us to recover what was lost. Ultimately, Bickle reassures that God's delight in us remains, even when we stumble.

Turn to 1 Samuel, chapter 21. Father, we come before you in the name of Jesus, and we just ask you for the spirit of wisdom and revelation of your heart. Lord, we ask you for insight into the emotions of your heart, that you would strengthen the root system, that we would be truly rooted and grounded in love, in the revelation of your emotions for us, and then the overflow to people. We ask you for that. In Jesus' name, amen. Well, tonight, I want to talk about David at Ziklag, and his revelation of God's delight in him, in what I think is clearly the greatest crisis of David's life. Now, most of you, any of you that are a little bit familiar with the life of David, you know the city of Ziklag. Everybody say Ziklag. That's just a city you need to know about, because it's at this city, David's 28 years old, and at this city, he has the greatest crisis of his faith in all of his 70 years on the earth. It would be equaled, or not even surpassed, but parallel only to what happened at the end of his life, when he encountered the rebellion by his son, Absalom, when he was in his 60s. But here he is, it's age 28 to 30. It's a 16-month period of time where things mount up, circumstances mount up, and it's the great decisive moment of his life. Now, what we do in those few decisive moments of our life determines our future. I'm not talking about the pain and difficulty, and even the crisis we feel by stumbling in our sin. That's a crisis in one sense. It's real. When we love Jesus and we stumble in sin, that's real. But I'm talking about something far more severe than that. It's the great crossroads of his young life. And again, it's what we do in these hours that determine our future. But David could only respond ultimately in the right way in that hour, because he had a root system that had been developed in his revelation of the love of God. Now, last week, we talked about Peter's denial of the Lord. In Luke chapter 21, I don't have this on the notes, but just referencing it from last week. Luke chapter 21, verse 32 to 34, the Lord made a distinction in Peter's life. He told Peter, you're going to stumble tonight. You're going to deny me tonight. However, I pray your faith does not fail. So the Lord distinguished Peter stumbling by denying him, which was serious. But he distinguished that from his faith failing, which means that Peter would give up and quit in his pursuit of a vision to go deep in God. And many times we stumble, we will compromise. And that's important that we respond to the Lord in a right way. But what the enemy is after is more than a momentary compromise. He's wanting to develop a scenario in our life where things mount up, where a crisis comes. That's a crossroad crisis. I'll refer to it that way, where we give up. We not only give into the sin, we give up on the vision of going deep after God. And I've watched people for over 30 years of ministry that had loved the Lord. But when those two or three life crises that might happen, two or three, I'm talking about the major crossroads of a person's life. 50 years of adult life, you might have two or three that are at the level I'm talking about here. They give up and they yield to shame or bitterness or despair. And they let go of their vision that they had in earlier years to go hard after God. Again, David had one of these crossroad crisis in his young life between 28 and 30. Well, he was right at 30 years old when it came to a head. But it began when he was about 28. It took about two years to develop, to come to a head. And then he had it again in his 60s when his son Absalom led a national rebellion against him. And many of David's long-term friends and captains in the army, they betrayed David as the nation did. And in both circumstances, David had a root system where he was able to respond in the right way to the Lord. And that's what Ziklag is talking about. You can apply the lessons that David, the story of David and Ziklag as what David did in his individual failure, which is a great lesson in itself. But also the greater story is what he did in this life crisis. When things mounted up, I mean, to a firestorm of trouble. Paragraph A, David's experiences at Ziklag give us insight. The way he responded to God at Ziklag give us insight into what he understood about God's heart for years before Ziklag. That's the key point. And it's in these years right now that we're developing a root system. Paul the apostle called it rooted and grounded in love. We're developing a root system in the love of God. It doesn't happen overnight, but over time by exercising our faith muscle, by meditating on the love of God. And when we stumble and face our shame and our sin, we go to the love of God and we speak the love of God and we recover in the love of God. And when disappointments happen, we resist the devil's accusations against God. When he says God's leadership, Jesus' leadership is not good. We resist it and we believe in the love of God. And in that way, we develop a root system. And Ephesians 3, 17 talks about being rooted, a root system in love. When we fail and shame attacks us, we develop that root system by speaking the word of God that he loves us. His delight is in us. He gave us the gift of righteousness. And then when a crisis happens that we're disappointed in others or in circumstances, we don't yield to offense, but we work that faith muscle. Now David did that for years before this crisis. And we don't want to imagine that in the great test, we will be prepared if we're not exercising our faith muscle and the love of God in the