Pastor Marty Friday, March 13, 2026 at 4:31PM 1 Peter 3:18-22. This sermon was preached by Pastor Marty Bonner on Sunday, March 8, 2026.
Here is the audio. The article will be up later.
Pastor Marty Wednesday, March 4, 2026 at 8:25AM 1 Peter 3:13-17. This sermon was preached by Pastor Marty Bonner on Sunday, March 1, 2026.
The verses leading up to this section were a quote from Psalm 34 which declares that God is against evildoers and on the side of the righteous. This was written by David expressing his faith in the midst of a time of persecution and suffering. In other words, it was written in a time when he could easily have doubted this truth.
This begs the question of why righteous people suffer. Peter doesn’t approach the issue this way, but it is at the back of all that he says about it.
Let’s look at our passage.
When I say that you “may” suffer for doing what is good and right, I am keying off of the conditional words that Peter gives in this section. The clincher is in verse 17. There Peter uses the phrase “if God should will it.”
Of course, there are levels of suffering and different kinds of suffering. Yet Peter is preparing believers for whatever levels they may face.
There is a cognitive dissonance that occurs when we recognize that, though God is on the side of the righteous, He often allows the righteous to suffer at the hands of the wicked. How can this be?
Whether we can answer this or not, Peter makes it clear that God does allow believers to suffer for doing what is good (verse 13) and right (verse 14). He does have a reason, but we do not always know specifically what that is.
Of course, we are talking about good and right as God defines it and not as society defines it. This is what marks a Christian. We have stopped defining these things for ourselves or using society’s definition. We are following the thinking and mind of Christ.
Even a society that was built upon the foundation of God’s definitions of good and right can drift away from them. Eventually this becomes all out rebellion to the Word of God and to the Spirit of Christ. We see this in the Bible with Israel, and we see it today in these united States of America. An example is how our culture has been accusing Christians of not showing love when they do not approve of homosexuality or the transgender craze that happening. The world makes a “moral” accusation that is equivalent to saying, “You are bad, even evil!”
Yet the truth is this. There is nothing more loving than to protect your child against this wicked persuasion that has taken over our land. It is fundamentally God’s will for parents to shield their kids from this. It is an age-old problem. Society’s love to call evil what God calls good and to call good what God calls bad.
In verse 13, Peter opens with this question. Who would harm you for doing what is right? Some translations use the word zealous for what is right and others have for following what is right. Regardless of which of these is the right word, they both are saying the same thing. Zeal refers to an internal drive for what is right. The phrase “following good” (or imitating good) focuses on the external act that flows out of an internal zeal. Yet the main point is about who would harm you for this.
We can approach this question like Paul does in Romans 8:31. “If God be for us who can be against us?” The answer in one respect is, “No one of any consequence.” Thus, Paul states that nothing (no one) can separate us from the love of God. This is true even when God allows them to persecute us (harm us for doing good).
Both Paul in the Romans 8 passage and Peter in this passage immediately bring up what God has done through Jesus and his suffering. When we think about the suffering of Christ, we are reminded that he endured this for the sake of saving those who are lost. Thus, we can contemplate this question of who might harm us for doing good in the sense that it would only be a person who is lost and under the judgment of God. This is a judgment that God does not desire for them. If my persecutors don’t repent, then they are going to face a judgment that they will not survive.
Whether we think of them as having no real power to affect our actions or we think of them as lost humans that Jesus wants to save, the Christian can face persecution without yielding to the temptation to be angry with God and even stop believing in His love for them.
In verse 14, Peter says, “even if you should suffer…” The experience of suffering in the first century and in the twenty first century is not uniform. On one hand, we are all guaranteed some level of suffering if we follow Christ. Paul wrote in 2 Timothy 3:12, “All who desire to live godly in Christ Jesus will suffer persecution.” You are going to pay a price. But, on the other hand, the suffering of one person may be quite light compared to another. The level of persecution is not the issue. Rather, it is how we respond to it.
