The Daily Audio Bible
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23 1-2 I still rebel and complain against God;
I cannot keep from groaning.
3 How I wish I knew where to find him,
and knew how to go where he is.
4 I would state my case before him
and present all the arguments in my favor.
5 I want to know what he would say
and how he would answer me.
6 Would God use all his strength against me?
No, he would listen as I spoke.
7 I am honest; I could reason with God;
he would declare me innocent[a] once and for all.
8 I have searched in the East, but God is not there;
I have not found him when I searched in the West.
9 God has been at work in the North and the South,
but still I have not seen him.
10 Yet God knows every step I take;
if he tests me, he will find me pure.
11 I follow faithfully the road he chooses,
and never wander to either side.
12 I always do what God commands;
I follow his will, not my own desires.
13 He never changes. No one can oppose him
or stop him from doing what he wants to do.
14 He will fulfill what he has planned for me;
that plan is just one of the many he has;
15 I tremble with fear before him.
16-17 Almighty God has destroyed my courage.
It is God, not the dark, that makes me afraid—
even though the darkness has made me blind.
24 Why doesn't God set a time for judging,
a day of justice for those who serve him?
2 People move property lines to get more land;
they steal sheep and put them with their own flocks.
3 They take donkeys that belong to orphans,
and keep a widow's ox till she pays her debts.
4 They prevent the poor from getting their rights
and force the needy to run and hide.
5 So the poor, like wild donkeys,
search for food in the dry wilderness;
nowhere else can they find food for their children.
6 They have to harvest fields they don't own,[b]
and gather grapes in vineyards of the wicked.
7 At night they sleep with nothing to cover them,
nothing to keep them from the cold.
8 They are drenched by the rain that falls on the mountains,
and they huddle beside the rocks for shelter.
9 Evil people make slaves of fatherless infants
and take the children of the poor in payment for debts.
10 But the poor must go out with no clothes to protect them;
they must go hungry while harvesting wheat.
11 They press olives for oil, and grapes for wine,
but they themselves are thirsty.
12 In the cities the wounded and dying cry out,
but God ignores their prayers.
13 There are those who reject the light;
they don't understand it or go where it leads.
14 At dawn the murderer gets up
and goes out to kill the poor,
and at night he steals.
15 The adulterer waits for twilight to come;
he covers his face so that no one can see him.
16 At night thieves break into houses,
but by day they hide and avoid the light.
17 They fear the light of day,
but darkness holds no terror for them.
[Zophar][c]
18 The wicked are swept away by floods,
and the land they own is under God's curse;
they no longer go to work in their vineyards.
19 As snow vanishes in heat and drought,
so sinners vanish from the land of the living.
20 Not even their mothers remember them now;
they are eaten by worms and destroyed like fallen trees.
21 That happens because they mistreated widows
and showed no kindness to childless women.
22 God, in his strength, destroys the mighty;
God acts—and the wicked die.
23 God may let them live secure,
but keeps an eye on them all the time.
24 For a while the wicked prosper,
but then they wither like weeds,
like stalks of grain that have been cut down.
25 Can anyone deny that this is so?
Can anyone prove that my words are not true?
25 1-2 God is powerful; all must stand in awe of him;
he keeps his heavenly kingdom in peace.
3 Can anyone count the angels who serve him?
Is there any place where God's light does not shine?
4 Can anyone be righteous or pure in God's sight?
5 In his eyes even the moon is not bright,
or the stars pure.
6 Then what about a human being, that worm, that insect?
What is a human life worth in God's eyes?
26 1-2 What a big help you are to me—
poor, weak man that I am!
3 You give such good advice
and share your knowledge with a fool like me!
4 Who do you think will hear all your words?
Who inspired you to speak like this?
[Bildad][d]
5 The spirits of the dead tremble
in the waters under the earth.
6 The world of the dead lies open to God;
no covering shields it from his sight.
7 God stretched out the northern sky
and hung the earth in empty space.
8 It is God who fills the clouds with water
and keeps them from bursting with the weight.
9 He hides the full moon behind a cloud.
10 He divided light from darkness
by a circle drawn on the face of the sea.
11 When he threatens the pillars that hold up the sky,
they shake and tremble with fear.
12 It is his strength that conquered the sea;[e]
by his skill he destroyed the monster Rahab.[f]
13 It is his breath that made the sky clear,
and his hand that killed the escaping monster.[g]
14 But these are only hints of his power,
only the whispers that we have heard.
Who can know how truly great God is?
27 1-2 I swear by the living Almighty God,
who refuses me justice and makes my life bitter—
3 as long as God gives me breath,
4 my lips will never say anything evil,
my tongue will never tell a lie.
5 I will never say that you men are right;
I will insist on my innocence to my dying day.
6 I will never give up my claim to be right;
my conscience is clear.
7 May all who oppose me and fight against me
be punished like the wicked and the unrighteous.
8 What hope is there for the godless
in the hour when God demands their life?
9 When trouble comes, will God hear their cries?
10 They should have desired the joy he gives;
they should have constantly prayed to him.
