AND PERSEVERANCE: e de hupomone: (Ro 15:4; 2Cor 1:4-6; 4:8-12; 6:9,10; Ja 1:12; 1Pet 1:6,7; 5:10)

Perseverance (5281) (hupomone from hupo = under + meno = abide) (Click here for the 6 uses in Romans) (Click for in depth study of hupomone) means literally to abide under and so describes a bearing up under trials in a God-honoring way so as to learn the lesson for which they have been sent, rather than attempting to squirm out from under them in an effort to be relieved of their pressure. Hupomone is the strength to bear up under plus the persistent application of this strength and is ultimately not a grin and bear it attitude/action but a supernatural work of the Holy Spirit.

Harry Ironside explains that...

"tribulation worketh patience" if we accept it as from our loving Lord Himself, knowing it is for our blessing. Out of patient endurance springs fragrant Christian experience, as the soul learns how wonderfully Christ can sustain in every circumstance. And experience blossoms into hope, weaning the heart from the things of earth and occupying them with the heavenly scene to which we are hastening. (Ironside, Harry. Romans and Galatians. Kregel. 2006)

John Calvin writes that perseverance...

"is not the natural effect of tribulation; for we see that a great portion of mankind are thereby instigated to murmur against God, and even to curse His name. But when that inward meekness, which is infused by the Spirit of God, and the consolation, which is conveyed by the same Spirit, succeed in the place of our stubbornness, then tribulations become the means of generating patience; yea, those (same) tribulations, which in the obstinate can produce nothing but indignation and clamorous discontent." (Romans 5)
 

Matthew Henry writes that perseverance...

"works an experience of God, and the songs He gives in the night; the patient sufferers have the greatest experience of the divine consolations, which abound as afflictions abound. It works an experience of ourselves. It is by tribulation that we make an experiment of our own sincerity, and therefore such tribulations are called trials. It works, dokimen—an approbation (an approving), as he is approved that has passed the test. Thus Job’s tribulation wrought patience, and that patience produced an approbation, that still he holds fast his integrity [Job 2:3]."

PROVEN CHARACTER: e de hupomone dokimen: (Josh 10:24,25; 1Sa 17:34-37; Ps 27:2,3; 42:4,5; 71:14,18-24; 2Cor 4:8-10; 2Ti 4:16-18)

Proven character (1382) (dokime) (Click for in depth study of the related verb dokimazo) means proof and in secular Greek was used to describe metals that had been tested and been determined to be pure. Dokime in context describes the proof of a believer's character.  It refers to a person who has successfully sustained the fiery test. He has learned that by God's grace he can endure. "I have trusted God in the middle of the trouble and found that God is faithful!" In short,  afflictions borne patiently show a Christian what he or she really is 'made of".

Dokime can refer to either the process of trial, proving, as in (2 Corinthians 8:2 "that in a great ordeal [trial = dokime] of affliction their abundance of joy and their deep poverty overflowed in the wealth of their liberality") or the result of trial, approvedness,

"But you know of [Timothy's] proven worth that he served with me in the furtherance of the gospel like a child serving his father."  (see note Philippians 2:22)

In the present context dokime refers to tried integrity; a state of mind which has stood the test. The process has already been expressed by tribulation. The verb dokimazo means “to put to the test for the purpose of approving, and finding that the person tested meets the specifications, to put one’s approval upon him.” This approved character produces in turn and increasing degree of hope, of absolute certainty that the Lord will do good to us in the future! (see index below to in depth study of this "blessed hope")

Wayne Barber explains proven character noting that...

The verb (katergazomai) is still implied (and can be paraphrased0 "brings out, works out" proven character. Suffering is a part of every believer’s life, just like it’s a part of anybody else in this world, except that we have persecution thrown in. The difference is we have the ability to endure. When we are able to bear up under in the power God gives us to bear up under, that proves something, not only to us but also to the world of what we really are. It proves the fact that we’ve been justified by our faith. I’ve always said, "Put a Christian under pressure, and you’ll find out what they’re made of." Pressure is God’s classroom. The whole world suffers, but to us it becomes a classroom. The term "proven character" is really the word dokime. It means to prove something, approve something. It’s the word Paul used in Philippians 2:22 when Paul spoke about Timothy. He said, "But you know of his proven worth that he served me in the furtherance of the gospel like a child serving his father." He’s been proven. It’s the same word. It’s also used in James 1:12 when James says, "Blessed is a man who perseveres under trial; for once he has been approved, he will receive the crown of life, which the Lord has promised to those who love Him." It’s a proving of something. When you depend upon the Lord you find something out about yourself, but you also find out something about Him that you could have known in no other way.

Peter says in 1 Peter 1:6 (see note), "In this you greatly rejoice, even though now for a little while, if necessary, you have been distressed by various trials, that the proof [same word] of your faith, being more precious than gold which is perishable, even though tested by fire, may be found to result in praise and glory and honor at the revelation of Jesus Christ." We need to understand how important suffering is to us so we don’t start shaking our fist in God’s face the next time something difficult happens in our life. It’s like a refiner’s fire.

