After turning the whole saying over (John 16:17), they settle on the part that stumped them most: "a little while." Gill says this phrase seems to have been "the most intricate and perplexing to them," and that whatever they thought about not seeing Him and seeing Him again, they "had no notion at all what he should mean by" a little while. They admit it honestly: "we cannot tell what he saith."

Before they could bring it to Him, Jesus answered (John 16:19). He did not say how many days, but He told them how the little while would end: "your sorrow shall be turned into joy" (John 16:20). Like a mother after childbirth who "remembereth no more the anguish" (John 16:21), they would see Him again, "and your joy no man taketh from you" (John 16:22). The first little while ended at the cross the next day; the second ended when He stood among them risen (John 20:19-20).

Jesus had used this phrase before. He told the crowds, "Yet a little while am I with you" (John 7:33), and told the disciples, "Yet a little while, and the world seeth me no more; but ye see me" (John 14:19). In John 16:16-19 the words "a little while" appear seven times. Barnes reads the first little while as His death, which "took place the next day," and the second as His rising, "After three days." The KJV "we cannot tell" means simply "we do not know" (ESV).

The disciples' confession, "we cannot tell what he saith," is one of the most honest lines in the Gospels. They did not pretend to understand. And Jesus met them right there.

The little while turned out to be very little indeed. In a few days their sorrow did turn to joy (John 20:20). Matthew Henry writes, "The sorrows of the disciples would soon be turned into joy; as those of a mother, at the sight of her infant." God's "little while" may feel long in the middle of it, but Jesus measured it, and He knew how it would end.