Feeding of the Five Thousand

¹⁰ When the apostles returned,^(A) they reported to Jesus all that they had done.^(B) He took them along and withdrew privately to a^[a] town called Bethsaida.^{(C) 11} When the crowds found out, they followed him. He welcomed them,^(D) spoke to them about the kingdom of God, and healed those who needed healing.

¹² Late in the day,^(E) the Twelve approached and said to him, “Send the crowd away,^(F) so that they can go into the surrounding villages and countryside to find food and lodging, because we are in a deserted place here.”

¹³ “You give them something to eat,” he told them.

“We have no more than five loaves^(G) and two fish,” they said, “unless we go and buy food for all these people.” ¹⁴ (For about five thousand men were there.)

Then he told his disciples, “Have them sit down^[b] in groups of about fifty each.” ¹⁵ They did what he said, and had them all sit down. ¹⁶ Then he took the five loaves and the two fish, and looking up to heaven,^(H) he blessed and broke them.^(I) He kept giving them to the disciples to set before the crowd. ¹⁷ Everyone ate and was filled. They picked up twelve baskets of leftover pieces.

Satan’s Second Test of Job

2 One day the sons of God^(A) came again to present themselves before the Lord, and Satan also came with them to present himself before the Lord. ² The Lord asked Satan, “Where have you come from?”

“From roaming through the earth,” Satan answered him, “and walking around on it.”

³ Then the Lord said to Satan, “Have you considered my servant Job? No one else on earth is like him, a man of perfect integrity,^(B) who fears God and turns away from evil.^(C) He still retains his integrity, even though you incited me against him, to destroy him for no good reason.”

⁴ “Skin for skin!” Satan answered the Lord. “A man will give up everything he owns in exchange for his life. ⁵ But stretch out your hand and strike^(D) his flesh and bones, and he will surely curse you to your face.”

⁶ “Very well,” the Lord told Satan, “he is in your power; only spare his life.” ⁷ So Satan left the Lord’s presence and infected Job with terrible boils from the soles of his feet to the top of his head.^{(E) 8} Then Job took a piece of broken pottery to scrape himself while he sat among the ashes.^(F)

⁹ His wife said to him, “Are you still holding on to your integrity? Curse God and die!”

¹⁰ “You speak as a foolish woman speaks,” he told her. “Should we accept only good from God and not adversity?” Throughout all this Job did not sin in what he said.^[a]

Job’s Three Friends

¹¹ Now when Job’s three friends—Eliphaz the Temanite,^(G) Bildad the Shuhite,^(H) and Zophar the Naamathite—heard about all this adversity that had happened to him, each of them came from his home. They met together to go and sympathize with him and comfort^(I) him. ¹² When they looked from a distance, they could barely recognize him. They wept aloud,^(J) and each man tore his robe and threw dust into the air and on his head.^{(K) 13} Then they sat on the ground with him seven days and nights,^(L) but no one spoke a word to him because they saw that his suffering^(M) was very intense.

Job’s Opening Speech

3 After this, Job began to speak and cursed the day he was born. ² He said:

The Guilt of the Gentile World

¹⁸ For God’s wrath^(A) is revealed from heaven against all godlessness and unrighteousness of people who by their unrighteousness suppress the truth,^{(B) 19} since what can be known^[a] about God is evident among them,^(C) because God has shown it to them. ²⁰ For his invisible attributes, that is, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly seen since the creation of the world,^(D) being understood through what he has made.^(E) As a result, people are without excuse. ²¹ For though they knew God, they did not glorify him as God or show gratitude. Instead, their thinking became worthless, and their senseless hearts were darkened.^{(F) 22} Claiming to be wise, they became fools^{(G) 23} and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images resembling mortal man, birds, four-footed animals, and reptiles.^(H)

²⁴ Therefore God delivered them over in the desires of their hearts^(I) to sexual impurity, so that their bodies were degraded among themselves. ²⁵ They exchanged the truth of God for a lie,^(J) and worshiped and served what has been created instead of the Creator, who is praised forever.^(K) Amen.

From Idolatry to Depravity

²⁶ For this reason God delivered them over to disgraceful passions.^(L) Their women^[b] exchanged natural sexual relations^[c] for unnatural ones. ²⁷ The men^[d] in the same way also left natural relations with women and were inflamed in their lust for one another. Men committed shameless acts with men^(M) and received in their own persons^[e] the appropriate penalty of their error.

²⁸ And because they did not think it worthwhile to acknowledge God, God delivered them over to a corrupt mind so that they do what is not right. ²⁹ They are filled with all unrighteousness,^[f] evil, greed, and wickedness. They are full of envy, murder, quarrels, deceit, and malice. They are gossips,^{(N) 30} slanderers, God-haters, arrogant, proud, boastful,^(O) inventors of evil, disobedient to parents,^{(P) 31} senseless, untrustworthy, unloving,^[g](Q) and unmerciful. ³² Although they know God’s just sentence—that those who practice such things deserve to die^[h](R)—they not only do them, but even applaud^[i](S) others who practice them.