But the Lord just laughs, for he sees their day of judgment coming.
Parallel translations
- WEB The Lord will laugh at him, for he sees that his day is coming.
- KJV The LORD shall laugh at him: for he seeth that his day is coming.
- BSB but the Lord laughs, seeing that their day is coming.
- NKJV The Lord laughs at him, For He sees that his day is coming.
- NASB The Lord laughs at him, For He sees that his day is coming.
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
The Lord laughs at the wicked because He sees that their day of judgment is coming. God is unthreatened by evil's plots.
Overview
While the wicked gnash their teeth, the Lord 'will laugh,' not from cruelty but from the certainty that their downfall is fixed (echoing Psalm 2:4). God sees 'his day' of reckoning approaching. This sovereign confidence assures believers that no scheme against them escapes God, who will judge all evil through Christ, to whom all judgment is given (John 5:22).
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 8
- Ps 2:4He who sits in the heavens will laugh. The Lord will have them in derision.
- Prov 1:26I also will laugh at your disaster. I will mock when calamity overtakes you;
- Dan 5:26This is the interpretation of the thing: MENE; God has counted your kingdom, and brought it to an end;
- 1 Sam 26:10David said, “As Yahweh lives, Yahweh will strike him; or his day shall come to die; or he shall go down into battle and perish.
- Ezek 21:25“‘You, deadly wounded wicked one, the prince of Israel, whose day has come, in the time of the iniquity of the end,
- Ezek 21:29while they see for you false visions, while they divine lies to you, to lay you on the necks of the wicked who are deadly wounded, whose day has come in the time of the iniquity of the end.
- Job 18:20Those who come after shall be astonished at his day, as those who went before were frightened.
- Jer 50:27Kill all her bulls. Let them go down to the slaughter. Woe to them! For their day has come, the time of their visitation.
Themes, concepts, people & topics
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Christ at the center
The Psalms are Christ's own prayer book and a gallery of his portraits — the suffering one of Psalm 22, the risen Lord of Psalm 16, the priest-king of Psalm 110, the Son to whom the nations are given.
How Psalms 37:13 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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