smaller test. And all of us are in smaller tests right now. But the great tests only happen a few times in a lifetime. Talking about the major ones. Paragraph B, the Lord is the one who described David as a man after God's own heart. That was God's description of David. I mean, can you imagine that God would say that about you? Now David was only about 17 years old when the Lord spoke this about him. What does it mean to be a man or a woman after God's own heart? Well, several things, but I'm going to only point out two. David was committed to obey the commands of God's heart. He was a man after God's own heart because he said, I will obey the commands of your heart. I will take this very seriously and I will go after it. When I fail, I will sign back up for full obedience. But number two, David was a student of the emotions of God's heart. And that's what I'm talking about tonight. Paragraph C, as we study God's emotions, his love, his gentleness, his gladness, his passion for his people, his affection. Many of those are saying the same thing in different ways. As we study the emotions of God's heart, we receive revelation about how God feels. And it touches us and it becomes very personal in our lives. Now, when we receive revelation, how God feels about us in a personal way, it's not just that God has love, but God has deep feeling for me personally. That's when the root system begins to grow. When we understand that, it empowers us to obey the Lord. Some different parts of the body of Christ, they focus, their ministries focused on people obeying the Lord, which is a great focus. I mean, that's at the top of the list, obeying the Lord of priorities. But people do not have the ability to obey the Lord if their hearts are not equipped in the knowledge of God's passion for them or God's emotion for them. Our hearts are empowered to obey. Our hearts are empowered when we get growing confidence in love. Confidence in love. And what I mean by confidence in love, I mean confident that God loves us when we stumble and confident that God sees our love is genuine when our love is weak. Because when we stumble, the devil comes and says, you're just a hypocrite. Look, you stumble, it's too late. You've gone too far. And when we have confidence that God loves us when our sin is manifest, that's one thing. But there's more to confidence in love than that. Confidence in love involves that when we love Jesus and our love is weak, but our love is real, we understand that he sees it as genuine. So the devil cannot come along and accuse us as hypocrites. So we give up in despair. So when I sin, the Lord wants me to know his love is bigger than my sin. And when I repent, the Lord wants me to know my love is still real, even though it's failed. I mean, though it's flawed and weak. That's what I mean by confidence in love. And when we have confidence in love, we know he loves us, but we know that he sees our love for him as real, even when it's weak. When we have that twofold confidence working in our spirit. Beloved, we are prepared. We're rooted and grounded in love. We can withstand any ziklag season. But many people, when they come into the ziklag season, and again, there's only a few in a lifetime, seasons like that. They don't have a root system. And they give up in despair because of their failure or they give up in despair because the circumstances offend them towards God. And they lose their confidence in his leadership. Paragraph D, just to give a little overview of David's life. For those of you that have never studied the life of David in 1 Samuel 16. He's about 17 years old. He's anointed by the spirit. Samuel the prophet visits his town in Bethlehem, where he grew up. And the spirit of the Lord comes upon David as just a teenager. 1 Samuel 17, he defeats Goliath. I mean, this is a national crisis. And David is taken out from a life of obscurity as a shepherd. And he's put on the front page. He is a national hero as a 17, 18 year old boy. Paragraph E, well, it increases. He goes from being a national hero to where he moves into the king's palace. And he marries the king's daughter. So he's in the king's family. Now he lives in the king's palace. 1 Samuel 19 and 20 and 21. Things change. The plot thickens. He is attacked. His father-in-law becomes jealous of him. It's not only his father-in-law, but it's his king. That's his, it's his boss. So his boss, his father-in-law and the president of the nation is against him. And at this time, David begins to be attacked by the king, his jealous father-in-law. We see the mistreatment mounting up in his life. And it's here that David's faith begins to waver. Now your faith does not fail unless you quit. Stumbling in an hour, being overcome with fear is not the same thing as faith failing. Again, Jesus told Peter, you're going to stumble tonight, but I pray you won't fail. So you can stumble and that's bad, but failing means giving up. And Peter almost gave up. It looks like when you, as we studied it last, last week, his life, but the Lord appeared to him and renewed his confidence in love and restored him. Paragraph F, David fled from the king's palace in 1 Samuel 21. He's, he flees, he flees in fear for his life. For Samuel 21, 10, David fled that day from Saul. And he went to this man, a king of the Philistines named Achish, Achish king of Gath. Now the Philistines are the nation next door. And Achish was one of the Philistine kings. And he ruled from a city called Gath. The Philistines had five cities and five kings, five main cities. And they had kind of a federation and they worked together. And this is one of the Philistine kings in the city of Gath. So David figured, he