Transcript & Slides: Christian Spouses

PDF Slides

Christian Spouses (1 Peter 3:1-7)
By David Feddes

Today we're studying from God's Word in 1 Peter 3:1-7. When we're studying this part of 1 Peter, let's keep in mind again that we're in a section where Peter is talking about living under the system. There are political systems, work systems, and family systems, and in each of those situations people who became Christians had questions: How do I live? Do I try to totally get rid of the existing system?

The answer to that was no. You don't just wipe out all systems. There’s going to be some kind of political, work, and family system that you have to live within. Also, how do I deal with the people who have positions of authority or prominence in that system, especially with pagans? What do I do when the ruler of the political system is a pagan? What do I do when the boss is a pagan?

And today: What do I do if my husband is a pagan? How do I deal with an unbelieving husband, a husband who is disobedient to the gospel and to the Word of God? How do I deal with that? That's the bigger context our passage comes in—how do I live under the system, and in particular, how do I live if the person I’ve got to deal with in that system is not a follower of Jesus Christ? Here it’s getting literally close to home: it’s living family life when someone is not a Christian.

Now, let’s understand the situation there too, because the Bible doesn’t take for granted that Christian people are just going to go off and marry people who aren’t—people who are disobedient to the gospel and reject the gospel of Christ. This is written in a missionary situation where people were coming to Christ in a society that had really not known anything of the gospel. Sometimes you had one spouse putting their faith in the Lord Jesus and the other one not. So if you’re the one who does trust Jesus, how do you live with the one who doesn’t? How do you conduct yourself?

Overall, the Bible says that if you’re a Christian and you’re in a community of Christians, then you shouldn’t marry somebody unless they are in the Lord as well. The overall instruction is: find somebody whose faith matches yours, who loves Jesus as you do, who wants to bring up children in the faith as you do. But the Bible addresses us often in the situation we’re in, not the one we’re supposed to be in. In that missionary situation, when both had started out as unbelievers and then one comes to faith, that’s the kind of situation you have to be ready to deal with.

So the Bible addresses women and then also briefly husbands in that situation. It would be more common probably for the husband to be unconverted and not the wife because, if a husband was converted, very often in that culture a wife would come along with him. Also, in 1 Peter he doesn’t speak with quite the same balance that the apostle Paul does. When Paul talks to slaves, he also talks to the owners. When Paul talks to children, he also talks to the parents. In this case Peter does talk to both the wife and the husband.

There’s a reason why Peter doesn’t talk with quite as much balance when he’s writing to these situations. There weren’t many rulers in his audience, so he was talking to their subjects mostly. There weren’t many slave owners in his audience, but there were a lot of slaves. And there probably weren’t very many men who were converted without their wives also coming along with them. But in this case he does speak to both. So let’s hear what Peter has to say.

^3:1 Wives, in the same way be submissive to your husbands so that, if any of them do not believe the word, they may be won over without words by the behavior of their wives, ² when they see the purity and reverence of your lives. ³ Your beauty should not come from outward adornment, such as braided hair and the wearing of gold jewelry and fine clothes. ⁴ Instead, it should be that of your inner self, the unfading beauty of a gentle and quiet spirit, which is of great worth in God's sight. ⁵ For this is the way the holy women of the past who put their hope in God used to make themselves beautiful. They were submissive to their own husbands, ⁶ like Sarah, who obeyed Abraham and called him her master. You are her daughters if you do what is right and do not give way to fear.

⁷ Husbands, in the same way be considerate as you live with your wives, and treat them with respect as the weaker partner and as heirs with you of the gracious gift of life, so that nothing will hinder your prayers. (1 Peter 3:1-7)

This is one of those allergy passages—a passage that people in our time will go allergic to the moment they hear it in some circumstances. So right away, if your reaction is somewhat allergic, if you're already breaking out into hives at what Peter had to say, then we should just put the two alternatives side by side, straight up.

First he says, “Husbands, in the same way be considerate as you live with your wives, and treat them with respect as the weaker partner and as heirs with you of the gracious gift of life, so that nothing will hinder your prayers” (1 Peter 3:7). We’ll look at what he says to husbands in a moment, but now the overall passage compared to the contemporary alternative—is the alternative better than the Bible?

