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3:1  Afflicted, I have seen and know what it’s like to feel the rod of God’s anger:
3:2  An absence of light and only darkness. Darkness—that’s where God has driven me.
3:3  Against me and me alone, over and over, God raises His hand incessantly.
3:4  Bones are broken, skin rubbed off, and my flesh wasted; this is God’s doing:
3:5  Besieged in hardship, wrapped in a husk of bitter poison and trouble;
3:6  Brought to darkness like those dead and decaying, and left there alone to live.
3:7  Cut off from every avenue of escape, God has fenced me in and tied me up with heavy chains.
3:8  Crying and carrying on do me no good; God shuts out my prayer.
3:9  Closed in and blocked by walls of cut stone, what paths I have left, He has twisted and confused my steps.
3:10  Dangerous as a stalking lion or a lurking bear, God lies in wait for me.
3:11  Dragging me off the path and tearing me up, He has left me desolate.
3:12  Drawing back His bow, God aims straight at me with His own arrow.
3:13  Ever true arrows, ready in His quiver, now sink into my gut.
3:14  Echoing taunts ring ’round me from the mouths of my own people, laughing and joking about me all day long.
3:15  Enough! He has filled me with bitterness, saturated me with gall.
3:16  For He crushes my teeth with a mouth filled with gravel; He humiliates me, trampling me in ashes.
3:17  Fragmented, my self knows no peace. I cannot remember what it’s like to be happy.
3:18  “Failed,” I say to myself. “My hope fails in the face of what the Eternal One has done.”
3:19  Grievous thoughts of affliction and wandering plagued my mind— great bitterness and gall.
3:20  Grieving, my soul thinks back; these thoughts cripple, and I sink down.
3:21  Gaining hope, I remember and wait for this thought:
3:22  How enduring is God’s loyal love; the Eternal has inexhaustible compassion.
3:23  Here they are, every morning, new! Your faithfulness, God, is as broad as the day.
3:24  Have courage, for the Eternal is all that I will need. My soul boasts, “Hope in God; just wait.”
3:25  It is good. The Eternal One is good to those who expect Him, to those who seek Him wholeheartedly.
3:26  It is good to wait quietly for the Eternal to make things right again.
3:27  It is good to have to deal with restraint and burdens when young.
3:28  Just leave in peace the one who waits in silence, patiently bearing the burden of God;
3:29  Just don’t interfere if he falls, gape-mouthed in the dust. There may well be hope yet.
3:30  Just let him offer his cheek when struck. Let him be the butt of jokes.
3:31  Kept in God’s care: the Lord won’t reject him forever.
3:32  Kindness prevails: Even though God torments sometimes, the greatness of God’s loyal love wins out.
3:33  Keeping us down: it is not the desire or way of God’s heart to hurt and grieve the children of men.
3:34  Left as captives of the land to be stomped on and crushed,
3:35  Legal action and human rights denied in the very presence of our exalted God,
3:36  Lord, surely You do not approve it—they deny one person’s rights and a fair trial.
3:37  Matters not who says a thing will or won’t happen unless the Lord determines that it should.
3:38  Most High God must proclaim it so— for both good and bad, joy and sorrow come from Him, so
3:39  Mind your complaint. Why should a person fuss when faced with the consequences of his own wrongdoing?
3:40  Now let’s search out our thoughts and ways and return to the Eternal.
3:41  Now let’s lift up to God in heaven our hearts along with our hands in praise and supplication.
3:42  Now, let us admit that we persisted in wrong and You, God, were right to deny us forgiveness.
3:43  You have wrapped Yourself in anger. You hunted us down and became our merciless killer.
3:44  Our prayers couldn’t penetrate the cloud You then wrapped around Yourself.
3:45  Oh, we are trash: You’ve made us so in the eyes of all people.
3:46  Putting us down, our enemies scoff. They gape and gawk at us.
3:47  Panic and pitfalls are all around us, nothing but breakdown and decay.
3:48  Pouring out from my eyes are tears like rivers over the destruction of my people, daughter Zion.
3:49  Quenched? It can’t be quenched, this sorrow in my eyes,
3:50  Quelled only by knowing that the Eternal looks down from heaven and sees.
3:51  Quickly I recoil from what my eyes see; I am choked with grief at the fate of the young women of my city.
3:52  Running me down, my enemies for no reason hunt me, a tiny bird.
3:53  Rattling my bones with stones thrown down on my head, having flung me mercilessly in a pit.
3:54  ’Round about me and over me, watery darkness closes in. I cry out, “I’m drowning! All is lost, lost.”
3:55  Saying Your name, Eternal One, I called to You from the darkness of this pit.
3:56  Surely You’ve heard me say, “Don’t be deaf to my call; bring me relief!”
3:57  So close when I’ve called out in my distress, You’ve whispered in my ear, “Do not be afraid.”
3:58  Taking up my cause, Lord, You’ve been my champion. You’ve paid the price; You saved my life.
3:59  Terrible things have been done to me. You’ve seen it, Eternal One. Judge my case with justice.
3:60  Their abuses against me are not hidden from You. You’ve seen all the awful things my enemies determine to do to me.
3:61  Ugly words and uglier plans they have for me— You’ve heard it all, Eternal One.
3:62  Under their breath, my adversaries whispering about me, devising nasty schemes all the time.
3:63  Unkind jokes at my expense, whether they’re sitting around or going to and fro.
3:64  Villains You will return to their recompense, Eternal One, according to their deeds.
3:65  Visit them with anguish and an insensitivity to Your words. Make Your curse fall hard on them.
3:66  Vehemently pummel them. Chase them down, obliterate them from below the heavens of the Eternal, from the earth itself.