Peter challenges us to see that we are blessed even if we should suffer for the sake of righteousness. He is using words from the Beatitudes of the Sermon on the Mount. Matthew 5:10 reads, “Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness sake.” Those these people are blessed because God speaks on their behalf, this word for blessing emphasizes the happy experience of a life that is lived in right relationship with God. How can a person be “happy in Jesus” when they are persecuted for doing the right thing? In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus continually points to what God is going to do for such people. The kingdom will be theirs. They have a great reward in heaven. You will be like the prophets (and Christ) before you. You will be comforted. You will see God! He ended with Matthew 5:12. “Rejoice and be exceedingly glad! How can a person rejoice when they are being persecuted? They have to trust in their heavenly Father greatly.
Peter then quotes a part of Isaiah 8:12. “Do not fear their intimidation, and do not be troubled.” In the context of Isaiah, God is counseling Isaiah on how to respond to the fear and craziness of a society that is in rebellion to God. He even tells Isaiah not to call a conspiracy the things his people called a conspiracy. This is not to say that there is no truth to their fears. Rather, they are only afraid of those things because they don’t know God. The one who trusts in God should not fear the things that the godless fear. When you have no fear of God and you walk away from Him, you feel exposed to everything. You fear anything and everything because God is not with you.
Threats can even come from people claiming to know God. Following the resurrection, the apostles were told by the religious leaders to quit preaching about Jesus. If they didn’t quit, they would be thrown in prison. Yet Christians are told by a man who faced such threats not to fear those who threaten us.
Think about David. Saul sought his life and called him a traitor. David could have let fear move him to protect himself. He could have killed Saul several times. Each time David refused to do so. Saul was a man in rebellion to God, and so he was afraid of things he didn’t have to fear. David was not a traitor, and even if he was, God called Saul and could protect him. It was Saul’s awareness that God was not on his side that caused fear.
Instead of fearing their threats and actions of persecution, we should do like David. He feared God too much to respond to Saul in like manner. We too should fear God too much to respond to people like the world around us is doing. Jesus is our example and guide.
Peter then lists two things we should do (verse 15) in lieu of fear. First, we are to set apart Christ as Lord. To sanctify or set apart means to make this one thing more important than anything else. Christ as my Lord must mean more to me than a perfect life of comfort and ease. I would be willing to give up anything even suffer anything before I would give up Christ as Lord. This is what Paul is driving home in Romans 8. Nothing can separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus. Yet I can let fears cause me to shrink back. We are to guard our heart from such things.
The second thing we are to do is to be always ready to defend the reason for the hope that is in us. People will be perplexed at the way you cling to Christ in the face of persecution and suffering. How can you go through this suffering and not rant and rave against God? How can you cling to Christ as your Lord when he doesn’t protect you from my torture?
They may never ask this question out loud, but we need to be ready to give a reason why we would have such faith in the face of such adversity.
Essentially, Peter is talking about testifying to your persecutors, your enemies. In fact, the persecution of the righteous is one of the ways that God pricks the heart of those who do evil. In those moments, we must not be overcome by their evil and return evil back to them. This is our finest hour, our opportunity to slip the Gospel past their spiritual defenses.
Our great hope in Christ is still held in these weak, mortal frames. It is easy for us to fear and balk under the threat of suffering. However, we need to double down on trusting God. When we are weak, the Spirit of God will be strong through us. We can testify for Jesus and about Jesus to those who do us wrong. This is the will and the mind of Christ.
Peter adds three descriptors to how we are to give our defense. We are to do so with meekness, fear, and a good conscience.
Meekness is strength under control. It is hard to keep your composure when you are unjustly persecuted. The Christian is called to control their flesh and follow the path of Christ. Instead of letting anger cause us to rage, we are to let the Holy Spirit give us the words to say. We are to trust God.
