I Peter 3:1-7
I Take You to be My Lawful Wedded
Wife/Husband
Now turn with me if you would to I Peter 3:1-7. Peter, of course, has been expounding to us the rich privileges which are ours in the gospel, that we have been translated from the kingdom of darkness and into the kingdom of light. And Peter’s great concern is that that should make a difference, that belonging to the kingdom of God, that having a relationship with Jesus Christ ought to make a difference. And he has been expounding that difference as it is seen first of all in our relationship to the state. He’s also been expounding that relationship as it affects us in the workplace. Now, we’re going to look at a passage in which it affects us in our homes and marriages, and then next week he will also speak to how that affects us in the church itself. And in all four of those areas, Peter has in mind scenarios that are less than ideal. How do we witness for Christ in situations that are less than ideal? Let’s turn our attention then to I Peter chapter 3 verses 1 though 7, knowing that the grass withers and the flower fades but the word of our God abides forever.
Amen. May God bless to us His word. Let’s pray together.
Our Father in heaven, be our teacher we pray. Help us now as we look at this passage, so very practical as it is and grant Lord, we pray that here at First Presbyterian Church we might have marriages that speak of Christ and that portray the beauty of Christ. For Jesus’ sake we ask it, Amen.
I wonder what it was like to be married to Peter. I wonder if you ever think about that. I wonder what it was like to be Mrs. Peter. I said to Rosemary, and she’s in my direct line of sight here, you can’t see her in the back, she’s over to the left here, I said to Rosemary, my wife, if you’re visiting, “I need to be able to look at you tonight because I’m going to say some things and I need to be able to discern that eye that only wives can give that says, ‘You hypocrite, you.’” I wonder what Peter was thinking when he wrote these words. I wonder where Mrs. Peter was. I wonder did Peter say to Mrs. Peter, “I’m going to say A, B, and C. What do you think?” I wonder was she the kind of wife who would say, “Whatever you say, darling”? or was she the kind of person who would respond, perhaps in an unobtrusive way, in a way that you’d never even discern that says, “Look, you can’t possibly say that.”
Peter is married, of course, we know that from Mark’s gospel. One of the first stories we read of in Jesus’ ministry in Mark’s gospel is the healing of Peter’s mother-in-law who was sick almost to death. The question that confronts us as we read this passage is, “What difference did it make in Peter’s life that he was married?”
We know from I Corinthians 9 that many of the apostles were married; they traveled with them in their itinerate ministry, their foundation-laying ministry of the early church, and Peter is one of those apostles that is singled out in that passage. So when Jesus said to Peter, “Come follow me,” Mrs. Peter followed too. Of course, the following for Peter, and it was made known to him in no uncertain terms, was a very costly one and it would be one in which eventually lead to his death and martyrdom: crucified, by his own request, upside-down outside of the walls of the city of Rome.
So I’m asking you, “What was it like to be Mrs. Peter?” I don’t know about you, but I’m looking forward to meeting Mrs. Peter. I know nothing about Mrs. Peter, absolutely nothing, but I do want to meet her in heaven. I just wonder what kind of woman she was to have been at the side of this extraordinary, talented, this multi-faceted, multi-dimensional man, Peter, with whom we identify so much because, perhaps, he fell so much and fell so drastically that somehow we identify with Peter perhaps more than we do with Paul. There’s obviously a certain amount of sensitivity about what Peter is saying here when he addresses marriage, and marriage in circumstances that are less than ideal, and the question is how does the gospel work itself out in that particular context?
I want to say, first of all, something by way of a matter of principle because Peter is establishing here a principle. Then, in the second place I want to see what he has to say to wives. And then in the third place I want us to see what he has to say to husbands. And I’m under a threat and a promise that I will get to what he has to say to husbands.
I. We should desire to please
Jesus more than our husband or wife.
