Many try to win the favor of rulers. And everyone is the friend of a person who gives gifts.Poor people are avoided by their whole family. Their friends avoid them even more. The poor person runs after his friends to beg for help. But they can’t be found.
“ Not long after that, the younger son packed up all he had. Then he left for a country far away. There he wasted his money on wild living.He spent everything he had. Then the whole country ran low on food. So the son didn’t have what he needed.He went to work for someone who lived in that country. That person sent the son to the fields to feed the pigs.
“ God has caused my family to desert me. The people I used to know are now strangers to me.My relatives have gone away. My closest friends have forgotten me.My guests and my female servants think of me as a stranger. They look at me as if I were an outsider.I send for my servant, but he doesn’t answer. He doesn’t come, even though I beg him to.My wife can’t stand the way my breath smells. My own family won’t have anything to do with me.
But my friends have stopped being kind to me. They are like streams that only flow for part of the year. They are like rivers that flow over their bankswhen the ice begins to break up. The streams rise when the snow starts to melt.But they stop flowing when the dry season comes. They disappear from their stream beds when the weather warms up.Groups of traders turn away from their usual paths. They go off into the dry and empty land. And they die there.Traders from Tema look for water. Traveling merchants from Sheba also hope to find it.They become troubled because they had expected to find some. But when they arrive at the stream beds, they don’t find any water at all.And now, my friends, you haven’t helped me either. You see the horrible condition I’m in. And that makes you afraid.I’ve never said,‘ Give me something to help me. Use your wealth to set me free.Save me from the power of my enemy. Rescue me from the power of mean people.’
