1 Chronicles 21:18-26

Living Bible

¹⁸ Then the Angel of the Lord told Gad to instruct David to build an altar to the Lord at the threshing floor of Ornan the Jebusite. ^19-20 So David went to see Ornan, who was threshing wheat at the time. Ornan saw the Angel as he turned, and his four sons ran and hid. ²¹ Then Ornan saw the king approaching. So he left the threshing floor and bowed to the ground before King David.

²² David said to Ornan, “Let me buy this threshing floor from you at its full price; then I will build an altar to the Lord and the plague will stop.”

²³ “Take it, my lord, and use it as you wish,” Ornan said to David. “Take the oxen, too, for burnt offerings; use the threshing instruments for wood for the fire and use the wheat for the grain offering. I give it all to you.”

²⁴ “No,” the king replied, “I will buy it for the full price; I cannot take what is yours and give it to the Lord. I will not offer a burnt offering that has cost me nothing!”

²⁵ So David paid Ornan $4,300 in gold$4,300 in gold, literally, “600 shekels of gold by weight.” ²⁶ and built an altar to the Lord there, and sacrificed burnt offerings and peace offerings upon it; and he called out to the Lord, who answered by sending down fire from heaven to burn up the offering on the altar.