First of all, I want us to see the principle. We can’t
possibly examine what Peter is saying here without understanding the principle
that lies behind it. The principle is two parts: first of all, the first thing
is that the teaching of Peter has a spiritual focus or a spiritual dimension to
it. Now, of course, the first thing that you see when you look at these seven
verses is that it’s not fair. How many of you, as you look at these verses and
as we read them together said to yourself, maybe you don’t want to admit it, but
just admit it inside yourself for a minute, that this isn’t fair? You know that
there are six verses here about women and only one verse about men. That’s
typical of the apostles, isn’t it, that’s typical of the inherent misogyny that
lies behind the apostles. It’s typical of male leadership in the church.
Well, of course, the answer to that is that this is atypical, this isn’t how it’s treated always in the Scriptures. In Ephesians 5, for example, Paul spends three times as much speaking to men as he does to women so there is some kind of balance between Paul and Peter here, but I think the answer to it is this: it’s a pastoral. And I think that the statistics in the early church were Christian women married to non-Christian men, rather than Christian men married to non-Christian women. There were far more Christian women in the predicament that Peter is addressing here than there were men, so he’s giving it a lot more attention. He’s addressing a very particular pastoral problem that existed in the early church. Now, we don’t know whether these women had married non-Christian men or whether they had been converted after they were married. In either case it’s irrelevant. There’s no point in Peter now going back and chastising them for marrying men that they shouldn’t have married; that’s not the way to deal with problems like this. The problem is done; now what they need is help. Now what they need is comfort, now what they need is instruction, now what they need is the word of God to come and address them where they are, and that’s what Peter is doing. I think that what has happened, though I cannot prove it, but I think that what has happened is that many of these women had been converted perhaps after they got married and Peter is addressing that difficult and tense situation.
Some of you here can relate to it all to well and you have spouses, and let me just address the women for a minute, you have husbands, in particular that are not converted, husbands that are not interested in spiritual things. Maybe they are converted, but they’re not where you are; they’re not on the same spiritual level of maturity that you are and it creates problems and marital problems and marital tension and Peter is addressing that here.
But there’s a second part to this principle that Peter is addressing, this spiritual problem of being united to Christ, on the one hand, but on the other, in our earthly relationships being united to a husband with whom you cannot relate spiritually and that’s an enormous problem. Peter is saying something by way of principle that actually he has already said when he has addressed the relationship that we have to the state and the relationship that slaves were to have to their masters, namely that the reason why we do anything in this world is first and foremost that we want to please our Savior. That’s why he begins, in the first verse of chapter 3 with the words, “In the same way,” that is just as he has been saying in our relationship to the state we are to be obedient to the powers that be, not because of who they are, but because we want to be obedient to our heavenly father. We want to be obedient to King Jesus; it is because of our relationship to Jesus that we do these things. And our relationship to Jesus Christ affects everything that we are and everything that we do. And what Peter is saying here is that you can face the most extraordinarily difficult circumstances and you can do that by looking to Jesus Christ, by seeing Jesus Christ as the one that you want to please more than any other. “In this same way,” Peter says.
Now what is his counsel to wives and then what is his counsel to husbands? Well, in the first place, his counsel to wives is: be submissive and develop true beauty. And what he is saying is that in order to fulfill the role that God has given to us in His providence, one of the things that emerges out of that relationship is that they can see in you something which reflects the beauty of the Lord Jesus Christ. And Peter’s aim here, of course, is an evangelistic aim; it’s how to win the unconverted husband. And what Peter says is that the way to win the unconverted husband is that when they look at the relationship that you have with your husband, your children will see something of the beauty and glory of Jesus Christ. That seems to be what Peter is saying. Actually he’s emphasizing here what is emphasized right at the very beginning of the Bible itself that the central ministry of a wife is to be a helpmate for her husband.
II. We should desire to honor our
husband or wife more than ourself.
