2 Samuel 24:10-25

10And David’s heart smote him after that he had numbered the people. And David said to the LORD, I have sinned greatly in what I have done: and now, I beseech thee, O LORD, take away the iniquity of thy servant; for I have done very foolishly. 11For when David had risen in the morning, the word of the LORD came to the prophet Gad, David’s seer, saying, 12Go and say to David, Thus saith the LORD, I offer thee three things ; choose thee one of them, that I may do it to thee. 13So Gad came to David, and told him, and said to him, Shall seven years of famine come upon thee in thy land? or wilt thou flee three months before thy enemies, while they pursue thee? or that there be three days’ pestilence in thy land? now consider, and see what answer I shall return to him that sent me. 14And David said to Gad, I am in deep distress: let us fall now into the hand of the LORD; for his mercies are great: and let me not fall into the hand of man.1 15So the LORD sent a pestilence upon Israel from the morning even to the time appointed: and there died of the people from Dan even to Beersheba seventy thousand men. 16And when the angel stretched out his hand upon Jerusalem to destroy it, the LORD repented of the evil, and said to the angel that destroyed the people, It is enough: stay now thy hand. And the angel of the LORD was by the threshingplace of Araunah the Jebusite.2 17And David spoke to the LORD when he saw the angel that smote the people, and said, Lo, I have sinned, and I have done wickedly: but these sheep, what have they done? let thy hand, I pray thee, be against me, and against my father’s house.

18And Gad came that day to David, and said to him, Go up, rear an altar to the LORD in the threshingfloor of Araunah the Jebusite.3 19And David, according to the saying of Gad, went up as the LORD commanded. 20And Araunah looked, and saw the king and his servants coming toward him: and Araunah went out, and bowed himself before the king on his face upon the ground. 21And Araunah said, Why is my lord the king come to his servant? And David said, To buy the threshingfloor of thee, to build an altar to the LORD, that the plague may be stayed from the people. 22And Araunah said to David, Let my lord the king take and offer up what seemeth good to him: behold, here are oxen for burnt sacrifice, and threshing instruments and other instruments of the oxen for wood. 23All these things did Araunah, as a king, give to the king. And Araunah said to the king, The LORD thy God accept thee. 24And the king said to Araunah, Nay; but I will surely buy it of thee at a price: neither will I offer burnt offerings to the LORD my God of that which doth cost me nothing. So David bought the threshingfloor and the oxen for fifty shekels of silver. 25And David built there an altar to the LORD, and offered burnt offerings and peace offerings. So the LORD was entreated for the land, and the plague was stayed from Israel.