David was a great man of God.

When David was a young man, King Saul made numerous attempts on David's life. David escaped from Saul's clutches every time, but his life was marked by many sorrows.

One time David was camped at a place called Ziklag with his small band of men and their families. When the men and David came back to Ziklag from a time away they found the camp had been raided and all that was not stolen was burned. Their families had been taken captive and taken away.

David and his men had had enough of trials and sorrow. This final insult to them caused them to weep "until they had no strength left to weep." It was David's lowest point in life as recorded in 1 Samuel.

It certainly would take a spectacular sorrow to weep ourselves dry. Such was the case with David and his men that day.

Here was a godly man who sought to walk with the Lord, and yet the problems in his life caused him to weep until he couldn't weep any more.

What's remarkable as you review the life of David in 1 Samuel and 2 Samuel, is that he was never so spiritually strong as when he was weak—in the temporal sense. All through 1 Samuel, he seemed on the run in front of the pursuing army of King Saul.

David did Saul nothing but good all the days of Saul's life, yet Saul irrationally hated and feared him. Saul seemed jealous of the way David could subdue Saul's enemies—starting with the great scene of David and Goliath.

David did not deserve the wrath of Saul and more than once Saul admitted as much. However, jealousy knows no logic and so David was a hunted man as long as Saul was alive.

When life became easy for David as described in 2 Samuel, his story was marked by sin, laziness, murder, adultery and so on. It seemed that he became spiritually weak after the pressure of Saul's anger was lifted and David became king in his place.

If we're honest with ourselves, we might look back on our own experiences in Christian living and recognize that when we are weak in ourselves, we are strong in the Lord. When we can handle life on our own, we too easily mess up.

In the midst of your sorrow, look again to the Lord for the needed grace to persevere. Acknowledge your weakness and ask Him to fulfil in your life Paul's experience that when he was weak then he was strong (2 Corinthians 12:10).