WEDNESDAY October 25th
1 Peter 5:10–11
‘And after you have suffered a little while, the God of all grace, who has called you to his eternal glory in Christ, will himself restore, confirm, strengthen, and establish you. To him be the dominion forever and ever. Amen.’
These verses give tremendous comfort to those of the Christian faith who are enduring severe testing or persecution for their faith at this time, if we stand firm, after we have suffered for a little while, God will do four things. He will restore, confirm, strengthen and establish.
There are three cross references from these verses in the ESV which I will add in here.
1 Corinthians 1:9 ‘God is faithful, by whom you were called into the fellowship of his Son, Jesus Christ our Lord.’
1 Thessalonians 2:12 ‘. . . we exhorted each one of you and encouraged you and charged you to walk in a manner worthy of God, who calls you into his own kingdom and glory.’
1 Timothy 6:12 ‘Fight the good fight of the faith. Take hold of the eternal life to which you were called and about which you made the good confession in the presence of many witnesses.’
I want to add another from Jude, firstly verse 20 ‘But you, beloved, building yourselves up in your most holy faith and praying in the Holy Spirit, keep yourselves in the love of God, waiting for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ that leads to eternal life’, then from verse 24 ‘Now to him who is able to keep you from stumbling and to present you blameless before the presence of his glory with great joy’.
We are nearly at the end of our devotions from 1st Peter and among all of the wonderful things he has written to encourage and to exhort us in our Christian walk, are these words that reassure us that as we remain faithful, God is faithful to us. He will as Paul reminds us in his letter to the church at Philippi, complete that which he has started in us and one day we will stand in his presence, rejoicing that we have run the race and finished well.
The final phrase in our text today we will turn to in another devotion.