The fear (reverence) cannot be towards men. He has just told us not to fear those intimidating us. This is the fear of the Lord. As I mentioned David earlier, he feared God too much to touch King Saul. He would let God remove Saul. When we give an answer to the ungodly, we are to know that we are to give the answer that God wants us to give. It will be an answer that pleads with them to turn from their wickedness and turn towards the love of God that is even now extended to them through you. Jesus is their judge, but he is also mine. I must trust his judgments, whether with my own persecution or my ultimate judgment in eternity.
Finally, Peter mentions that we should have a good conscience. This is also before God. If I have done what I know God wants me to do (the good and the right as He defines it), then my heart and mind will have a simplicity (no ulterior motive) and the peace that comes from it. David was no traitor. He had a clean conscience before God. Yet Saul still hunted him. David didn’t understand why this was going on, but he knew that he was following God. He didn’t deserve the things Saul was doing. We may often struggle with the why of life, but there is a peace that can be found in having a clean conscience. “I am following Jesus, and he will help me all the way. He will be attentive to my prayer and against those who try to do me evil.” I don’t have to know why; I just need to know Who.
Verse 16 ends with the challenge to do this in such a way that those who are slandering us (calling our good evil) will be put to shame. All who falsely accuse the righteous of doing evil will one day face the shame of what they have done before God. They may rail against your good conduct in Christ now, but they will be silent when they stand before God. God will not be intimidated by the power and authority they had in this life.
Yet this can also go another way. There is a certain public spectacle that happens when people given to righteousness are persecuted and slandered. The person doing so may have their conscience pricked by the realization of what they are doing. However, even if they don’t feel the shame of their actions, others watching may see the shame of it. At the cross Jesus was truly paying the price for our sins. Yet he was also pricking the conscience of everyone who ever hears the story of what was done to him and why.
Shame is real whether a person feels it or not. Ultimately, we are challenged to live in such a way that those who do persecute us will only become a clarion call to the world around us drawing attention to the Lord we serve.
Verse 17 makes it clear, if it isn’t already, that God sometimes wills that we suffer for the good that we do. This sounds strange, but Peter has laid the groundwork for the reasons He would do such things. We are the goads in the hands of Jesus, pricking the dull conscience of this world. We don’t do this just through our suffering, but also through how we suffer.
In these times, we must not lose sight of the purpose of God. We must not let the enemy convince us that God doesn’t care about us. We must not let the enemy separate our heart from the love of God, both for ourselves and for those who persecute us.
It was God’s will that Jesus suffer because it would make salvation possible, and it would draw people to that salvation. Why do we tend to flee from suffering? This is precisely what God uses to testify through us to others. Perhaps we have fled too much, so much that there is no longer a testimony of Christ in our sphere of influence.
Peter ends with the encouragement that it is better to suffer for doing what is right than to suffer for doing what is wrong. To suffer for doing wrong is not great feat. You deserve it. However, enduring undeserved punishments is a mark of someone who knows Jesus. It is great righteousness. We can only do this if we have a close relationship with Jesus by the Holy Spirit. It is his vision, and it is what saved our soul. He gave mercy to me and you through people who could have written us off. If he did such for us, how can we not be his mercy in the lives of others, even those who persecute us for doing good? We can’t, or better we shouldn’t. We should say with Jesus, “Nevertheless, Your will be done!”
Email Article | Print Article | Share Article | tagged Blessed, Fear, Meekness, Persecution, Shame, Suffering Pastor Marty Wednesday, February 25, 2026 at 3:23PM 1 Peter 3:8-12. This sermon was preached by Pastor Marty Bonner on Sunday, February 22, 2026.
Peter has been looking at specific relationships that Christians would have in those days. In each one, he gives specific instructions. Today’s passage sums all of this up.
Let’s look at our passage.
Peter uses a phrase that is generally translated as “to sum up” or “finally.” Having reached the end of the relationships he wanted to address specifically, Peter now gives advice on how, as believers in Jesus, we ought to approach our relationships regardless of whether or not we are in the strong or the weak position. This would include our relationships with other believers and those who are unbelievers. However, unbelievers are not going to be hearing Peter’s instructions much less adhering to them.
