1 Peter 3 - Continuing on the theme of women, men and the whole church...

We ended the last post with Paul writing.....

1Co 14:33  For God is not the author of confusion, but of peace, as in all churches of the saints.

1Co 14:34  Let your women keep silence in the churches: for it is not permitted unto them to speak; but they are commanded to be under obedience, as also saith the law.

1Co 14:35  And if they will learn any thing, let them ask their husbands at home: for it is a shame for women to speak in the church.

1Co 14:36  What? came the word of God out from you? or came it unto you only?

1Co 14:37  If any man think himself to be a prophet, or spiritual, let him acknowledge that the things that I write unto you are the commandments of the Lord.

1Co 14:38  But if any man be ignorant, let him be ignorant.

1Co 14:39  Wherefore, brethren, covet to prophesy, and forbid not to speak with tongues.

1Co 14:40  Let all things be done decently and in order.

Peter picks up this theme of wives and husbands with these words, and then brings the teaching back into the context of the whole church and how we are to live in the world.

Wives and Husbands

1Pe 3:1  Likewise, ye wives, be in subjection to your own husbands; that, if any obey not the word, they also may without the word be won by the conversation of the wives;

1Pe 3:2  While they behold your chaste conversation coupled with fear.

1Pe 3:3  Whose adorning let it not be that outward adorning of plaiting the hair, and of wearing of gold, or of putting on of apparel;

1Pe 3:4  But let it be the hidden man of the heart, in that which is not corruptible, even the ornament of a meek and quiet spirit, which is in the sight of God of great price.

1Pe 3:5  For after this manner in the old time the holy women also, who trusted in God, adorned themselves, being in subjection unto their own husbands:

1Pe 3:6  Even as Sara obeyed Abraham, calling him lord: whose daughters ye are, as long as ye do well, and are not afraid with any amazement.

1Pe 3:7  Likewise, ye husbands, dwell with them according to knowledge, giving honour unto the wife, as unto the weaker vessel, and as being heirs together of the grace of life; that your prayers be not hindered.

Suffering for Righteousness' Sake

1Pe 3:8  Finally, be ye all of one mind, having compassion one of another, love as brethren, be pitiful, becourteous:

1Pe 3:9  Not rendering evil for evil, or railing for railing: but contrariwise blessing; knowing that ye are thereunto called, that ye should inherit a blessing.

1Pe 3:10  For he that will love life, and see good days, let him refrain his tongue from evil, and his lips that they speak no guile:

1Pe 3:11  Let him eschew evil, and do good; let him seek peace, and ensue it.

1Pe 3:12  For the eyes of the Lord are over the righteous, and his ears are open unto their prayers: but the face of the Lord is against them that do evil.

1Pe 3:13  And who is he that will harm you, if ye be followers of that which is good?

1Pe 3:14  But and if ye suffer for righteousness' sake, happy are ye: and be not afraid of their terror, neither be troubled;

1Pe 3:15  But sanctify the Lord God in your hearts: and be ready always to give an answer to every man that asketh you a reason of the hope that is in you with meekness and fear:

1Pe 3:16  Having a good conscience; that, whereas they speak evil of you, as of evildoers, they may be ashamed that falsely accuse your good conversation in Christ.

1Pe 3:17  For it is better, if the will of God be so, that ye suffer for well doing, than for evil doing.

1Pe 3:18  For Christ also hath once suffered for sins, the just for the unjust, that he might bring us to God, being put to death in the flesh, but quickened by the Spirit:

1Pe 3:19  By which also he went and preached unto the spirits in prison;

1Pe 3:20  Which sometime were disobedient, when once the longsuffering of God waited in the days of Noah, while the ark was a preparing, wherein few, that is, eight souls were saved by water.

1Pe 3:21  The like figure whereunto even baptism doth also now save us (not the putting away of the filth of the flesh, but the answer of a good conscience toward God,) by the resurrection of Jesus Christ:

1Pe 3:22  Who is gone into heaven, and is on the right hand of God; angels and authorities and powers being made subject unto him.

Gill's comment on the end of verse 21 says this:

but the answer of a good conscience towards God; the Vulgate Latin renders it, "the interrogation of a good conscience"; referring, it may be, to the interrogations that used to be put to those who desired baptism; as, dost thou renounce Satan? dost thou believe in Christ? see Act 8:36, others render it, "the stipulation of a good conscience"; alluding also to the ancient custom of obliging those that were baptized to covenant and agree to live an holy life and conversation, to renounce the devil and all his works, and the pomps and vanities of this world; and baptism does certainly lay an obligation on men to walk in newness of life; see Rom 6:4, the Ethiopic version renders it, "confession of God"; and to this the Syriac version agrees, rendering it, "confessing God with a pure conscience"; for, to baptism, profession of faith in Christ, and of the doctrine of Christ in a pure conscience, is requisite; and in baptism persons make a public confession of God, and openly put on Christ before men: the sense seems plainly this; that then is baptism rightly performed, and its end answered, when a person, conscious to himself of its being an ordinance of Christ, and of his duty to submit to it, does do so upon profession of his faith in Christ, in obedience to his command, and "with" a view to his glory; in doing which he discharges a good conscience towards God: and being thus performed, it saves,

by the resurrection of Jesus Christ; being a means of leading the faith of the baptized person, as to the blood of Christ, for pardon and cleansing, so to the resurrection of Christ, to justification; see Act 2:38, moreover, the sense of the passage may be this, that baptism is a like figure as the ark of Noah was; that as the entrance of Noah and his family into the ark was an emblem of a burial, so their coming out of it was a figure of the resurrection; and just such a figure is baptism, performed by immersion, both of the resurrection of Christ from the dead, and of the resurrection of saints to walk in newness of life. The Arabic version renders the whole verse thus; "of which thing baptism is now a type saving us, not by removing the filth of the flesh only, but by exhilarating a good conscience towards God, by the resurrection of Jesus Christ".

I would add that our good conscience or our righteousness comes not from the acts or obedience that we do...but rather rests 100% on the righteousness that is found in Christ Jesus and the gift of this through his grace and mercy that gives us our faith. Paul says that if Christ had not been raised from the dead all this would be in vain..

1Co 15:12  Now if Christ be preached that he rose from the dead, how say some among you that there is no resurrection of the dead?

1Co 15:13  But if there be no resurrection of the dead, then is Christ not risen:

1Co 15:14  And if Christ be not risen, then is our preaching vain, and your faith is also vain.

1Co 15:15  Yea, and we are found false witnesses of God; because we have testified of God that he raised up Christ: whom he raised not up, if so be that the dead rise not.

1Co 15:16  For if the dead rise not, then is not Christ raised:

1Co 15:17  And if Christ be not raised, your faith is vain; ye are yet in your sins.

1Co 15:18  Then they also which are fallen asleep in Christ are perished.

1Co 15:19  If in this life only we have hope in Christ, we are of all men most miserable.

But that chapter will be in my next day's readings....