1 Peter 3:16-22 "Share Hope through Suffering Well"

Intro

In 1873, two years after the Great Chicago Fire, Horacio Spafford put his put his wife and his four daughters on a ship to sail for England, while he remained behind to settle up some business ventures.

The ship runs into another ship and begins to sink quickly.

His four daughters died.

His wife barely escapes.

He receives a telegram from his wife: “Saved. Alone.”

He gets on a ship to join his wife in England

As he sails over the location in the ocean where their ship went down, he wrote: “When peace like a river attendeth my way, or sorrows like sea billows roll, whatever my lot, you have taught me to say, ‘It is well; it is well with my soul.”

How can this be well?!

“My sin, O the bliss, of this glorious thought! My sin not in part, but the whole, is nailed to the cross and I bear it no more! Praise the Lord, Praise the Lord, O my soul!”

He knew Jesus loved Him regardless his sin and helplessness.

We do not need to wonder where his hope lies.

Horacio Spafford gives us a deep look into what it looks like to share hope through suffering.

Suffering Well Reveals Hope

1 Peter 3:16–17 ESV

16 having a good conscience, so that, when you are slandered, those who revile your good behavior in Christ may be put to shame. 17 For it is better to suffer for doing good, if that should be God’s will, than for doing evil.

Suffering reveals what we truly believe

It’s not difficult to rejoice the Lord when things are going well in our lives

Suffering well unjustly reveals our hope in Jesus

Not all Christians possess the spiritual gift of evangelism

But every single Christian is to make Jesus’ name known!

Not asking you to preach in the public square

I’m asking you to be faithful at all times

This includes suffering.

Jesus is more precious than any suffering we could ever go through

Romanian Pastor absolute confidence in God’s will for His life

Interrogated and beaten during intense persecution in Romania

“One time being interrogated by 6 men, I told my interrogators, ‘What is taking place here is not an encounter between you and me. This is an encounter between my God and me.’ The interrogators looked puzzled and I told them, ‘My God is teaching me a lesson through you—I don’t know what it is; maybe He wants to teach me several lessons. I only know, sirs, that you will do to me only what God wants you to do, and you will not go one inch further because you are only an instrument of my God.’ Everyday I saw these men as nothing more than my Father’s instruments.

You want to make Jesus’s name known in your life?

You will need more than presuppositional apologetics

Nothing will make Jesus look more magnanimous than a believer who suffers well with patient endurance because Jesus is worth it.

But why do we suffer for Jesus?

Jesus’ Suffering is the Foundation of Hope

1 Peter 3:18–19 ESV

18 For Christ also suffered once for sins, the righteous for the unrighteous, that he might bring us to God, being put to death in the flesh but made alive in the spirit, 19 in which he went and proclaimed to the spirits in prison,

Peter calls our attention to the unjust sufferings of Jesus

The righteous for the unrighteous

Jesus, the righteous before God, took the responsibility for the unrighteous.

He took responsibility for our sin on Himself, and endured the full weight of the outpoured wrath of God

He provided a righteousness for us which is perfect and eternal!

Jesus’s death and resurrection was no silent victory

The bad guy didn’t just forget about him

The Greek word is κηρύσσω - Kerysso

To proclaim, to make known publicly and loudly

In ancient times, heralds would run to the town as representatives of rulers to make public announcements or precede generals and kings in proceedings to celebrate military triumphs and victories in battle.

Jesus went to the demons of Hell and declared victory!

Jesus’s sufferings serve as a sermon of hope!

“The righteous was given for the unrighteous!”

he that knew no sin, suffered instead of those who knew no righteousness.

- Matthew Henry

The entire purpose of the Jesus’s cross was our hope for resurrection!

Suffering well for the sake of the gospel is a proclamation of our hope in the finished work of Jesus

Baptism Proclaims Hope

1 Peter 3:20–22 ESV

20 because they formerly did not obey, when God’s patience waited in the days of Noah, while the ark was being prepared, in which a few, that is, eight persons, were brought safely through water. 21 Baptism, which corresponds to this, now saves you, not as a removal of dirt from the body but as an appeal to God for a good conscience, through the resurrection of Jesus Christ, 22 who has gone into heaven and is at the right hand of God, with angels, authorities, and powers having been subjected to him.

Does baptism save you?

Entire theologies have been brought about from this particular verse

Context is key

Do not isolate this phrase

Wedding ring

“With this ring, I thee wed”

We do not mean that by putting the ring on the finger, that makes us married

If I take the ring off, am I any less married?

The covenant vows I made with my wife made the marriage

It shows the covenant

“With this baptism, you are united to Christ”

We are not saved by the water, but in the faith! The covenant!

Peter is not referring to water baptism in this passage

He’s referring to Baptism of the Holy Spirit

Mark 1:8 ESV

8 I have baptized you with water, but he will baptize you with the Holy Spirit.”

Acts 1:4–5 ESV

4 And while staying with them he ordered them not to depart from Jerusalem, but to wait for the promise of the Father, which, he said, “you heard from me; 5 for John baptized with water, but you will be baptized with the Holy Spirit not many days from now.”

This baptism is a spiritual baptism

It occurs on the inside

“Not as a removal of dirt from the [physical] body”

Rather a baptism into Christ

An immersion into Christ

Romans 6:3 ESV

3 Do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death?

We are immersed into the sufferings of Jesus!

This is to say that we are covered in His cross!

When Jesus died, we died with Him!

We take on all of Christ death for all of our lives!

It is not through the act of baptism that you’re saved, but “through the resurrection of Jesus Christ” (v. 21)

Big Idea:

We can suffer well because because Jesus suffered victoriously.

Applications/Next Steps

Graceland believes everyone has a next step.

Our passage gives us three natural next steps to take

To Christians (vv. 16-17)

Suffer well for goodness’ sake

The way you’re going to communicate your hope in the gospel is through suffering well

Romanian pastor

“During an early interrogation, I told an officer who was threatening to kill me, ‘Sir, let me explain how I see this issue. Your supreme weapon is killing; my supreme weapon is dying. Here’s how it works: You know that my sermons on tape have spread all over the country. If you kill me, those sermons will be sprinkled with my blood. Everyone will know that I died for my preaching. Everyone will pick it up and say, ‘I will listen again to what this man preached because he really meant it. He sealed it with his life.’ So, sir, my sermons will speak 10 times louder than before. I will actually rejoice in this supreme victory if you kill me.’

“After I had said this, the interrogator sent me home.”

Another officer was interrogating another pastor said, “We know that the other pastor would love to be a martyr, but we are not that foolish to fulfill his wish.”

I stopped to consider the meaning of that statement. I remembered that for many years, I’d been afraid of dying and wasted my life in inactivity. But now that I had placed my life on the alter and decided that I would die for the gospel, they were telling me they would not kill me. I could go wherever I wanted and preach whatever I wanted, knowing I was safe. As long as I was trying to save my life, I was losing it. Now that I was willing to lose it, I found it.

Confidence in the will of God and the sacrifice of Jesus leads to death-defying devotion to the mission and the enjoyment of God.

When Christians suffer well it displays confidence in the finished work of Jesus.

Which leads to point 2

To Non Christians (vv. 18-19)

Recognize “the righteous for the unrighteous”

Do not rest unto you are cleansed by the Holy Spirit and the blood of Jesus.

Only in His death and resurrection are we assured hope and peace!

To Closet (Uncommitted) Christians (vv. 20-22)

Be baptized and share the hope of the gospel

Would you take the next step? Would you give your life to Him who suffered for you and is calling you into a joyful hope?