Job 16

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¹Then Job spoke again: ²“I have heard all this before. What miserable comforters you are! ✦ ³Won’t you ever stop blowing hot air? What makes you keep on talking? ✦ ⁴I could say the same things if you were in my place. I could spout off criticism and shake my head at you. ✦ ⁵But if it were me, I would encourage you. I would try to take away your grief. ✦ ⁶Instead, I suffer if I defend myself, and I suffer no less if I refuse to speak. ✦ ⁷“O God, you have ground me down and devastated my family. ✦ ⁸As if to prove I have sinned, you’ve reduced me to skin and bones. My gaunt flesh testifies against me. ✦ ⁹God hates me and angrily tears me apart. He snaps his teeth at me and pierces me with his eyes. ✦ ¹⁰People jeer and laugh at me. They slap my cheek in contempt. A mob gathers against me. ✦ ¹¹God has handed me over to sinners. He has tossed me into the hands of the wicked. ✦ ¹²“I was living quietly until he shattered me. He took me by the neck and broke me in pieces. Then he set me up as his target, ✦ ¹³and now his archers surround me. His arrows pierce me without mercy. The ground is wet with my blood. ✦ ¹⁴Again and again he smashes against me, charging at me like a warrior. ✦ ¹⁵I wear burlap to show my grief. My pride lies in the dust. ✦ ¹⁶My eyes are red with weeping; dark shadows circle my eyes. ✦ ¹⁷Yet I have done no wrong, and my prayer is pure. ✦ ¹⁸“O earth, do not conceal my blood. Let it cry out on my behalf. ✦ ¹⁹Even now my witness is in heaven. My advocate is there on high. ✦ ²⁰My friends scorn me, but I pour out my tears to God. ✦ ²¹I need someone to mediate between God and me, as a person mediates between friends. ✦ ²²For soon I must go down that road from which I will never return. ✦

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Scripture quotations are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.

Where this chapter connects

Job 6 ·8 Lam 3 ·6 Job 29 ·5 Job 13 ·5 Job 7 ·5 Job 15 ·4 Ps 7 ·4 Job 19 ·4

Christ at the center

Job's cry for a mediator who can lay his hand on both God and man, and his confidence that 'my Redeemer lives' and will stand on the earth, reaches forward to Jesus the living Redeemer.

How Job 16 points to him is part of the one story that runs through all Scripture — meet Jesus at the heart of the web, or follow a trail that traces him from Genesis to Revelation.

Resources, by level

Lay

★ Start hereAudioThrough the WordThrough the Word · ~10 min/chapter · Free · evangelical
A clear ~10-minute audio teaching for every one of the Bible's 1,189 chapters — the most systematic free way to study chapter by chapter.

Pastoral

SermonChuck Smith — C2000 SeriesChuck Smith · Free · evangelical
Free verse-by-verse audio through the entire Bible from the founder of Calvary Chapel.

Commentaries & study tools

VideoBibleProject — Job videosBibleProject · Lay · Free · evangelical
Free animated overview and word-study videos for this book.
VideoWatch teaching on Job 16YouTube · Lay · Free
Sermons and chapter teaching from across YouTube.
CommentaryEnduring Word — Job 16David Guzik · Lay · Free · evangelical
Readable, verse-by-verse exposition of the whole chapter.
CommentaryMatthew Henry on JobMatthew Henry · Pastoral · Free · evangelical
The beloved Puritan exposition of this whole book — warm, devotional, and verse by verse (free, CCEL).
ReferenceBlue Letter Bible — Job 16Blue Letter Bible · Seminary · Free
Interlinear, lexicon, and study tools across the chapter.

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