goes, if I run across the national border and go to the Philistines, Saul won't chase me because Saul's more afraid of Achish than he is enraged at me. So he'll give up on trying to kill me. If I just go to the, across the, the, uh, the border there. So David saw his way out of his problem. Paragraph G, David was too afraid of Saul to stay in Israel. So he crosses the line, but Saul was too afraid of the Philistines to cross the national border in order to go get him. Paragraph H, I'm just kind of building the, the storyline here. So we can see the drama and the intensity of what came to a head at Ziklag and how David responded and why he responded. First Samuel 21, verse 11 to 14. So David, now he goes over the, the border. He's now in the land of the Philistines. He's a, he's a Jewish soldier, but he's in the land of the Philistines. Very similar kind of thing that you could imagine today. And verse 11, and the servants of Achish, one of those five Kings of the Philistines went to Achish and said, wait, we know who this man is. This is David. He's the king over there in Israel. We remember his face. It was only a couple of years ago. When David took on Goliath, when all the armies were arrayed against each other, they said, we remember him. He's the guy that killed Goliath. And Achish looks at David. They said, we even heard the song that they were singing about David. The young maidens throughout the land, they sang, Saul has killed his thousands. But David is 10,000. He's 10 times more anointed than Saul is. Verse 12, when David heard these words, he took them to heart and he became afraid. We've never seen David in fear yet. So this time in his life, he became very much afraid. Now he's afraid of Saul. That's why he went over to Achish territory. Now he's in front of Achish. He's afraid again. Fear is taking hold of him. Now, when we study the life of David, we don't typically, most of us don't talk much about David's fear, but David, particularly in this season, this about 16 months, that's a couple of years season, actually fear is really coming after him. Again, this season here, we're looking at he's 28 to 30 years old, but this fear was starting to knock on his door. So verse 13, David changed his behavior before them. He feigned madness. He faked it. He fell on his, on his knees. He scratched the door of the gate. Saliva was coming down his beard. He's, ah, they're looking at him. And Achish said, this guy's insane. Get him out of here. So David, top of page two, he flees from Achish. The David's, this is a really bad season in David's life right now. Now he's got all these dynamic prophetic promises. The spirit of the Lord has been manifesting in his life and ministry, but David's not connecting with the Lord like he used to. Top of page two, first Samuel 22, the next verse after, I mean, right after he leaves Achish's presence, first Samuel 22 verse one, David therefore departed from there, from Achish, and he escaped. He escaped because he was a fear for his life. And he escaped to the cave of Adullam. Now it's in the cave of Adullam. There's so many paradoxes in David's life. It's here in the cave of Adullam. He's afraid of fall of Saul and he's afraid of Achish. When his brothers and all of his father's house, they heard that David was in the cave of Adullam. They went down to him. The word got out because he's back in the land of Israel. The word gets out. Verse 20, verse two. Everyone who was in distress, everyone who was in debt, everyone who was discontented, they gathered to him. And he became their captain and 400 men, and we find out later their families came too. So here's David. Again, he's 28 years old at this time. He's got 400 men say, we want to join you. Yes, we're distressed. We have no money and we got a bad spirit. We're mad at a lot of people. No, this is real. Can you imagine this congregation that David was raising up? It's interesting that these 400, in a moment we'll see they grew to 600. And they, many of them became David's mighty men of faith. Years later, he honored them as mighty men. They broke through their unbelief and their pride and their selfishness. And they became mighty men of David. Not all of them, but some of them did. And this is a side note. Many of God's mighty men and women start out as the distress in debt and discontented group in the early days. Paragraph B. So David has these 400 and their families. In verse 3, he goes from a Golem to Moab. That's just a few miles away to the west. But he leaves the country again. Now he was on the east side of Israel with the Philistines. Now he's on the west side. He goes over the national border, boundary again. And he's hiding in the stronghold. Now a stronghold was a city that was a fortress. It had a fort. It had a military buildup there often. That's what a stronghold was. It means there was a military presence as a rule. It's what the word stronghold means. And David was welcomed to stay there. But the prophet Gad, 1 Samuel 22, verse 5. And the prophet Gad is part of the 400. The prophet Gad is one of the guys that came and joined David at the cave. And Gad said to David, thus says the Lord, verse 5. Don't stay here in Moab, but go to the land of Judah. And the idea is God doesn't want you running to the east side to the Philistines or the west side to Moab. He wants you to stay in the land. He wants to encounter you in the land. His promises are real. His eyes are on you. He can protect you from Saul. Go back to the land. So David said, okay, okay, that sounds right. Paragraph C, a few months go by. 1 Samuel 27, verse 1, David's fear now grows to depression. And that's a very natural progression to go from fear