Now Peter gives particular application of that and we shall see
that in a minute, but I want us to notice that what Peter goes on to say
generally to wives is this: that this can only come about as you seek to develop
true spiritual beauty. And it’s interesting that it’s beauty that Peter has in
mind in verses 3 and 4 and again in verse 5, and Peter want us to see that it’s
not an external beauty, it’s not the beauty of a glamour girl on the front cover
of a magazine, it’s not that kind of beauty. It’s the kind of beauty that God
sees. It’s the kind of beauty, let me say, that is sometimes and maybe more
than sometimes, demonstrated in older women rather than in younger women. That
is to say the beauty of wisdom; it’s the beauty of maturity, it’s the beauty of
an unadorned lifestyle that is given over to the purposes of the kingdom of God,
the unfading beauty of a gentle and quiet spirit.
Now Peter isn’t recommending here that women should be frumpy, when he speaks in verse 3 about braiding of hair and wearing gold jewelry and putting on dresses. Peter isn’t saying that those things are unimportant. What he’s saying is that there is a beauty which transcends all of that. I remember hearing Lee Samuel, this is 25 years ago now, at a student conference that I was attending, and he was dealing with all of those things that students are always preoccupied by, namely dating and relationships and all of that, and it’s the same across the water as it is here. Only we talk about it with a little more, well a little less openly that you do here, let me put it that way. And I remember Lee Samuel saying to these young men, “Don’t marry the ugliest woman that you see just because she’s a Christian.” And Peter is saying something along those lines here; he’s interested in a beauty that can’t be found in a box; he’s talking about an unfading beauty of a gentle, he says in verse 4, of a gentle and quiet spirit.
Now less we misunderstand, Peter uses here an illustration and he goes to the illustration of Sarah in the Old Testament. Now Sarah, just as a matter-of-fact, was no shrinking violet. Sarah knew occasions when she would inform Abraham of things that he should not have done. Peter addresses here Sarah regarding a particular incident in Genesis 20 where Sarah refers to Abraham and calls him “Lord.” And I think we need to be avoid the idea, especially us men, that what Peter is suggesting here is a lady-like quality. That’s not what Peter is saying; the quality that Peter wants women to adorn is actually a quality which can be seen in Jesus Christ himself. The word that Peter uses here of a gentle, or meek and quiet spirit is a word that Jesus used of himself in one of those few moments in the gospel when Jesus actually describes his own character: “I am meek and lowly of heart,” he said. And if you find that what Peter is saying here a little objectionable then see it from this point of view that “Ladies,” women, Peter is saying, “you should have the same characteristics about you that was true of Jesus Christ” and I think that seeing it that way almost turns the whole thing upside-down. Let me put it in this way: it’s a Christ-like quality that Peter wants to see in these Christian women. Not develop a ladylike, Southern Belle-type quality, no, that’s not what Peter is saying at all; he’s saying develop Christ-like properties, a property that says, “I long to see my husband honor God and honored by God,” and if it comes down to it, “I long to see my husband more honored than I am myself.” That’s what Peter is saying, and that is a Christ-like quality.
III. God will not honor the
husband or wife who dishonors their spouse.
But, I want to move on quickly to see what he has to say to the
husbands. And he goes for the jugular in verse 7, “Husbands, likewise, live
with your wives in an understanding way.” He goes for the jugular of male
chauvinism and he says, “Husbands, be considerate and show respect.” Now, note
the language: “Husbands, likewise,” in the same way, be different from
other husbands in this way: you are to be considerate and you are to show
proper, biblical respect to your wives. Honor and respect your wives in the
most profound sense imaginable, Peter says.
Now look at what he says in verse 7: “Treat them with honor, and treat them with respect because they are heiresses,” they are heirs, female heirs of the kingdom of God. Now you have to understand that in the times in which Peter is writing, women did not inherit. You have to understand that and you have to understand just how staggering a statement this would have been in the first century that men, husbands in particular, are to treat their wives as heirs, heiresses of the kingdom of God, that the radical difference that comes into Christian marriages is the way husbands treat their wives, and it’s staggering, it’s absolutely staggering and takes your breath away. And Peter says, “Husbands, if you don’t do that, if you bully your wives and treat them with disrespect, your prayers will not be answered.”