The first thing we run into is to be “harmonious” (NASB). The word is literally “same-minded” and has the sense of operating from the same thinking. Though it is not specifically stated in this verse, it is the mind of Christ and the example that came from it that Peter has in mind (see 2:21-25). To further support this, Peter will use some phrases in this section that were used earlier regarding Jesus. Thus, it is particularly the mind of Christ that we are to have.
Our approach in our relationships needs to start with the question, “What would Jesus have me do?” “Jesus, how can I be a boss, an employee, a husband, a wife, etc. that is following your mind?”
Paul says it this way in Philippians 2:5, “Let this mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus…” Relationships are better when both parties are thinking like Jesus. We should be focused on the purposes of God rather than on the purposes of our natural desires.
To be clear, we are not talking about trying to be a good boss as defined by lazy employees, nor are we trying to be a good employee as defined by harsh employers who expect all of your time, even when you are off the clock. It is defined by Jesus and the trusted Word that we have written down for us in Scripture.
I can have the mind of Christ even when the other person doesn’t. God will help us to be a witness for Jesus to them by how we act and respond. No matter what people may do to get ahead of you and push you down, we can entrust ourselves to God. Will they get away with it? It may look like it to us, but they haven’t gotten away with it. God is our defense and reward.
Let’s be clear. What Jesus experienced was bad. You too will go through things that are not right. It is not that God wants these bad things to happen to us but that He promises to work them to the good for us and others. This is what it means to have the mind of Christ. It means that we cease using the sin of others to justify our own sin. Rather, we choose to honor the righteousness of God in the situation and entrust our future into His hands.
Peter continues with a list that describes what it means to have the mind of Christ. “Having compassion for one another” involves being able to identify with the suffering of another person. It touches us deeply. The opposite would be to have a hard and insensitive approach to others.
He then mentions “loving as brothers.” This refers to the familial love that we should have for one another. This is best understood within the family of believers. Of course, familial love has lots of ups and downs, especially in our spiritual infancy. Brothers will get on each other’s nerves, step on each other’s toes. Yet we are family. You don’t kick people out of the family. You work to reconcile. Thus, spiritual parents are important. Mature believers have a duty to help immature believers embrace the righteous path of asking for forgiveness and giving forgiveness. Yet, in the end, our Heavenly Father will ultimately hold us to the reality of learning to love our brothers and sisters.
We are to be “tender-hearted.” Similar to compassion, this has the idea of having deep feelings toward one another. Our love should come from the depths of our heart.
With the last description, we have a manuscript issue. Some of the early manuscripts have “humble in spirit” and others have “friendly.” We won’t go into the details of all of that. I think we can agree that both could be attached to this list without inserting error. Whether Peter meant humility or friendliness, I would say that they are both good. The humble person approaches others without arrogance or thinking of yourself as more important than others.
Peter then moves to a couple of negative issues, i.e., things from which to refrain. He uses the wording about Jesus from 2:22-23. Jesus did not respond with evil for evil, nor did he revile those who reviled him. We mentioned back then that reviling has the sense of strong verbal abuse to it. We are quickly becoming a society that is treating verbal abuse as more and more acceptable. A Christian must refrain from this activity, even if the other person is abusing us.
In fact, even Christians can have misunderstandings or see things differently from one another. We are to restrain ourselves from the natural inclinations of our flesh and take hold of the same mind that Christ had when he restrained himself.
Instead of returning evil for evil and reviling for reviling, we are to return a blessing to them. This a clear allusion to the words of Jesus in the Sermon on the Mount, Matthew 5:44. “Love your enemies and bless those who curse us, pray for those who spitefully use you…”
Yes, this may seem unfair, but unless the other person repents, they will be in a world of hurt in the Judgment. Don’t let the tragedy of another person’s spiritual destruction pull you down into that destruction as well.