to depression. He determines he can't take the pressure anymore in Israel because Saul keeps chasing him. He said, I got to get out of here. I know that I'm not supposed to. I know I'm supposed to stay by the word of the Lord in the land of Judah, which is Israel. But I can't take it. Saul's going to kill me. 1 Samuel 27, verse 1, David said in his heart, now I shall perish someday by the hand of Saul. There's nothing better for me than I should speedily escape back to the land of the Philistines. Saul will despair of looking for me because I know he won't cross the national border. And I will escape. I can imagine Gad, he's still on the team saying, yeah, that's a plan. But don't you remember I gave you the word of the Lord a few months ago that you were to go back to Judah. The Lord wants to meet you in Judah. He doesn't want you escaping to the east side or the west side of the land of Israel to find refuge in another nation. He wants to be your fortress. He doesn't want you to trust the Philistines or the Moabites. It's not really to trust them, but to trust Saul's fear of them so that Saul wouldn't go over those national lines to pursue David. 1 Samuel 22, I mean, 27, verse 2, paragraph D. David went over with 600 men. So his 400 has now grown to 600 in the last several months. Verse 3, he dwelt with Achish. He goes to Gath again, goes, Achish, it's me. And the last encounter Achish had, David was spinning on his beard, scratching on the doors, acting like a madman. And Achish looks at him and David winks. It's my version of it. It says, hey, I lost my nerve. I was faking it. And Achish goes, okay. And Achish and David became good friends, a strange thing. Verse 4, it was told to Saul that David fled. He went back to Gath again. And Saul goes, okay, that's it. I'm not going over the national line. I'm not going to risk my life finding him over in Gath. So it looked like everything was working, but it wasn't. Because the Lord says, I don't want you finding your own safety out of the will of God. I want you to develop a history with me in Israel, meaning I want you in the land that I put you. Though you feel fear, I want you to be where I put you so that you and I will connect. Yes, Lord, but Israel is the place my enemies are. And often we figure out a way to escape from our enemies. Now, there are times where the Lord moves us from our enemies. But there are other times where the Lord wants us to develop a root system, a history with him in the place where there's pressure and there's difficulty. And in this season of David's life, he said, I want you to touch me in the land because you're going to be a great king in Israel. And you need to know that my eyes are on you. You need to know that I hear your heart. You need to know me in even a greater way than you do. Because I'm going to trust many things to you in the days to come. And the pressures will mount up in a great way. And your root system in me is going to be vital in that day. How many of you know that the Lord is developing a root system in every one of your lives right now? And he's allowing you to face personal failures in your heart where we stumble and see our own sin. He's allowing disappointments as well, where our confidence in his leadership is trusted. Why did you let that happen? And our confidence in his mercy towards us is being tested as well. Will you forgive me even though I stumbled? Paragraph E. So now David lives. I mean, he's moved over with the whole group. They got 600 of them there now. Paragraph E. Akish says, I'll tell you what, instead of you living at Gath, I'll give you a city called Ziklag. It's kind of out in the countryside. You can have the whole city. You're 600 men and their families. You can just have your own little, you know, community there. So David gets the city of Ziklag and he begins to develop the city and planning to live there for a long period of time seemingly. 1 Samuel 27, verse 5. Now David said to Akish, if I found favor in your eyes, give me a little, some little town. And verse 6, Akish gave him Ziklag. Now the time that David dwelt there in Ziklag in the land of the Philistines was a year and four months. That's why, where we get the time frame of 16 months. He stays there for 16 months. But the problem is, the prophet Gad said, you're supposed to be in the land of Judah. So for 16 months, he is out of the will of God and knows it. He knows he's not supposed to be there, but things seemingly are going well. Paragraph F, 1 Samuel 27, verse 8. Now David begins to deceive Akish king of Gath. David and his men went on raids against the Amalekites. Now the Amalekites were enemies of Israel. But David lies to the king about what he's doing. Because he would come back with all the spoils of war. If you read the whole text, he would come back with all this, you know, cattle and spoils of war. And the king said, where did you get all of this? And David lied. Verse 9, whenever David attacked the land, Akish would say in verse 10, where have you made a raid today? And David would say, well, against the southern area of Judah. In other words, against my home, my country. And Akish said, really, you attacked Israel? Yes, I attacked Israel. Wow, boy, you're really burning the bridges. Yeah, I made a choice. I'm with you, Akish. He's absolutely lying, bold face lying. And he carries on in this mode for 16 months. Verse 11, David would save neither man or woman alive. So nobody could bring the news back to Gath, which is one of those five capital cities. So they could not tell on David. Thus was David's behavior all the 16 months. He was in the land of the Philistines. He was carrying on this way. Verse 12, Akish