Reconnaissance of the Heart

And you shall remember all the way which the Lord your God has led you in the wilderness these forty years, in order to humble you, putting you to the test, to know what was in your heart, whether you would keep His commandments or not.  Deuteronomy 8:2  NASB

The test – In the NASB 95, this phrase is translated “testing you.”  The idea is the same, of course, but translating it as a verb makes more sense, first because it is a verb in Hebrew and second because the action is the test.  The test is not some exam that requires the Israelites to pass.  The test is what they do—the actions themselves, not a separate inquisition.

In Hebrew, the verb is נָסָה (nāsâ).  It means “to prove, to try, to assay.”  It’s also translated as “tempt” in older Bibles, but, “In most contexts nāsâ has the idea of testing or proving the quality of someone or something, often through adversity or hardship. The rendering tempt, used frequently by the av and asb, generally means prove, test, put to the test, rather than the current English idea of ‘entice to do wrong.’”^[1]  What this means is that the forty-year sojourn in the wilderness is summed up in a word about assessing the character of the people.  Zornberg comments:

“The forty-year midbar journey was intended as a difficult odyssey of self-understanding, a reconnaissance mission into the human heart.  The manna is essential wilderness food, unknown, uncanny; but precisely in its unknowability it will open a new kind of knowledge: ‘that man does not live on bread alone but on what issues from God’s mouth.’  The sentence communicates the mystery of the manna: it stirs up the question—What is it that can sustain human life?”[2]

This is what we need to learn today.  James can write that trials and tribulations are joyful because they are the signs of God’s reconnaissance of the heart.  The way to intimacy, with God or someone else, is through the wilderness.  No, it isn’t all a test.  You aren’t here to prove you are worthy.  God already deems you worthy—worthy of His attention to the reconnaissance.  The purpose of the wilderness is for you to discover your worthiness, for you to assay your true character.  It’s not news to God.  It’s good news for you.

What is it that sustains your life?  What really matters to you?  What are you willing to die for?  Those are the wilderness questions that must be answered, not in order to gain God’s approval but in order for you to know who you are when the lights are off.

Topical Index:  testing, nāsâ, worth, wilderness, Deuteronomy 8:2

^[1] Wilson, M. R. (1999). 1373 נָסָה. R. L. Harris, G. L. Archer Jr., & B. K. Waltke (Eds.), Theological Wordbook of the Old Testament (electronic ed., p. 581). Chicago: Moody Press.

[2] Avivah Gottlieb Zornberg,  Bewilderments: Reflections on the Book of Numbers, p. xvii.