So how can I bless someone who is “cursing” me? Ultimately, we are seeking to be a good thing in their life, whether they see it as that or not. We should start by praying for them. “Lord, I know that you don’t like what they are doing. I pray that you help me to speak your words, draw them away from their sin and towards you.” If done well, we can be a good thing in their life by warning them of the judgment that hangs over their actions. Lastly, we can find something that is tangible to do for them. In all of this, we need to ask for the wisdom and leading of the Holy Spirit.
We cannot do this in a fake and superficial way. It must be real and sacrificial. It must come from the heart of God.
Peter mentions that those who do this “will inherit a blessing.” He basically says, “If you want to inherit a blessing, then live your life in such a way as to be a blessing to others.”
There is a certain inheritance in this life. It is up to us how much like Jesus we want to be and therefore the ways He will bless us in this life. Yet our full inheritance will not come until the Resurrection. Any blessing in this life is only a bitter-sweet foretaste of something that will have all the bitterness removed in the future! To dwell with God and His goodness for eternity in immortal, imperishable, bodies is a great inheritance indeed!
Peter then quotes Psalm 34:12-16. He is essentially showing us that Scripture backs up what he has been saying.
This psalm was written by David when he pretended to be insane in front of the Philistine king in order to save his life. What was David doing in the Philistine territory? King Saul of Israel accused David of disloyalty and sought to kill him. This eventually drove David out of Israel into the enemy’s territory. This isn’t just about people, but about the devil and his angels too.
It was the fear of the Lord and the desire to be blessed by God that helped David to restrain himself. Yes, David was not as good as Jesus, but he would be an example from the Old Testament that they could remember. More than an example, the words of David (the lessons that he discovered in this time) are instructive to us going through something similar.
This section challenges those who want the truth. Do you desire life, to love and see good days? If you do, then you must restrain yourself from doing evil and choose to do good, seeking and pursuing peace with others. Why? God is watching all that happens. He will ultimately judge our actions in these things.
God’s eyes are depicted as being towards the righteous. This is a reference to being favorable to Him. He is watching us and hearing our prayers in order to “attend” to them. However, the face of God is against those who do evil.
David simply trusted God. Saul’s evil actions meant to kill David. They even pushed David into dangerous territory. It would be easy for David to justify evil actions toward Saul. However, David had the mind of Christ (at least in this situation). David knew that he could not kill Saul and remain guiltless. God had raised up and anointed Saul, and therefore, God would remove Saul in a way that David could remain pure (see 1 Samuel 26:8-12).
It is difficult to trust God and wait upon Him. God is far more gracious than we would be. King Saul didn’t deserve all the grace that God gave him, but David recognized that God would eventually deal with him.
This brings up a powerful question in all of our relationships. God is watching me and the other person. The way we treat one another is making a case to God for good or for bad. We are choosing to be on the side of the righteous or on the side of the wicked.
It is better for us to do what is right (even if the evil continues to be poured out on us) and receive the blessing of God, then to come under the curse and judgment of God. We all need His grace. God’s delay of judgment with the wicked is a grace to them. They may even yet repent.
Perhaps you repented at one point and chose to follow Jesus. That is great! Yet repentance needs to be a present attitude with you and me. We are continually ready to judge when God is not. It is not just the external enemies who threaten to pull us away from Christ. It is the internal enemy of our own sinful nature that really threatens to pull us down.
Can we simply be a repenting people who sacrifice themselves in order to pursue peace with others? Can I serve the purpose of God in the situation rather than the purpose of me?
Others may think that you are foolish, but it is never foolish to stand with Jesus and live out his righteousness. Of course, we can only do this by the help of the Holy Spirit, through keeping our faith in the mind of Christ, and when we entrust ourselves to the truth that God is our vindication. Our greatest times of witnessing to the greatness of Christ is when we lay down our desires and pick up his. This is when the world truly sees Jesus in us!
