Job 27:11-21

11 "I've given you a clear account of God in action, suppressed nothing regarding God Almighty.
12 The evidence is right before you. You can all see it for yourselves, so why do you keep talking nonsense?
13 "I'll quote your own words back to you: "'This is how God treats the wicked, this is what evil people can expect from God Almighty:
14 Their children - all of them - will die violent deaths; they'll never have enough bread to put on the table.
15 They'll be wiped out by the plague, and none of the widows will shed a tear when they're gone.
16 Even if they make a lot of money and are resplendent in the latest fashions,
17 It's the good who will end up wearing the clothes and the decent who will divide up the money.
18 They build elaborate houses that won't survive a single winter.
19 They go to bed wealthy and wake up poor.
20 Terrors pour in on them like flash floods - a tornado snatches them away in the middle of the night,
21 A cyclone sweeps them up - gone! Not a trace of them left, not even a footprint.

Job 27:11-21 Meaning and Commentary

INTRODUCTION TO JOB 27

Though Job's friends were become silent, and dropped the controversy with him, he still continued his discourse in this and the four following chapters; in which he asserts his integrity; illustrates and confirms his former sentiments; gives further proof of his knowledge of things, natural and divine; takes notice of his former state of prosperity, and of his present distresses and afflictions, which came upon him, notwithstanding his piety, humanity, and beneficence, and his freedom from the grosser acts of sin, both with respect to God and men, all which he enlarges upon. In this chapter he gives his word and oath for it, that he would never belie himself, and own that he was an hypocrite, when he was not, but would continue to assert his integrity, and the righteousness of his cause, as long as he lived, Job 27:1-6; for to be an hypocrite, and to attempt to conceal his hypocrisy, would be of no advantage to him, either in life, or in death, Job 27:7-10; and was this his character and case, upon their principles, he could expect no other than to be a miserable man, as wicked men are, who have their blessings turned into curses, or taken away from them, and they removed out of the world in the most awful and terrible manner, and under manifest tokens of the wrath and displeasure of God, Job 27:11-23.

Published by permission. Originally published by NavPress in English as THE MESSAGE: The Bible in Contemporary Language copyright 2002 by Eugene Peterson. All rights reserved.