The Daily Audio Bible
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19 When King Nahash of Ammon died, his son Hanun became the new king.
2-3 Then David declared, “I am going to show friendship to Hanun because of all the kind things his father did for me.”
So David sent a message of sympathy to Hanun for the death of his father. But when David’s ambassadors arrived, King Hanun’s counselors warned him, “Don’t fool yourself that David has sent these men to honor your father! They are here to spy out the land so that they can come in and conquer it!”
4 So King Hanun insulted King David’s ambassadors by shaving their beards and cutting their robes off at the middle to expose their buttocks; then he sent them back to David in shame. 5 When David heard what had happened, he sent a message to his embarrassed emissaries, telling them to stay at Jericho until their beards had grown out again. 6 When King Hanun realized his mistake he sent $2,000,000 to enlist mercenary troops, chariots, and cavalry from Mesopotamia, Aram-maacah, and Zobah. 7 He hired thirty-two thousand chariots, as well as the support of the king of Maacah and his entire army. These forces camped at Medeba where they were joined by the troops King Hanun had recruited from his cities.
8 When David learned of this, he sent Joab and the mightiest warriors of Israel. 9 The army of Ammon went out to meet them and began the battle at the gates of the city of Medeba. Meanwhile, the mercenary forces were out in the field. 10 When Joab realized that the enemy forces were both in front and behind him, he divided his army and sent one group to engage the Syrians. 11 The other group, under the command of his brother Abishai, moved against the Ammonites.
12 “If the Syrians are too strong for me, come and help me,” Joab told his brother; “and if the Ammonites are too strong for you, I’ll come and help you. 13 Be courageous and let us act like men to save our people and the cities of our God. And may the Lord do what is best.”
14 So Joab and his troops attacked the Syrians, and the Syrians turned and fled. 15 When the Ammonites, under attack by Abishai’s troops, saw that the Syrians were retreating, they fled into the city. Then Joab returned to Jerusalem.
16 After their defeat, the Syrians summoned additional troops from east of the Euphrates River, led personally by Shophach, King Hadadezer’s commander-in-chief. 17-18 When this news reached David, he mobilized all Israel, crossed the Jordan River, and engaged the enemy troops in battle. But the Syrians again fled from David, and he killed seven thousand charioteers and forty thousand of their troops. He also killed Shophach, the commander-in-chief of the Syrian army. 19 Then King Hadadezer’s troops surrendered to King David and became his subjects. And never again did the Syrians aid the Ammonites in their battles.
20 The following spring (spring was the season when wars usually began) Joab led the Israeli army in successful attacks against the cities and villages of the people of Ammon. After destroying them, he laid siege to Rabbah and conquered it. Meanwhile, David had stayed in Jerusalem. 2 When David arrived on the scene, he removed the crown from the head of King Milcom[a] of Rabbah and placed it upon his own head. It was made of gold inlaid with gems and weighed seventy-five pounds! David also took great amounts of plunder from the city. 3 He drove the people from the city and set them to work with saws,[b] iron picks, and axes, as was his custom with all the conquered Ammonite peoples. Then David and all his army returned to Jerusalem.
4 The next war was against the Philistines again, at Gezer. But Sibbecai, a man from Hushath, killed one of the sons of the giant, Sippai, and so the Philistines surrendered. 5 During another war with the Philistines, Elhanan (the son of Jair) killed Lahmi, the brother of Goliath the giant; the handle of his spear was like a weaver’s beam! 6-7 During another battle, at Gath, a giant with six fingers on each hand and six toes on each foot (his father was also a giant) defied and taunted Israel; but he was killed by David’s nephew Jonathan, the son of David’s brother Shimea. 8 These giants were descendants of the giants of Gath, and they were killed by David and his soldiers.
21 Then Satan brought disaster upon Israel, for he made David decide to take a census.
2 “Take a complete census throughout the land[c] and bring me the totals,” he told Joab and the other leaders.
