Job's closing statements
Job continues
I am desperate
1Job said:
2I am desperate because
God All-Powerful refuses
to do what is right.
As surely as God lives,
3and while he gives me breath,
4I will tell only the truth.
5Until the day I die,
I will refuse to do wrong
by saying you are right,
6because each day my conscience
agrees that I am innocent.
7I pray that my enemies
will suffer no less
than the wicked.
8Such people are hopeless,
and God All-Powerful
will cut them down,
9without listening
when they beg for mercy.
10And that is what God should do,
because they don't like him
or ever pray.
11Now I will explain in detail
what God All-Powerful does.
12All of you have seen these things
for yourselves.
So you have no excuse.
How God treats the wicked
13Here is how God All-Powerful
treats those who are wicked
and brutal.
14They may have many children,
but most of them will go hungry
or suffer a violent death.
15Others will die of disease,
and their widows
won't be able to weep.
16The wicked may collect riches
and clothes in abundance
as easily as clay.
17But God's people will wear
clothes taken from them
and divide up their riches.
18No homes built by the wicked
will outlast a cocoon
or a shack.
19Those sinners may go to bed rich,
but they will wake up poor.
20Terror will strike at night
like a flood or a storm.
21Then a scorching wind
will sweep them away
22without showing mercy,
as they try to escape.
23At last, the wind will celebrate
because they are gone.