Job 20:4-11

New International Reader's Version

⁴ “I’m sure you must know how things have always been.
    They’ve been that way
    ever since human beings were placed on this earth.
⁵ Those who are evil are happy for only a short time.
    The joy of ungodly people lasts only for a moment.
⁶ Their pride might reach all the way up to the heavens.
    Their heads might touch the clouds.
⁷ But they will disappear forever,
    like the waste from their own bodies.
Anyone who has seen them will say,
    ‘Where did they go?’
⁸ Like a dream they will fly away.
    They will never be seen again.
    They will be driven away like visions in the night.
⁹ The eyes that saw them won’t see them anymore.
    Even their own families won’t remember them.
¹⁰ Their children must pay back what they took from poor people.
    Their own hands must give back the wealth they stole.
¹¹ They might feel young and very strong.
    But they will soon lie down in the dust of their graves.