Bible Strands
Job 27:9
Will God hear his cry when distress comes upon him?
Berean Standard Bible
Follow its threads on the canvas →
Study note
Setting — Job addresses his friends at the close of his speech on the wicked, posing a rhetorical question about divine response. He asks whether God will listen to the desperate appeals of the godless when calamity strikes.
The words — The Hebrew יִשְׁמַע (yishma) means "will he hear," paired with צַעֲקָתוֹ (tza'akatô), "his cry." These terms frame the verse as a direct inquiry into whether divine attention follows human desperation.
The thread — This pattern of divine silence toward the unrepentant runs through Jeremiah 14:12, Proverbs 1:28, and Isaiah 1:15, where God explicitly refuses to listen to the cries or prayers of those who have rejected Him.
Why it lands — The text forces a direct evaluation of spiritual posture, asking the reader to determine whether their relationship with God is rooted in genuine reverence or merely transactional appeals during crisis.
Drafted by a language model from the text, its original words and its cross-references, then checked against them. It can still be wrong: open the verse in the app to report it.
The Hebrew words
King James Version
Will God hear his cry when trouble cometh upon him?
Cross-references
- Jeremiah 14:12 Although they may fast, I will not listen to their cry; although they may offer burnt offerings and grain offerings, I will not accept them. Instead, I will finish them off by sword and famine and plague.”
- Proverbs 1:28 Then they will call on me, but I will not answer; they will earnestly seek me, but will not find me.
- Isaiah 1:15 When you spread out your hands in prayer, I will hide My eyes from you; even though you multiply your prayers, I will not listen. Your hands are covered with blood.
- Job 35:12 There they cry out, but He does not answer, because of the pride of evil men.
- Psalms 18:41 They cried for help, but there was no one to save them—to the LORD, but He did not answer.
- Micah 3:4 Then they will cry out to the LORD, but He will not answer them. At that time He will hide His face from them because of the evil they have done.
- Psalms 66:18 If I had cherished iniquity in my heart, the Lord would not have listened.
- Proverbs 28:9 Whoever turns his ear away from hearing the law, even his prayer is detestable.
- Jeremiah 11:11 Therefore this is what the LORD says: ‘I am about to bring upon them a disaster that they cannot escape. They will cry out to Me, but I will not listen to them.
- Ezekiel 8:18 Therefore I will respond with wrath. I will not look on them with pity, nor will I spare them. Although they shout loudly in My ears, I will not listen to them.”