Anonymous Asks (315)

“Why does God test us?”

Regardless of your personal beliefs about the origin of man, it’s evident bad things happen to good people. The difference between a Christian worldview and a naturalistic one is that the latter offers no explanation for suffering and unpleasant choices beyond the luck of the draw. If randomness rules, then these serve no higher purpose than weeding out the weak. If God does, then perhaps misery has meaning.

I could offer all kinds of anecdotes and speculations in response to a question like this, but it’s one that scripture answers in plain language very early on. Who needs my opinion when we can read the words of the Holy Spirit through men like Moses and Job?

So why does God test us? Here are six biblical reasons:

1/ To Keep Us from Sinning

Moses knew who God was in all his aspects. He had seen God’s provision and care for his people, and he had also witnessed God’s judgments against sin, and knew him to be holy. So when Israel approached Sinai, and saw the lightning, the trumpet and the smoking mountain, he encouraged the people not to panic. He said:

“God has come to test you, that the fear of him may be before you, that you may not sin.”

Living rightly before God requires we keep his holiness front and center in our minds. There is a natural human tendency to think of God as indifferent and distant, or similar to ourselves, or as a doting, indulgent grandfather-type. God is none of these things. He loves us intensely and enduringly, but he also hates sin passionately. God tests us so that we learn to think of him rightly and respond obediently to his commands.

2/ To Reveal the Heart

Moses told Israel why God had tested the nation for forty years in the wilderness:

“You shall remember the whole way that the Lord your God has led you these forty years in the wilderness, that he might humble you, testing you to know what was in your heart, whether you would keep his commandments or not.”

The argument may be made that God has no need to test us to know what’s in our hearts. The Bible states repeatedly that he’s well aware of all our motivations, reservations and secret thoughts. But the Hebrew word translated “know” in this verse may also be translated “show”, “tell”, “declare” or “teach”. This is probably closer to the reason God tests men: to bring out what’s in our hearts for all to see. Neither sinfulness nor obedience can be made evident unless man is given a line he must not cross and some compelling motivation to cross it anyway. It’s only at that point that the world can witness what we are made of.

3/ To Do Us Ultimate Good

Moses again to Israel later in the same chapter:

“[The Lord] led you through the great and terrifying wilderness, with its fiery serpents and scorpions and thirsty ground where there was no water, who brought you water out of the flinty rock, who fed you in the wilderness with manna that your fathers did not know, that he might humble you and test you, to do you good in the end.”

The purpose of testing is not to break us, but to do us good. The experiences of life, good and bad, are designed to produce faith, hope, love and other desirable qualities, not nihilism and despair. But note the good that God intends to do for us comes “in the end”. It may not be evident until the test has reached its conclusion.

4/ To Reveal the Quality of Our Love for God

Moses to Israel one more time, this time about false prophets and idolatry:

“If a prophet or a dreamer of dreams arises among you and gives you a sign or a wonder, and the sign or wonder that he tells you comes to pass, and if he says, ‘Let us go after other gods,’ which you have not known, ‘and let us serve them,’ you shall not listen to the words of that prophet or that dreamer of dreams. For the Lord your God is testing you, to know whether you love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul.”

Testing brings out and declares to heaven and earth not just whether we fear God but whether we love him. Love for God, as the Lord Jesus taught, is the greatest of the commandments.

5/ To Prove Our Faithfulness

The book of Job is premised on a disagreement between God and Satan concerning the faithfulness of a man. Job recognized that he was being tested, and determined he would not fail. He insisted:

“But he knows the way that I take; when he has tried me, I shall come out as gold.”

Why should the thoughts, words and actions of human beings be of concern to the principalities and powers of the heavens? We may not be able to answer that question with certainty, but it is abundantly clear in scripture that they are. Ultimately, we know that God will always be proven right, but wouldn’t it be a privilege to be used by him to make his case for righteousness to the universe?

6/ To Purify Us

The psalmist speaks of going through fire and water, of having a crushing burden laid on his back, of being trapped in a net. Yet all of this, he says, is for our good:

“For you, O God, have tested us; you have tried [refined] us as silver is tried.”

Silver is refined by fire to remove its impurities. The end product is stronger, more useful, more attractive and more valuable as a result. The writers of the New Testament understood this well, writing things like “Suffering produces endurance” and “Blessed is the man who remains steadfast under trial.”