Job 22

2 “Is it not the Lord who teaches understanding and knowledge?

3 What does it matter to the Lord if you were blameless in what you did?

Or what is gained if you keep your way straight?

4 Is it because he takes account of you that he will convict you

and go with you into judgment?

5 Is your evil not great,

and your sins beyond counting?

6 You took pledges from your brothers for no reason,

and stripped the clothing off the naked.

7 You gave no water to the thirsty to drink;

you kept back bread from the hungry.

8 You were impressed by the faces of certain men,

and you settled men on the land.

9 You sent widows away empty-handed,

and you did harm to orphans.

10 That is why traps are all around you,

and a terrible war has come at you in haste.

11 Your light has turned to darkness,

and while you lay down to sleep, water covered you.

12 Does the one who lives in the heights not look down and see?

Has he not brought low those who are carried along by arrogance?

13 And you said, ‘What does the Strong One know?

Will he give judgment through the thick darkness?

14 Clouds are his hiding place, and he will not be seen,

and he walks the circle of heaven.’

15 Will you keep to the ancient path,

the one that unrighteous men have trodden,

16 who were seized before their time?

Their foundations are an overflowing river.

17 They are the ones who say, ‘What will the Lord do to us?

Or what will the Almighty bring on us?’

18 Yet it was he who filled their houses with good things;

and the counsel of the ungodly is far from him.

19 The righteous saw it and laughed;

the blameless man mocked them.

20 Surely their substance was wiped out,

and fire will eat up what is left of them.

21 Make yourself hard, then, if you can endure,

and your fruit will be among good things.

22 Take a declaration from his mouth,

and store up his words in your heart.

23 If you turn back and humble yourself before the Lord,

you will have put what is unrighteous far from your home.

24 You will lay up your treasure on a mound among the rocks,

and Ophir will be to you like the rock of a mountain stream.

25 So the Almighty will be your helper against enemies,

and he will give you back pure, like silver refined in fire.

26 Then you will speak freely before the Lord,

looking up to heaven with a glad face.

27 When you pray to him he will hear you,

and he will grant you to pay what you vowed.

28 He will restore to you a home of righteousness,

and there will be light on your paths.

29 Because he has brought a man low, you will say, ‘He was arrogant’;

and he will save the one whose eyes are bent down.

30 He will rescue the guiltless;

and you, be saved by the cleanness of your hands.”