Now men, husbands, I don’t know anything in the Scriptures that terrifies me more than that. You can ransack the Scriptures from Genesis to Revelation to find anything that will terrify you more than that, that the way you speak to your wives, and let’s face it men, you can be sweet and lovely in the office, you can be sweet and lovely to your secretaries, but when you get home and close the door, you can be like bears.
Our wives see the worst aspects of our character and temperament. And Peter is saying, and here he’s meddling. You talk about meddling and preaching, but he’s meddling here because he’s saying if that’s the way your marriage is then you can stop praying because God isn’t going to answer your prayers. Now I don’t know about you, but I find that terrifying.
Now let me say four things very quickly. First of all, to those of you who are married and I want to ask you a very simple question: is this a description of your marriage? Wives, is this a description of the way you think about your husband: I want him to be honored by God even more that God honors me. That’s a hard, hard prayer isn’t it? “Lord bless my husband even if that means that I sort of move out of the picture.” That’s a really, really hard prayer to pray.
And you know, my friends, and let me speak to you ladies here this evening who may be married to men that are not converted, that is the greatest evangelistic tool that you have.
Let me say something to those who are married to non-Christians in particular: “You cannot,” Peter is saying, “You cannot ordinarily nag your husbands into the kingdom of God.” That’s what he is saying, that it’s going to take a great deal of submissiveness, of meekness, of lowliness, of a Christ-like spirit to tolerate some of the things that you are tolerating in order, Peter says, to win you into the kingdom of God. Let me say something to those of you who are possibly contemplating marriage. You long to find a godly wife, you long to find a godly husband, and you long to be in a relationship of marriage. Young ladies, or maybe not-so-young ladies, can you say about the person that you would like to marry, “I want God to so honor him and bless him even if it means that I am almost out of the picture.” Can you say that about that want-to-be husband, because if you can’t, whatever you do, do not marry him. If you can’t say that, do not marry him.
Young men, you may be so desperate to get married that you’ll do almost any crazy thing, but if you can’t say about this young lady, “I want to treat this young lady as an heir of the kingdom of God with all the honor and respect that goes along with that,” if you can’t say that, whatever you do, don’t marry her.
There are words here, I think, for those that are single and perhaps for those for whom God has called to singleness. What does this have to say to you? Well, I think what it has to say to you is a general principle that the way to live our lives, no matter what circumstance we may find ourselves in, even if we find ourselves in circumstances that are less than ideal, in a marriage in which there isn’t a spiritual union, the way to live is to have as our number one goal in our lives to please Jesus Christ. “I have it,” as Paul says in 2 Corinthians 4, “I have it as my goal to please Christ.”
Now husbands, wives, who are you seeking to please in your marriage? Who are you seeking to please in your marriage? Are you seeking to please Christ or are you seeking to please yourself, because your marriage may well depend on it. It really may. Now that’s a practical word, isn’t it, from Peter. Let’s take it to heart. Let’s take it home with us. Let’s talk about it in our marriages. Husbands, wives, don’t go home and just make tea and coffee and just forget about it. Talk about it. Is there something in my life that needs to change? On either side here, wives and husbands, is there something that needs to change in order that Christ might shine forth from our marriage. Let’s pray together.
Our Father, we thank you for these words from Peter. They are difficult, they hurt, they accuse, they bring a sense of guilt to many of us. We long in our marriages to be better husbands and better wives. We pray especially tonight for those in the kinds of marriages that Peter is addressing here where on of the partners may not be converted and we pray that you would give them so much grace to live the kinds of lives that would be pleasing to Christ and that by that example, their spouses might be won for the Savior. And hear us Lord for Jesus’ sake, Amen.