17 Bible Verses about Distinguishing

Then Isaac said to Jacob, “Please come closer so I can touch you, my son. Are you really my son Esau or not?”

But solid food is for the mature—for those whose senses have been trained to distinguish between good and evil.

They sent the robe of many colors to their father and said, “We found this. Examine it. Is it your son’s robe or not?”

Then watch: If it goes up the road to its homeland toward Beth-shemesh, it is the Lord who has made this terrible trouble for us. However, if it doesn’t, we will know that it was not His hand that punished us—it was just something that happened to us by chance.”

The Gileadites captured the fords of the Jordan leading to Ephraim. Whenever a fugitive from Ephraim said, “Let me cross over,” the Gileadites asked him, “Are you an Ephraimite?” If he answered, “No,” they told him, “Please say Shibboleth.” If he said, “Sibboleth,” because he could not pronounce it correctly, they seized him and killed him at the fords of the Jordan. At that time 42,000 from Ephraim died.

You’ll recognize them by their fruit. Are grapes gathered from thornbushes or figs from thistles?

So you’ll recognize them by their fruit.

“Either make the tree good and its fruit good, or make the tree bad and its fruit bad; for a tree is known by its fruit.

Then Moses said, “This is how you will know that the Lord sent me to do all these things and that it was not of my own will: If these men die naturally as all people would, and suffer the fate of all, then the Lord has not sent me. But if the Lord brings about something unprecedented, and the ground opens its mouth and swallows them along with all that belongs to them so that they go down alive into Sheol, then you will know that these men have despised the Lord.”

This is how God’s children—and the Devil’s children—are made evident.

Whoever does not do what is right is not of God, especially the one who does not love his brother.

and when it was full, they dragged it ashore, sat down, and gathered the good fish into containers, but threw out the worthless ones.

For each tree is known by its own fruit. Figs aren’t gathered from thornbushes, or grapes picked from a bramble bush.

By this all people will know that you are My disciples, if you have love for one another.”

But whoever keeps His word, truly in him the love of God is perfected. This is how we know we are in Him:

This is how you know the Spirit of God: Every spirit who confesses that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God.

We are from God. Anyone who knows God listens to us; anyone who is not from God does not listen to us. From this we know the Spirit of truth and the spirit of deception.

This is how we know that we love God’s children when we love God and obey His commands.