1 Chronicles 21:13

_AND DAVID SAID UNTO GAD, I AM IN A GREAT STRAIT: LET ME FALL NOW INTO THE HAND OF THE LORD; FOR VERY GREAT ARE HIS MERCIES: BUT LET ME NOT FALL INTO THE HAND OF MAN._ Let me fall now into the hand of the Lord ... let me not fall into the hand of man. Experience had taught him that human passion and vengeance had no bounds, whereas our wise and gracious Father in heaven knows the kind, and regulates the extent, of chastisement which everyone needs....

Verse 1 Chronicles 21:13. _DAVID SAID - I AM IN A GREAT STRAIT_] The Targum reasons thus: "And David said to Gad, If I choose _famine_, the Israelites may say, The granaries of David are full of corn; neither doth he care should the people of Israel die with hunger. And if I choose _war_, and fly before an enemy, the Israelites may say, David is a strong and warlike man, and he cares not though the people of Israel should fall by the sword. I am brought into a great strait; I will deliver myself now into the _HAND of the WORD of the LORD_, ביד מימרא דיי beyad meymera dayai, for his mercies are many; but into the hands of the children of men I will not deliver myself....

EXPOSITION This very important chapter in David's history is the parallel of 2 Samuel 24:1, which contains some details not found here, _e.g._ the route taken by those who went to number Israel (2 Samuel 24:5), and omits others. This chapter furnishes one of the clearer proofs (in respect of what it supplies, _not _found in Samuel) that its indebtedness is not to that book, but to a work open as well to the compiler of Chronicles as to the writer of Samuel. Its contents fall into five sections. 1. David's command to number the people, with Joab's remonstrances (2 Samuel 24:1). 2. The means taken to rouse David to a sense of his sin, and

See Gill "1Ch 21:1"....

May the Lord instruct us while we read. Perhaps We shall understand it better if we begin in the 21 st chapter at the 26 th verse. 1 Chronicles 21:26. _And David built there an altar unto the LORD, and offered burnt offerings and peace offerings, and called upon the LORD; and he answered him from heaven by fire upon the altar of burnt offering. And the LORD commanded the angel; and he put up his sword again into the sheath thereof._ «And David built there» that is upon the threshing-floor of Ornan. The place of sacrifice was the place of salvation. The angel was smiting Jerusalem, but as soon as the sacrifice was offered the angel sheathed his sword. 1 Chronicles 21:28. At that time when David saw that the LORD had answered him in the thresh

10. THE NUMBERING OF THE PEOPLE AND THE PUNISHMENT CHAPTER 21 _ 1. David's failure in numbering the people (1 Chronicles 21:1)_ 2. David's confession and the message of God (1 Chronicles 21:8) 3. David's answer and the punishment (1 Chronicles 21:13) 4. The altar in the threshing floor of Ornan (1 Chronicles 21:18) On the alleged discrepancy between the statement in 2 Samuel 24:1 “And again the anger of the LORD was kindled against Israel, and He moved (lite

1 CHRONICLES 21:1 TO 1 CHRONICLES 22:1 THE NUMBERING OF THE HOSTS; THE PUNISHMENT (see notes on 2 Samuel 24:1). There are many variations from the corresponding passage in 2 S., and it is uncertain whether the Chronicler used any other source or not. 1 Chronicles 21:1. And Satan stood up: in 2 Samuel 24:1 the temptation comes from Yahweh; the Chronicler altered this as unfitting in view of the developed doctrine of God which had supervened. In the earlier literature the term Satan means adversary ...

GREAT. many....

_into the hand of the Lord_ David deprecates war, and prefers famine or pestilence....

LESSON TEN 21-22 A MILITARY CENSUS AND A PLAGUE 13. DAVID'S MILITARY CENSUS AND ITS CONSEQUENCES (Chapter 21) INTRODUCTION The final serious mistake David made was this military census. God did not withhold judgment. Israel suffered. David repented and begged for God's mercy. Preparing for the building of the Temple and charging Solomon with the responsibility of carrying out the plans occupied king David's last days. TEXT 1 Chronicles 21:1. And Satan stood up against Israel, and moved David to number Israel. 2. And David said to Joab and to the princes of the people, Go, number Israel from Beer-sheba even to Dan; and bring me word, that I may know the sum of them. 3. And Joab said, Jehovah make his people a hundred times as many as they are: but, my lord the king, are they not all my lord's servants; Why doth my lord require this thing