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New Living Translation |   | |
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| | Job 9:1 | Then Job spoke again:
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| | Job 9:2 | "Yes, I know this is all true in principle. But how can a person be declared innocent in the eyes of God?
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| | Job 9:3 | If someone wanted to take God to court, would it be possible to answer him even once in a thousand times?
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| | Job 9:4 | For God is so wise and so mighty. Who has ever challenged him successfully?
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| | Job 9:5 | "Without warning, he moves the mountains, overturning them in his anger.
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| | Job 9:6 | He shakes the earth from its place, and its foundations tremble.
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| | Job 9:7 | If he commands it, the sun won't rise and the stars won't shine.
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| | Job 9:8 | He alone has spread out the heavens and marches on the waves of the sea.
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| | Job 9:9 | He made all the stars--the Bear, Orion, the Pleiades, and the constellations of the southern sky.
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| | Job 9:10 | His great works are too marvelous to understand. He performs miracles without number.
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| | Job 9:11 | Yet when he comes near, I cannot see him. When he moves on, I do not see him go.
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| | Job 9:12 | If he sends death to snatch someone away, who can stop him? Who dares to ask him, 'What are you doing?'
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| | Job 9:13 | And God does not restrain his anger. The mightiest forces against him are crushed beneath his feet.
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| | Job 9:14 | "And who am I, that I should try to answer God or even reason with him?
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| | Job 9:15 | Even if I were innocent, I would have no defense. I could only plead for mercy.
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| | Job 9:16 | And even if I summoned him and he responded, he would never listen to me.
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| | Job 9:17 | For he attacks me without reason, and he multiplies my wounds without cause.
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| | Job 9:18 | He will not let me catch my breath, but fills me instead with bitter sorrows.
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| | Job 9:19 | As for strength, he has it. As for justice, who can challenge him?
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| | Job 9:20 | Though I am innocent, my own mouth would pronounce me guilty. Though I am blameless, it would prove me wicked.
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| | Job 9:21 | "I am innocent, but it makes no difference to me--I despise my life.
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| | Job 9:22 | Innocent or wicked, it is all the same to him. That is why I say, 'He destroys both the blameless and the wicked.'
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| | Job 9:23 | He laughs when a plague suddenly kills the innocent.
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| | Job 9:24 | The whole earth is in the hands of the wicked, and God blinds the eyes of the judges and lets them be unfair. If not he, then who?
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| | Job 9:25 | "My life passes more swiftly than a runner. It flees away, filled with tragedy.
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| | Job 9:26 | It disappears like a swift boat, like an eagle that swoops down on its prey.
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| | Job 9:27 | If I decided to forget my complaints, if I decided to end my sadness and be cheerful,
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| | Job 9:28 | I would dread all the pain he would send. For I know you will not hold me innocent, O God.
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| | Job 9:29 | Whatever happens, I will be found guilty. So what's the use of trying?
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| | Job 9:30 | Even if I were to wash myself with soap and cleanse my hands with lye to make them absolutely clean,
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| | Job 9:31 | you would plunge me into a muddy ditch, and I would be so filthy my own clothing would hate me.
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| | Job 9:32 | "God is not a mortal like me, so I cannot argue with him or take him to trial.
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| | Job 9:33 | If only there were a mediator who could bring us together, but there is none.
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| | Job 9:34 | The mediator could make God stop beating me, and I would no longer live in terror of his punishment.
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| | Job 9:35 | Then I could speak to him without fear, but I cannot do that in my own strength.
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