55 “‘If, though, YOU will not drive the inhabitants of the land away from before YOU,+ then those whom YOU leave of them will certainly become as pricks in YOUR eyes and as thorns in YOUR sides, and they will indeed harass YOU on the land in which YOU will be dwelling.+

2 And you must remember all the way that Jehovah your God made you walk these forty years in the wilderness,+ in order to humble you,+ to put you to the test+ so as to know what was in your heart,+ as to whether you would keep his commandments or not.

13 YOU should positively know that Jehovah YOUR God will not continue to dispossess these nations on YOUR account;+ and they must become to YOU as a trap and as a snare and as a scourge on YOUR flanks+ and as thorns in YOUR eyes until YOU have perished off this good ground that Jehovah YOUR God has given YOU.+

4 And they kept serving as agents to test+ Israel so as to know whether they would obey Jehovah’s commandments that he had commanded their fathers by means of Moses.+

3 The refining* pot is for silver and the furnace for gold,+ but Jehovah is the examiner of hearts.+