Job trusts in his redeemer
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Then Job answered and said,
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“How long will you make me suffer and break me into pieces with words?
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These ten times you have reproached me; you are not ashamed that you have treated me harshly.
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If it is indeed true that I have erred, my error remains my own concern.
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If indeed you will exalt yourselves above me and use my humiliation against me,
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then you should know that God has done wrong to me and has caught me in his net.
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See, I cry out, “Violence!” but I get no answer. I call out for help, but there is no justice.
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He has walled up my way so that I cannot pass, and he has set darkness in my path.
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He has stripped me of my glory, and he has taken the crown from my head.
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He has broken me down on every side, and I am gone; he has plucked up my hopes like a tree.
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He has also kindled his wrath against me; he regards me as one of his adversaries.
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His troops come on together; they cast up siege mounds against me and encamp around my tent.
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He has put my brothers far from me; my acquaintances are wholly alienated from me.
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My kinsfolk have failed me; my close friends have forgotten me.
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Those who once stayed as guests in my house and my female servants regard me as a stranger; I am an alien in their sight.
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I call to my servant, but he gives me no answer although I entreat him with my mouth.
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My breath is offensive to my wife; I am even disgusting to those who were born from my mother’s womb.
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Even young children despise me; if I rise to speak, they speak against me.
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All my familiar friends abhor me; those whom I love have turned against me.
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My bones cling to my skin and to my flesh; I survive only by the skin of my teeth.
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Have pity upon me, have pity upon me, my friends, for the hand of God has touched me.
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Why do you persecute me as if you were God? Why are you not satisfied with consuming my flesh?
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Oh, that my words were now written down! Oh, that they were inscribed in a book!
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Oh, that with an iron pen and lead they were engraved in the rock forever!
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But as for me, I know that my Redeemer lives, and that at last he will stand on the earth;
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after my skin, that is, this body, is destroyed, then in my flesh I will see God.
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I will see him myself; my eyes-and not someone else-will see him. My kidneys fail within me.
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If you say, ’How we will persecute him! The root of his troubles lies in him,’
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then be afraid of the sword, because wrath brings the punishment of the sword, so that you may know there is a judgment.”
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