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when your fathers tempted me, tested me, and saw my work.
Psalms 95:9 · World English Bible
Parallel translations
  • KJV When your fathers tempted me, proved me, and saw my work.
  • BSB where your fathers tested and tried Me, though they had seen My work.
  • NKJV When your fathers tested Me; They tried Me, though they saw My work.
  • NASB “When your fathers put Me to the test, They tested Me, though they had seen My work.
  • NLT For there your ancestors tested and tried my patience, even though they saw everything I did.

Scripture taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

Scripture quotations taken from the (NASB®) New American Standard Bible®, Copyright © 1960, 1971, 1977, 1995, 2020 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. All rights reserved. lockman.org

Scripture quotations are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.

Quick answer

There Israel's fathers tested God though they had seen His works. Witnessing God's deeds is no guarantee of a believing heart.

Overview

The wilderness generation tested and provoked God despite having seen His mighty acts in Egypt and the desert. Their unbelief amid abundant evidence exposes the deep problem of the human heart. This warns that signs alone do not produce saving faith; only a heart softened by God truly trusts, as the gospel calls us to do (Hebrews 3:9; John 12:37).

Cross-references & the web

Cross-references · 7

  • Num 14:22because all those men who have seen my glory, and my signs, which I worked in Egypt and in the wilderness, yet have tempted me these ten times, and have not listened to my voice;
  • 1 Cor 10:9Let us not test Christ, as some of them tested, and perished by the serpents.
  • Ps 78:56Yet they tempted and rebelled against the Most High God, and didn’t keep his testimonies;
  • Ps 78:17–18Yet they still went on to sin against him, to rebel against the Most High in the desert.
  • Ps 78:40–41How often they rebelled against him in the wilderness, and grieved him in the desert!
  • Matt 11:20–22Then he began to denounce the cities in which most of his mighty works had been done, because they didn’t repent.
  • John 15:24If I hadn’t done among them the works which no one else did, they wouldn’t have had sin. But now have they seen and also hated both me and my Father.

Themes, concepts, people & topics

Topics (3)

Resources, by level

Commentaries & study tools

  • VideoBibleProject — Psalms videosBibleProject · Lay · Free · evangelical

    Free animated overview and word-study videos for this book.

  • VideoWatch teaching on Psalms 95:9YouTube · Lay · Free

    Sermons and teaching on this passage from across YouTube.

  • CommentaryEnduring Word — verse-by-verseDavid Guzik · Lay · Free · evangelical

    Clear, readable, conservative exposition — the best free place to start on any passage.

  • CommentaryClassic commentaries for this verseBibleHub (20+ works) · Pastoral · Free

    Matthew Henry, Barnes, Gill, the Pulpit Commentary, Ellicott, Cambridge, and more — stacked on one page for this exact verse.

  • CommentaryMatthew Henry on PsalmsMatthew Henry · Pastoral · Free · evangelical

    The beloved Puritan exposition of this whole book — warm, devotional, and verse by verse (free, CCEL).

  • ReferenceInterlinear, lexicon & Strong'sBlue Letter Bible · Seminary · Free

    Hebrew/Greek interlinear, word definitions, and cross-references for this verse.

Christ at the center

The Psalms are Christ's own prayer book and a gallery of his portraits — the suffering one of Psalm 22, the risen Lord of Psalm 16, the priest-king of Psalm 110, the Son to whom the nations are given.

How Psalms 95:9 points to him is part of the one story that runs through all Scripture — meet Jesus at the heart of the web, or follow a trail that traces him from Genesis to Revelation.

Original language

Each word below is tagged with its Strong’s number — tap one to see the underlying Hebrew word, its meaning, and every verse that uses it.