Job 3; Job 4; Acts 7:44-60

Job 3

1 After this Job began to speak and cursed the day he was born.

2 He said:

3 May the day I was born perish, and the night when they said, "A boy is conceived."

4 If only that day had turned to darkness! May God above not care about it, or light shine on it.

5 May darkness and gloom reclaim it, and a cloud settle over it. May an eclipse of the sun terrify it.

6 If only darkness had taken that night away! May it not appear among the days of the year or be listed in the calendar.

7 Yes, may that night be barren; may no joyful shout be heard in it.

8 Let those who curse [certain] days cast a spell on it, those who are skilled in rousing Leviathan.

9 May its morning stars grow dark. May it wait for daylight but have none; may it not see the breaking of dawn.

10 For that night did not shut the doors of my [mother's] womb, and hide sorrow from my eyes.

11 Why was I not stillborn; [why] didn't I die as I came from the womb?

12 Why did the knees receive me, and why were there breasts for me to nurse?

13 For then I would have laid down in peace; I would be asleep. Then I would be at rest

14 with the kings and counselors of the earth, who rebuilt ruined cities for themselves,

15 or with princes who had gold, who filled their houses with silver.

16 Or [why] was I not hidden like a miscarried child, like infants who never see daylight?

17 There the wicked cease to make trouble, and there the weary find rest.

18 The captives are completely at ease; they do not hear the voice of [their] oppressor.

19 Both the small and the great are there, and the slave is set free from his master.

20 Why is light given to one burdened with grief, and life to those whose existence is bitter,

21 who wait for death, but it does not come, and search for it more than for hidden treasure,

22 who are filled with much joy and are glad when they reach the grave?

23 [Why is life given] to a man whose path is hidden, whom God has hedged in?

24 I sigh when food is [put] before me, and my groans pour out like water.

25 For the thing I feared has overtaken me, and what I dreaded has happened to me.

26 I cannot relax or be still; I have no rest, for trouble comes.

Job 4

1 Then Eliphaz the Temanite replied:

2 Should anyone try to speak with you when you are exhausted? Yet who can keep from speaking?

3 Look! You have instructed many and have strengthened weak hands.

4 Your words have steadied the one who was stumbling, and braced the knees that were buckling.

5 But now that this has happened to you, you have become exhausted. It strikes you, and you are dismayed.

6 Isn't your piety your confidence, and the integrity of your life your hope?

7 Consider: who has perished when he was innocent? Where have the honest been destroyed?

8 In my experience, those who plow injustice and those who sow trouble reap the same.

9 They perish at a [single] blast from God and come to an end by the breath of His nostrils.

10 The lion may roar and the fierce lion growl, but the fangs of young lions are broken.

11 The strong lion dies if [it catches] no prey, and the cubs of the lioness are scattered.

12 A word was brought to me in secret; my ears caught a whisper of it.

13 Among unsettling thoughts from visions in the night, when deep sleep descends on men,

14 fear and trembling came over me and made all my bones shake.

15 A wind passed by me, and I shuddered with fear.

16 [A figure] stood there, but I could not recognize its appearance; a form loomed before my eyes. I heard a quiet voice:

17 "Can a person be more righteous than God, or a man more pure than his Maker?"

18 If God puts no trust in His servants and He charges His angels with foolishness,

19 how much more those who dwell in clay houses, whose foundation is in the dust, who are crushed like a moth!

20 They are smashed to pieces from dawn to dusk; they perish forever while no one notices.

21 Are their tent cords not pulled up? They die without wisdom.

Acts 7:44-60

44 "Our forefathers had the tabernacle of the testimony in the desert, just as He who spoke to Moses commanded him to make it according to the pattern he had seen.

45 Our forefathers in turn received it and with Joshua brought it in when they dispossessed the nations that God drove out before our fathers, until the days of David.

46 He found favor in God's sight and asked that he might provide a dwelling place for the God of Jacob.

47 But it was Solomon who built Him a house.

48 However, the Most High does not dwell in sanctuaries made with hands, as the prophet says:

49 Heaven is My throne, and earth My footstool. What sort of house will you build for Me? says the Lord, or what is My resting place?

50 Did not My hand make all these things?

51 "You stiff-necked people with uncircumcised hearts and ears! You are always resisting the Holy Spirit; as your forefathers did, so do you.

52 Which of the prophets did your fathers not persecute? They even killed those who announced beforehand the coming of the Righteous One, whose betrayers and murderers you have now become.

53 You received the law under the direction of angels and yet have not kept it."

54 When they heard these things, they were enraged in their hearts and gnashed their teeth at him.

55 But Stephen, filled by the Holy Spirit, gazed into heaven. He saw God's glory, with Jesus standing at the right hand of God, and he said,

56 "Look! I see the heavens opened and the Son of Man standing at the right hand of God!"

57 Then they screamed at the top of their voices, stopped their ears, and rushed together against him.

58 They threw him out of the city and began to stone him. And the witnesses laid their robes at the feet of a young man named Saul.

59 They were stoning Stephen as he called out: "Lord Jesus, receive my spirit!"

60 Then he knelt down and cried out with a loud voice, "Lord, do not charge them with this sin!" And saying this, he fell asleep.