1 Peter 1:25 Meaning But the Lord’s Word Endures Forever

Everything on the earth passes away and the Face of your Lord remains: only one thing outlasts the rest Sufi teachers come back to this line of the Quran whenever they take stock of what they are leaning on. Nearly everything a person builds a life around wears out, including their own body, their work, and their name. Facing that early instead of at the end changes where a person puts their weight.

Tajdīd al-khalq: creation made new at every moment Ibn Arabi held that nothing here lasts two moments in a row, because God brings the world into being again and again. The solid feel of ordinary things comes from how quickly each moment is replaced by the next one. Someone who sees this stops asking the world to hold still and starts looking elsewhere for something steady.

Kalām Allāh: God's speech Al-Ghazali taught that God's speech belongs to God, so it does not age or wear thin the way ours does. Human words are gone in seconds: the sound dies, the memory blurs, the promise gets broken or forgotten. Meeting a word that works differently gives a person ground to stand on when their own words have failed.

Dhikr: keeping God in mind by repeating His words Ibn Ata Allah gave much of his teaching to this, since a word takes root only by being said over and over. A message that reached someone once can sit in them unused, and then it thins out like anything else left alone. Returning to it, out loud or quietly, is what keeps it living in a person rather than stored away.

Baqāʾ: what remains with God Baqāʾ names what is left standing in a person once their own self-importance has dropped away. Whatever continues in them was handed to them; it came from outside and is still at work inside. So a person can lose almost everything they counted on and still find something in them that holds.