3 But Joab objected. “If the Lord were to multiply his people a hundred times, would they not all be yours? So why are you asking us to do this? Why must you cause Israel to sin?”
4 But the king won the argument, and Joab did as he was told; he traveled all through Israel and returned to Jerusalem. 5 The total population figure which he gave came to 1,100,000 men of military age in Israel and 470,000 in Judah. 6 But he didn’t include the tribes of Levi and Benjamin in his figures because he was so distressed at what the king had made him do.
7 And God, too, was displeased with the census and punished Israel for it.
8 But David said to God, “I am the one who has sinned. Please forgive me, for I realize now how wrong I was to do this.”
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. 21 Then Ornan saw the king approaching. So he left the threshing floor and bowed to the ground before King David.
22 David said to Ornan, “Let me buy this threshing floor from you at its full price; then I will build an altar to the Lord and the plague will stop.”
23 “Take it, my lord, and use it as you wish,” Ornan said to David. “Take the oxen, too, for burnt offerings; use the threshing instruments for wood for the fire and use the wheat for the grain offering. I give it all to you.”
24 “No,” the king replied, “I will buy it for the full price; I cannot take what is yours and give it to the Lord. I will not offer a burnt offering that has cost me nothing!”
25 So David paid Ornan $4,300 in gold
25 Being a Jew is worth something if you obey God’s laws; but if you don’t, then you are no better off than the heathen. 26 And if the heathen obey God’s laws, won’t God give them all the rights and honors he planned to give the Jews? 27 In fact, those heathen will be much better off[a] than you Jews who know so much about God and have his promises but don’t obey his laws.
28 For you are not real Jews just because you were born of Jewish parents or because you have gone through the Jewish initiation ceremony of circumcision. 29 No, a real Jew is anyone whose heart is right with God. For God is not looking for those who cut their bodies in actual body circumcision, but he is looking for those with changed hearts and minds. Whoever has that kind of change in his life will get his praise from God, even if not from you.
3 Then what’s the use of being a Jew? Are there any special benefits for them from God? Is there any value in the Jewish circumcision ceremony? 2 Yes, being a Jew has many advantages.
First of all, God trusted them with his laws so that they could know and do his will.[b] 3 True, some of them were unfaithful, but just because they broke their promises to God, does that mean God will break his promises? 4 Of course not! Though everyone else in the world is a liar, God is not. Do you remember what the book of Psalms says about this?[c] That God’s words will always prove true and right, no matter who questions them.
5 “But,” some say, “our breaking faith with God is good, our sins serve a good purpose, for people will notice how good God is when they see how bad we are. Is it fair, then, for him to punish us when our sins are helping him?” (That is the way some people talk.) 6 God forbid! Then what kind of God would he be, to overlook sin? How could he ever condemn anyone? 7 For he could not judge and condemn me as a sinner if my dishonesty brought him glory by pointing up his honesty in contrast to my lies. 8 If you follow through with that idea you come to this: the worse we are, the better God likes it! But the damnation of those who say such things is just. Yet some claim that this is what I preach!
11 How dare you tell me, “Flee[a] to the mountains for safety,” when I am trusting in the Lord?
2 For the wicked have strung their bows, drawn their arrows tight against the bowstrings, and aimed from ambush at the people of God. 3 “Law and order have collapsed,”[b] we are told. “What can the righteous do but flee?”
4 But the Lord is still in his holy temple; he still rules from heaven. He closely watches everything that happens here on earth. 5 He puts the righteous and the wicked to the test; he hates those loving violence. 6 He will rain down fire and brimstone on the wicked and scorch them with his burning wind.
7 For God is good, and he loves goodness; the godly shall see his face.[c]
10 It doesn’t seem right for a fool to succeed or for a slave to rule over princes!
11 A wise man restrains his anger and overlooks insults. This is to his credit.
12 The king’s anger is as dangerous as a lion’s. But his approval is as refreshing as the dew on grass.
The Living Bible copyright © 1971 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers Inc., Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.