Joyful Givers

²⁴Then I set apart twelve of the chiefs of the priests, even Sherebiah, Hashabiah, and ten of their brothers with them, ²⁵and weighed to them the silver, the gold, and the vessels, even the offering for the house of our God, which the king, his counselors, his princes, and all Israel there present, had offered. ²⁶I weighed into their hand six hundred fifty talents of silver, one hundred talents of silver vessels; one hundred talents of gold, ²⁷twenty bowls of gold weighing one thousand darics; and two vessels of fine bright bronze, precious as gold. ²⁸I said to them, “You are holy to Yahweh, and the vessels are holy. The silver and the gold are a free will offering to Yahweh, the God of your fathers. ²⁹Watch and keep them, until you weigh them before the chiefs of the priests and the Levites, and the princes of the fathers’ households of Israel, at Jerusalem, in the rooms of Yahweh’s house.” ³⁰So the priests and the Levites received the weight of the silver and the gold, and the vessels, to bring them to Jerusalem to the house of our God. ³¹Then we departed from the river Ahava on the twelfth day of the first month, to go to Jerusalem. The hand of our God was on us, and he delivered us from the hand of the enemy and the bandit by the way. ³²We came to Jerusalem, and stayed there three days. ³³On the fourth day the silver and the gold and the vessels were weighed in the house of our God into the hand of Meremoth the son of Uriah the priest; and with him was Eleazar the son of Phinehas; and with them was Jozabad the son of Jeshua, and Noadiah the son of Binnui, the Levite; ³⁴everything by number and by weight; and all the weight was written at that time. ³⁵The children of the captivity, who had come out of exile, offered burnt offerings to the God of Israel, twelve bulls for all Israel, ninety-six rams, seventy-seven lambs, and twelve male goats for a sin offering. All this was a burnt offering to Yahweh. ³⁶They delivered the king’s commissions to the king’s local governors, and to the governors beyond the River. So they supported the people and God’s house.