Marriage can be same-sex. Peter addresses husbands and wives. Contemporary life says, “Hey, it could be either one. It doesn’t matter if you marry someone of your own sex or not.” And even if you marry someone of the opposite sex, you’re pretty much interchangeable. You’re pretty much identical. Act like you’re interchangeable. Don’t try to win over a faithless spouse. Who would want to do that? We’re very tolerant. You wouldn’t want to make it your objective to help someone believe in Jesus just because you do. Focus on clothes and cosmetics; image is everything. Women, be pushy. Men, be wimpy. The wife is the stronger partner. That would be maybe a bit of a caricature, but a summary of what contemporary people tend to think in Western society.

So if you’re really immersed or absorbed or saturated with this kind of thinking, then what Peter says will maybe hit you very hard, and you won’t like it. It’s important nonetheless to allow the possibility that God knows better than we do—just maybe God knows better than we do.

Now we have to be careful not to assume that everything we ever grew up with about women and men and their relationship came straight from the throne of God. There are a lot of older cultural assumptions that might have been incorrect, as well as some of the new ones. So we have to allow for the possibility nonetheless that when we’re listening to the Word of God and it hits us wrong, we’re the ones who might need to change, more than tweaking and adapting what God’s Word says.

When we think about what Peter says to wives, it’s basically giving the message that the wife who’s married to a non-Christian husband in particular is to attract rather than to push or browbeat or nag him into becoming a Christian.

There are three things that summarize Peter’s message: win without words, dress for success, and respect is royalty.

When I think about winning without words, that doesn’t mean that if you’re a woman married to an unbelieving man you would never talk to him about Jesus or the gospel. Again, within context, we have read the first part of 1 Peter 3. If you move on just a little further to verse 15, it says, “Always be ready to give an answer to everyone who asks you to give the reason for the hope that you have. But do this with gentleness and respect” (1 Peter 3:15). Be ready to explain the gospel, be ready to give an answer when somebody asks, and always do that with gentleness and respect.

Now if that’s true of your relationships in general, how much more true it ought to be when you’re dealing with the person who is closest to you? You don’t keep your faith a total secret and say, “Well, I’ve been converted, but the Bible says to win him over without words, so I’m not going to make a single peep about the fact that I now believe in Jesus or follow him.” Be ready to answer anytime and explain why you believe in Jesus and who he is and why you love him and the difference he’s making in your life.

But sometimes a husband does not obey the gospel. He does not receive Christ as Savior. What then? Once you’ve stated what you believe and why, then, says Peter, let your life do the talking.

Let your life do the talking. Go back to Proverbs for a moment. What does the book of Proverbs say about a nagging wife? It’s not a pretty picture. At one point it says she’s like a drip, drip, drip, drip, drip, drip, drip (Proverbs 27:15). If you’re going to try to nag your husband into the kingdom of God with drip, drip, drip, it makes him want to be somewhere else. It says, “Better to live on the corner of the roof than share a house with a quarrelsome wife” (Proverbs 21:9). Let me rephrase—it’s better to live out in the desert than to live with a wife like that (Proverbs 21:19).

So if you don’t want your husband to say, “Oh, drip, drip, drip, drip, drip. I wish I was on the roof—no, I think I wish I was out in the Mojave Desert,” then don’t try to win him to Christ by every day waking up and saying, “Honey, have you believed yet? Has Jesus invaded your heart and taken over your life?” Whatever else your nagging technique might be, Peter is saying no. If he won’t listen when you’ve presented the gospel, then let your life and your manner win him over.

This is excellent guidance not just for a wife dealing with an unbelieving husband but for a lot of relationships we’re in. If you have an unbelieving friend, be ready anytime to say why you believe and how they could become a Christian, but sometimes they’re not ready to listen. Stay friends. Build bonds of respect and love, and show by your life that you’ve got something they may be missing out on.

That can be the case even with bringing up children. We’re called to bring up our children in the instruction of the Lord, so instruct your children and teach them the ways of God. Read them the Bible every day. Have Bible reading and family time together. But realize that sometimes the timing is going to be different. They may not believe right away; they may resist the gospel. It’s going to have to be, to a considerable degree—especially as they get older—your life and your love and your manner rather than your words that win them over. The words will sink in if the life keeps winning them over.

