1 Chronicles 21:15–28

¹⁵And God sent an angel^j to destroy Jerusalem.^k But as the angel was doing so, the Lord saw it and relented^l concerning the disaster and said to the angel who was destroying^m the people, “Enough! Withdraw your hand.” The angel of the Lord was then standing at the threshing floor of Araunah^b the Jebusite.

¹⁶David looked up and saw the angel of the Lord standing between heaven and earth, with a drawn sword in his hand extended over Jerusalem. Then David and the elders, clothed in sackcloth, fell facedown.ⁿ

¹⁷David said to God, “Was it not I who ordered the fighting men to be counted? I, the shepherd,^c have sinned and done wrong. These are but sheep.^o What have they done? Lord my God, let your hand fall on me and my family,^p but do not let this plague remain on your people.”

David Builds an Altar

¹⁸Then the angel of the Lord ordered Gad to tell David to go up and build an altar to the Lord on the threshing floor^q of Araunah the Jebusite. ¹⁹So David went up in obedience to the word that Gad had spoken in the name of the Lord.

²⁰While Araunah was threshing wheat,^r he turned and saw the angel; his four sons who were with him hid themselves. ²¹Then David approached, and when Araunah looked and saw him, he left the threshing floor and bowed down before David with his face to the ground.

²²David said to him, “Let me have the site of your threshing floor so I can build an altar to the Lord, that the plague on the people may be stopped. Sell it to me at the full price.”

²³Araunah said to David, “Take it! Let my lord the king do whatever pleases him. Look, I will give the oxen for the burnt offerings, the threshing sledges for the wood, and the wheat for the grain offering. I will give all this.”

²⁴But King David replied to Araunah, “No, I insist on paying the full price. I will not take for the Lord what is yours, or sacrifice a burnt offering that costs me nothing.”

²⁵So David paid Araunah six hundred shekels^d of gold for the site. ²⁶David built an altar to the Lord there and sacrificed burnt offerings and fellowship offerings. He called on the Lord, and the Lord answered him with fire^s from heaven on the altar of burnt offering.

²⁷Then the Lord spoke to the angel, and he put his sword back into its sheath. ²⁸At that time, when David saw that the Lord had answered him on the threshing floor of Araunah the Jebusite, he offered sacrifices there.