'Now therefore, if you will indeed obey My voice and keep My covenant, then you shall be a special treasure to Me above all people; for all the earth [is] Mine.

'And you shall be to Me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation.' These [are] the words which you shall speak to the children of Israel."

" For you [are] a holy people to the LORD your God; the LORD your God has chosen you to be a people for Himself, a special treasure above all the peoples on the face of the earth.

"but because the LORD loves you, and because He would keep the oath which He swore to your fathers, the LORD has brought you out with a mighty hand, and redeemed you from the house of bondage, from the hand of Pharaoh king of Egypt.

"For the LORD will not forsake His people, for His great name's sake, because it has pleased the LORD to make you His people.

From following the ewes that had young He brought him, To shepherd Jacob His people, And Israel His inheritance.

"And I will make your descendants as the dust of the earth; so that if a man could number the dust of the earth, [then] your descendants also could be numbered.

Then He brought him outside and said, "Look now toward heaven, and count the stars if you are able to number them." And He said to him, "So shall your descendants be."

"blessing I will bless you, and multiplying I will multiply your descendants as the stars of the heaven and as the sand which [is] on the seashore; and your descendants shall possess the gate of their enemies.

So David said to Joab and to the leaders of the people, "Go, number Israel from Beersheba to Dan, and bring the number of them to me that I may know [it."]

Then Joab gave the sum of the number of the people to David. All Israel [had] one million one hundred thousand men who drew the sword, and Judah [had] four hundred and seventy thousand men who drew the sword.

But he did not count Levi and Benjamin among them, for the king's word was abominable to Joab.

But David did not take the number of those twenty years old and under, because the LORD had said He would multiply Israel like the stars of the heavens.

Joab the son of Zeruiah began a census, but he did not finish, for wrath came upon Israel because of this census; nor was the number recorded in the account of the chronicles of King David.