believed the lie. He believed David. And here's what Akish would say about David. David has made his people Israel utterly abhor him. They will really hate David now because he's attacking his own people. But he wasn't really attacking his own people. He was attacking the enemies of Israel. So the lie is building. I imagine some of David's guys were saying, David, we've been with you for a while now. You're disobeying the prophetic word of Gath. And you're lying to the king. Sooner or later, this is going to catch up with you. I can imagine David, just don't worry about it. I've got to figure it out. He didn't have it figured out. Paragraph G, it gets more complicated. It gets more complicated than ever because now it's time for Akish to go to war against Israel and to go to battle against King Saul, the king of Israel. So in 1st Samuel 28, in those days, the Philistines gathered their armies together for war to fight Israel. And Akish said to David, you know, you've been fighting Israel all these 16 months. Shouldn't be a problem to you. I saw how good you were when you fought Goliath. Hey, we're friends. I trust you. You trust me. Why don't you go to battle with us? And you can fight against Saul yourself. And David said, he says, you're really good at battle. And David, you got to give him credit for this. He does avoid a direct answer. He says, surely, you know how good of a soldier I am. That's in essence what he said. But he gave Akish the impression that he was going to go to war with him against Israel. I can imagine David goes home or goes back to his team. And the 600 men said, what did you and Akish talk about? Well, guys, it's really complicated. They want us to fight against Israel. These 600 men say, our brothers are our soldiers in Israel. We can't fight against them. I mean, they'll recognize this. And David says, I know I'm really in a jam right now. I don't know how to get out of this. Because Akish wanted David, he was so confident in David's lies. Well, you can read on your own. Akish's generals said, Akish, where is your brain at? David could turn on us in a moment in battle and win the favor of Israel and be welcomed home as his hero. Akish goes, no, you don't know David. He's totally trustworthy. They said, no, we don't buy it. So the generals prevailed and David was, yes, Lord. Yes, Lord, thank you. Akish said, David, I'm really apologize. They don't trust you. They don't know your heart. He goes, that's fine. I just free you from that invitation. Top of page three. So David and his 600 men, they leave Akish and Gath and they're on their way back to their hometown, Ziklag. I mean, it's a Philistine. It's their new hometown in the land of the Philistines. Again, they've been there 16 months. So they're, you know, beginning to develop the area. And it's the worst day of David's life. This is the greatest crisis. I don't mean a difficult day. I'm talking about the greatest crisis in David's entire life comes to a head on this day. And it ends up becoming one of the most powerful weeks of blessing in David's life. The greatest hour of crisis. It turns and becomes one of the most powerful seasons of blessing. And one of the reasons is because in the crisis moment. And again, you only have as few of these moments in a lifetime. I'm talking about the major decisive moments of his life. David drew on that root system when everything was going wrong. And he chose to trust God and do it God's way. Says in 1 Samuel 30 verse 1, David and his men, they came to Ziklag. They come marching back home because Achish, they went to war. So David says, well, let's just go back home and be with our families. David and his men came to Ziklag. But the Amalekites, remember them a minute ago. They are the ones David's been attacking them. They're mad. So they come and attack Ziklag when David's up with Achish. Because when David was up with Achish. Remember, Achish wants him to go to war with all of his men. So all the soldiers are with David up north, down south in Ziklag. The Amalekites go, let's go pay back that renegade David. And let's burn the city and steal all of his stuff and get all of our spools of war back. So the Amalekites, they attack Ziklag and they burn it. So David and his men, they came to the city. And there it was burned with fire. I can imagine David marching back over the coming back over the hill. And they see smoke on the horizon. Well, that smoke is where Ziklag is. You know, there's some miles away. And they get there and the city's burned to the ground. And their wives, their sons, their daughters had all been taken captive. All of their families are enslaved to this cruel people, the Amalekites. This is bad news. Because what they're going to do to their families is great, is terrible. It's going to be cruel what they're going to do to these families. Verse 4. And David and the people who were with him, the 600 men, they lifted up their voices and wept till they had no more power to weep. They are utterly reduced, utterly shattered. The city is burned. They can't go back home to Israel because Saul's after them. They got a bounty. David is most wanted criminal in Israel, for real. He's literally top of the list. Matter of fact, those of you that have studied the life of David, there are 3,000 soldiers that are committed to finding David and killing him. Not a few hundred, 3,000. He is top of the list. Most wanted criminal in Israel. They go, we can't go there. Our city's burned. Our families are enslaved by a cruel people. You know, paragraph B, sometimes we get into a ziklag situation. David was only in ziklag because he was afraid. He should have never been in ziklag, but he was afraid