Christian Suffering – I Peter 3:13-4:6

It is easy to imagine how the life of an exile might be marked with frequent suffering. The scriptures record the woeful plight of Israel in hardship of this sort on multiple occasions in multiple scenarios. Maintaining enduring faith under such hardships is a challenge worthy of apostolic exhortation and so Peter addresses this issue thoroughly in his epistle. The context references a situation in the early church of Asia Minor, described in (4:12) as a “fiery trial”. In the next verse, he bids us to rejoice nevertheless insofar as we share in Christ's sufferings. In our joy despite trials, we welcome the day when His glory is revealed. In these two verses, Peter summarizes and reprises themes he has expanded in detail in chapters 3 & 4. In these passages he lays out the relationship between the sufferings of Christ and our own call to suffer. Recognizing this connection will equip the church to proclaim and testify to the gospel despite the battle around him and the battle within him. These instructions are crucial to the testimony of the church in every age... When we embrace the hardships that attend the Christian life as Peter sets forth in our text today, we magnify Christ the Lord as holy (15a). To do any less is to implicitly affirm worldly philosophies like nihilism which holds that nothing has any ultimate meaning, least of all the sufferings of this existence. Looking to Christ, we see that nothing could be further from the truth. Verses 21 & 22 appeal to the resurrection and ascension which remind us that though we are called to struggle as elect exiles sojourners – In Christ – we are ultimately triumphant. What hope and help for the weary Christian the Gospel brings, Let us thereby be equipped.