Participants: Tom Shepherd & Deyvy Rodriguez
Series Code: PBOTB
Program Code: PBOTB00013B
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00:01 And we're back to "Books of the Book."
00:02 We're studying Chapter 3 of the book 1 Peter. 00:07 Dr. Shepherd, you were commenting on verse 18, 00:10 I don't think you were quite finished there. 00:11 All right, so we have verse 18, and we see that, 00:15 we have this whole experience of Christ 00:17 that is described there. 00:19 Placing this whole thing in the context of the whole book 00:21 is rather interesting that there is quite a parallel 00:24 between this passage in 3:18-22 and the passage 00:28 we already studied in 2:21-25. 00:32 The parallels go like this, here's some of the parallels. 00:35 Christ suffered and we suffer. 00:37 Remember, he was talking about the servant's suffering there. 00:40 Christ is the example in both places, there and over here. 00:44 Christ has a vicarious action that's mentioned, 00:47 He takes our place, He died for us. 00:49 Christ's suffering saves us, 00:52 and both of these passages describe that. 00:54 So it's rather interesting that he has similar context 00:58 where in chapter 2, we had the servants 01:02 and they were going through suffering, 01:03 they was supposed to follow the example of Jesus. 01:06 And in chapter 3, we already said, verses 3: 13-17 01:10 talk about the Christian giving a proper witness to the world, 01:13 living faithfully and suffering for it 01:16 and then he supports it. 01:17 So he, kind of, thinks his thoughts again 01:19 but he expands them into other areas 01:21 that he hasn't talk about. 01:23 So in verse 18, we found that, 01:25 he gives the--almost the typical gospel presentation. 01:28 Christ suffered, He died, He was buried, 01:32 He arose again, you know, 01:34 and so He suffered in the flesh 01:36 and then He was made alive in the spirit or by the spirit. 01:40 Okay, and that bring us 01:42 then to next part, the next idea. 01:45 Now verse 19 seems to be one of those difficult passages 01:48 to understand and this is one of those problematic verses 01:53 in the Bible where we don't really know what it means. 01:56 Perhaps you can comment on this verse 01:58 because it seems like Jesus went somewhere, 02:00 He did something, He preached. 02:03 So what did He preach? 02:04 To whom did He preach, and what is He doing, 02:07 where did He go? 02:09 Okay, so there's a lot of questions there. 02:10 Where did He go? 02:12 When did He go? 02:13 To whom did He preach? 02:14 And what did He preach? 02:16 Let me just comment about problem texts in the Bible. 02:19 I've asked students on tests sometimes. 02:22 How many problem texts are there in the Bible? 02:25 You know what the answer is? 02:26 What is that? Zero. 02:28 There are no problem texts in the Bible, 02:30 because the text is not the problem. 02:34 We don't want to call the revelation of God a problem. 02:38 And when we get that kind of mentality 02:40 that there's a problem, 02:42 actually it limits us to see other truths that is. 02:45 The text is not the problem, our understanding of the text 02:48 can be a problem but not the text itself. 02:50 So we got to, kind of, follow or try and follow 02:52 Peter's discussion here. 02:55 Okay, so just like you said, in verse 19, 02:58 it talks about him going some place. 03:01 Now one of the things that question is, who went? 03:07 Because in-- if you read your version, 03:09 at the end of verse 18, it says, "He was made alive, 03:13 by the spirit," and then how does verse 19 start? 03:16 "By whom also He went 03:18 and preached to the spirits in prison." 03:20 Now, my version has a capital 'H' on He, 03:23 I don't know if that makes a difference or not. 03:24 Yes, yes, well, who's doing the preaching there? 03:26 According to the version that you have, 03:27 it's probably the Holy Spirit. 03:30 You know, by which He went and preached 03:31 to the spirits in prison. 03:33 Now we got talk about these spirits in prison 03:35 and who they are. 03:36 But first we want to talk about 03:37 who in the world is preaching, okay? 03:39 If we take verse 18, the end of verse 18, 03:42 we say that He was made-- He died in the flesh 03:47 and He was made alive in the spirit or by the spirit. 03:52 The problem was seeing that it's the Holy Spirit 03:54 is you have this flesh and spirit, kind of idea. 03:58 And if it is the Holy Spirit, 04:00 it kind of seems to break a little bit 04:02 because the first part we're talking about Jesus. 