of Saul and Saul's army of 3,000 men that were committed to kill David. And so David, he made his own ziklag, so to speak. And we do that sometimes. We get in a jam and we go and we find a ziklag. We find a place of safety, but it's out of the will of God, seeming safety. But there's one problem. Eventually, because God loves us, he will let ziklag be burned. David didn't realize that this was the hour of his deliverance, but it didn't feel like it in that moment. It seemed like the hour of his destruction, but it ends up because our God has all power and all wisdom and all love. The hour of David's destruction becomes the hour, the day of his deliverance. But David in this great crisis, he has to respond to the Lord in the right way. And many people in the great hour of crisis at the crossroads, they have no root system, though they've been in the kingdom for years and they actually go the wrong way and respond in a negative way to the Lord in the crisis. And what they do is they get in a bigger crisis in the years to come. Paragraph D, it says in verse 6, 1 Samuel 30, verse 6, David greatly distressed because the people with the 600 men, his team, they spoke of stoning him, but David strengthened himself in the Lord, his God. Verse 8, David inquired of the Lord and he asked the Lord, okay, let's get, let's, Lord, let's, let me get it right with you right now. Let me get every issue out of my life that's in the way. Okay, the city's burned. You help me by letting the city be burned. I'm in despair, but totally all I have is you now. This is the hour where David drolls on his root system because his 600 men are against him. His family is gone. Saul is going to kill him if he crosses the state, the national border. Everything possible is going bad. So he strengthens himself in the Lord. He reestablishes his relationship with God and he establishes in his heart. I'm going for full relationship with you. No compromise, no half heartedness. I'm going all the way and I'm starting today. The Lord says, I'll take you today. Now we don't want to wait till we get in Ziklag and it burns before we make that decision, but that's what David did. And this one, this again is the greatest crisis of his life. This is the darkest hour, not only in circumstances, but in terms of David's spiritual life. We never see him in this element of struggle, this type of, of yielding and darkness and compromise. I mean, even when he committed adultery with Bathsheba and had her husband killed, it wasn't a prolonged season as significant and as important as that is in terms of a grievous thing to the Lord. David repented and returned to the Lord much faster than he did in this period here. So we've never seen David in a greater negative circumstance and a greater prolonged season of compromise as here in Ziklag. Verse eight, he inquired of the Lord. He says, okay, Lord, you and me, we're back in business. It's a hundred percent obedience. I'm going for everything again. Throw away my compromise. I repent. I tell you what David knew how to do. He knew how to repent, receive the Lord's forgiveness and push delete. We repent, the Lord forgives us, but the devil does not want us hitting the delete button. He wants us relating to the Lord in our shame and in our despair instead of in confidence. And the Lord answers back to David. Verse eight, at the end of verse eight, David says, shall I go after these guys or what? The Lord could have said, well, David, we haven't talked in a while at this level. And you want to know, should you go after these enemies that you've been attacking? I haven't even told you to attack them previously, but you've been attacking them. Now you want my direction. Yes. Lord says, okay, I'll take you at that level. Let's do it. He says, pursue them. Not only am I with you, you will overtake them. And without fail, you will recover everything. Thus says the Lord. Paragraph E, 1 Samuel 30, verse 17. David attacked the Amalekites from twilight until the evening of the next day. I mean, he goes all day, all night, all day again. They are exhausted, but David recovered all that the Amalekites had taken. Nothing of theirs was lacking. David recovered everything. And that's the message that the word of God is communicating to us. Now on the north side of the land, of the Philistine land and of Israel, there's a great battle going on in the north. They're down in the south. Remember the battle that Achish said, David, you can't go. Paragraph F, in the battle up north, the Philistines against Israel, the jealous King Saul, an arrow strikes him and kills him. So Saul is killed suddenly on the same day that Ziklag was burned and David, or in the same several day period, because David had fought for a day or two straight against the Amalekites down south. In the same timeframe, David recovers all and his arch enemy, the King of Israel, Saul is killed as well. Paragraph Roman number four. Now, it took a long time to tell the story. Now I want to just tell you where David's heart was when all of these events were unfolding. Psalm 18 gives us the most insight. Of course, Psalm 56 as well. When you read Psalm 18, the title of Psalm 18 that's in the Bible, I don't mean it's just a, you know, a modern day insert. It's the title from the ancient days. Here's what the title says. This was a Psalm, I haven't read their paragraph A. This is a Psalm was written in the day God delivered David from the hand of his enemies and from the hand of Saul. So this was written on the day that Saul dies and the Amalekites are defeated and David gets everything back. He's 30 years old now. It all happens in one, two, three day period of time. So Psalm 18 will