Well, here we go, this ought to be interesting! 1 Peter 3

We started off this section of the book with Peter grounding us in the reality of who we are in Christ. We are “a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for his possession, so that we might proclaim the excellencies of the one who called us out of darkness into his marvelous light.”

That’s chapter 2, verse 9. In verse 10 he adds two more descriptions, “strangers and exiles”, as he begins the process of unpacking what that going to mean for us in this life.

Peter addresses four major areas of social interaction—we’ve looked at two of them so far:

That pretty much covers most of life, right? Peter’s showing how all our relationships are transformed by following Jesus Christ. And the goal in all of it is to live as the people of God and display Christ in such a way that we win people to Him, make disciples.

There have been some controversial topics in this section, and today is no exception. And that’s good a good thing, because that’s how we grow!

When we believe the Bible is sufficient for us, amen? So when we just work through it together, verse by verse, chapter by chapter as a church family, it becomes less about what I think you need to hear, and less about what you think you need to hear, and more about what God thinks we need to hear.

One pastor I listened to this week said these first verses in chapter 3 ought to come with a wick hanging out of it, just to warn you that it’s a powder keg about to blow up.

So with that word of encouragement, let’s read the text.

In the same way, wives, submit yourselves to your own husbands so that, even if some disobey the word, they may be won over without a word by the way their wives live when they observe your pure, reverent lives. Don’t let your beauty consist of outward things like elaborate hairstyles and wearing gold jewelry or fine clothes, but rather what is inside the heart  — the imperishable quality of a gentle and quiet spirit, which is of great worth in God’s sight. For in the past, the holy women who put their hope in God also adorned themselves in this way, submitting to their own husbands, just as Sarah obeyed Abraham, calling him lord. You have become her children when you do what is good and do not fear any intimidation.

1 Peter 3:1–6

This is the word of the Lord—like I said a couple weeks ago—whether we like it or not!

Which is actually a good point to touch on as we look at a text that can be controversial and may seem like an archaic, outdated perspective to modern people like us:

We don’t follow Jesus because everything he teaches makes the most sense to us. We follow him because he is Lord.

Exegesis

”In the same way”

In what same way? That’s kind of an important place to start… you mean the same way as slaves? This message is going to be even tougher than I thought! No, we’re going to have fun this morning learning from God’s word.

I’m sure it might feel like that sometimes, ladies, but no. The same way as Jesus. Remember last week? Jesus is our perfect example on submission, “entrusting himself to the one who judges justly… and in the same way, wives…” That’s the connection. This is how you live like Jesus would.

Even if some disobey the word…

The phrase “Even if” means this is not the ideal situation.

The ideal is two people who love Jesus also falling in love with each other, get married, and spend their lives working side by side for the Kingdom.

Life in a fallen world is rarely ideal. It doesn’t always happen that way. Sometimes, they get married and neither one of them are believers, and then by the grace of God, one of them comes to Christ. Sometimes it’s the guy, but a lot of the time, it’s the girl.

That creates issues. You’re living in two different worlds now—literally, two different kingdoms. You’re in the kingdom of light, but your spouse is still in darkness.

You see things different. You want to spend your time differently. You want to spend your money differently. You want to raise the kids differently. And naturally, you want your spouse to treasure Jesus like you have.

It would have created even more issues back then than it would today, because in the Greco-Roman society, women had almost no rights. Seriously, the household servants we talked about at the end of chapter 2 often had more rights than wives.

In a polytheistic culture, lots of various gods, wives were expected to worship whatever God their husbands worshipped. A man could actually lose his standing in the society and even be ineligible for higher office if his wife didn’t follow him in this.

Which is probably part of the reason Peter devotes 6 verses to the wives, and only 1 verse to the husbands. He’s been talking about submission, especially to those we disagree with, and he continues the theme here for those who disagree on the most fundamental things of all.

But, if you think about the phrase, “Even if”, it means that what he’s saying applies across the board, even if the worst case scenario is true, if the husband is actively rebelling against the truth of the Gospel.