So, win without words. And let me emphasize again that he says win them over. When Peter says, “Be submissive to your husband and let your life do the talking,” he’s not saying, “Be the nice little wifey, the doormat who’s powerless in the relationship and is a nobody.” He’s saying, “No, I want a little bit of strategic submission here, because you’re trying to do the influencing. You’re trying to change him. Actually, you are.”

You’ve got to be careful about trying to change your spouse, and that’s one reason that if you have a choice in the matter, you don’t marry someone you know to be a non-Christian and say, “I’ll change them afterward.” That’s disobeying God. But having said that, if you’re in this relationship, the submission Peter describes here is not the doormat version of submission. It’s saying, “I’ve got a goal for my husband because I love him. I want him to live forever. I want him to belong to Jesus and enjoy all the benefits of belonging to Jesus. So I’m going to put up with some stuff, I’m going to live under the situation we’re in, and I’m going to let my life do the talking and win him over.”

All through this part of the letter, Peter is saying that strategic submission can be a way to win people over. Now you who are living under government—you may feel like a victim, but you are actually the agents of God’s change and his kingdom in this world. You’re living as a slave under a boss or a master and you feel like nobody. No, you’re not a victim. You’re an agent. You are here to be God’s ambassador in this world. Whatever your social position is, you’re a wife considered subservient to husbands in that society—well, you’re still an agent, and you’re trying to win. You’re trying to win him over, only you’re doing it without words, without a bunch of nagging.

Then the next thing that Peter brings out is the nature of true beauty, or of dressing for success. He’s saying don’t measure success by how you look. That’s not to say that how you look doesn’t matter at all or that it’s bad to be beautiful. If you read the Bible, you find that Sarah, the wife of Abraham, was beautiful; that Rebekah, the wife of Isaac, was beautiful; that Rachel, the wife of Jacob, was beautiful; that Abigail, a person of great intelligence, was also very beautiful—with a husband whose name literally meant “fool.” At one point she had to step in because Fool was wrecking everything. Nabal was going to get everybody in the whole household killed by being such a dunce. So Abigail stepped in and said, “Yeah, my husband’s name is Fool, and he lives up to it—or down to it—and I’ve got to intervene here and save everybody’s bacon.”

So submission does not mean let the fool wreck everything and get you all killed. She was a very beautiful as well as a very wise woman. Queen Esther rose to her position because of her extraordinary beauty, and yet she didn’t say, “Well, I’m a nice, cute thing to be looked at.” She saved the people of God when the chips were down. But all that’s to say that being beautiful is a good thing if you happen to have beauty.

Keep in mind what Proverbs says: “Charm is deceptive, and beauty is fleeting, but a woman who fears the Lord is to be praised” (Proverbs 31:30). “Like a gold ring in a pig’s snout is a beautiful woman who shows no discretion” (Proverbs 11:22). So beauty—it’s nice if you’ve got it; it’s worth something. Now let’s think about what real beauty is. He says that’s the beauty of the inner person, of a gentle and quiet spirit, which God cares about a lot. It’s of great worth in God’s sight.

When you hear that, it means we’ve got to readjust, because again, the message of our culture is very, very different. When we “dress for success” in our culture, some women will dress in a manner that has two goals. One is to get men to look and to lust, and the other is to get women to envy. Is that stating it too strongly? “I’m trying to attract the eyes of men and make them want me—want me in sometimes the lowest way—and I’d like the ladies to say, ‘Oh, I wish I was her. I wish I looked like that. I wish I was dressed like that. I wish I had jewelry like that.’”

So this idea in Peter of saying, “Now what do you consider to be really beautiful?” and “What kind of cosmetics and dress are you aiming for?” Outer beauty matters less than inner beauty in God’s sight. It’s that simple.

So, just a blunt question for ladies and girls: Do I spend more time in front of a mirror working on my makeup and my look for the day than I do with the Lord? Just check your watch sometime. How much time do I spend dressing up and looking good versus how much time I spend with the Lord? If you’re spending a long time on your look and two minutes or less on your Bible reading and prayer, you may want to tweak that a little bit—or a lot.

And again, I don’t want to—I’m a guy; I don’t always get the whole makeup thing. I figure when people look good, they look good even without all the makeup. But hey, have at it if you want a little bit of that. But that’s not real beauty, and different people are going to have different tastes in that. Be very cautious that your definition of beauty and the amount of time and effort you invest into beauty—are you trying to develop the beauty of the inner self that Peter says is of great worth in God’s sight?