Pastor Marty Monday, February 16, 2026 at 7:33PM 1 Peter 3:7. This sermon was preached by Pastor Marty Bonner on Sunday, February 15, 2026.
We continue in this section that focuses on the way that a Christian should use their relationships to demonstrate the love and wisdom of Jesus to the world around them.
There is a greater concern here in that we are also desiring to be pleasing in God’s sight. He is currently offering terms of peace to this world. As we cooperate with this purpose, we can rest in the assurance that God will help us and reward us.
Today, we will wrap up the specific relationships that Peter has been addressing by looking at husbands.
Let’s look at our verse.
In all of our relationships, it is our natural tendency to worry about what the other person is or isn’t doing. We can be overly concerned with God’s Word to them, yet, overlooking His Word to us.
Peter begins this command to husbands with the phrase, “in the same way.” This is exactly what he did with his instruction to wives in verses 1-6. Again, this phrase is pointing husbands back to the example of Jesus written about in 1 Peter 2:21-25. In the same way that Jesus sacrificed his rights in order to serve God the Father and humanity, so a husband needs to choose to serve God the Father and their wife. Jesus needs to be their example and help in this.
Peter’s main imperative is for husbands to live with their wives in understanding. The word translated as “live with” is a special word that highlights the cohabiting nature of the marital relationship. They are not just doing life together. They dwell in a home together, and that home becomes an extension of their relationship. This life and home that a husband is making with his wife needs to be done with understanding.
Before we delve further into that, I will say that a husband and wife can seem to be one thing in public but be something quite different at home. What goes on in the home, in private, is important to God, and so it should be important to me.
So, what does it mean for a husband to understand his wife? Part of it is understanding her situation in general as a woman. Genesis 1-2
describes the intent of God for marriage. A man and a woman are intended to become one before God. That unity is also intended to image God. Paul describes this specifically as being a picture of the relationship between Christ and His Church.
A husband also needs to gain the understanding of what his wife has been through particularly. What has she experienced both bad and good? How can I care for her as if she were a part of my own body?
That last question may seem strange, but it is the perspective the Apostle Paul calls husbands to have in Ephesians 5:8. “So husbands ought to love their own wives as their own bodies; he who loves his wife loves himself.”
It is common in our culture to sacrifice marital relationships to get something we want. We end up undermining the relationship in a multitude of ways. This is why Paul refers to a wife as being a part of her husband. This connects back to the oneness of Genesis 1-2. He is challenging husbands in this area.
Our culture has many pressures upon marriages. Many decry marriage as the problem because it “goes against our human nature,” “monogamy is unnatural.” They even project that there would be no guilt in relationships (a kind of sexual Utopia) if we could just drop this Christian notion. Of course, I wouldn’t hold my breath for any proof that lack of commitment rids people of guilt and creates something good in this area.
Paul’s challenge to a husband is this. To abuse your wife is to abuse yourself. To reject this wisdom is to reject the wisdom of Christ. Thus, a Christian husband really has no choice if he wants to remain a follower of Christ. Live with your wife with even the understanding of how God has connected her to you. Of course, we should have a nobler purpose in taking good care of our spouse than caring for ourselves. We need to do it because it is right, and it is what Jesus wants us to do.
God’s purpose in marriage is not the problem. It is not restricting us. It is our own sin that is the problem.
Peter uses the phrase “as with someone weaker.” In another version, it refers to her as “a weaker vessel.” The body as a vessel for our spirits is a metaphor that was quite common in those days. Paul uses it in 1 Thessalonians 4:3-4. “For this is the will of God, your sanctification: that you should abstain from sexual immorality; that each of you should know how to possess his own vessel in sanctification and honor, not in lustful passion…”
A woman listening to this might be offended at being called a weaker vessel, but it is not exactly spelled out in which ways she is weaker. The obvious place to start is to recognize that women in general are physically weaker than men. However, I don’t think this is the only thing Peter is referencing. The physical weakness of women has been a source of much pain for them. Husbands need to understand how this physical weakness has shaped the psyche of wives, the way they think, and the desires they have.
