Day 157 of 364

^19:1Then Job answered, ^19:2“How long will you torment me, and crush me with words? ^19:3You have reproached me ten times. You aren’t ashamed that you attack me. ^19:4If it is true that I have erred, my error remains with myself. ^19:5If indeed you will magnify yourselves against me, and plead against me my reproach, ^19:6know now that God has subverted me, and has surrounded me with his net. ^19:7“Behold, I cry out of wrong, but I am not heard. I cry for help, but there is no justice. ^19:8He has walled up my way so that I can’t pass, and has set darkness in my paths. ^19:9He has stripped me of my glory, and taken the crown from my head. ^19:10He has broken me down on every side, and I am gone. He has plucked my hope up like a tree. ^19:11He has also kindled his wrath against me. He counts me among his adversaries. ^19:12His troops come on together, build a siege ramp against me, and encamp around my tent. ^19:13“He has put my brothers far from me. My acquaintances are wholly estranged from me. ^19:14My relatives have gone away. My familiar friends have forgotten me. ^19:15Those who dwell in my house and my maids consider me a stranger. I am an alien in their sight. ^19:16I call to my servant, and he gives me no answer. I beg him with my mouth. ^19:17My breath is offensive to my wife. I am loathsome to the children of my own mother. ^19:18Even young children despise me. If I arise, they speak against me. ^19:19All my familiar friends abhor me. They whom I loved have turned against me. ^19:20My bones stick to my skin and to my flesh. I have escaped by the skin of my teeth. ^19:21“Have pity on me. Have pity on me, you my friends, for the hand of God has touched me. ^19:22Why do you persecute me as God, and are not satisfied with my flesh? ^19:23“Oh that my words were now written! Oh that they were inscribed in a book! ^19:24That with an iron pen and lead they were engraved in the rock forever! ^19:25But as for me, I know that my Redeemer lives. In the end, he will stand upon the earth. ^19:26After my skin is destroyed, then I will see God in my flesh, ^19:27whom I, even I, will see on my side. My eyes will see, and not as a stranger. “My heart is consumed within me. ^19:28If you say, ‘How we will persecute him!’ because the root of the matter is found in me, ^19:29be afraid of the sword, for wrath brings the punishments of the sword, that you may know there is a judgment.” ^20:1Then Zophar the Naamathite answered, ^20:2“Therefore my thoughts answer me, even by reason of my haste that is in me. ^20:3I have heard the reproof which puts me to shame. The spirit of my understanding answers me. ^20:4Don’t you know this from old time, since man was placed on earth, ^20:5that the triumphing of the wicked is short, the joy of the godless but for a moment? ^20:6Though his height mount up to the heavens, and his head reach to the clouds, ^20:7yet he will perish forever like his own dung. Those who have seen him will say, ‘Where is he?’ ^20:8He will fly away as a dream, and will not be found. Yes, he will be chased away like a vision of the night. ^20:9The eye which saw him will see him no more, neither will his place see him any more. ^20:10His children will seek the favor of the poor. His hands will give back his wealth. ^20:11His bones are full of his youth, but youth will lie down with him in the dust. ^20:12“Though wickedness is sweet in his mouth, though he hide it under his tongue, ^20:13though he spare it, and will not let it go, but keep it still within his mouth, ^20:14yet his food in his bowels is turned. It is cobra venom within him. ^20:15He has swallowed down riches, and he will vomit them up again. God will cast them out of his belly. ^20:16He will suck cobra venom. The viper’s tongue will kill him. ^20:17He will not look at the rivers, the flowing streams of honey and butter. ^20:18He will restore that for which he labored, and will not swallow it down. He will not rejoice according to the substance that he has gotten. ^20:19For he has oppressed and forsaken the poor. He has violently taken away a house, and he will not build it up. ^20:20“Because he knew no quietness within him, he will not save anything of that in which he delights. ^20:21There was nothing left that he didn’t devour, therefore his prosperity will not endure. ^20:22In the fullness of his sufficiency, distress will overtake him. The hand of everyone who is in misery will come on him. ^20:23When he is about to fill his belly, God will cast the fierceness of his wrath on him. It will rain on him while he is eating. ^20:24He will flee from the iron weapon. The bronze arrow will strike him through. ^20:25He draws it out, and it comes out of his body. Yes, the glittering point comes out of his liver. Terrors are on him. ^20:26All darkness is laid up for his treasures. An unfanned fire will devour him. It will consume that which is left in his tent. ^20:27The heavens will reveal his iniquity. The earth will rise up against him. ^20:28The increase of his house will depart. They will rush away in the day of his wrath. ^20:29This is the portion of a wicked man from God, the heritage appointed to him by God.” ^21:1Then Job answered, ^21:2“Listen diligently to my speech. Let this be your consolation. ^21:3Allow me, and I also will speak. After I have spoken, mock on. ^21:4As for me, is my complaint to man? Why shouldn’t I be impatient? ^21:5Look at me, and be astonished. Lay your hand on your mouth. ^21:6When I remember, I am troubled. Horror takes hold of my flesh. ^21:7“Why do the wicked live, become old, yes, and grow mighty in power? ^21:8Their child is established with them in their sight, their offspring before their eyes. ^21:9Their houses are safe from fear, neither is the rod of God upon them. ^21:10Their bulls breed without fail. Their cows calve, and don’t miscarry. ^21:11They send out their little ones like a flock. Their children dance. ^21:12They sing to the tambourine and harp, and rejoice at the sound of the pipe. ^21:13They spend their days in prosperity. In an instant they go down to Sheol. ^21:14They tell God, ‘Depart from us, for we don’t want to know about your ways. ^21:15What is the Almighty, that we should serve him? What profit should we have, if we pray to him?’ ^21:16Behold, their prosperity is not in their hand. The counsel of the wicked is far from me. ^21:17“How often is it that the lamp of the wicked is put out, that their calamity comes on them, that God distributes sorrows in his anger? ^21:18How often is it that they are as stubble before the wind, as chaff that the storm carries away? ^21:19You say, ‘God lays up his iniquity for his children.’ Let him recompense it to himself, that he may know it. ^21:20Let his own eyes see his destruction. Let him drink of the wrath of the Almighty. ^21:21For what does he care for his house after him, when the number of his months is cut off? ^21:22“Shall any teach God knowledge, since he judges those who are high? ^21:23One dies in his full strength, being wholly at ease and quiet. ^21:24His pails are full of milk. The marrow of his bones is moistened. ^21:25Another dies in bitterness of soul, and never tastes of good. ^21:26They lie down alike in the dust. The worm covers them. ^21:27“Behold, I know your thoughts, the plans with which you would wrong me. ^21:28For you say, ‘Where is the house of the prince? Where is the tent in which the wicked lived?’ ^21:29Haven’t you asked wayfaring men? Don’t you know their evidences, ^21:30that the evil man is reserved to the day of calamity, that they are led out to the day of wrath? ^21:31Who will declare his way to his face? Who will repay him what he has done? ^21:32Yet he will be borne to the grave. Men will keep watch over the tomb. ^21:33The clods of the valley will be sweet to him. All men will draw after him, as there were innumerable before him. ^21:34So how can you comfort me with nonsense, because in your answers there remains only falsehood?”