Suffering

The New Testament never treats suffering as proof that God is absent. Read Romans 5, James 1, and 1 Peter 4 together and you find pain handled as something that forms character, not something to be explained away.

By BibleInTongues Editorial TeamPublished March 10, 2026Reviewed by BibleInTongues Review Team on June 5, 2026

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Suffering the New Testament expects, not denies

Jesus is blunt about it in John 16:33: in the world you will have trouble. He says this in the same breath as a promise of peace, so the two are not opposites. The apostles inherited that realism. When Peter writes to scattered believers in 1 Peter 4:12, he tells them not to be astonished at the fiery trial, as though something strange had happened. Suffering is treated as normal weather for faith, not a sign that something has gone wrong.

This matters for how you read these letters. Paul, Peter, and James are not writing from comfortable studies; they write to people losing homes, jobs, and sometimes their lives. The honesty is part of the comfort. You are not being asked to pretend the pain is small.

How Romans and James trace the chain

Romans 5:3-4 lays out a sequence: suffering produces perseverance, perseverance produces proven character, and character produces hope. Paul does not say suffering is good in itself; he says it is the soil in which something grows. The word translated perseverance means staying under a weight without collapsing.

James runs the same logic from a different angle. In James 1:2-3 he tells readers to count it all joy when they fall into trials, because the testing of their faith produces endurance. Notice both writers refuse to skip the middle. The joy is not denial of the trial; it is confidence about where the trial is heading.

Weighing the present against what is coming

Paul keeps placing present pain on a scale. In Romans 8:18 he says the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory that will be revealed. In 2 Corinthians 4:17 he calls the same affliction light and momentary, working an eternal weight of glory. He is not minimizing pain that he himself endured; he is measuring it against something larger.

There is also fellowship in it. 2 Corinthians 1:5 says that as the sufferings of Christ overflow to us, so does the comfort. Suffering, in this frame, draws a believer nearer to Christ rather than further from him, which is why Paul in Philippians 3:10 even speaks of the fellowship of his sufferings.

Reading and praying these passages this week

Try reading Romans 5:1-5 and James 1:2-4 side by side in one sitting. Mark the repeated words: perseverance, endurance, testing, hope. Seeing the same chain in two letters keeps you from treating either one as a stray verse to lift out of context.

When you pray, resist rushing to the resolution. Peter tells suffering readers to rejoice as partakers of Christ's sufferings (1 Peter 4:13), but he says it to people still in the fire, not on the far side of it. Name your actual trial, then ask not first for it to end but for the perseverance and proven character these passages promise it can produce.

Verses

3Romans 5:3
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Not only this, but we also rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces perseverance;
10James 5:10
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Take, brothers, for an example of suffering and of perseverance, the prophets who spoke in the name of the Lord.
21Matthew 24:21
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for then there will be great suffering, such as has not been from the beginning of the world until now, no, nor ever will be.
29Matthew 24:29
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“But immediately after the suffering of those days, the sun will be darkened, the moon will not give its light, the stars will fall from the sky, and the powers of the heavens will be shaken;
18Romans 8:18
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For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory which will be revealed toward us.
52 Corinthians 1:5
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For as the sufferings of Christ abound to us, even so our comfort also abounds through Christ.
62 Corinthians 1:6
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But if we are afflicted, it is for your comfort and salvation. If we are comforted, it is for your comfort, which produces in you the patient enduring of the same sufferings which we also suffer.
72 Corinthians 1:7
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Our hope for you is steadfast, knowing that, since you are partakers of the sufferings, so you are also of the comfort.
10Philippians 3:10
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that I may know him and the power of his resurrection, and the fellowship of his sufferings, becoming conformed to his death,
24Colossians 1:24
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Now I rejoice in my sufferings for your sake, and fill up on my part that which is lacking of the afflictions of Christ in my flesh for his body’s sake, which is the assembly,
112 Timothy 3:11
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persecutions, and sufferings—those things that happened to me at Antioch, Iconium, and Lystra. I endured those persecutions. The Lord delivered me out of them all.
9Hebrews 2:9
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But we see him who has been made a little lower than the angels, Jesus, because of the suffering of death crowned with glory and honor, that by the grace of God he should taste of death for everyone.
10Hebrews 2:10
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For it became him, for whom are all things and through whom are all things, in bringing many children to glory, to make the author of their salvation perfect through sufferings.
32Hebrews 10:32
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But remember the former days, in which, after you were enlightened, you endured a great struggle with sufferings:
13James 5:13
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Is any among you suffering? Let him pray. Is any cheerful? Let him sing praises.
111 Peter 1:11
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searching for who or what kind of time the Spirit of Christ which was in them pointed to when he predicted the sufferings of Christ and the glories that would follow them.
191 Peter 2:19
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For it is commendable if someone endures pain, suffering unjustly, because of conscience toward God.
201 Peter 2:20
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For what glory is it if, when you sin, you patiently endure beating? But if when you do well, you patiently endure suffering, this is commendable with God.
131 Peter 4:13
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But because you are partakers of Christ’s sufferings, rejoice, that at the revelation of his glory you also may rejoice with exceeding joy.
11 Peter 5:1
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Therefore I exhort the elders among you, as a fellow elder and a witness of the sufferings of Christ, and who will also share in the glory that will be revealed:
91 Peter 5:9
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Withstand him steadfast in your faith, knowing that your brothers who are in the world are undergoing the same sufferings.
7Jude 1:7
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Even as Sodom and Gomorrah and the cities around them, having in the same way as these given themselves over to sexual immorality and gone after strange flesh, are shown as an example, suffering the punishment of eternal fire.
14Revelation 7:14
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I told him, “My lord, you know.” He said to me, “These are those who came out of the great suffering. They washed their robes and made them white in the Lamb’s blood.
12Matthew 11:12
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From the days of John the Baptizer until now, the Kingdom of Heaven suffers violence, and the violent take it by force.
21Matthew 16:21
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From that time, Jesus began to show his disciples that he must go to Jerusalem and suffer many things from the elders, chief priests, and scribes, and be killed, and the third day be raised up.
12Matthew 17:12
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but I tell you that Elijah has come already, and they didn’t recognize him, but did to him whatever they wanted to. Even so the Son of Man will also suffer by them.”
15Matthew 17:15
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“Lord, have mercy on my son, for he is epileptic and suffers grievously; for he often falls into the fire, and often into the water.
26Mark 5:26
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and had suffered many things by many physicians, and had spent all that she had, and was no better, but rather grew worse,
31Mark 8:31
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He began to teach them that the Son of Man must suffer many things, and be rejected by the elders, the chief priests, and the scribes, and be killed, and after three days rise again.
12Mark 9:12
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He said to them, “Elijah indeed comes first, and restores all things. How is it written about the Son of Man, that he should suffer many things and be despised?