Of course, weakness does not necessarily have a negative connotation. In 1 Corinthians 12:22, Paul mentions that “those members of the body which seem to be weaker are necessary.” His use of “seem” implies that things may look to us as weak in one sense, but their weakness makes them strong for the necessary purpose they have. An example in life would be fine China. China is not used for everyday dining especially with children. It is not physically capable of being used all the time without being chipped. Yet its weakness for everyday wear is a part of its honorable usage at special events.
Peter likely also has in mind the weaker social position that women had. I’ve mentioned before that a woman generally did not have the right of divorcing her husband for any reason. There was a huge disparity in the area of unfaithfulness. If a woman was caught in an adulterous affair, the husband could have her executed. However, if a man was caught in an adulterous affair, there was little a woman could do about it.
A husband’s understanding of his wife needs to incorporate these things. Her weakness physically (or even socially) does not say anything about her value. What is a wife’s value? Is it in how much money she can bring to the home? Is it in how many sons she can birth? Is her value in what she can do to satisfy her husband’s desires?
A wife’s value begins with the design and intention of God. She was made by God to unite with her husband and help him. This help is not necessarily in the ways the man would dictate. Rather, it is in the ways that the wisdom of God has discerned that husbands need.
A wife forces a young husband to face the issues of growing up. It challenges a young man to see strength in that which may look weak to him. It challenges him to learn to unify with someone who thinks differently than him. It challenges him to come out of himself and choose to be intimate with another person in every way.
Will marriage fix the world? No. It can only challenge the world in the ways that God knows we need challenged.
All of this is to say that a wife has value before she does a single thing. Part of living with one’s wife with understanding is valuing her as God does. A good husband will not just patronize his wife but rather understand her total situation with grace and understanding as he builds a home with her.
A husband cannot change the culture surrounding him and his wife, but he can change the culture inside the home.
This leads well into the next point. Peter calls husbands honor their wives as fellow heirs of the grace of life. This clearly means to honor, or to value, them highly. Your wife is a fellow heir (a joint-heir or co-heir). Peter does not explain this fully. We know that wives have an inheritance in God’s Church just as much as husbands. Peter may be speaking of this in these general terms. However, he may even see a further connection between a particular husband and his wife with what they will inherit both in this life and in the life to come.
Regardless, the challenge for husbands is to recognize that their future inheritance is impacted by how they treat their wives.
He says that they are heirs of the “grace of life.” We can be too quick to jump to the understanding of this as eternal life, something that is in the future. Yet Scripture tells us that God’s eternal life is even now pouring into the life of every Christian. We can experience a kind of down payment on the grace of God. The reality of our future inheritance ought to be affecting our present attitudes in marriage.
Finally, Peter challenges husbands that their relationship with their wife can affect their relationship with God. Prayer is the mainstay of our relationship with God. A man may be very religious in many ways. However, failure in this area can hinder his prayers. It doesn’t matter what people think about your marriage. It matters what God thinks.
This reminds me of the instructions of Jesus regarding forgiveness in Matthew 5:24. If you go to sacrifice at the altar of God and remember that your brother has something against you, you should leave your gift at the altar and go your way. First be reconciled to your brother and then come and offer your gift. If we have been abusing people in our relationships, or they at least believe they have been sinned against, we should not approach God in prayer without first dealing with it. Of course, we can pray for wisdom in talking with them, asking forgiveness. I believe this is what Peter is describing here. If you are ignoring the plight and suffering of your wife, don’t expect God to be answering your prayers except for the prayer of repentance.
It is the things we do in private that make the public things of any value. May God help us to see that He is not looking at the public personae we project. He sees our private lives, our home life. He sees the heart of our spouse and challenges us to live with them in understanding.
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