So sorry ladies, you can’t just go, “Whew, my husband’s a Christian, I’m glad I can ignore this part!” No, it applies to all, EVEN IF he’s not a Christian.

Submission & Our Culture

So let’s talk about this issue of submission in marriage. I think we need to do some deconstruction here before we go on, for a couple reasons:

  1. Our own (past) cultural ideals of womanhood (“pregnant & barefoot in the kitchen”)

  2. Misapplication and misuse of these verses and others like it in the past by fools who didn’t read verse 7.

Our current culture’s overreaction to both those things that rejects the notion of submission as misogyny.

So what we’re going to do is break up our discussion of submission into two sections: (1) What it’s not saying, (2) and what it is saying.

What it’s not saying…

1. Submit to all men everywhere.

Notice there in verse 1, the words “submit yourselves to your own husband.” And that’s it. You are not called to submit to every man in the world because you’re a woman.

Complementarianism, which is the theological belief that men and women have distinct, complementary, God-given roles, it has at it’s heart the truth that men and when are created equally in the image of God. Equal, but different.

We all know instinctively that this is true. I see it in my youngest daughter, Adelaide, who turns 2 years old on Wednesday. She’s got that nurturing side already, that Ben does not have at 8.

I have never intentionally put hand lotion on in my life. Kay lathers up every few minutes. One kind in the bathroom, another in the kitchen, and a different kind for before bed. We’re different.

Equally made in the image of God. Not equal in strengths, weakness, approaches to life.

We’re not equal in gender. One of the saddest things to me about the way our culture thinks about gender role—that they are outdated, a social construct—is that it completely rejects the beauty of God’s good design. He made us to fit together.

We fit together physically. We fit together emotionally… as in women will acknowledge they have them! I need conversations with my wife, so that I will stop and feel things!

And yet, sometimes, you gotta stop wallowing in the feelings and just do something. Guys, can I get a witness? Yeah.

Equally made in the image of God, expressing in their own way an aspect of who God is. But different, complementary roles in marriage.

In marriage. When the Bible calls women specifically to submit, it’s to their husbands. Not to random guy on the street, because he’s a man, and “she’s a woman who should know her place.”

Yeah, read verse 7, buddy. Her place is a co-heir of Christ. Your place is a cross.

2. Stay in a dangerous, abusive relationship.

It’s not laid out here in this text, but in light of the whole of Scripture, it is. In the first century Roman culture this letter was written in, where women had basically no rights like they do today, one thing they took seriously was domestic violence.

Remember when we talked about the government, and we looked at the passage in Romans 13, “it does not hold the sword for no reason…” It’s God-given authority in society is to punish evildoers like abusive husbands.

In all of these issues of submission, there is this tension of submission up until the point where submission is sin. Remember, this discussion starts with “submit because of the Lord.”

Which means that a husband who threatens and intentionally injures his wife is not only breaking God’s law, but also the state’s civil law. In expecting his wife to quietly accept his threats and injuries, he is asking her to participate in his breaking of both God’s moral law and the state’s civil law.

A wife’s submission to the authority of civil law, for Christ’s sake, may, therefore, overrule her submission to a husband’s demand that she endure his injuries.

3. Trade your brains for diamonds at the altar.

That’s not what Biblical submission means. And yet, you’ve probably all seen it, that guy—purposely didn’t say man, boy who can shave—to whom it is unthinkable that his wife would have a thought or opinion or knowledge that was deeper than his.

And maybe you haven’t seen that—I pray not, may it never be true of us—but I’m telling you, there is that undercurrent among some more fundamentalist Christian types.

I purposely went and sought out female Christian authors and commentaries on this passage. Why? BECAUSE I NEED THEM! We need them. Their perspective on this passage. They’re made in the image of the same God, filled with the same Spirit, studying the same Bible.

And not a pretty pastel Bible with pictures of flowers on the pages. I’m talking about the kind of Bible that’s most beautiful of all, one that is worn out, and marked up, one that’s been prayed over and poured over by a woman following Jesus with her mind and her heart.

