Today started with David speaking his last words. “Probably to be understood as David’s last poetic testimony (in the manner of his psalms), perhaps composed at the time of his final instructions and warnings to his son Solomon.
Then it went through listing David’s mighty men and the things they each had done, i.e. brief background, the battles and number of people they struck down, etc. This section took up the remainder and ultimately most of chapter 23.
After that David wanted to take a census. He sent the commander of his army, Joab out to number the people of Israel and of Judah. He was gone nine months and twenty days. When he returned he declared that the number of men in Israel able to draw the sword was 800,000 and Judah was 500,000.
But after the people were numbered, David’s heart struck him. He said to the Lord that he had sinned and acted foolishly. He asked the Lord to take away his iniquity. When David arose the next morning, the word of the Lord came to the prophet Gad, David’s seer.
He explained that the Lord would give David three options. He was to choose one and that would be what the Lord did to him.
- Three years of famine to the land.
- Flee three months while his foes pursued him.
- Three days’ pestilence in the land.
David said to Gad,
So the Lord sent a pestilence on Israel from the morning until the appointed time, and 70,000 men died.
When the angel sent out his hand to destroy Jerusalem, the Lord relented from the calamity and said, “It is enough; now stay your hand.” Then David spoke to the Lord when he saw the angel who was striking the people and said how he had sinned and done wickedly. But, he asked the Lord to let his hand be against him and not against his father’s house.
Gad came to David and told him to raise an altar to the Lord on the threshing floor. So David went and tried to buy the threshing floor, but the man didn’t want to sell it to him. The man wanted to just give it to him for free along with his oxen and yoke.
David refused and said, “I will buy it from you for a price. I will not offer burnt offerings to the Lord my God that cost me nothing.” So David bought the threshing floor and the oxen.
David built an altar to the Lord and offered burnt offerings and peace offerings. So the Lord responded to the plea for the land, and the plague was averted from Israel.
This is the end of 2 Samuel!