Job 8:5
But if you would earnestly seek God and ask the Almighty for mercy,
BSB
ASV
If thou wouldest seek diligently unto God, And make thy supplication to the Almighty;
KJV
If thou wouldest seek unto God betimes, and make thy supplication to the Almighty;
If thou wouldest seek unto God betimes - If thou wouldest do it now. If even on the supposition that your sons have thus perished, and that God has come out in judgment against your family, you would look to God, you might be restored to favor. The word rendered “seek betimes” (שׁחר shâchar) means literally to seek in the morning, to seek early; and then, to make it the first business. It is derived from the word meaning aurora (שׁחר shachar) and has reference to the early light of the morning, and hence, to an early seeking.
That it was a usual thing for Providence to extinguish the joys and hopes of wicked men as his were extinguished; and therefore that they had reason to suspect him for a hypocrite,
Rare words are the text's own signal of a deliberate thread: the fewer the occurrences, the more the places it appears belong together.
The walk5
Follow this verse’s cross-references two steps out. Each card is a verse this one points to, and beneath it the verses that one points to in turn. Where several different paths arrive at the same place, that place is listed first: the text keeps returning to it. Every stop shows its own words, and every stop is a page.
Through
Job 11:13As for you, if you direct your heart and lift up your hands to Him,
leads to
I stretch out my hands to You; my soul thirsts for You like a parched land. Selah
My eyes grow dim with grief. I call to You daily, O LORD; I spread out my hands to You.
Then they will not be like their fathers, a stubborn and rebellious generation, whose heart was not loyal, whose spirit was not faithful to God.
Then Samuel said to all the house of Israel, “If you are returning to the LORD with all your hearts, then rid yourselves of the foreign gods and Ashtoreths among you, prepare your hearts…
But if you would earnestly seek God and ask the Almighty for mercy,