2 Samuel 24: A Costly Offering<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"But the king replied to Araunah, \u201cNo, I insist on paying you for it. I will not sacrifice to the Lord my God burnt offerings that cost me nothing.\u201d -2\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/holywrit\/2013\/02\/2-samuel-24-a-costly-offering\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"2 Samuel 24: A Costly Offering\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"But the king replied to Araunah, \u201cNo, I insist on paying you for it. I will not sacrifice to the Lord my God burnt offerings that cost me nothing.\u201d -2\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/holywrit\/2013\/02\/2-samuel-24-a-costly-offering\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Holy Writ\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2013-02-12T12:19:23+00:00\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Dillon Burroughs\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Dillon Burroughs\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"2 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/holywrit\/2013\/02\/2-samuel-24-a-costly-offering\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/holywrit\/2013\/02\/2-samuel-24-a-costly-offering\/\",\"name\":\"2 Samuel 24: A Costly Offering\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/holywrit\/#website\"},\"datePublished\":\"2013-02-12T12:19:23+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2013-02-12T12:19:23+00:00\",\"author\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/holywrit\/#\/schema\/person\/669844d33ee3d514a9a43e03beb33263\"},\"description\":\"But the king replied to Araunah, \u201cNo, I insist on paying you for it. I will not sacrifice to the Lord my God burnt offerings that cost me nothing.\u201d -2\",\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/holywrit\/2013\/02\/2-samuel-24-a-costly-offering\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/holywrit\/2013\/02\/2-samuel-24-a-costly-offering\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/holywrit\/2013\/02\/2-samuel-24-a-costly-offering\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/holywrit\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"2 Samuel 24: A Costly Offering\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/holywrit\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/holywrit\/\",\"name\":\"Holy Writ\",\"description\":\"Dillon Burroughs on copying the Bible by hand, one chapter a day\u2026\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/holywrit\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":\"required name=search_term_string\"}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/holywrit\/#\/schema\/person\/669844d33ee3d514a9a43e03beb33263\",\"name\":\"Dillon Burroughs\",\"image\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/holywrit\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/653264cf4a082e19075cc75da75b8b17?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/653264cf4a082e19075cc75da75b8b17?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"caption\":\"Dillon Burroughs\"},\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/holywrit\/author\/readdb\/\"}]}<\/script>\n","yoast_head_json":{"title":"2 Samuel 24: A Costly Offering","description":"But the king replied to Araunah, \u201cNo, I insist on paying you for it. I will not sacrifice to the Lord my God burnt offerings that cost me nothing.\u201d -2","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/holywrit\/2013\/02\/2-samuel-24-a-costly-offering\/","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"2 Samuel 24: A Costly Offering","og_description":"But the king replied to Araunah, \u201cNo, I insist on paying you for it. I will not sacrifice to the Lord my God burnt offerings that cost me nothing.\u201d -2","og_url":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/holywrit\/2013\/02\/2-samuel-24-a-costly-offering\/","og_site_name":"Holy Writ","article_published_time":"2013-02-12T12:19:23+00:00","author":"Dillon Burroughs","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_misc":{"Written by":"Dillon Burroughs","Est. reading time":"2 minutes"},"schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/holywrit\/2013\/02\/2-samuel-24-a-costly-offering\/","url":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/holywrit\/2013\/02\/2-samuel-24-a-costly-offering\/","name":"2 Samuel 24: A Costly Offering","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/holywrit\/#website"},"datePublished":"2013-02-12T12:19:23+00:00","dateModified":"2013-02-12T12:19:23+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/holywrit\/#\/schema\/person\/669844d33ee3d514a9a43e03beb33263"},"description":"But the king replied to Araunah, \u201cNo, I insist on paying you for it. I will not sacrifice to the Lord my God burnt offerings that cost me nothing.\u201d -2","breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/holywrit\/2013\/02\/2-samuel-24-a-costly-offering\/#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/holywrit\/2013\/02\/2-samuel-24-a-costly-offering\/"]}]},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/holywrit\/2013\/02\/2-samuel-24-a-costly-offering\/#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/holywrit\/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"2 Samuel 24: A Costly Offering"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/holywrit\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/holywrit\/","name":"Holy Writ","description":"Dillon Burroughs on copying the Bible by hand, one chapter a day\u2026","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/holywrit\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":"required name=search_term_string"}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/holywrit\/#\/schema\/person\/669844d33ee3d514a9a43e03beb33263","name":"Dillon Burroughs","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/holywrit\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/653264cf4a082e19075cc75da75b8b17?s=96&d=mm&r=g","contentUrl":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/653264cf4a082e19075cc75da75b8b17?s=96&d=mm&r=g","caption":"Dillon Burroughs"},"url":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/holywrit\/author\/readdb\/"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/holywrit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1682","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/holywrit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/holywrit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/holywrit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/209"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/holywrit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1682"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/holywrit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1682\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/holywrit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1682"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/holywrit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1682"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/holywrit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1682"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}

{"id":1682,"date":"2013-02-12T07:19:23","date_gmt":"2013-02-12T12:19:23","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/holywrit\/?p=1682"},"modified":"2013-02-12T07:19:23","modified_gmt":"2013-02-12T12:19:23","slug":"2-samuel-24-a-costly-offering","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/holywrit\/2013\/02\/2-samuel-24-a-costly-offering\/","title":{"rendered":"2 Samuel 24: A Costly Offering"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

But the king replied to Araunah, \u201cNo, I insist on paying you for it. I will not sacrifice to the Lord my God burnt offerings that cost me nothing.\u201d<\/em> -2 Samuel 24:24<\/p>\n

As king, David could have selected any location to present an offering to the Lord. The location he chose belonged to another man who said David could have it for free. Sounds good, doesn\u2019t it? But not to David. He declared, \u201cI will not sacrifice to the Lord my God burnt offerings that cost me nothing.\u201d<\/p>\n

Why not? What difference did it make? The answer is found in the last phrase \u201cofferings that cost me nothing.\u201d David knew that an offering must be a commitment for it to have any meaning. Without any sense of giving, there is no offering, but only ritual.<\/p>\n

David would have none of it. He had sinned. God had judged, yet shown mercy. David intended to worship the Lord as a result. His offering would reveal his commitment\u2013one that cost.<\/p>\n

Interestingly, Jesus would reveal this same attribute. He came to present himself as the ultimate offering for our sins. His offering cost him everything.<\/p>\n

Today, we are presented with a choice: will we serve the Lord only when there is no cost or will we serve him regardless of the sacrifice? If we choose to serve the Lord no matter what, we are in good company. David did it, Jesus did it. And by God\u2019s Spirit living within us, we too can offer our lives in devoted service to the Lord Almighty.<\/p>\n

Let\u2019s talk about it on Facebook<\/a>! Share your thoughts, pictures, or videos on handwriting Scripture.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

+++<\/p>\n

Dillon Burroughs<\/strong><\/a> is the author and coauthor of numerous books and is handwriting a copy of all 31,173 verses of the Bible at\u00a0HolyWritProject.com<\/a>. Find out more about Dillon at\u00a0 Facebook.com\/readdB<\/a> or\u00a0 readdB.com<\/a>.<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"