Do you know what a refiner’s fire was? When a silversmith melted silver he would put it into a pot and heat that pot and heat that pot. It would get hotter and hotter and hotter, and finally the dross that’s in that silver would come to the surface. He would take a ladle and throw it off. When the silversmith could look into the pot and see himself, then he would cool the fire. Somebody said, "Having gone through the fire, it has become silver." I disagree. It was silver before it ever went in the fire, but it was the fire that burned off all the things that had been hiding what it really was.

When Shadrack, Meshack and Abednego went through the fiery furnace in the book of Daniel, the only things that burned on them were the things that bound them. It didn’t singe a hair on their heads. They didn’t even have the smell of smoke on them.

When we go through these things it proves what we are. How many Christians are fighting against the very thing God is trying to use to prove Himself, who you are and what He has given you in the Holy Spirit of God? This is a tremendous truth of this brand new relationship that we have with God. It is no wonder James could say, "Count it all joy, brethren, when you encounter various trials." If you read that without knowing Romans, you would think he had lost his mind. Who wants to thank God for trials? This is why Paul said in 1Thessalonians 5:18 (note), "in everything give thanks."

He also wrote in Ephesians 5:20 (note), "always giving thanks for all things." It’s not only IN it but FOR it, because he knows something. Whatever goes on in your life or in my life, God is using it as a refiner’s fire to prove what we are, to prove to us who He is, and to show us how much He desperately loves us.

Suffering is the classroom the believer goes through. Everyone in the world suffers, but Romans 8:17 (note) says we suffer with Christ. That’s the difference. We are not suffering alone. I’ve been justified by faith; therefore, He lives in me. He goes through it with me. That’s the difference between a person in the world and a person who knows Jesus Christ.

If we could see suffering from God’s point of view, we would stand up and rejoice in our suffering. We would begin to understand that we talk about things we have, but we don’t have a clue what that means in our life. Why? Because we fight Him through the valleys. We say, "God, why did You do this?" God’s looking back at you and saying, "Wait a minute. Don’t you eternally stand in My favor? It is for your good that I am doing this. I’m using it to shape you into the image of My Son, Jesus Christ. That’s the most incredible message in Romans 5 for the believer that you can find.

The world would stand up and defy everything I am saying. "Ah! God must be a cruel god to make us live like we live." God is the greatest god you can ever be around. The problem is they are looking at it from their perspective, not from His. So, it proves us; it proves Him to us, us to ourselves and gives us a witness to people who are all around us. Suffering, persecution, you name it. All of that has to do with God’s loving us in this life. If you didn’t go through it, you would have nothing to say on the other end of it.

Barnes explains this process writing that dokime refers to...

"that thorough examination by which we ascertain the quality or nature of a thing, as when we test a metal by fire, or in any other way, to ascertain that it is genuine. It also means approbation, or the result of such a trial; the being approved, and accepted as the effect of a trying process. The meaning is, that long afflictions borne patiently show a Christian what he is; they test his religion, and prove that it is genuine. Afflictions are often sent for this purpose, and patience in the midst of them shows that the religion which can sustain them is from God... (Afflictions) show that religion is genuine; that it is from God; and not only so, but they direct the mind onward to another world (exult in the hope), and sustain the soul by the prospect of a glorious immortality there." (Romans 5)

James writes a similar motivating truth...

"Blessed is a man who perseveres (hupomone - present tense = continually, habitually) under trial (peirasmos); for once he has been approved (dokimos), he will receive the crown of life, which the Lord has promised to those who love Him." (James 1:12)
 

In a parallel truth, Peter encourages his suffering readers...

"In this you greatly rejoice, even though now for a little while, if (since it is) necessary (to prepare us for glory), you have been distressed by various ("sized and shaped") trials (peirasmos), that the proof (dokimon) of your faith, being more precious than gold which is perishable, even though tested by fire, may be found to result in praise and glory and honor at the revelation of Jesus Christ" (see note 1Peter 1:6 1:7).

In short, Christians can boast and rejoice in tribulations fully confident of what those tribulations are guaranteed to produce. This truth is another facet of the diamond called the good news or the gospel. Let us stand firm therefore and gird our minds for action, disciplining ourselves for godliness, for such discipline is profitable not only for the present age but for that to come!

And so for a believer, trials work FOR and NOT AGAINST us. No amount of suffering can separate us from the Lord, for as Paul asks

"Who (or what) shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword?" (see note Romans 8:35)

In point of truth, trials actually bring us closer to our Lord and make us more like Him. Suffering builds Christ-like character, a character that has been tested and received God's seal of approval! When you put metal through a fiery testing and it comes out on the other side persevering and enduring, what you call that metal is "proven" or "authentic" or "genuine" and that is the idea of this section. When you go through tribulation, and your faith is tested, and it bears up under the load of the difficult circumstance and results in the finished product, a wonderful sense of authenticity. You know beyond doubt that your faith is genuine for it has been tested and has stood the test with perseverance. Your faith is therefore real, authentic, proven, genuine.