give us great insight into what David was thinking in the hour of the crisis. It's top of page four, paragraph D. It's one of my favorite verses in the whole book of Psalms. Psalm 18, verse 19. This is the day that God has delivered David from Saul. This is a day or two after Ziklag was burned. Psalm 18, verse 19. David says, the Lord delivered me because he delighted in me. Now the guys around David could have said, what? I can imagine. I try, I always imagine this as a newspaper reporter comes to David, says, well, David, this is the biggest turnaround we've seen in years of a person's political and military career. Here you are the number one criminal of the nation for real. You fleed over to the Philistines. Your city is burned. The king that's against you, Saul, is killed. They make David king of Judah right after that. You're now the new king of Judah. It all happened in a matter of days. Well, what do you have to say? How did that happen? And David says, I have one answer. He likes me. He delights in me. That's why. Well, David, practically speaking, really, why did this happen? Because God likes me. Even in my weakness, I can imagine David's team going, David, I was there when you told the lies. I heard Gath, the prophet, tell you not even to go over to the Philistines. You've been in compromise for months. How dare you say God delivered you because he likes you? Maybe he was just so committed to mercy. He just put up with you. He goes, he is committed to mercy, but he likes me because he likes his people. David had this audacity. I mean, when I first read this some years ago, I thought, what person, what delusional person can have that kind of confidence after 16 months of compromise? Then as I studied it more and time went by, I said, hey, I'm going to get it. I'm going to get in on this. Beloved, this isn't just a pep talk. This is a real revelation of God's heart. And David needed that revelation in this hour. He said he delivered me because he delights in me. David was a student of God's emotions. Then he said a few verses later, still in Psalm 18, now he's talking directly to God. He turns it into direct prayer. He said, Father, your hand has held me up. Your gentleness has made me great. He says, Lord, if you would have been harsh towards me, I would not end up great. But you have been gentle towards me. Far beyond what any man would have done if they would have had the decision you had towards me. Your gentleness has created the environment that I will end up in greatness. Now, David's greatness is not greatness before men, because all of us can be great. Because God is gentle towards you and he's gentle towards me, he gives us a new beginning day after day. He doesn't treat us according to our transgressions. But he deals far more gentle than we could ever deserve. Because he wants us to recover in our relationship with him that our hearts would be great in love and great in the fear of God. This isn't talking about you were gentle. Therefore, I'm going to be famous. That's not what he was talking about. He said, because you didn't wipe me out when I deserved it, I will have an opportunity to return my relationship. I mean, to be having restored where my heart could be great before you. Now, he went on to be great before men. But this is the this is the day of his deliverance. He's not great in this hour yet. He's still a fugitive in the land. Well, he's just been made king of Judah. I mean, he's but in the absolute sense, he's not great yet. He's just beginning. He's just out of his fugitive status. Paragraph G. David went on to write in Psalm 100 and 130. He said, Lord, if you should mark iniquities, who could stand? But with you, there's forgiveness. So that you can be feared. Here's what David was saying. If you measure my sins, if you mark my iniquities, to mark them means to measure them. If you keep track of how much I deserve to be written out of blessing, to be canceled out, if you keep track of it, who could stand? But with you, there's forgiveness. There's gentleness. But here's what's gonna happen. Because you forgive me, I will receive mercy new every day. And I will grow up to fear you. And I will be mighty in the fear of God one day because you didn't wipe me out in the early years. See, we think of Paul the apostle as a mighty man of God. And he certainly was. But if the Lord would have wiped him out when he deserved to be, he never ever would have been an apostle. If the Lord gave us what we deserved, we would never be what he wants us to be in the years ahead. David understood it. He goes, if you should mark iniquities, none of us will have a future. When he says no one can stand against, none of us could have confidence with you. None of us would have a future in God. You gave us what we deserved. But with you, there's forgiveness. And because there's forgiveness, we're gonna grow up. Our hearts will mature. We will be great in the fear of God one day. Our hearts will be abound in love for you. Paragraph I, Psalm 56. David also wrote this Psalm when he was in Ziklag, or I mean, about the Ziklag years. No, I'm actually in Ziklag. When he was with Achish king of Gath, it says it in the title of Psalm 56. Here's what's happening in David's heart in the midst of the 16 months of compromise. He writes this, you number my wonderings. What he's telling the Lord, I know that, you know, I'm not in Israel and I'm over in the Philistine, land of Philistines, I should not be. I know that, you know, I've wondered from home. I get it. You number, you've taken account. You know where I'm at. I'm in the land of the Philistines. He's writing this. He says, but you put my tears in your bottle. Are