Job 21:7-21

7“Why do the wicked go on living, grow old, even increase in power?

8Their children are firmly established in their presence, their offspring before their eyes.

9Their houses are safe and without fear; and no rod of punishment from God is upon them.

10Their bulls breed without fail; their cows calve and do not miscarry.

11They allow their children to run like a flock; their little ones dance about.

12They sing to the accompaniment of tambourine and harp, and make merry to the sound of the flute.

13They live out their years in prosperity and go down to the grave in peace.

14So they say to God, ‘Turn away from us! We do not want to know your ways.

15Who is the Almighty, that we should serve him? What would we gain if we were to pray to him?’

16But their prosperity is not their own doing. The counsel of the wicked is far from me!

17“How often is the lamp of the wicked extinguished? How often does their misfortune come upon them? How often does God apportion pain to them in his anger?

18How often are they like straw before the wind, and like chaff swept away by a whirlwind?

19You may say, ‘God stores up a man’s punishment for his children!’ Instead let him repay the man himself so that he may know it!

20Let his own eyes see his destruction; let him drink of the anger of the Almighty.

21For what is his interest in his home after his death, when the number of his months has been broken off?