20:7 Lord, you coerced me into being a prophet,
and I allowed you to do it.
You overcame my resistance and prevailed over me.
Now I have become a constant laughingstock.
Everyone ridicules me.
20:8 For whenever I prophesy, I must cry out,
“Violence and destruction are coming!”
This message from the Lord has made me
an object of continual insults and derision.
20:9 Sometimes I think, “I will make no mention of his message.
I will not speak as his messenger any more.”
But then his message becomes like a fire
locked up inside of me, burning in my heart and soul.
I grow weary of trying to hold it in;
I cannot contain it.
20:14 Cursed be the day I was born!
May that day not be blessed when my mother gave birth to me.
20:15 Cursed be the man
who made my father very glad
when he brought him the news
that a baby boy had been born to him!
20:16 May that man be like the cities
that the Lord destroyed without showing any mercy.
May he hear a cry of distress in the morning
and a battle cry at noon.
20:17 For he did not kill me before I came from the womb,
making my pregnant mother’s womb my grave forever.
20:18 Why did I ever come forth from my mother’s womb?
All I experience is trouble and grief,
and I spend my days in shame.