That I may Know HIM - A Devotional

Day 7: OPERATION ZIKLAG

Day 7: OPERATION ZIKLAG

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1 And it came to pass, when David and his men were come to Ziklag on the third day, that the Amalekites had invaded the south, and Ziklag, and smitten Ziklag, and burned it with fire;

2 And had taken the women captives, that were therein; they slew not any, either great or small, but carried them away, and went on their way.

3 So David and his men came to the city, and behold it was burned with fire: and their daughters were taken captives.

4 Then David and the people that were with him lifted up their voices and wept, until they had no more power to weep.

5 And David’s two wives were taken captives...

6 And David was greatly distressed... [and] the soul of the people was grieved...

1 Samuel 30:1-6.

The Amalekites, the enemies, invaded Ziklag, David’s base and stronghold. And they burnt the city down. But they did no harm to the women and children whom they met at the base. They simply carried them away captives. When David and his soldiers returned to camp, they discovered to their great pain, that their wives and children had been taken captive while they had been out on their military expedition. How terribly devastated those great warriors were to discover that they had no home and no family any more.

‘Operation Ziklag’ is no new tactics in spiritual warfare. The enemy has used it to great advantage in several instances: the men, the strong and mighty generals of God, go out to fight the Lord’s battles only to come back home to discover that while they had been away doing exploits, the enemy had been home taking their household captive. How can any general, no matter how great, retain his triumphant and victorious momentum if he has to come home to a devasting defeat which the enemy has wreaked personally on his home while he himself had been out against the enemy?

Satan, through Pharaoh king of Egypt, meant to use the same mischievous tactics against Moses and Israel, but the bid was foiled by discerning Moses who could not conceive of a Canaan or Paradise for men whose wives and children would be captives under Pharaoh’s manipulation (Exodus 10:10-11).

For others, it is their children. While they are at present engaged in the many battles of the Lord, the enemy plots their future dismay by taking their children captive. The children speak the language of Egypt, dress in the fashions of Egypt, and have an appetite for the abominable ‘cucumbers’ and ‘garlics’ and ‘onions’ of Egypt. They are offsprings of Abraham in captivity to Pharaoh. The men return happily from their battles, but as soon as they step into the house, they are “greatly distressed” because Ziklag is on fire, and their family is under enemy control. Their song suddenly dies off their lips like a stuttering flame swiftly killed by a merciless wind in the open field. Manipulating the women and children becomes an indirect means of manipulating the great men themselves. It was the same situation in Eden. Getting Eve was the easy way to getting Adam, and now all of us.

What a way to take the song from the lips of the mighty! What a way to distress the soldiers of the Lord! What a strange kind of battle to wage against the men of God!

Even in the natural, women and children are usually the most vulnerable. In war, the women are raped, abducted, etc., and the children bloat sickly in the belly, overfed with terminal starvation. In Women, Poverty and Productivity in India, Lynn Benneth declares, "Women are more vulnerable than men to the extremes of poverty and its consequences” (59).

In the spiritual, it is the same. There are usually more women, as well as children, than men, in Satanic captivity. The men go out to war and leave the city to the women and children. The enemy comes to the defenceless city of weak women and helpless little children, burns it, and takes captive all of them. In the end, the men come back with their jubilation cut short. They return from war to meet another battle which would need to be fought for the restoration of their Ziklag. Only thereafter does their previous victory itself become meaningful and worth celebrating.