35 Bible Verses about Striving With God
Most Relevant Verses
When we had all fallen to the earth, I heard a voice saying to me in the Hebrew language, 'Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting me? It is hard for you to kick against the goads.'
Behold, God is with us at our head, and his priests with the trumpets of alarm to sound an alarm against you. Children of Israel, don't fight against Yahweh, the God of your fathers; for you shall not prosper."
Take counsel together, and it will be brought to nothing; speak the word, and it will not stand: for God is with us."
If then God gave to them the same gift as us, when we believed in the Lord Jesus Christ, who was I, that I could withstand God?"
The kings of the earth take a stand, and the rulers take counsel together, against Yahweh, and against his Anointed, saying, "Let's break their bonds apart, and cast their cords from us." He who sits in the heavens will laugh. The Lord will have them in derision.read more.
Then he will speak to them in his anger, and terrify them in his wrath:
the wicked man writhes in pain all his days, even the number of years that are laid up for the oppressor. A sound of terrors is in his ears. In prosperity the destroyer shall come on him. He doesn't believe that he shall return out of darkness. He is waited for by the sword.read more.
He wanders abroad for bread, saying, 'Where is it?' He knows that the day of darkness is ready at his hand. Distress and anguish make him afraid. They prevail against him, as a king ready to the battle. Because he has stretched out his hand against God, and behaves himself proudly against the Almighty; he runs at him with a stiff neck, with the thick shields of his bucklers;
"You stiff-necked and uncircumcised in heart and ears, you always resist the Holy Spirit! As your fathers did, so you do.
But indeed, O man, who are you to reply against God? Will the thing formed ask him who formed it, "Why did you make me like this?"
"Shall he who argues contend with the Almighty? He who argues with God, let him answer it."
Woe to him who strives with his Maker -- a clay pot among the clay pots of the earth! Shall the clay ask him who fashions it, 'What are you making?' or your work, 'He has no hands?' Woe to him who says to a father, 'What have you become the father of?' or to a mother, 'To what have you given birth?'" Thus says Yahweh, the Holy One of Israel, and his Maker: "You ask me about the things that are to come, concerning my sons, and you command me concerning the work of my hands!
All the congregation lifted up their voice, and cried; and the people wept that night. All the children of Israel murmured against Moses and against Aaron: and the whole congregation said to them, "Would that we had died in the land of Egypt! or would that we had died in this wilderness! Why does Yahweh bring us to this land, to fall by the sword? Our wives and our little ones will be a prey: wouldn't it be better for us to return into Egypt?"read more.
They said one to another, "Let us make a captain, and let us return into Egypt."
These are the waters of Meribah; because the children of Israel strove with Yahweh, and he was sanctified in them.
Don't harden your heart, as at Meribah, as in the day of Massah in the wilderness, when your fathers tempted me, tested me, and saw my work.
But if it is of God, you will not be able to overthrow it, and you would be found even to be fighting against God!"
Then David said to the Philistine, "You come to me with a sword, and with a spear, and with a javelin: but I come to you in the name of Yahweh of Armies, the God of the armies of Israel, whom you have defied.
this is the word which Yahweh has spoken concerning him. The virgin daughter of Zion has despised you and ridiculed you. The daughter of Jerusalem has shaken her head at you. Whom have you defied and blasphemed? Against whom have you exalted your voice and lifted up your eyes on high? Against the Holy One of Israel. By your servants, have you defied the Lord, and have said, "With the multitude of my chariots I have come up to the height of the mountains, to the innermost parts of Lebanon. I will cut down its tall cedars and its choice fir trees. I will enter into its farthest height, the forest of its fruitful field.read more.
I have dug and drunk water, and with the sole of my feet I will dry up all the rivers of Egypt."
He fell on the earth, and heard a voice saying to him, "Saul, Saul, why do you persecute me?" He said, "Who are you, Lord?" The Lord said, "I am Jesus, whom you are persecuting.
