Today's Reading

¹Then Job answered,

²"No doubt, but you are the people, and wisdom shall die with you.

³But I have understanding as well as you; I am not inferior to you. Yes, who doesn't know such things as these?

⁴I am like one who is a joke to his neighbor, I, who called on God, and he answered. The just, the blameless man is a joke.

⁵In the thought of him who is at ease there is contempt for misfortune. It is ready for them whose foot slips.

⁶The tents of robbers prosper. Those who provoke God are secure, who carry their God in their hands.

⁷"But ask the animals, now, and they shall teach you; the birds of the sky, and they shall tell you.

⁸Or speak to the earth, and it shall teach you. The fish of the sea shall declare to you.

⁹Who doesn't know that in all these, the hand of the Lord has done this,

¹⁰in whose hand is the life of every living thing, and the breath of all mankind?

¹¹Doesn't the ear try words, even as the palate tastes its food?

¹²With aged men is wisdom, in length of days understanding.

¹³"With God is wisdom and might. He has counsel and understanding.

¹⁴Behold, he breaks down, and it can't be built again. He imprisons a man, and there can be no release.

¹⁵Behold, he withholds the waters, and they dry up. Again, he sends them out, and they overturn the earth.

¹⁶With him is strength and wisdom. The deceived and the deceiver are his.

¹⁷He leads counselors away stripped. He makes judges fools.

¹⁸He loosens the bond of kings. He binds their waist with a belt.

¹⁹He leads priests away stripped, and overthrows the mighty.

²⁰He removes the speech of those who are trusted, and takes away the understanding of the elders.

²¹He pours contempt on princes, and loosens the belt of the strong.

²²He uncovers deep things out of darkness, and brings out to light the shadow of death.

²³He increases the nations, and he destroys them. He enlarges the nations, and he leads them captive.

²⁴He takes away understanding from the chiefs of the people of the earth, and causes them to wander in a wilderness where there is no way.

²⁵They grope in the dark without light. He makes them stagger like a drunken man.

¹"Behold, my eye has seen all this. My ear has heard and understood it.

²What you know, I know also. I am not inferior to you.

³"Surely I would speak to the Almighty. I desire to reason with God.

⁴But you are forgers of lies. You are all physicians of no value.

⁵Oh that you would be completely silent! Then you would be wise.

⁶Hear now my reasoning. Listen to the pleadings of my lips.

⁷Will you speak unrighteously for God, and talk deceitfully for him?

⁸Will you show partiality to him? Will you contend for God?

⁹Is it good that he should search you out? Or as one deceives a man, will you deceive him?

¹⁰He will surely reprove you if you secretly show partiality.

¹¹Shall not his majesty make you afraid, And his dread fall on you?

¹²Your memorable sayings are proverbs of ashes, Your defenses are defenses of clay.

¹³"Be silent, leave me alone, that I may speak. Let come on me what will.

¹⁴Why should I take my flesh in my teeth, and put my life in my hand?

¹⁵Behold, he will kill me. I have no hope. Nevertheless, I will maintain my ways before him.

¹⁶This also shall be my salvation, that a godless man shall not come before him.

¹⁷Hear diligently my speech. Let my declaration be in your ears.

¹⁸See now, I have set my cause in order. I know that I am righteous.

¹⁹Who is he who will contend with me? For then would I hold my peace and give up the spirit.

²⁰"Only do not do two things to me; then I will not hide myself from your face:

²¹withdraw your hand far from me; and do not let your terror make me afraid.

²²Then call, and I will answer; or let me speak, and you answer me.

²³How many are my iniquities and sins? Make me know my disobedience and my sin.

²⁴Why hide you your face, and hold me for your enemy?

²⁵Will you harass a driven leaf? Will you pursue the dry stubble?

²⁶For you write bitter things against me, and make me inherit the iniquities of my youth:

²⁷You also put my feet in the stocks, and mark all my paths. You set a bound to the soles of my feet,

²⁸though I am decaying like a rotten thing, like a garment that is moth-eaten.

¹"Man, who is born of a woman, is of few days, and full of trouble.

²He comes forth like a flower, and is cut down. He also flees like a shadow, and doesn't continue.

³Do you open your eyes on such a one, and bring me into judgment with you?

⁴Who can bring a clean thing out of an unclean? Not one.

⁵Seeing his days are determined, the number of his months is with you, and you have appointed his bounds that he can't pass;

⁶Look away from him, that he may rest, until he shall accomplish, as a hireling, his day.

⁷"For there is hope for a tree, If it is cut down, that it will sprout again, that the tender branch of it will not cease.

⁸Though its root grows old in the earth, and its stock dies in the ground,

⁹yet through the scent of water it will bud, and put forth boughs like a plant.

¹⁰But man dies, and is laid low. Yes, man gives up the spirit, and where is he?

¹¹As the waters fail from the sea, and the river wastes and dries up,

¹²so man lies down and doesn't rise. Until the heavens are no more, they shall not awake, nor be roused out of their sleep.

¹³"Oh that you would hide me in Sheol, that you would keep me secret, until your wrath is past, that you would appoint me a set time, and remember me!

¹⁴If a man dies, shall he live again? All the days of my warfare would I wait, until my release should come.

¹⁵You would call, and I would answer you. You would have a desire to the work of your hands.

¹⁶But now you number my steps. Do you not watch over my sin?

¹⁷My disobedience is sealed up in a bag. You fasten up my iniquity.

¹⁸"But the mountain falling comes to nothing. The rock is removed out of its place;

¹⁹The waters wear the stones. The torrents of it wash away the dust of the earth. So you destroy the hope of man.

