But if you would earnestly seek God and ask the Almighty for mercy,
Parallel translations
- WEB If you want to seek God diligently, make your supplication to the Almighty.
- KJV If thou wouldest seek unto God betimes, and make thy supplication to the Almighty;
- NKJV If you would earnestly seek God And make your supplication to the Almighty,
- NASB “If you will search for God And implore the compassion of the Almighty,
- NLT But if you pray to God and seek the favor of the Almighty,
Scripture taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
Scripture quotations taken from the (NASB®) New American Standard Bible®, Copyright © 1960, 1971, 1977, 1995, 2020 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. All rights reserved. lockman.org
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.
Quick answer
Bildad urges Job to seek God earnestly and plead with the Almighty. The counsel to pray is good, though it rests on a flawed premise about Job's guilt.
Overview
Bildad calls Job to diligent prayer and supplication, assuming that doing so will reverse his fortunes. Seeking God is always right, yet Bildad ties it to a transactional view that right conduct guarantees restoration. The book affirms genuine prayer while denying that God's blessing can be mechanically earned.
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 8
- Jas 4:7–10Submit yourselves, then, to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you.
- Isa 55:6–7Seek the LORD while He may be found; call on Him while He is near.
- Job 11:13As for you, if you direct your heart and lift up your hands to Him,
- Matt 7:7–8Ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and the door will be opened to you.
- Heb 3:7–8Therefore, as the Holy Spirit says: “Today, if you hear His voice,
- 2 Chr 33:12–13And in his distress, Manasseh sought the favor of the LORD his God and earnestly humbled himself before the God of his fathers.
- Job 5:8However, if I were you, I would appeal to God and lay my cause before Him—
- Job 22:21–30Reconcile now and be at peace with Him; thereby good will come to you.
Themes, concepts, people & topics
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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 8:5 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.
Original language
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