There are a couple of kinds of immodesty. Peter talks this way, and the apostle Paul also writes in 1 Timothy 2: “I also want women to dress modestly, with decency and propriety, not with braided hair or gold or pearls or expensive clothes, but with good deeds, appropriate for women who profess to worship God” (1 Timothy 2:9-10).

So there are a couple of kinds of immodesty. One is the kind where you’re trying to lure them with sexual beauty and let more show than you should. The other is showing off your wealth: “I shop, therefore I am”—a little twist on Descartes. “I can buy this stuff, I can wear this stuff. Aren’t I wonderful?” Your jewelry and your apparel are how you show your affluence, your wealth, your high society—and people who wear the cheaper stuff from Walmart, well, what are they?

So there are two kinds of immodesty. One is sexual immodesty, but the other is equally problematic, and that is trying to make money and style the measure. You see it. Some of you were homeschooled, some of you grew up in school, and you know how kids who didn’t wear the latest and most expensive styles are looked at. Kids who had only the forty-dollar knockoff brand instead of the two-hundred-dollar shoes—they just don’t measure up. So again, dress for success in God’s sight.

And then, to respect as royalty. Again, when it comes to this beauty of the inner self, it’s not just talking to women. It says in verse 15 again that when you’re giving an account to other people of your faith, you do it with gentleness and respect (1 Peter 3:15). There it’s not talking just to women relating to their husbands; it’s talking to everybody.

When it says to be submissive, the Bible doesn’t actually just talk to women about that. When it talks in Ephesians 5 and says, “Wives, submit to your husbands,” it first says, “Submit to one another out of reverence for Christ” (Ephesians 5:21-22). The other is just a continuation of that thought. The word “submit” doesn’t actually even appear in the instruction to women—it’s a continuation of the thought: “Now submit to one another out of reverence for Christ; wives to your husbands as to the Lord.”

If you read in 1 Peter, it says, “Wives, be submissive to your husbands,” and just a little bit later it says, “All of you, clothe yourselves”—again, dress for success, combining the thoughts—“all of you, clothe yourselves with humility toward one another” (1 Peter 5:5). Clothe yourselves with humility. Dress yourself up in humility, and then you’ll be really looking good in God’s sight.

There is nonetheless still this sense that a woman is to show great respect for her husband, to be submissive to him. It says, “This is the way the holy women of the past who put their hope in God used to make themselves beautiful. They were submissive to their own husbands, like Sarah, who obeyed Abraham and called him her master” (1 Peter 3:5-6).

Now again, you have to take what it says and also remember the wider context. If you read the actual story of Sarah and Abraham, she referred to Abraham as her master, and she also told Abraham what to do—a number of times. Maybe a couple of times when she shouldn’t have, but nonetheless, she was not exactly, “Hey Abe, what’s happening today? Your wish is my command.” She would get ideas of what ought to be done and she would tell them to Abraham, and the man would usually do what she said.

So there is this mutual influence going on between them, and yet there’s not a competition. She knew Abraham. She knew her husband. She knew that he was great in God’s eyes, and he was pretty great in her eyes too. So if you’re married to a man, even a pagan man, you’re being told here by Peter to honor him and to live under him. But if you’re married to a godly Christian man, how much better, and how much easier, to have that attitude of respect and regard him as someone that God has placed in your life to bless you.

One of the things it doesn’t say here is that you submit to every man on the whole planet because he’s a man and you’re a woman. That’s one of the things that’s not said. Another is simply that submission to him, as I’ve already said, means you’re actually in the business of winning him over if you’re married to an unbelieving man. You’re actually seeking to influence him at the same time you’re showing respect and honoring him. So all those things are going on at the same time.

The short of it is: be seeking what’s good for your husband, and above all, that he be saved and know the Lord Jesus Christ, and then that he flourish as a man in who he ought to be—not that he just be your little lackey under your thumb following your orders.

Then Peter goes on to talk to husbands. Wives are to attract in the right way, and husbands, if you had to summarize it, are to be attentive. Peter says to dwell with them in knowledge, to protect them as the weaker partner, to honor them as eternal equals, and to listen to them like God listens.