²⁰You forever prevail against him, and he departs. You change his face, and send him away.

²¹His sons come to honor, and he doesn't know it. They are brought low, but he doesn't perceive it of them.

²²But his flesh on him has pain, and his soul within him mourns."

¹Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus through the will of God, and Timothy our brother, to the church of God which is at Corinth, with all the saints who are in the whole of Achaia:

²Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.

³Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies and God of all comfort;

⁴who comforts us in all our affliction, that we may be able to comfort those who are in any affliction, through the comfort with which we ourselves are comforted by God.

⁵For as the sufferings of Christ abound to us, even so our comfort also abounds through Christ.

⁶But if we are afflicted, it is for your comfort and salvation. If we are comforted, it is for your comfort, which produces in you the patient enduring of the same sufferings which we also suffer.

⁷Our hope for you is steadfast, knowing that, since you are partakers of the sufferings, so also are you of the comfort.

⁸For we do not desire to have you uninformed, brothers, concerning our affliction which happened in Asia, that we were weighed down exceedingly, beyond our power, so much that we despaired even of life.

⁹Yes, we ourselves have had the sentence of death within ourselves, that we should not trust in ourselves, but in God who raises the dead,

¹⁰who delivered us out of so great a death, and does deliver; on whom we have set our hope that he will also still deliver us;

¹¹you also helping together on our behalf by your supplication; that, for the gift bestowed on us by means of many, thanks may be given by many persons on our behalf.

¹²For our boasting is this: the testimony of our conscience, that in holiness and sincerity of God, not in fleshly wisdom but in the grace of God we behaved ourselves in the world, and more abundantly toward you.

¹³For we write no other things to you, than what you read or even acknowledge, and I hope you will acknowledge to the end;

¹⁴as also you acknowledged us in part, that we are your boasting, even as you also are ours, in the day of our Lord Jesus.

¹⁵In this confidence, I was determined to come first to you, that you might have a second benefit;

¹⁶and by you to pass into Macedonia, and again from Macedonia to come to you, and to be sent forward by you on my journey to Judea.

¹⁷When I therefore was thus determined, did I show fickleness? Or the things that I purpose, do I purpose according to the flesh, that with me there should be the "Yes, yes" and the "No, no?"

¹⁸But as God is faithful, our word toward you is not "Yes and no."

¹⁹For the Son of God, Jesus Christ, who was preached among you by us, by me, Silvanus, and Timothy, was not "Yes and no," but in him is "Yes."

²⁰For however many are the promises of God, in him they are "Yes." Therefore also through him they are "Amen," to the glory of God through us.

²¹Now he who establishes us with you in Christ, and anointed us, is God;

²²who also sealed us, and gave us the down payment of the Spirit in our hearts.

²³But I call God for a witness to my soul, that I did not come to Corinth to spare you.

²⁴Not that we have lordship over your faith, but are fellow workers with you for your joy. For you stand firm in faith.

¹Praise Yah! Praise God in his sanctuary! Praise him in his heavens for his acts of power!

²Praise him for his mighty acts! Praise him according to his excellent greatness!

³Praise him with the sounding of the trumpet! Praise him with harp and lyre!

⁴Praise him with tambourine and dancing! Praise him with stringed instruments and flute!

⁵Praise him with loud cymbals! Praise him with resounding cymbals!

⁶Let everything that has breath praise Yah! Praise Yah!

¹Like snow in summer, and as rain in harvest, so honor is not fitting for a fool.

²Like a fluttering sparrow, like a darting swallow, so the undeserved curse doesn't come to rest.

³A whip is for the horse, a bridle for the donkey, and a rod for the back of fools!

⁴Do not answer a fool according to his folly, lest you also be like him.

⁵Answer a fool according to his folly, lest he be wise in his own eyes.

⁶One who sends a message by the hand of a fool is cutting off feet and drinking violence.

⁷Like the legs of the lame that hang loose: so is a parable in the mouth of fools.

⁸As one who binds a stone in a sling, so is he who gives honor to a fool.

⁹Like a thornbush that goes into the hand of a drunkard, so is a parable in the mouth of fools.

¹⁰As an archer who wounds all, so is he who hires a fool or he who hires those who pass by.

¹¹As a dog that returns to his vomit, so is a fool who repeats his folly.

¹²Do you see a man wise in his own eyes? There is more hope for a fool than for him.

¹³The sluggard says, "There is a lion in the road! A fierce lion roams the streets!"

¹⁴As the door turns on its hinges, so does the sluggard on his bed.

¹⁵The sluggard buries his hand in the dish. He is too lazy to bring it back to his mouth.

¹⁶The sluggard is wiser in his own eyes than seven men who answer with discretion.

¹⁷Like one who grabs a dog's ears is one who passes by and meddles in a quarrel not his own.

¹⁸Like a madman who shoots firebrands, arrows, and death,

¹⁹is the man who deceives his neighbor and says, "Am I not joking?"

²⁰For lack of wood a fire goes out. Without gossip, a quarrel dies down.

²¹As coals are to hot embers, and wood to fire, so is a contentious man to kindling strife.

²²The words of a whisperer are as dainty morsels, they go down into the innermost parts.

²³Like silver dross on an earthen vessel are the lips of a fervent one with an evil heart.

²⁴A malicious man disguises himself with his lips, but he harbors evil in his heart.

²⁵When his speech is charming, do not believe him; for there are seven abominations in his heart.

²⁶His malice may be concealed by deception, but his wickedness will be exposed in the assembly.

²⁷Whoever digs a pit shall fall into it. Whoever rolls a stone, it will come back on him.

²⁸A lying tongue hates those it hurts; and a flattering mouth works ruin.