Jacob was left alone, and wrestled with a man there until the breaking of the day. When he saw that he didn't prevail against him, he touched the hollow of his thigh, and the hollow of Jacob's thigh was strained, as he wrestled. The man said, "Let me go, for the day breaks." Jacob said, "I won't let you go, unless you bless me."read more.
He said to him, "What is your name?" He said, "Jacob." He said, "Your name will no longer be called Jacob, but Israel; for you have fought with God and with men, and have prevailed."
Yahweh also has a controversy with Judah, and will punish Jacob according to his ways; according to his deeds he will repay him. In the womb he took his brother by the heel; and in his manhood he contended with God. Indeed, he struggled with the angel, and prevailed; he wept, and made supplication to him. He found him at Bethel, and there he spoke with us,read more.
even Yahweh, the God of Armies; Yahweh is his name of renown!
Herein I also practice always having a conscience void of offense toward God and men.
"Strive to enter in by the narrow door, for many, I tell you, will seek to enter in, and will not be able.
For we know that the law is spiritual, but I am fleshly, sold under sin. For I don't know what I am doing. For I don't practice what I desire to do; but what I hate, that I do. But if what I don't desire, that I do, I consent to the law that it is good.read more.
So now it is no more I that do it, but sin which dwells in me. For I know that in me, that is, in my flesh, dwells no good thing. For desire is present with me, but I don't find it doing that which is good. For the good which I desire, I don't do; but the evil which I don't desire, that I practice. But if what I don't desire, that I do, it is no more I that do it, but sin which dwells in me. I find then the law, that, to me, while I desire to do good, evil is present. For I delight in God's law after the inward man, but I see a different law in my members, warring against the law of my mind, and bringing me into captivity under the law of sin which is in my members. What a wretched man I am! Who will deliver me out of the body of this death? I thank God through Jesus Christ, our Lord! So then with the mind, I myself serve God's law, but with the flesh, the sin's law.
Every man who strives in the games exercises self-control in all things. Now they do it to receive a corruptible crown, but we an incorruptible. I therefore run like that, as not uncertainly. I fight like that, as not beating the air, but I beat my body and bring it into submission, lest by any means, after I have preached to others, I myself should be rejected.
that I may know him, and the power of his resurrection, and the fellowship of his sufferings, becoming conformed to his death; if by any means I may attain to the resurrection from the dead. Not that I have already obtained, or am already made perfect; but I press on, if it is so that I may take hold of that for which also I was taken hold of by Christ Jesus.read more.
Brothers, I don't regard myself as yet having taken hold, but one thing I do. Forgetting the things which are behind, and stretching forward to the things which are before, I press on toward the goal for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus.
For to this end we both labor and suffer reproach, because we have set our trust in the living God, who is the Savior of all men, especially of those who believe.
Epaphras, who is one of you, a servant of Christ, salutes you, always striving for you in his prayers, that you may stand perfect and complete in all the will of God.
There is none who calls on your name, who stirs up himself to take hold of you; for you have hidden your face from us, and have consumed us by means of our iniquities.
Being in agony he prayed more earnestly. His sweat became like great drops of blood falling down on the ground.
Moses returned to Yahweh, and said, "Lord, why have you brought trouble on this people? Why is it that you have sent me? For since I came to Pharaoh to speak in your name, he has brought trouble on this people; neither have you delivered your people at all."
"'Why, then, have you brought me forth out of the womb? I wish I had given up the spirit, and no eye had seen me.
Yahweh, why do you reject my soul? Why do you hide your face from me? I am afflicted and ready to die from my youth up. While I suffer your terrors, I am distracted. Your fierce wrath has gone over me. Your terrors have cut me off.read more.
They came around me like water all day long. They completely engulfed me. You have put lover and friend far from me, and my friends into darkness. A contemplation by Ethan, the Ezrahite.
Yahweh, how long will I cry, and you will not hear? I cry out to you "Violence!" and will you not save? Why do you show me iniquity, and look at perversity? For destruction and violence are before me. There is strife, and contention rises up. Therefore the law is paralyzed, and justice never goes forth; for the wicked surround the righteous; therefore justice goes forth perverted.