04:04 He was made alive in the flesh and then He's made, 04:09 I mean, He was put to death in the flesh 04:11 and then He was made alive in the spirit. 04:14 That seems to be a nice parallelism. 04:16 If you said He was put to death din the flesh 04:19 but He was made alive by the spirit, 04:21 it seems to break that parallelism up a little bit. 04:24 So it's probably better to take the end of verse 18 to say, 04:27 He was put to death in the flesh 04:29 but He was made alive in the spirit, 04:32 that's in the spiritual realm. 04:33 In which, that means in the spiritual realm, 04:38 in which He that means Christ went and proclaimed, 04:44 or does yours say preached? 04:46 Preached. Yeah. Sure does. Yeah. Okay. 04:49 Now this does not-- this does not use the verb 04:52 "to bring good news." 04:54 Evangelizo, that we use the word evangelism comes from. 04:58 This is not to evangelize, but it is to proclaim. 05:02 Now sometimes that terminology could be used to talk about 05:04 proclaiming the gospel message, okay. 05:07 But we should notice what verse 19 05:10 does not say, okay? 05:14 Verse 19, does not say 05:19 that He was dead when He preached. 05:23 Verse 19, does not say that He went down to preach. Right. 05:30 And verse 19, does not say, what He proclaimed or preached. 05:38 Okay? So it's important to know as much 05:41 what the text does not say, as to know 05:46 what it does say, right? 05:49 There are three basic options for this passage 05:53 that scholars have come up with. Okay? 05:55 To refer to what in the world is it talking about 06:00 and what is involved and what Christ did. 06:04 Well, one of the positions, I'll call the three positions, 06:07 the hell position, the flood position 06:10 and the ascension position. 06:12 Okay. Hell, flood and the ascension. All right. 06:16 The hell position is a traditional position, 06:20 held by our domination but by some others. 06:25 That Christ when He died, as a spirit, He didn't, 06:31 you know, sleep in the grave as the Bible teaches 06:34 but He went to the spiritual world 06:39 and there He preached salvation to dead souls, 06:43 so that they could have a second chance at salvation. 06:47 And He's so strong that He even preached in hell, 06:52 that's the hell position. 06:54 The flood position picks up on a later part of this. 07:00 In verse 20 it says that "He went and proclaimed 07:04 to the spirits in heaven-- in prison because they formerly 07:09 did not obey when God's patience waited in the days of Noah, 07:12 while the Ark was being prepared in which a few, 07:14 that is eight persons were brought safely through water." 07:19 All right. So these people, 07:21 this time of preaching to the spirits 07:26 was at the time of the flood. 07:29 And this position takes that the Holy Spirit 07:33 or the pre-incarnate Jesus went and proclaimed 07:37 to these spirits in prison whoever they are and proclaimed, 07:43 preached to them, maybe the gospel, 07:45 He was preaching through Noah to the people, 07:48 the antediluvian people at that time. All right. 07:53 Why Peter would go to that and talk about 07:56 that seems a little hard to piece together, 07:59 you know, exactly why bring in the flood and Noah 08:03 and then who are these spirits in prison? 08:05 And you know, what's going on with them. 08:07 So there are a lot of questions that people ask. 08:09 The third position is the ascension position. 08:13 That is when Christ makes this proclamation, 08:18 He is going to spirit in prison, these are like evil angels 08:23 or spiritual forces of the dark side of this world 08:27 of the great controversy and He's proclaiming 08:30 not while He's dead but after He's been raised to life, okay. 08:35 That He goes and proclaims to them victory, 08:38 because He has won victory over sin and they have lost. 08:44 This is kind of the picture "Christus Victor," 08:47 He is ascending and He is, you know, 08:51 declaring His victory over the evil forces. Okay. 08:54 Those are the three positions. 08:56 Now we could take a long time to talk about 08:58 which one of these makes the most sense, 09:00 you know, and go back and forth some of them 09:02 but there is a valuable parallel in the book of 1 Timothy 3:16, 09:07 that helps gives us some pointers 09:08 and we got to kind of wrap this up quickly. 