35 Bible Verses about Proving, Through Testing

{And then} in all the land," {declares} Yahweh, "{two thirds} will be cut off and perish, and one third will be left alive in it. And I will bring the [remaining] third into the fire, and I will refine them like [one] refines silver, and I will test them like [one] tests gold. They will call my name, and I will answer them. I will say, 'They are my people,' and they will say, 'Yahweh [is] my God.'"

For you have tested us, O God; you have tried us as silver is tried. You brought us into the net; you placed a {heavy burden} on our backs. You let men ride over our heads. We went through fire and through water, but you have brought us out to the place of abundance.

A crucible [is] for the silver, and a furnace [is] for the gold, but Yahweh will test hearts.

Look! I have refined you, but not like silver; I have chosen you in [the] furnace of misery.

"I have made you an assayer among my people, a fortification, so that you may know and put to the test their ways. All of them [are] stubborn rebels, going about [talking] slander. [They are] bronze and iron, they [are] all behaving corruptly. [The] bellows are burned up, lead is consumed by fire. {In vain} {he keeps on refining}, but [the] wicked are not torn apart.read more.
{They are called} rejected silver, For Yahweh has rejected them."

Therefore, thus says Yahweh of hosts: "Look, I [am] about to refine them, and I will test them, for what else can I do, because of the {presence} of the daughter of my people?

And Yahweh said to Moses, "Look, I am going to rain down for you bread from the heavens, and the people will go out and gather enough for the day on its day; in that way I will test them: Will they go according to my law or not?

And he cried out to Yahweh, and Yahweh showed him [a piece of] wood, and he threw [it] into the water, and the water became sweet. There he made a rule and regulation for them, and there he tested them. And he said, "If you carefully listen to the voice of Yahweh your God and you do [what is] right in his eyes and give heed to his commands and you keep all his rules, [then] I will not bring about on you any of the diseases that I brought about on Egypt, because I [am] Yahweh your healer.

And you shall remember all [of] the way that Yahweh your God led you [during] these forty years in the desert in order to humble you and to test you to know what [is] in your heart, whether you would [diligently] keep his commandments or not. And he humbled you and let you go hungry, and [then] he fed you with that which you did not know nor did your ancestors know, in order to make you know that not by bread alone but by all [that] goes out of the mouth of Yahweh humankind shall live. Your clothing did not wear out {on you}, and your feet did not swell [during] these forty years.read more.
And you should know with your heart that as a man disciplines his son, [so] Yahweh your God [is] disciplining you.

in order to test Israel whether or not they would observe the way of Yahweh, to walk in it just as their ancestors did."

These [are] the nations that Yahweh left, to test Israel by them ([that is, to test] all those who {had not experienced} any of the wars of Canaan, in order that the generations of Israel would know war, to teach those {who had not experienced it} before): the five rulers of the Philistines, all the Canaanites, the Sidonians, and the Hivites living on Mount Lebanon, from Mount Baal Hermon up to Lebo-Hamath.read more.
They were [left] for testing Israel, to know [whether] they would keep the commands of Yahweh that he commanded their ancestors through the hand of Moses.

And I know, my God, that you yourself test the heart and are pleased with uprightness. I, in the uprightness of my heart, have willingly offered all these [things], and now I have seen your people who are found here willingly offer to you.

"If a prophet stands up in your midst or a dreamer of dreams and he gives to you a sign or wonder, and the sign or the wonder comes [about] that he spoke to you, {saying}, 'Let us go after other gods (those whom you have not known), and let us serve them,' you must not listen to the words of that prophet or to that dreamer, for Yahweh your God {is testing you to know whether you love} Yahweh your God with all of your heart and with all [of] your inner self.

in which you rejoice greatly, [although] now for a short time, if necessary, you are distressed by various trials, so that the genuineness of your faith, more valuable than gold that is passing away, but is tested by fire, may be found to [result in] praise and glory and honor at the revelation of Jesus Christ,

And it happened [that] after these things, God tested Abraham. And he said to him, "Abraham!" And he said, "Here I [am]." And he said, "Take your son, your only child, Isaac, whom you love, and go to the land of Moriah, and offer him there as a burnt offering on one of the mountains where I will tell you." And Abraham rose up early in the morning and saddled his donkey. And he took two of his servants with him, and Isaac his son. And he chopped wood for a burnt offering. And he got up and went to the place which God had told him.read more.
On the third day Abraham lifted up his eyes, and he saw the place at a distance. And Abraham said to his servants, "You stay here with the donkey, and I and the boy will go up there. We will worship, then we will return to you." And Abraham took the wood of the burnt offering and placed [it] on Isaac his son. And he took the fire in his hand and the knife, and the two of them went together. And Isaac said to Abraham his father, "My father!" And he said, "Here I [am], my son." And he said, "Here is the fire and the wood, but where is the lamb for a burnt offering?" And Abraham said, "{God will provide} the lamb for a burnt offering, my son." And the two of them went together. And they came to the place that God had told him. And Abraham built an altar there and arranged the wood. Then he bound Isaac his son and placed him on the altar atop the wood. And Abraham stretched out his hand and took the knife to slaughter his son. And the angel of Yahweh called to him from heaven and said, "Abraham! Abraham!" And he said, "Here I [am]." And he said, "Do not stretch out your hand against the boy; do not do anything to him. For now I know that you are {one who fears} God, since you have not withheld your son, your only child, from me." And Abraham lifted up his eyes and looked. And behold, a ram was caught in the thicket by his horns. And Abraham went and took the ram, and offered it as a burnt offering in place of his son. And Abraham called the name of that place "Yahweh {will provide}," {for which reason} it is said today, "on the mountain of Yahweh {it shall be provided}." And the angel of Yahweh called to Abraham a second time from heaven. And he said, "I swear by myself, declares Yahweh, that because you have done this thing and have not withheld your son, your only child, that I will certainly bless you and greatly multiply your offspring as the stars of heaven, and as the sand that is by the shore of the sea. And your offspring will take possession of the gate of his enemies. All the nations of the earth will be blessed through your offspring, because you have listened to my voice."

