2 Samuel 15:30
And David went up by the ascent of mount Olivet, and wept as he went up, and had his head covered, and he went barefoot: and all the people that was with him covered every man his head, and they went up, weeping as they went up. And David went up by the ascent of mount Olivet, and wept as he went up, and had his head covered, and he went barefoot: and all the people that was with him covered every man his head, and they went up, weeping as they went up.
The verse records David's precipitate flight for his life from his throne in Jerusalem during the rebellion stirred up by his own son Absalom. As he climbed the ascent of the Mount of Olives, the uncrowned king wept, covered his head, and went barefoot with only a small company. All the people with him covered every man his head and went up weeping as they went, following his example in a broken-spirited, tearful procession turning its back on the scenes of his glory and his crime. Those outward acts were signs of humiliation, contrition, and distress. In marked contrast to his earlier wars, when he went out with confidence and kingly honor, he now went without courage because of his sin.
The ascent came just after he sent the ark back to Jerusalem in submission to whether God would bring him back or do to him as seemed good. Sorrow was therefore deepened by being a fugitive king with outcasts who felt forsaken even by the ark, with the future dark with terror and foreboding. On that ascent he was told that Ahithophel had joined Absalom. Ahithophel was the ablest and most wily political leader, and his defection was prompted by revenge for the family disgrace in David's wrong to Bathsheba, who was Ahithophel's granddaughter. David recognized his calamities as the result of his own sin.
David viewed the rebellion as the predicted trouble brought on him by his great crime, and he accepted it as God's correction and verdict. He did so without complaining, making excuses, repining, or lessening his guilt, knowing that years of earlier service did not excuse his sin or cancel the judgment. His guilt-scourged conscience recoiled terribly upon him and deteriorated his entire character. It weakened him physically and morally, costing him self-respect and self-confidence, making him feel he had forfeited the love and loyalty of his subjects and scarcely daring to trust his old and formerly tried advisers.
In that humbled position he submitted patiently to affliction and injury in humble reliance on God. He showed the fruits of repentance in resignation, patience, kindness, and generosity amid his own woes. Though a man of keenest temperament cut to the quick by unmerited wrong and heartbreaking reproach, he restrained all irritation, resentment, vehement rage, and revenge and kept fine and deep feeling unblunted while sensing his sin most keenly. For that reason he was never more worthy of admiration and never greater than in that hour of adversity while wrestling with storm and tempest as a cedar of God. Though afflicted and humbled, he was not forsaken but tenderly regarded with pity and love, with greater standing before God than in prosperity because he faced the storm humbly. His tearful, heartbroken appeals to God on that sorrowful ascent became the occasion of his most eloquent psalm.