11 When David got up in the morning, the Lord spoke his word to the prophet Gad, David’s seer.
12 “Go and tell David, ‘This is what the Lord says: I’m offering you three choices. Choose the one you want me to do to you.’ ”
13 When Gad came to David, he told David this and asked, “Should seven years of famine come to you and your land, or three months during which you flee from your enemies as they pursue you, or should there be a three-day plague in your land? Think it over, and decide what answer I should give the one who sent me.”
14 “I’m in a desperate situation,” David told Gad. “Please let us fall into the Lord’s hands because he is very merciful. But don’t let me fall into human hands.”
15 So the Lord sent a plague among the Israelites from that morning until the time he had chosen. Of the people from Dan to Beersheba, 70,000 died.
16 But when the Messenger stretched out his arm to destroy Jerusalem, the Lord changed his mind about the disaster. “Enough!” he said to the Messenger who was destroying the people. “Put down your weapon.” The Messenger of the Lord was at the threshing floor of Araunah the Jebusite.
17 When David saw the Messenger who had been killing the people, he said to the Lord, “I’ve sinned. I’ve done wrong. What have these sheep done? Please let your punishment be against me and against my father’s family.”