Right there in verse 1, you have the wife thinking for herself. She’s just made the most important decision in the universe, I’m going to follow Jesus Christ. He doesn’t, I am. That’s independent thinking of a massive kind.

And right along with independent thinking goes this…

4. You’re not allowed to have an opinion of your own or make it known.

Listen, “without a word” there doesn’t mean she doesn’t say anything. She’s not giving him the silent treatment!

It’s not like of a sudden she comes with the biggest smile on her face, joy in her heart, her life, attitude is transformed, she’s a better wife in every way except that she no longer joins in going the family’s gods, and he’s left scratching his head, “What happened to her?”

No, she’s clearly shared the Good News that she’s heard with him, he’s just actively rejecting it.

Peter uses the example of Sarah here at the end of the passage. We’ll get into this more next week when we talk about the men, but there were multiple times in Genesis that Sarah speaks up, and Abraham listens to her, submits to her.

So the woman this text points out as an example is not one who didn’t have any opinions of her own, or just kept them to herself.

I think part of the reason submission in marriage can be such a hard topic sometimes is…

  1. the same reason none of these topics are popular. Sinners don’t like to submit. But also…

  2. because we’ve not been taught well what Biblical submission looks like. We have a certain “Leave It To Beaver” sort of picture in our minds that is more cultural than Biblical.

Biblical submission doesn’t mean being a wallflower. Gospel centered womanhood is absolutely fearless.

It doesn’t mean giving in to every argument so you don’t make trouble. That’s specifically not who God has called wives to be, and it’s also not what your husband needs you to be, either.

5. Don’t fix your hair, wear jewelry, makeup, etc.

If someone (usually a guy) said, “I don’t believe women should have fancy hair, wear earrings, jewelry, makeup. See, it says so right there in the Bible, 1 Peter 3:3.”

What would your response be?

When I was born, my dad was a pastor in Olive Branch, down by Horseshoe Lake in Alexander County, at Lake Milligan Missionary Baptist Church.

He would preach on WBCE 1200 AM, Wickliffe, KY. Grandma, McLeansboro/Enfield, hand on AM radio

He had visited a Buddhist, Grandma called, “What kind of person?!?”

“Oh, thank goodness, we thought you said ‘Nudist!’”

Look at the verse closely, he mentions 3 things there, not 2.

Don’t let your beauty consist of outward things like elaborate hairstyles and wearing gold jewelry or fine clothes,

Literally, “or the putting on of clothes.” If you’re going to argue that this verse prohibits fancy hairstyles and gold jewelry, then you’re arguing that all Christians should be nudists!

Which is not what I’m preaching this morning, just so we’re clear!

There are so many silly arguments from the Bible that can be destroyed in an instant just by applying logical equally. Leviticus 19.

Old Southern saying, “If the barn needs painting, paint it.”

So, let’s try to rid ourselves of all of these unbiblical ideas of submission. It doesn’t mean…

  1. submit to all men everywhere
  2. stay in a dangerous, abusive relationship
  3. trade your brains for diamonds at the altar
  4. that you’re not allowed to have an opinion of your own or make it known
  5. don’t fix your hair, wear jewelry, clothes.

What it is saying…

1. Let your actions speak louder than your words.

In the same way, wives, submit yourselves to your own husbands so that, even if some disobey the word, they may be won over without a word by the way their wives live when they observe your pure, reverent lives.

1 Peter 3:1–2

We’re to be living in such a way that it will win people to Christ.

“Happy wife, happy life” and “If momma ain’t happy, nobody’s happy” are such popular sayings for a reason. You have a tremendous amount of power in your husbands life, more than you realize.

If Kay is in a good move when I leave, my day is just better, in ways that I don’t even understand. And the reverse is also true.

No man has ever been nagged into the kingdom of God. He may come to church to get you off his back, but his heart won’t be transformed.

Even if you’re husband’s a believer, there are times in every believer’s life when we are “disobeying the word.” This applies just as much to a disobedient Christian husband as a non-believing husband.