Cranfield adds that...

"the quality of provedness which is possessed by faith when it has stood up to testing, like the precious metal which is left when the base metals have been refined away”

The idea is that sufferings are like a test which, when endured by the strength which God supplies, results in a quality of life and character that has been tempered and purified and demonstrated to be pleasing to God.

Paul is probably drawing on a well established theme of Jewish wisdom—the idea of testing, particularly that of proving gold by testing it with fire.

In (Proverbs 17:3) Solomon writes that...

"The refining pot is for silver and the furnace for gold, but the LORD tests hearts." The Septuagint (Greek of the Hebrew) reads "As silver and gold are continuously tried (dokimazo) in a furnace, so are choice hearts with the Lord."
 

Ray Stedman:

We have all seen the tire advertisements on television. A car is equipped with four tires and is put through horrendous tests -- driven through desert sands, bogs, swamps, and marshes, driven over rough, hard, cobblestone roads, over roads with holes and chuck-holes, over boards studded with nails. The tire is twisted and pulled and stretched in every direction, and you are amazed at what that tire can take! After the test is over, they hold the tire up and it looks like it's never been out of its wrapping! Then the ad comes: "Buy Sock'em Tires! They're tested, proven!" Now that is what this word character means. God is building you up so he can hold you up and say, "He's approved, he's tested." God is in the process of making veterans. I have always liked that word. A veteran has been through something and has been tested and proven. (Read full text of Rejoicing in Suffering)

AND PROVEN CHARACTER, HOPE: e de dokime elpida: (See detailed chart discussion on hope)

That hope does not put the believer to shame suggests that, on the contrary, being freed from illusion and despair, he is able to go boldly on his course through this life, knowing that he will not be disappointed.

How does "proven character" bring about hope? Isn't the answer that when your faith has been tried in affliction, and persevered, and thus proven genuine and authentic you know you are real and not a fake Christian and that gives you hope that you really are a child of God and will inherit his glory. In other words, one of the great obstacles to a full and strong hope in the glory of God is the fear that we are hypocrites - that our faith is not real and that we just inherited it from our parents and have been motivated by things that are not honoring to God. One of the purposes of afflictions in our lives is to give us victory over those fears and make us full of hope and confidence as the children of God.

Hendriksen writes that...

It is immediately clear that consciousness, on their part, of the fact that they have sustained the test, so that God’s approval rests on them, will strengthen their hope. (Hendriksen, W., & Kistemaker, S. J. NT Commentary Set. Baker Book or Logos)

Morris adds that...

the Christian who has been tested has proved God’s faithfulness and will surely hope the more confidently. (Morris, L. The Epistle to the Romans. W. B. Eerdmans; Inter-Varsity Press)
 

Cranfield explained that...

To have one's faith proved by God in the fires of tribulation and sustained by Him so as to stand the test is to have one's hope in Him and in the fulfilment of His promises, one's hope of His glory (v. 2), strengthened and confirmed.

MacArthur adds that...

The more a believer pursues holiness, the more he is persecuted and troubled and the greater will be his hope as he is sustained through it all by God’s powerful grace. (MacArthur, J: Romans 1-8. Chicago: Moody Press or Logos)

Denney comments that...

The experience of what God can do, or rather of what He does, for the justified amid the tribulations of this life, animates into new vigor the hope with which the life of faith begins.

Ray Stedman writes:

"Suffering produces character. Character (gradually growing into true manhood and womanhood) makes us hope, for we see that the job is being done, and we know that God is at work and that we need not stand at last ashamed and disappointed before Jesus Christ when he comes. All this, Paul says, is because God loves us -- so, when suffering comes, it is not a mark of God's anger; it is a mark of his love. That is what Heb12 says, doesn't it? Every son whom God receives, he chastens because he loves him -- not because he hates him -- but because he loves him {cf, Heb12:6}. Therefore, there is no necessity to cry out, and say, "Oh, what have I done? What have I done, that God should treat me like this?" We think that God is interested in getting a certain amount of work done in this world, and we think that the work is the important thing to God, but it is not so. God doesn't need us to do the work that he wants done in the world. He can do that with a rock, or a stone, or a child, or a tree -- it makes no difference. Did not Jesus say, when the Pharisees rebuked the crowds for praising him as he rode into the city of Jerusalem on the triumphal entry -- did not he say to them, "Look, if these should hold their peace, the very stones would cry out," {cf, Lk19:40}. That is, God can use anything to do his work. This isn't what he is interested in. He is interested in our lives -- it is what the work does to us, it is what life is doing to us. It is our character that God is after, and this is why (in love) he introduces suffering, tribulation, trials, disappointments, and anguish into our lives. These are an indispensable part of the process. Oh, I wish we could see that! These things come because he loves us, and because he has given the Holy Spirit to us to do this very work in our lives.

Let me share with you a brief word from Amy Carmichael; some of you know of her great work out in India. She was a woman who suffered greatly through her life, but accomplished tremendous things for God in southern India. She writes this under the title, The Shadowed Way: