Jesus: The Way to God

Pastor Don Carpenter / General

Not From Around Here: The Complicated Life of a Sojourner / Salvation; Will of God; Preaching; Intercession / 1 Peter 3:18–22

Do you know just how much you are loved? Jesus loves you so much that He provided several ways to reach you and bring you to God. He paid the price for your sin. He reaches out for you through His Word and preaching. He gives you a clean slate by wiping out the old man and making you a new creature. He is constantly praying and interceding for you now. All of this was done in such a way that we could choose to accept Him or choose to reject Him. Jesus is the Door… the only way to God is through Him. If you accept His provisions, the door is open, if not the door to God is closed.

As Peter finishes chapter 3 by encouraging the suffering believers that they are following in the steps of the Savior because He suffered for them, Peter tells us about the different things Jesus did and is doing to bring us to God.  

This passage is one of the most difficult and complicated passages in the Bible. After much study and prayer, I believe we can navigate the deep truths of this text together.

The key is verse 18 to see that all that Jesus did was designed to bring us to God.

1 Peter 3:18 KJV

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:

 Christ Brings Us To God Through His Payment

Romans 5:6–8 KJV

For when we were yet without strength, in due time Christ died for the ungodly. 

For scarcely for a righteous man will one die: yet peradventure for a good man some would even dare to die. 

But God commendeth his love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.

Christ Brings Us To God Through Preaching.

1 Peter 3:19–20 KJV

By which also he went and preached unto the spirits in prison; 

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.

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3:19–20. Through whom … He … preached to the spirits in prison has been subject to many interpretations. Some believe Peter here referred to the descent of Christ’s Spirit into hades between His death and resurrection to offer people who lived before the Flood a second chance for salvation. However, this interpretation has no scriptural support.

Others have said this passage refers to Christ’s descent into hell after His crucifixion to proclaim His victory to the imprisoned fallen angels referred to in 2 Peter 2:4–5, equating them with “the sons of God” Moses wrote about (Gen. 6:1–2). Though much commends this view as a possible interpretation, the context seems more likely to be referring to humans rather than angels.

-Bible Knowledge Commentary

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The “spirits” (pneumasin, a term usually applied to supernatural beings but also used at least once to refer to human “spirits”; cf. Heb. 12:23) are described in 1 Peter 3:20 as those who were disobedient when God waited patiently for Noah to finish building the ark.

Hebrews 12:23 KJV

To the general assembly and church of the firstborn, which are written in heaven, and to God the Judge of all, and to the spirits of just men made perfect,

They had rebelled against the message of God during the 120 years the ark was being built. God declared He would not tolerate people’s wickedness forever, but would extend His patience for only 120 more years (Gen. 6:3). Since the entire human race except Noah (Gen. 6:5–9) was evil, God determined to “wipe mankind … from the face of the earth.” The “spirits” referred to in 1 Peter 3:20 are probably the souls of the evil human race that existed in the days of Noah. Those “spirits” are now “in prison” awaiting the final judgment of God at the end of the Age.

Genesis 6:3 KJV

And the LORD said, My spirit shall not always strive with man, for that he also is flesh: yet his days shall be an hundred and twenty years.

Genesis 6:5–9 KJV

And GOD saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually. 

And it repented the LORD that he had made man on the earth, and it grieved him at his heart. 

And the LORD said, I will destroy man whom I have created from the face of the earth; both man, and beast, and the creeping thing, and the fowls of the air; for it repenteth me that I have made them. 

But Noah found grace in the eyes of the LORD. 

These are the generations of Noah: Noah was a just man and perfect in his generations, and Noah walked with God.

The problem remains as to when Christ preached to these “spirits.” Peter’s explanation of the resurrection of Christ (3:18) “by the Spirit” brought to mind that the preincarnate Christ was actually in Noah, ministering through him, by means of the Holy Spirit. Peter (1:11) referred to the “Spirit of Christ” in the Old Testament prophets. Later he described Noah as “a preacher of righteousness” (2 Peter 2:5). The Spirit of Christ preached through Noah to the ungodly humans who, at the time of Peter’s writing, were “spirits in prison” awaiting final judgment.

1 Peter 1:11 KJV

Searching what, or what manner of time the Spirit of Christ which was in them did signify, when it testified beforehand the sufferings of Christ, and the glory that should follow.

2 Peter 2:5 KJV

And spared not the old world, but saved Noah the eighth person, a preacher of righteousness, bringing in the flood upon the world of the ungodly;

This interpretation seems to fit the general theme of this section (1 Peter 3:13–22)—keeping a good conscience in unjust persecution. Noah is presented as an example of one who committed himself to a course of action for the sake of a clear conscience before God, though it meant enduring harsh ridicule. Noah did not fear men but obeyed God and proclaimed His message. Noah’s reward for keeping a clear conscience in unjust suffering was the salvation of himself and his family, who were saved through water, V 2, p 852 being brought safely through the Flood.1

1 Roger M. Raymer, “1 Peter,” in The Bible Knowledge Commentary: An Exposition of the Scriptures, ed. J. F. Walvoord and R. B. Zuck, vol. 2 (Wheaton, IL: Victor Books, 1985), 851–852.

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It would then be implied here, that though the instrumentality of Noah was employed, yet that it was done not by the Holy Spirit, but by him who afterwards became incarnate. On the supposition, therefore, that this whole passage refers to his preaching to the antediluvians in the time of Noah, and not to the ‘spirits’ after they were confined in prison, this is language which the apostle would have properly and probably used. If that supposition meets the full force of the language, then no argument can be based on it in proof that he went to preach to them after their death, and while his body was lying in the grave.1

1 Albert Barnes, Notes on the New Testament: James to Jude, ed. Robert Frew (London: Blackie & Son, 1884–1885), 177.

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When did Christ preach to the spirits in prison? “When once the longsuffering of God waited in the days of Noah.” In Christ’s day, the spirits of those men to whom Noah had preached were in prison, for they had rejected the message of Noah. They had gone into sheol. They were waiting for judgment; they were lost. But Christ did not go down and preach to them after He died on the cross. He preached through Noah “when once the longsuffering of God waited in the days of Noah.” For 120 years Noah had preached the Word of God. He saved his family but no one else. It was the Spirit of Christ who spoke through Noah in Noah’s day. In Christ’s day, those who rejected Noah’s message were in prison. The thought is that Christ’s death meant nothing to them just as it means nothing to a great many people today who, as a result, will also come into judgment.1

1 J. Vernon McGee, Thru the Bible Commentary: The Epistles (1 Peter), electronic ed., vol. 54 (Nashville: Thomas Nelson, 1991), 76–77.

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Christ Brings Us To God Through Purging

1 Peter 3:20–21 KJV

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. 

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:

Romans 6:3–5 KJV

Know ye not, that so many of us as were baptized into Jesus Christ were baptized into his death? 

Therefore we are buried with him by baptism into death: that like as Christ was raised up from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life. 

For if we have been planted together in the likeness of his death, we shall be also in the likeness of his resurrection:

Galatians 3:27 KJV

For as many of you as have been baptized into Christ have put on Christ.

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And this (ho, relative pronoun—“water” is the understood antecedent) water symbolizes baptism (baptisma). Baptism represents a complete break with one’s past life. As the Flood wiped away the old sinful world, so baptism pictures one’s break from his old sinful life and his entrance into new life in Christ. Peter now applied to his readers the principle he set forth in verses 13–17 and illustrated in verses 18–20. He exhorted them to have the courage to commit themselves to a course of action by taking a public stand for Christ through baptism. The act of public baptism would “save” them from the temptation to sacrifice their good consciences in order to avoid persecution. For a first-century Christian, baptism meant he was following through on his commitment to Christ, regardless of the consequences.

Baptism does not save from sin, but from a bad conscience. Peter clearly taught that baptism was not merely a ceremonial act of physical purification, but (alla, making a strong contrast) the pledge (eper?t?ma, also trans. “appeal”; cf. nasb) of a good conscience (syneid?se?s; cf. v. 16) toward God. Baptism is the symbol of what has already occurred in the heart and life of one who has trusted Christ as Savior (cf. Rom. 6:3–5; Gal. 3:27; Col. 2:12). To make the source of salvation perfectly clear Peter added, by the resurrection of Jesus Christ (cf. 1 Peter 1:3).1

1 Roger M. Raymer, “1 Peter,” in The Bible Knowledge Commentary: An Exposition of the Scriptures, ed. J. F. Walvoord and R. B. Zuck, vol. 2 (Wheaton, IL: Victor Books, 1985), 852.

Christ Brings Us To God Through Intercessory Prayer

1 Peter 3:22 KJV

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

The first statement is that Jesus “is at the right hand of God.” The root of this statement is in Ps. 110:1, which the early church interpreted christologically. The wording itself is found in Rom. 8:34, and the sense occurs in Acts 2:34; 5:31; Eph. 1:20; Col. 3:1; Heb. 1:3; 8:1; 10:11; 12:2. The meaning of the statement is clear: Jesus now reigns, for he sits in the place of power.

The second statement, “having gone into heaven,” is implied in the first, and it indicates the ascension that followed the resurrection of Jesus. The words also occur in Acts 1:10 in association with other ways of describing the ascension. Peter probably cites the ascension for two reasons: (1) it was traditional to mention it alongside the resurrection (3:18) and the session at God’s right hand, and (2) in ascending Christ passed triumphantly through the sphere of the principalities and powers over which he now reigns.

Thus the third statement declares Christ’s present reign over “angels and authorities and powers.” This is also derived from Ps. 110:1, along with Ps. 8:6, for if Jesus is now seated in the place of power, his enemies must be under his feet.

Romans 8:34 KJV

Who is he that condemneth? It is Christ that died, yea rather, that is risen again, who is even at the right hand of God, who also maketh intercession for us.

Exported from Logos Bible Software, 5:47 PM September 8, 2020.