2 Samuel 24:19
ESV
So David went up at Gad 's word, as the Lord commanded.
NIV
So David went up, as the Lord had commanded through Gad.
NASB
Then David went up in accordance with the word of Gad, just as the Lord had commanded.
CSB
David went up in obedience to Gad’s command, just as the Lord had commanded.
NLT
So David went up to do what the Lord had commanded him.
KJV
And David, according to the saying of Gad, went up as the Lord commanded.
NKJV
So David, according to the word of Gad, went up as the Lord commanded.
What does 2 Samuel 24:19 mean?
God sent an angel with a devastating plague in response to David's sinful census. The angel stopped on the mountain above Jerusalem. God sends the seer Gad to tell David to build an altar there (2 Samuel 24:1, 15–16, 18).Shortly after David became king of all Israel, he decided to make Jerusalem his capital city. The Jebusites, a tribe of Canaanites, mocked David, claiming that not even he could breach their fortified city. David's men used the shaft that brought water into the city and conquered it easily (2 Samuel 5:6–10). The "City of David" doesn't encompass the entirety of what Jerusalem becomes. It's a small sliver of land south of what is now the temple Mount. In David's time, some Jebusites still lived in the area.
Araunah is one such Jebusite. He owns the hilltop and uses it as a threshing floor. Despite being of the people God told Joshua to destroy (Joshua 10:5; 11:3), Araunah apparently lives peacefully among the Israelites and recognizes David as king. He asks David what he wants, and David says he wants to buy the threshing floor (2 Samuel 24:21). After some cultural banter, David buys the threshing floor, a larger piece of land, Araunah's oxen and wheat, and the oxen's yoke and threshing sledge (1 Chronicles 21:23). As David sacrifices, God halts the plague, sparing Jerusalem.
The account of this event in 1 Chronicles gives more detail. It describes David seeing the angel "standing between earth and heaven, and in his hand a drawn sword stretched out over Jerusalem," which was only a few hundred yards away. It also identifies David's "servants" as elders of the city (1 Chronicles 21:16).