they not in your book? That when I cry out to you, then my enemies will turn back. This I know, because I know that you are for me. Now here's David before the breakthrough, before Ziklag burns, he's writing this. He goes, my tears are in your bottle. They're written in your book. So here's David over in Ziklag, in the Ziklag years, and he has tears. His tears are sadness to where he is with God. He says, oh Lord, I don't, you know, I'm not supposed to be here. You know, I'm lying. You know, I'm not doing what I should be doing. These were tears of repentance. These were tears of remorse. He says, I'm stuck. I know I could just go back today, but I feel stuck. And I know I'm not really stuck, but it feels that way. And he's weeping, but he says, Lord, I know one thing about you. You're not looking at my tears, writing me off as a hopeless hypocrite. You store my tears in your bottle. Every single one of them you number in your book. So when David's tears, if I love you, but I don't have the breakthrough, they would come. The Lord would sweep down and catch every tear and store them because they were precious to God. David said, I know this. I know my pain is dear to you. I know my sorrow. You see it and you value it. Verse nine, and I cry out to you, help me. Take care of the Saul thing. Get me out of the land of the Philistines. I cry out to you, make it, make it different. And this, I know you will do for me. Because even in the Philistine land of the Philistines, I know you're for me. I know you are for me. I know you are for me and I'm stuck, but I know you're for me. And then some years pass. I mean, some, some weeks or months pass is what I meant to say. And ziklag burns. And David had been crying out to God for deliverance. He didn't want ziklag to burn, but he wanted to be delivered. And he was delivered. And for a moment there, when his 600 men picked up stones to stone him, the city was burning, his family was gone and Saul was still alive. Everything looked absolutely disastrous and David encouraged himself. He goes, God, I'm going 100% with you starting right now. Paragraph J, David writes undoubtedly about this time, as well as other seasons in his life. We'll end with this Psalm 103. God has not dealt with us according to our sins. He's not punished us according to our iniquities. In other words, he hasn't given us what we deserve. That's the point. For as high as the heavens are above the earth, so great is God's mercy to those, those that will set their heart to fear him. As far as the East is from the West, he has removed our transgressions. The Lord says, if you will repent, as far as the East is from the West, I will literally remove it. You really could push delete. You can really have a new day with me starting today in full confidence that my love is bigger than your sin and that I see your weak love is real. You can have confidence. I don't receive you as a hypocrite. I receive your love as genuine, though your love is weak. We can have a confident relationship together. Or a relationship based on David having confidence in love is the phrase I like to use. Verse 13, as a father has compassion on his children, so the Lord has compassion on those who fear him. And then David says, one thing I've come to understand, God knows our frame. He knows our weakness. He knows our frailty and his mercy is great. Amen. Let's stand. Some of you are in sick leg and some of you you can see sick leg coming down the road. He says, you know what, I got it. There's a few issues they haven't mounted up. Others of you, it was a past season where your relationship with God, you were on the verge of giving up, not loving Jesus, but giving up on going 100%. I mean, for the full obedience, for the full vision, for the fullness that God's ever put in your heart of what to have with him. And you've given up on it because time, the years have passed or the months have passed or things have gone wrong or you've sinned. And the Lord says, you don't need to give up on it. Strengthen yourself in God tonight. And if we do it on little time, I mean, on the small times like now, most of us, it's a, there are small issues in our life. I mean, they're important and they're important to us, but it's not the life crisis. A few of you are in a life crisis, but if we will do it in these smaller times of testing and stumbling, beloved, we'll develop a root system for the times of crisis. We'll have something to draw on that's deep and proven. So I'm gonna invite anyone to come forward that says, you know what, maybe I'm not at zig lag or maybe I used to be, or maybe whatever. I just know this. I need to strengthen myself in God in a new way. Starting tonight, 1 Samuel 30, verse six. I need to strengthen myself and go full hearted for God again, starting now. And if he will have me, I'll go 100% tonight. I'm telling you, he'll push the lead. He'll say, yes, I'll push the lead on the whole deal. I'll forgive you if you will take me at my word, the Lord says. Just gonna let the instruments play. Just continue. We're gonna wait on the Lord for a few minutes, but just keep the instruments. Lord, here we are. The Lord says, strengthen yourself with me tonight. For I'm catching your tears in my bottle. They are precious to me. I don't write you off. I have not written you off. Your pain is real to me. You're stumbling. I see the pain in your heart. I see that you do love me. The Holy Spirit, I ask you. I ask you to come now, release your power. I ask you to release your power even now. The Lord doesn't want you just to get by. He wants you to go for the full vision. I don't mean just you're gonna fill stadiums. I don't mean the big impact.