Job: God Will Punish the Wicked

¹Then Job answered:

²“Listen carefully to my words;let this be your consolation to me.

³Bear with me while I speak;then, after I have spoken, you may go on mocking.

⁴Is my complaint against a man?Then why should I not be impatient?

⁵Look at me and be appalled;put your hand over your mouth.

⁶When I remember, terror takes hold,and my body trembles in horror.

⁷Why do the wicked live on,growing old and increasing in power?

⁸Their descendants are established around them,and their offspring before their eyes.

⁹Their homes are safe from fear;no rod of punishment from God is upon them.

¹⁰Their bulls breed without fail;their cows bear calves and do not miscarry.

¹¹They send forth their little ones like a flock;their children skip about,

¹²singing to the tambourine and lyreand making merry at the sound of the flute.

¹³They spend their days in prosperityand go down to Sheol in peace.

¹⁴Yet they say to God: ‘Leave us alone!For we have no desire to know Your ways.

¹⁵Who is the Almighty, that we should serve Him,and what would we gain if we pray to Him?’

¹⁶Still, their prosperity is not in their own hands,so I stay far from the counsel of the wicked.

¹⁷How often is the lamp of the wicked put out?Does disaster come upon them?Does God, in His anger, apportion destruction?

¹⁸Are they like straw before the wind,like chaff swept away by a storm?

¹⁹It is said that God lays up one’s punishment for his children.Let God repay the man himself, so he will know it.

²⁰Let his eyes see his own destruction;let him drink for himself the wrath of the Almighty.

²¹For what does he care about his household after him,when the number of his months has run out?

²²Can anyone teach knowledge to God,since He judges those on high?

²³One man dies full of vigor,completely secure and at ease.

²⁴His body is well nourished,and his bones are rich with marrow.

²⁵Yet another man dies in the bitterness of his soul,having never tasted prosperity.

²⁶But together they lie down in the dust,and worms cover them both.

²⁷Behold, I know your thoughts full well,the schemes by which you would wrong me.

²⁸For you say, ‘Where now is the nobleman’s house,and where are the tents in which the wicked dwell?’

²⁹Have you never asked those who travel the roads?Do you not accept their reports?

³⁰Indeed, the evil man is spared from the day of calamity,delivered from the day of wrath.

³¹Who denounces his behavior to his face?Who repays him for what he has done?

³²He is carried to the grave,and watch is kept over his tomb.

³³The clods of the valley are sweet to him;everyone follows behind him,and those before him are without number.

³⁴So how can you comfort me with empty words?For your answers remain full of falsehood.”

Job: Who Can Understand God’s Majesty?

¹Then Job answered:

²“How you have helped the powerlessand saved the arm that is feeble!

³How you have counseled the unwiseand provided fully sound insight!

⁴To whom have you uttered these words?And whose spirit spoke through you?

⁵The dead tremble—those beneath the waters and those who dwell in them.

⁶Sheol is naked before God,and Abaddonhas no covering.

⁷He stretches out the north over empty space;He hangs the earth upon nothing.

⁸He wraps up the waters in His clouds,yet the clouds do not burst under their own weight.

⁹He covers the face of the full moon,spreading over it His cloud.

¹⁰He has inscribed a horizon on the face of the watersat the boundary between light and darkness.

¹¹The foundations of heaven quake,astounded at His rebuke.

¹²By His power He stirredthe sea;by His understanding He shattered Rahab.

¹³By His breath the skies were cleared;His hand pierced the fleeing serpent.

¹⁴Indeed, these are but the fringes of His ways;how faint is the whisper we hear of Him!Who then can understandthe thunder of His power?”

Job: My Redeemer Lives

¹Then Job answered:

²“How long will you torment meand crush me with your words?

³Ten times now you have reproached me;you shamelessly mistreat me.

⁴Even if I have truly gone astray,my error concerns me alone.

⁵If indeed you would exalt yourselves above meand use my disgrace against me,

⁶then understand that it is God who has wronged meand drawn His net around me.

⁷Though I cry out, ‘Violence!’ I get no response;though I call for help, there is no justice.

⁸He has blocked my way so I cannot pass;He has veiled my paths with darkness.

⁹He has stripped me of my honorand removed the crown from my head.

¹⁰He tears me down on every side until I am gone;He uproots my hope like a tree.

¹¹His anger burns against me,and He counts me among His enemies.

¹²His troops advance together;they construct a ramp against meand encamp around my tent.

¹³He has removed my brothers from me;my acquaintances have abandoned me.

¹⁴My kinsmen have failed me,and my friends have forgotten me.

¹⁵My guests and maidservants count me as a stranger;I am a foreigner in their sight.

¹⁶I call for my servant, but he does not answer,though I implore him with my own mouth.

¹⁷My breath is repulsive to my wife,and I am loathsome to my own family.

¹⁸Even little boys scorn me;when I appear, they deride me.

¹⁹All my best friends despise me,and those I love have turned against me.

²⁰My skin and flesh cling to my bones;I have escaped by the skin of my teeth.

²¹Have pity on me, my friends, have pity,for the hand of God has struck me.

²²Why do you persecute me as God does?Will you never get enough of my flesh?

²³I wish that my words were recordedand inscribed in a book,

²⁴by an iron stylus on lead,or chiseled in stone forever.

²⁵But I know that my Redeemerlives,and in the end He will stand upon the earth.

²⁶Even after my skin has been destroyed,yet in my fleshI will see God.

²⁷I will see Him for myself;my eyes will behold Him, and not as a stranger.How my heart yearnswithin me!

²⁸If you say, ‘Let us persecute him,since the root of the matter lies with him,’

²⁹then you should fear the sword yourselves,because wrath brings punishment by the sword,so that you may know there is a judgment.”

I Cry Out before You

¹O LORD, the God of my salvation,day and night I cry out before You.

²May my prayer come before You;incline Your ear to my cry.

³For my soul is full of troubles,and my life draws near to Sheol.

⁴I am counted among those descending to the Pit.I am like a man without strength.

⁵I am forsaken among the dead,like the slain who lie in the grave,whom You remember no more,who are cut off from Your care.

⁶You have laid me in the lowest Pit,in the darkest of the depths.

⁷Your wrath weighs heavily upon me;all Your waves have submerged me.Selah

⁸You have removed my friends from me;You have made me repulsive to them;I am confined and cannot escape.

⁹My eyes grow dim with grief.I call to You daily, O LORD;I spread out my hands to You.

¹⁰Do You work wonders for the dead?Do departed spirits rise up to praise You?Selah

¹¹Can Your loving devotion be proclaimed in the grave,Your faithfulness in Abaddon?

¹²Will Your wonders be known in the darkness,or Your righteousness in the land of oblivion?

¹³But to You, O LORD, I cry for help;in the morning my prayer comes before You.

¹⁴Why, O LORD, do You reject me?Why do You hide Your face from me?

¹⁵From my youth I was afflicted and near death.I have borne Your terrors; I am in despair.

¹⁶Your wrath has swept over me;Your terrors have destroyed me.

¹⁷All day long they engulf me like water;they enclose me on every side.

¹⁸You have removed my beloved and my friend;darkness is my closest companion.