The Sunday sermon lasts but an hour or two (and you thought I preach a long time!), but holiness of life is a continued sermon all week long.

Robert Leighton
  1. Let your actions speak louder than your words.

2. Let your spirit be your prettiest feature.

In the Roman culture, woman’s beauty was everything. Not that much different than today, other than that was basically their only outlet, not much outside work other than hard labor/prostitution. So they stayed inside and made themselves pretty.

If there had been Instagram, they’d have been all over it with their selfies and duck faces.

They wore wigs a lot, most popular color? Blonde, for those Italians. Even back then, blondes had more fun.

This verse is not about the specifics of what you do or don’t wear. It’s about the specifics of your attitude, and where your focus is.

The revenue of the U.S. cosmetic industry is estimated to amount to about 49.2 billion U.S. dollars in 2019, and some portion of that was from Christians.

Can you imagine if every female believer spent as much money, time, and energy working on the inside as much as the outside?

the imperishable quality of a gentle and quiet spirit

1 Peter 3:4

Coming back to a theme from chapter 1, perishable vs imperishable. Outer beauty is perishable. Doesn’t matter how much lotion you rub in, how much you work out, how much wrinkle cream you put on, gravity always wins in the end.

There’s a kind of beauty that is imperishable, an inner person that is gentle and quiet, tranquil, like a lake at sunrise.

And it’s that kind of beauty that is of great worth, precious in God’s sight. And his sight is the one that matters most of all. Give your energy to a beauty that God regards as stunning.

  1. Let your actions speak louder than your words.
  2. Let your spirit be your prettiest feature.

3. Let your hope make you fearless.

For in the past, the holy women who put their hope in God also adorned themselves in this way, submitting to their own husbands, just as Sarah obeyed Abraham, calling him lord. You have become her children when you do what is good and do not fear any intimidation. [ESV: do not fear anything that is frightening.”]

1 Peter 3:5–6

This word “lord” in Greek, common in polite society, respectful.

If this your husbands asks for more tea or something, don’t go, “Yes, MY LORD!” and say, “Bro. Luke told me to.”

Only one place in the OT where Sarah calls Abraham Lord, it’s in Genesis 18:

The Lord said, “I will certainly come back to you in about a year’s time, and your wife Sarah will have a son!” Now Sarah was listening at the entrance of the tent behind him.

Abraham and Sarah were old and getting on in years. Sarah had passed the age of childbearing. So she laughed to herself: “After I am worn out and my lord is old, will I have delight?”

Genesis 18:10–12

That’s it. Just an offhand comment. There are other places where she clearly submits to Abraham in a more obvious way. Why use that seemingly throwaway comment as the example?

Because it shows her heart. She’s laughing to herself when she said that, she didn’t think anyone else was going to hear her. Turns out God did hear her and called her out on it, but that’s beside the point for now.

The way she thought about her husband, even when she thought no one would hear her, was still loving, respectful, and submissive.

So let’s trace the logic of how this works here at the end. If you mark up your bibles, get your pen out.

What’s the key to this whole thing? What’s Peter been talking about from the very beginning of this book? Hope. “who put their hope in God.”

And when we hope in God, I mean really put all our hope there, we become absolutely fearless. Underline do not fear any intimidation, from an unbelieving husband, or anywhere else. Who’s going to intimidate you when your hope is in God?

That leads to a gentle and quiet spirit—underline that. Serene. Tranquil. Not all caught up in the worries of life.

And in that kind of Gospel power, you can submit to your husband, even if he disobeys the word. And by your pure, reverent, fearless life, he may won over without a word.

Conclusion

These traits are not uniquely feminine traits. They’re Christlike traits.

Take up my yoke and learn from me, because I am lowly and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.”

Matthew 11:29–30

If you’re not married, women… you need to pay attention to find a man who follows Jesus. You don’t want to spend your life submitting to a fool.

If you’re a man, your day is coming next week, but for now… be the kind of man that is easy to follow, because your following Jesus. She’s been called to follow, you’ve been called to lead.