27
Job replied one more time
1 Job replied again to his three friends,
2 “Almighty God has refused to treat me justly/fairly.
He has caused me to feel bitter/resentful.
But just as surely as he lives,
3 as long as God’s Spirit enables me to breathe,
4 I will not lie;
I [SYN] will not say anything to deceive anyone.
5 I will never admit that what you three have said is true;
until the day that I die, I will insist that I have not done things that are wrong.
6 I will say that I am innocent, and never ◄say anything different/change what I say►;
my conscience will never reproach me as long as I live.
7 “I want my enemies to be punished like all wicked people are punished;
I want God to punish those who oppose me like he punishes all unrighteous people.
8 When it is time for God to get rid of godless/wicked people and to cause them to die,
there is absolutely nothing good [RHQ] that they can confidently expect to happen to them.
9 When they experience troubles, ◄will God hear them call out to him for help?/God certainly will not hear them call out to him for help.► [RHQ]
10 ◄Will they be happy about what Almighty God does?/They certainly will not be happy about what Almighty God does.► [RHQ]
◄Will they begin to pray to him frequently?/They certainly will not begin to pray to him frequently.► [RHQ]
Certainly not!
11 “I will teach you three something about the power [MTY] of Almighty God [MTY];
I will reveal what he is thinking.
12 But you three have seen for yourselves what God has done;
so ◄why are you saying such nonsense?/you should not be saying such nonsense.► [RHQ]
13 “I will tell you what Almighty God does to wicked people,
the things that he does to people who oppress others.
14 Even if they have many children, many of those children will die in wars [MTY],
and their other children will die because they do not have enough food to eat.
15 Their children who are still alive will die from diseases,
and their widows will not even mourn for them.
16 Sometimes wicked people accumulate a huge amount [SIM] of silver
and pile up clothes like [SIM] those clothes were a pile of clay,
17 but those wicked people will die, and then righteous people will wear those clothes,
and honest/innocent people will get their silver and divide it among themselves.
18 The houses that they build are as frail/fragile as [SIM] spider webs,
or they are like flimsy huts that watchmen live in while they guard people’s fields.
19 Wicked people are rich when they lie down at night,
but when they wake up in the morning, they find out that their money has disappeared.
20 “Things that terrify them [PRS] strike them like a flood [SIM];
during the night a whirlwind carries them away.
21 It is as though the wind from the east picks them up and carries them away from their homes,
and they disappear.
22 That wind strikes them without pitying them
while they are running away, trying to escape from its force/power [MTY].
23 That wind is like someone clapping his hands [MET] at them to ridicule them,
howling at them wherever they run to.”