Who has the strength to bring believers through affliction and pressure?
The Lord Himself is the One who is able to carry believers through affliction and pressure. He is the same Lord who permits their trials, yet He also supplies the strength to bring them through. Early believers rested on that promise while under constant pressure.
Les explains that the early believers were under constant pressure. Their confidence was not that they would avoid trouble, but that the Lord who was permitting the affliction and pressure was also the Lord who had the strength to bring them through it. Paul described trouble in Asia: he was pressed out of measure, above strength, so that he despaired of life. He had the sentence of death in himself so that he would not trust in himself, but in God who raised the dead—the God who had delivered, does deliver, and will yet deliver. Les notes Paul likely had a mental attitude toward trials and tribulations tied to resurrection hope like Peter and the other apostles experienced.