Job 8  EasyEnglish Bible

² ‘You should not continue to talk like this.
    Your words are like a wind that blows strongly.
³ Surely you know that God is fair.
    The Almighty God never changes right things into wrong things.
⁴ Your children did things that were wrong.
    That is why God punished them.
⁵ But you should pray to Almighty God.
    You should ask him to help you.
⁶ If you are honest and live in the right way,
    God will do something to help you.
He will give you a family again
    that will bring you honour.
⁷ You will be successful in the future,
    with more riches than you had before.
⁸ Think about the people who lived before us.
    Study the things that our ancestors learned.
⁹ We have not lived for very long,
    so we do not know very much.
Our lives are like shadows that quickly disappear.
¹⁰ But the people who lived before us can teach you.
    They can tell you the things that they have learned.
¹¹ Some plants only grow tall in wet ground.
    Reeds only grow well where there is water.
¹² If the water is no longer there,
    they will quickly die.
They will die before they are ready for people to cut them.
    They become useless more quickly than grass.
¹³ People who turn away from God are like those plants.
    Their hope quickly disappears.
¹⁴ They trust in useless things to help them.
    Those things are as weak as a spider's web.^[b]
15 If they expect something like that to help them,
    it will fall down and leave them.
If they take hold of it,
    it will not keep them safe.
¹⁶ People who turn away from God are like weeds.
When there is plenty of water and the sun shines on them,
    they grow all over the garden.
¹⁷ Their roots grow around a heap of stones.
    They have a strong home among the rocks.
¹⁸ But finally, someone pulls those weeds out of the ground.
When that happens,
    nobody knows that the weeds were ever there.
¹⁹ People who are like weeds only have that kind of joy.
    When they disappear, other weeds grow in their place.

²⁰ Listen! God never turns away from a man who is not guilty.
    Nor will he ever help wicked people.
²¹ He will surely make you happy again.
    You will be able to laugh and shout with joy.
²² People who hate you will be ashamed.
    Wicked people will have nowhere to live.’