But he knows {the way that I take}; he tests me--I shall come out like gold.

And thus [in the matter of] the envoys of the commanders of Babylon who had been sent to him to seek the sign that had happened in the land, God forsook him, to test him [and] to know all [that was] in his heart.

{Then Jesus, when he looked up} and saw that a large crowd was coming to him, said to Philip, "Where can we buy bread so that these [people] can eat?" (Now he said this to test him, because he knew what he was going to do.)

Consider [it] all joy, my brothers, whenever you encounter various trials, [because you] know that the testing of your faith produces endurance.

And they tested God in their heart [by] asking food {for their craving}. And they spoke against God. They said, "Is God able to prepare a table in the wilderness? Yes, he struck [the] rock and water flowed and streams gushed out, [but] can he also give food or provide meat for his people?"read more.
Therefore Yahweh heard and he was very angry, and a fire was kindled against Jacob, and [his] anger also rose up against Israel, because they did not believe God, and they did not trust his salvation.

And all the community of the {Israelites} set out from the desert of Sin for their journeys according to the command of Yahweh, and they camped in Rephidim, and there was no water for the people to drink. And the people quarreled with Moses, and they said, "Give us water so that we can drink." And Moses said to them, "Why do you quarrel with me? Why do you test Yahweh?" And the people thirsted for water, and the people grumbled against Moses and said, "Why {ever} did you bring us up from Egypt to kill me and my sons and my cattle with thirst?"read more.
And Moses cried out to Yahweh, saying, "What will I do with this people? A little longer and they will stone me." And Yahweh said to Moses, "Go on before the people and take with you [some] from the elders of Israel, and the staff with which you struck the Nile take in your hand, and go. Look, I [will be] standing before you there on the rock in Horeb, and you will strike the rock, and water will come out from it, and the people will drink." And Moses did so before the eyes of the elders of Israel. And he called the name of the place Massah and Meribah because of the quarrel of the {Israelites} and because of their testing Yahweh [by] saying, "Is Yahweh in our midst or not?"

But because all the men who have seen my glory and my signs that I did in Egypt and in the desert yet tested me these ten times and did not listen to my voice, they will not see the land that I swore by oath to their ancestors, and all those who despised me will not see it.

You shall not put Yahweh your God to [the] test, as you tested [him] at Massah.

How often they rebelled against him in the wilderness and vexed him in [the] wasteland! So they again tested God and distressed the Holy One of Israel. And they did not remember his {power} {when} he redeemed them from the enemy,read more.
how he performed his signs in Egypt and his wonders in the region of Zoan, when he turned their rivers to blood so they could not drink [from] their streams.

They quickly forgot his works; they did not wait for his counsel. And they {craved intensely} in the wilderness, and tested God in [the] desert. So he gave to them their request, but he sent leanness into their souls.

nor put Christ to the test, as some of them tested [him], and were destroyed by snakes,

Therefore, just as the Holy Spirit says, "Today, if you hear his voice, do not harden your hearts as in the rebellion, in the day of testing in the wilderness, where your fathers tested [me] by trial and saw my worksread more.
[for] forty years. Therefore I was angry with this generation, and I said, 'They always go astray in their heart, and they do not know my ways.' As I swore in my anger, '{They will never enter} into my rest.'"

For he [is] our God, and we [are] the people of his pasture and the sheep of his hand. {Today} if you will hear his voice: "Do not harden your heart as [at] Meribah, as [in] the day of Massah in the wilderness, when your ancestors tried me. They put me to the test, [even] though they had seen my work.read more.
For forty years I loathed [that] generation, and said, '[They are] a people [whose] heart wanders. And my ways they do not know.' Therefore I swore in my anger, 'They shall surely not enter into my rest.'"

Bring the whole tithe to {the storehouse}, so that there will be food in my house, and test me please in this," says Yahweh of hosts, "if I will not open for you the windows of heaven, and pour forth for you {an overflowing blessing}.

And Yahweh continued to speak to Ahaz, saying, "Ask for a sign for yourself from Yahweh God; make [it] deep [as] Sheol or make [it] high as above." But Ahaz said, "I will not ask, and I will not put Yahweh to the test."read more.
Then he said, "Hear, house of David! [Is it] too little for you to make men weary, that you should also make my God weary? Therefore the Lord himself will give you a sign. Look! the virgin [is] with child and she is about to give birth [to] a son, and she shall call his name 'God with us.'

Test yourselves [to see] if you are in the faith. Examine yourselves! Or do you not recognize regarding yourselves that Jesus Christ [is] in you, unless you are unqualified?

But let each one examine his own work, and then he will have a reason for boasting in himself alone, and not in someone else.

but examine all [things]; hold fast to [what is] good.

Let two or three prophets speak, and the others evaluate.

Dear friends, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits [to determine] if they are from God, because many false prophets have gone out into the world. By this you know the Spirit of God: every spirit that confesses Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God, and every spirit that does not confess Jesus is not from God, and this is the [spirit] of the antichrist, [of] which you have heard that it is coming, and now it is already in the world.