1 Peter 5:10: After You Have Suffered

And the God of all grace, who called you to his eternal glory in Christ, after you have suffered a little while, will himself restore you and make you strong, firm and steadfast.

1 Peter 5:10 (NIV)

After You Have Suffered

There’s a point in a long trouble when people stop asking how you are. The trouble has outlasted their attention, and on some days it has outlasted yours. The calls thin out to the two who still call, and in October a message arrives that says thinking of you today, sent by somebody who means it and has their own week to get through. You stop bringing it up first. You say about the same and change the subject, because the real answer takes twenty minutes and you have already told it twice.

The believers who got this letter were under a pressure that was costing them something. Peter had told them that believers everywhere were going through the same kind of suffering, and he says so plainly.

The restoring lands on the far side of the suffering, after you have suffered a little while. Peter names the wait and leaves its length where it is. He measures it against eternal glory, where three years counts as a little while, and at four in the morning nobody is standing on that scale. When I am awake at that hour I want somebody to tell me how long, and nobody can.

And the God of all grace will himself restore you and make you strong, firm and steadfast. No condition comes attached to it. That leaves the one who is suffering with nothing to perform. It is worth a great deal to anybody who has been told their healing is waiting on the size of their own faith. People say that early in a long trouble, to the person least able to argue with them.

Peter promises that God will restore them and make them strong, firm and steadfast, and he promises it about people who are being worn down right now.