Job to Bildad: My Redeemer Lives

Job 19

Then Job answered,

“How long will y’all torment me, and will y’all crush me with words? Y’all have reproached me ten times. Y’all aren’t ashamed to mistreat me. If it is true that I have erred, my error remains with myself. If indeed y’all will magnify yourselves against me, and y’all plead against me my reproach, Y’all should know now that God has subverted me, and has surrounded me with ʜɪꜱ net.

 

“I cry out ‘Violence!’ but I am not heard. I cry for help, but there is no justice. Hᴇ has walled up my way so that I can’t pass, and has set darkness in my paths. Hᴇ has stripped me of my glory, and taken the crown from my head. Hᴇ has broken me down on every side, and I am gone. Hᴇ has uprooted my hope up like a tree. Hɪꜱ anger is kindled against me. Hᴇ counts me among ʜɪꜱ enemies. Hɪꜱ troops come on together, build a siege ramp against me, and encamp around my tent.

 

“Hᴇ has removed my from me. My acquaintances are wholly estranged from me. My relatives have gone away. My familiar friends have forgotten me. Those who dwell in my house and my female servants consider me a stranger. I am an foreigner in their sight. I call to my servant, and he gives me no answer. I beg him with my mouth. My breath is offensive to my wife. I am loathsome to the children of my own mother. Even young children despise me. If I arise, they speak against me. All my familiar friends abhor me. They whom I loved have turned against me. My bones stick to my skin and to my flesh. I have escaped by the skin of my teeth.

 

“Y’all have pity on me, Y’all have pity on me, my friends, for the hand of God has touched me. Why do y’all persecute me as God does? Are y’all not satisfied with my flesh?

 

“Oh that my words were now written! Oh that they were inscribed in a book! That with an iron pen and lead they were engraved in the rock forever! But as for me, I know that my Redeemer lives. In the end, he will stand upon the earth. After my skin is destroyed, then I will see God in my flesh, whom I, even I, will see on my side. My eyes will see, and not as a stranger.

 

“My heart is consumed within me. If y’all say, ‘How we will persecute him!’ because the root of the matter is found in me, Y’all should be afraid of the sword, for wrath brings the punishments of the sword, so that y’all may know there is a judgment.”