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22
Eliphaz replied again
1 Then Eliphaz replied, saying this:
2 “◄Can anyone be useful to God?/Certainly no one can be useful to God.► [RHQ]
People who are wise can be useful to themselves, but not to God.
3 If you were righteous, ◄would that benefit Almighty God?/that certainly would not benefit Almighty God. ► [RHQ]
If you had ◄lived a perfect life/never done anything that is wrong►, would that help him?
4 Is it because you have an awesome respect for God that he punishes you?
Is that the reason that he puts you on trial?
5 No, it certainly must be [RHQ] because you are extremely wicked.
It must be that no one can count the evil things that you have done!
6 You must have lent money to others and wrongly forced them to give you things to guarantee that they would pay that money back to you;
you must have taken all their clothes and left them with nothing to wear.
7 You must not have given water to those who were thirsty,
and you must have refused to give food to those who were hungry.
8 Because you were very powerful, you must have taken over all the people's land,
and then, being very respected, you have begun to live on that land.
9 When widows came to you for help, you must have sent them away without giving them anything,
and you must have oppressed orphans.
10 Because of all that, now there are pits around you for you to fall into,
and suddenly there are things that terrify you and cause you to tremble.
11 It is as though it has become very dark, with the result that you cannot see anything,
and it is as though [MET] a flood covers you.
12 But consider this, Job: God lives [RHQ] high up in the heavens.
From there he [RHQ] looks down on the highest stars.
13 So why do you say, ‘What does God know about what we are doing?
He is hidden from us by dark clouds, so ◄how can he judge us?/he certainly cannot judge us.► [RHQ]’
14 Do you think that while he walks on the dome that covers the sky,
there are thick clouds around him, with the result that he cannot see what we do?
15 Will you continue to conduct your life the old way
that evil people have done for many years?
16 They suddenly died while they were still young;
they disappeared like everything disappears when there is a flood [MET].
17 They kept saying to God, ‘◄Allow us to be alone/Do not bother us►,’
and they also said defiantly, ‘Almighty God can do nothing [RHQ] to harm us!’
18 But it was God who filled their houses with good things,
so I cannot at all understand why wicked people think like they do.
19 But when God punishes wicked people, and righteous people see that, they are glad,
and they laugh, ridiculing the wicked people.
20 They say, ‘Now our enemies have been destroyed,
and all their possessions that were left have been burned in a fire.’
21 So, Job, be reconciled to God and make peace with him;
if you do that, good things will happen to you.
22 Allow him to teach you,
and put his words into your ◄mind/inner being►.
23 If you humble yourself and return to God,
if you stop doing all the evil things that you have been doing in your house,
24 if you throw away your gold,
even the fine gold from the dry stream beds in Ophir land,
25 and if you allow Almighty God to be as precious to you as your gold and your silver have been,
26 you will be happy because of your close relationship with God,
and you will be able to approach him [IDI] confidently.
27 You will pray to him, and he will do what you request him to do;
you will do the things that you promised him that you would do.
28 Everything that you decide to do will be successful;
it will be as though a light is shining on the road in front of you.
29 God humbles those who are proud,
but he saves those who are downcast/discouraged.
30 God rescues those who ◄are innocent/have not done things that are wrong►,
so he will rescue you if you ◄start doing things that are right/are not guilty [IDI] of doing things that are wrong►.”

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© 2008-2016 Ellis W. Deibler, Jr.