11 Let me teach you how great is God's power,
and explain what Almighty God has planned.
12 But no, after all, you have seen for yourselves;
so why do you talk such nonsense?
[Zophar][h]
13 This is how Almighty God
punishes wicked, violent people.
14 They may have many sons,
but all will be killed in war;
their children never have enough to eat.
15 Those who survive will die from disease,
and even their widows will not mourn their death.
16 The wicked may have too much silver to count
and more clothes than anyone needs;
17 but some good person will wear the clothes,
and someone honest will get the silver.
18 The wicked build houses like a spider's web[i]
or like the hut of a slave guarding the fields.
19 One last time[j] they will lie down rich,
and when they wake up, they will find their wealth gone.
20 Terror will strike like a sudden flood;
a wind in the night will blow them away;
21 the east wind will sweep them from their homes;
22 it will blow down on them without pity
while they try their best to escape.
23 The wind howls at them as they run,
frightening them with destructive power.
The Change in Paul's Plans
12 We are proud that our conscience assures us that our lives in this world, and especially our relations with you, have been ruled by God-given frankness[a] and sincerity, by the power of God's grace and not by human wisdom. 13-14 We write to you only what you can read and understand. But even though you now understand us only in part, I hope that you will come to understand us completely, so that in the Day of our Lord Jesus you can be as proud of us as we shall be of you.
15 I was so sure of all this that I made plans at first to visit you, in order that you might be blessed twice. 16 (A)For I planned to visit you on my way to Macedonia and again on my way back, in order to get help from you for my trip to Judea. 17 In planning this, did I appear fickle? When I make my plans, do I make them from selfish motives, ready to say “Yes, yes” and “No, no” at the same time? 18 As surely as God speaks the truth, my promise to you was not a “Yes” and a “No.” 19 (B)For Jesus Christ, the Son of God, who was preached among you by Silas, Timothy, and myself, is not one who is “Yes” and “No.” On the contrary, he is God's “Yes”; 20 for it is he who is the “Yes” to all of God's promises. This is why through Jesus Christ our “Amen” is said to the glory of God. 21 It is God himself who makes us, together with you, sure of our life in union with Christ; it is God himself who has set us apart, 22 who has placed his mark of ownership upon us, and who has given us the Holy Spirit in our hearts as the guarantee of all that he has in store for us.
23 I call God as my witness—he knows my heart! It was in order to spare you that I decided not to go to Corinth. 24 We are not trying to dictate to you what you must believe; we know that you stand firm in the faith. Instead, we are working with you for your own happiness.
2 So I made up my mind not to come to you again to make you sad. 2 For if I were to make you sad, who would be left to cheer me up? Only the very persons I had made sad. 3 That is why I wrote that letter to you—I did not want to come to you and be made sad by the very people who should make me glad. For I am convinced that when I am happy, then all of you are happy too. 4 I wrote you with a greatly troubled and distressed heart and with many tears; my purpose was not to make you sad, but to make you realize how much I love you all.
Forgiveness for the Offender
5 Now, if anyone has made somebody sad, he has not done it to me but to all of you—in part, at least. (I say this because I do not want to be too hard on him.) 6 It is enough that this person has been punished in this way by most of you. 7 Now, however, you should forgive him and encourage him, in order to keep him from becoming so sad as to give up completely. 8 And so I beg you to let him know that you really do love him. 9 I wrote you that letter because I wanted to find out how well you had stood the test and whether you are always ready to obey my instructions. 10 When you forgive people for what they have done, I forgive them too. For when I forgive—if, indeed, I need to forgive anything—I do it in Christ's presence because of you, 11 in order to keep Satan from getting the upper hand over us; for we know what his plans are.
A Prayer in Sickness[a]
41 Happy are those who are concerned for the poor;
the Lord will help them when they are in trouble.
2 The Lord will protect them and preserve their lives;
he will make them happy in the land;
he will not abandon them to the power of their enemies.
3 The Lord will help them when they are sick
and will restore them to health.
4 I said, “I have sinned against you, Lord;
be merciful to me and heal me.”
5 My enemies say cruel things about me.
They want me to die and be forgotten.
6 Those who come to see me are not sincere;
they gather bad news about me
and then go out and tell it everywhere.
7 All who hate me whisper to each other about me,
they imagine the worst about[b] me.
8 They say, “He is fatally ill;
he will never leave his bed again.”
9 (A)Even my best friend, the one I trusted most,
the one who shared my food,
has turned against me.
10 Be merciful to me, Lord, and restore my health,
and I will pay my enemies back.
11 They will not triumph over me,
and I will know that you are pleased with me.
12 You will help me, because I do what is right;
you will keep me in your presence forever.
13 (B)Praise the Lord, the God of Israel!
Praise him now and forever!
Amen! Amen!
5 If you love your life, stay away from the traps that catch the wicked along the way.
6 (A)Teach children how they should live, and they will remember it all their life.
Good News Translation® (Today’s English Version, Second Edition) © 1992 American Bible Society. All rights reserved. For more information about GNT, visit www.bibles.com and www.gnt.bible.