09:10 But we'll point out what seems 09:13 to be the best position for this passage. 09:16 1 Peter 3:16, it's kind of like a little hymn 09:20 that the Apostle Paul refers to 1 Peter 3:16, 09:24 you want you to read that for us? 09:25 "And without controversy great is the mystery of godliness. 09:28 God was manifested in the flesh, justified in the spirit, 09:32 seen by angles, preached among the Gentiles, 09:36 believed on in the world, received up in glory." 09:40 All right. This was maybe a little hymn 09:42 that they used to sing. 09:44 He's talking about Jesus. 09:45 He was manifested in the flesh, vindicated in the spirit. 09:50 Notice the same terminology, in the flesh, in the spirit. 09:53 Seen by angels, notice, seen by angels. 09:57 Proclaimed among the nations, that's our evangelistic work. 10:01 Believed on in the world, 10:02 taken up in glory, there's His ascension. 10:04 The same kind of pattern that you have, 10:07 He is manifested in the flesh, vindicated in the spirit, 10:10 seen by angels, take up in glory, 10:13 which points to the idea that what's happening in verse 18-19, 10:18 is actually the ascension of Jesus Christ in glory. 10:23 Who are these evil spirits in prison? 10:26 These are evil angels who disobeyed God 10:29 and who were cast out heaven. 10:31 They have been fighting God and His truth 10:33 ever since that time. 10:35 And at Christ's resurrection, they were totally defeated 10:42 and they faced off against a force that was much greater 10:45 than they could stand. 10:47 Now if you read in that kind of light-- 10:50 let's read the text again and we'll sort of see it all. 10:52 I'll sort of fill in here a little bit, 10:54 the interpretation-- Okay, so we're reading verse-- 10:55 We're starting at verse 18, 10:57 "For Christ also suffered once for sins, 10:59 the righteous for the unrighteous that he might 11:01 bring us to God, being put to death in the flesh 11:04 at the cross and made alive in the spirit at his resurrection, 11:09 in which spiritual realm, He went and proclaimed 11:12 to the spirits, the evil forces in prison 11:15 because they formerly did not obey 11:18 when God's patience waited in the days of Noah, 11:20 while Ark was being prepared, in which of few 11:24 that is eight persons were brought safely 11:26 through the water" and he's digressing a little bit 11:27 but for a good reason, he says, verse 21, 11:30 baptism which corresponds to this now saves you, 11:34 "not as a removal of a dirt from the body 11:36 but as the appeal to God for a good conscience, 11:38 through the resurrection of Jesus Christ. 11:40 Coming back to the resurrection, 11:41 baptism links you to the resurrection of Jesus. 11:44 Who has gone into heaven and is at the right hand of God 11:47 with angels and authorities, powers having 11:49 been subjected to him. All right. 11:51 So how does this fit with verse 13-17, 11:56 see that's question. 11:57 But verse 13-17 was about the Christian 12:00 suffering for sharing their faith. 12:03 And being persecuted by the wicked 12:06 because they were Christians. 12:09 He says, "Well, that's exactly 12:10 what happened to Jesus, isn't it?" 12:13 That's exactly what happened to him. 12:14 He suffered and died and went through hell for you. 12:17 He went through all this trouble. 12:19 But God raised him from the dead. 12:21 And that victory of Jesus Christ when He rose from the dead 12:25 is the same victory the Christian will have, 12:28 if he is faithful she is faithful to the Lord Jesus. 12:32 So you see, this position makes 12:35 verses 18 to 22 really fit 12:38 as a support for verses 13 to 17, 12:41 where some of the other ones don't seem to fit 12:44 so well at all, this one shows you that as Christ suffered, 12:48 as He was vindicated and rose from the dead, 12:50 that's exactly what's going to happen to us. 12:53 If we will be faithful to Christ, 12:55 and we also will have that same experience. 12:58 Dr. Shepherd, I feel like 13:00 I've been in a classroom setting 13:01 with you at the Theological Seminary 13:03 at Andrews University and we want to thank you 13:05 for joining us in this very interesting Bible Study. 13:08 And we want to also continue encouraging our viewers 13:11 and listening audience to join us 13:13 in this series of "Books of the Book." 13:15 We are studying 1 and 2 Peter 13:18 and there are still much more to learn. 13:20 So be with us. 13:22 See you next time and God bless you. |
Revised 2014-12-17