8. After nine months and twenty days, they had gone through all the land. Then they came back to Jerusalem.
9. Joab gave the list of the people to the king. There were eight hundred thousand men in Israel who could use the sword and five hundred thousand men in Judah.
10. David felt ashamed after he had counted the people. He said to the Lord, “I have sinned greatly by what I have done. Lord, I beg you to forgive me, your servant, because I have been very foolish.”
11. When David got up in the morning, the Lord spoke his word to Gad, who was a prophet and David’s seer.
12. The Lord told Gad, “Go and tell David, ‘This is what the Lord says: I offer you three choices. Choose one of them and I will do it to you.’ ”
13. So Gad went to David and said to him, “Should three years of hunger come to you and your land? Or should your enemies chase you for three months? Or should there be three days of disease in your land? Think about it. Then decide which of these things I should tell the Lord who sent me.”
14. David said to Gad, “I am in great trouble. Let the Lord punish us, because the Lord is very merciful. Don’t let my punishment come from human beings!”
15. So the Lord sent a terrible disease on Israel. It began in the morning and continued until the chosen time to stop. From Dan to Beersheba seventy thousand people died.
16. When the angel raised his arm toward Jerusalem to destroy it, the Lord felt very sorry about the terrible things that had happened. He said to the angel who was destroying the people, “That is enough! Put down your arm!” The angel of the Lord was then by the threshing floor of Araunah the Jebusite.
17. When David saw the angel that killed the people, he said to the Lord, “I am the one who sinned and did wrong. These people only followed me like sheep. They did nothing wrong. Please punish me and my family.”
18. That day Gad came to David and said, “Go and build an altar to the Lord on the threshing floor of Araunah the Jebusite.”
19. So David did what Gad told him to do, just as the Lord commanded.
20. Araunah looked and saw the king and his servants coming to him. So he went out and bowed facedown on the ground before the king.
21. He said, “Why has my master the king come to me?”David answered, “To buy the threshing floor from you so I can build an altar to the Lord. Then the terrible disease will stop.”
22. Araunah said to David, “My master and king, you may take anything you want for a sacrifice. Here are some oxen for the whole burnt offering and the threshing boards and the yokes for the wood.
23. My king, I give everything to you.” Araunah also said to the king, “May the Lord your God be pleased with you.”
24. But the king answered Araunah, “No, I will pay you for the land. I won’t offer to the Lord my God burnt offerings that cost me nothing.”So David bought the threshing floor and the oxen for one and one-fourth pounds of silver.