Today, I am reading and commenting on  1 Chronicles 20-23.

Today’s passage discusses the plague which descended upon Israel following David’s census.  I struggle with how to express my thoughts about the ending of the plague because the wording the writer uses to describe what happened is less than completely clear.  There was some kind of event which happened at the threshing floor of Araunah.  This event led David and his advisors to build an altar there and begin offering sacrifices.  What is not clear to me is whether we are to understand that the plague stopped there before or after David made an offering there.  One way of reading this passage is that David bought the threshing floor, built an altar upon it, and began making offerings there because the plague stopped there.  Another way of reading this is that God directed David to buy the threshing floor, build an altar upon it, and began making sacrifices there and that the plague stopped when David followed those instructions.  Whichever way we are supposed to understand these events, something clearly happened at the threshing floor because the passage tells us that David was unwilling to go past it to go to Gibeon, where the tabernacle and the altar which travelled through the wilderness with it were set up.  The passage says that David and his advisors saw an angel with a drawn sword extended over Jerusalem.  The passage also tells us that Araunah and his four sons saw the angel as well.  Perhaps the reason the passage seems to indicate both that the plague stopped before David offered sacrifices at the threshing floor and that the plague stopped because David sacrificed at the threshing floor is because the writer realized in hindsight that the plague had stopped before the sacrifices were made but that David and those around him did not know that when they made those sacrifices.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

Today, I am reading and commenting on  1 Chronicles 20-23.

Today’s passage contains the account of how David chose the future location of the temple in response to the plague which followed his census of the fighting men of Israel.  I will confess that I find all of these accounts confusing.  This one is no exception, and may be more confusing to me than the others.  David insisted on the census even though Joab warned him against it, realizing that he had sinned when he received the results.  Which is the first of the things I find confusing, since the passage does not explain why David commanding the census was a sin.  However, I can think of multiple reasons why it might be a sin, so it is not very confusing.  Next, God offered David the choice of three options for punishment, three years of famine, three days of plague, or three days being forced to flee from his enemies.  David asked only that his punishment come at the hand of God, not at the hand of men.  So, God sent a plague angel against Israel.  Which is also slightly confusing.  Are supposed to understand that David requesting into the hands of God was him choosing plague.  If so, how was plague more at the hands of God than famine?  As the plague angel approached Jerusalem, God ordered it to stop.  Also, as the angel approached Jerusalem, David saw it, fell on his face, and begged God to punish only himself.  God then sent word to David that he should build an altar to God at the threshing floor of Araunah the Jebusite.   Araunah and his sons saw the angel and Araunah’s sons hid.  Then Araunah saw David approaching and went out to greet him.  After David had offered his sacrifices, God told the angel to put up its sword and cease threatening Jerusalem.  So, the passage tells us that God told the plague angel to stop as it approached Jerusalem, but also seems to imply that He stopped the plague because David begged Him to turn His anger solely against David and only stopped the plague after David made offerings on a temple at Araunah’s threshing floor.  Perhaps the strangest part of this passage is where it says that David could not go to the tabernacle in Gibeon to inquire of God because he was afraid of the sword of the angel.  I read that as saying that David continued to be afraid to go to Gibeon.  After much thought, I believe the writer chose not to write this in a way which clarified the confusing points in order to convey how we are often confused by the way in which God works and need to look at it in hindsight to have even a modicum of understanding of what He did.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

Today, I am reading and commenting on  1 Chronicles 20-23.

Usually when I look at this passage I look at David’s census and the plague which followed it.  However, it struck me today that this writer includes the census and the plague as setup to explain why the spot to build the Temple was chosen.  David chose the location of Araunah’s threshing floor as the place to build an altar to God.  Later, Solomon built the Temple there.  I find the description of how David chose that spot somewhat confusing (I am not sure that confusing is the correct word).  First the passage tells us that God told the angel to stop spreading the plague when it was at Araunah’s threshing floor.  Then the passage tells us that David saw the angel at Araunah’s threshing floor and begged God to stop sending a plague upon the people of Israel, who were innocent of this wrongdoing.  Then David went to Araunah’s threshing floor to build an altar in order to make an offering to the Lord (or, maybe, David went there as part of pleading with the Lord).  Finally, the passage tells us that Araunah was threshing, saw the angel, and then saw David approaching.  This reads to me as if the writer of this passage had several different accounts which contained slightly different details and were not told in a way which allowed him to determine exactly how they fit together.  It reads to me as if David began praying for God to stop the plague as soon as he became aware of it.  As the plague came to Jerusalem, Gad instructed David to have an altar built to make an offering to God.  As David headed for Mount Moriah, which was the obvious place in Jerusalem for an altar, he saw the angel of the Lord at Araunah’s threshing floor.  At the same time, Araunah saw the angel as well.  At that moment God instructed the angel to stop, or perhaps God instructed the angel to stop just before David or Araunah saw it.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

Today, I am reading and commenting on  1 Chronicles 20-23.

Every time I read one of the accounts about the census King David held and the plague which followed it I have unanswered questions.  None of the accounts clearly define what David’s sin was in holding the census.  However, today I want to focus on the place where the angel of the Lord which was spreading the plague stopped and where David built an altar to God.  The passage tells us that an angel of the Lord spread a plague over the nation of Israel, stopping as it approached Jerusalem at the threshing floor of Araunah the Jebusite.  The passage also tells us that David and the elders of Israel were dressed in sackcloth and fell face down when David saw the angel standing there with a drawn sword.  At this point David cried out to God asking that the punishment fall only on himself and his family, since it was his sin which brought it about.  The next verse has an angel tell David’s seer, or prophet, to build an altar on the threshing floor of Araunah.

So, the first thing I noticed about this was that David and the elders of Israel were already dressed in sackcloth when David saw the angel.  The passage has God telling the angel to stop before it mentions that David cried out to God to spare the people.  Yet, it is clear that David and the elders were already praying for just such an outcome.  In this passage David gives two examples which every leader of people should follow.  First, he acknowledges that the people he was leading suffered as a result of his sin, his mistake.  Second, he sought to suffer in their place.

I want to apologize for not getting into the selection of this spot to build an altar, but, as often happens, as I wrote this blog I found myself going in a different direction.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.