1 Chronicles 21:9-20

Living Bible

⁹ Then the Lord said to Gad, David’s personal prophet, ^10-11 “Go and tell David, ‘The Lord has offered you three choices. Which will you choose? ¹² You may have three years of famine, or three months of destruction by the enemies of Israel, or three days of deadly plague as the Angel of the Lord brings destruction to the land. Think it over and let me know what answer to return to the one who sent me.’”

¹³ “This is a terrible decision to make,” David replied, “but let me fall into the hands of the Lord rather than into the power of men, for God’s mercies are very great.”

¹⁴ So the Lord sent a plague upon Israel and 70,000 men died as a result. ¹⁵ During the plague God sent an Angel to destroy Jerusalem; but then he felt such compassion that he changed his mind and commanded the destroying Angel, “Stop! It is enough!” (The Angel of the Lord was standing at the time by the threshing floor of Ornan the Jebusite.) ¹⁶ When David saw the Angel of the Lord standing between heaven and earth with his sword drawn, pointing toward Jerusalem, he and the elders of Israel clothed themselves in sackcloth and fell to the ground before the Lord.

¹⁷ And David said to God, “I am the one who sinned by ordering the census. But what have these sheep done? O Lord my God, destroy me and my family, but do not destroy your people.”

¹⁸ Then the Angel of the Lord told Gad to instruct David to build an altar to the Lord at the threshing floor of Ornan the Jebusite. ^19-20 So David went to see Ornan, who was threshing wheat at the time. Ornan saw the Angel as he turned, and his four sons ran and hid.