He says, “Husbands, in the same way be considerate as you live with your wives, and treat them with respect as the weaker partner and as heirs with you of the gracious gift of life, so that nothing will hinder your prayers” (1 Peter 3:7).

Where it says, “Husbands, be considerate as you live with your wives,” it’s a little bit of over-translating. Literally, it just says, “Husbands, dwell with your wife in knowledge.” The emphasis actually is on “dwell,” and then “in knowledge” is what qualifies that. I think there’s actually something very important in “husbands, dwell or live with your wife,” because it is possible to be a husband who is largely an absentee husband. Maybe you’re gone way too much. Maybe you’re there and you’re still gone—you just don’t listen, you don’t pay attention. When you’re home, you’re watching the tube all day—or not all day (hopefully you do a little work once in a while)—but when you are in the home, are you actually paying attention, or are you just up to something else?

So dwell. Be there for her. And then dwell in knowledge. Now, what does that mean? The translation we’re using, the NIV, says, “Be considerate as you live with your wife,” and that’s certainly very important. You consider her; your knowledge is of her; you’re paying attention to her so that you understand her better and you know her better. But again, it’s a little over-translating to say “be considerate,” because it just means “dwell in knowledge,” and it probably means knowledge of what God wants as well as of who she is and what she wants.

Pay attention to God’s guidance for how to be the right kind of husband, and then pay attention to her—who she is and how she can best flourish. Because you’re not going to be the kind of husband you ought to be if you’re not paying attention to who she is. In short, don’t be a dunce, and don’t be gone all the time—whether checked out physically and never there, or checked out mentally and never paying attention. Dwell with knowledge.

Study the Bible with her—that’ll kill two birds with one stone, because if you’re doing devotions together as a couple or as a family, then you’re learning God’s will, and at the same time, as you’re talking together, you’re learning more and more about each other. Your marriage is going to flourish the better you know God and the better you know each other.

The second thing is protect the weaker partner. Now this again is one of those things that some folks might go allergic to. A week or two ago there was a lot of publicity because a student—a female student—at a university did the kickoff in a football game for a team that hadn’t won a game all year. This was news—that all is equal now.

Let me just ask you for a moment: if it comes to a tussle in a football game, is your bet on the kicker or the middle linebacker? The middle linebacker is a little stronger than the kicker. The kicker is the weakest position on the team in terms of physical strength, and yet you don’t see any female kickers—except for that one kickoff for a winless team—because let’s face it, physically, almost always men are stronger.

You watch these movies with the ninja mamas—the 110-pounders that are beating up on the 250-pound men. In real life, my bet’s on the 250-pounder, not on the ninja mamas. But hey, we all have our fantasies. I watch spy movies—I’m no super spy either. If I was out on the football field, I’d get killed too.

When Peter’s talking, he’s not saying, “Now she’s the weaker partner because she’s dumber than you are. Your intellect is superior.” He’s not saying she’s the weaker partner because you’re worth more than she is. If something is more fragile than something else, does that mean that one is worth more than the other? If that’s the case, I have a plastic cup that I would love to exchange for one of those vases from the Ming dynasty. They’re worth a gazillion dollars. That plastic cup—you can dozens for a few dollars. Just because something is a bit more fragile does not mean that the Ming vase is not worth as much as my tougher plastic cup.

Well, there’s a lot to consider here. I’m not going to try to get into all of it because I’m not that much more knowledgeable than anybody else. But the Bible does say that if you’re a man, keep track of the fact that she’s the weaker vessel, the weaker partner, especially in a physical sense.

There are situations where a woman has a very high position, even in society—where she may hold a big position in a corporation—and at home her husband beats on her because he can. In almost every situation, a husband can beat up his wife and ruin her if he wants to. Use your strength to protect her, not to ruin her life.

It’s also true, maybe to a degree, although that’s more of a generalization, that when you’re dealing with feelings, sometimes women are more vulnerable. It’s a generalization, but it’s not true in every case, that when faced with hard circumstances, men get mad and women get sad. Now, if the shoe doesn’t fit, then just scratch that out. But if you study psychology and sociology, you’ll find that as a generalization, women’s reaction to adverse circumstances is often to be more depressed, and men more aggressive. Women get sad, men get mad. If that doesn’t help, then ditch it, but if it kind of fits your experience and your situation, then observe that.

If that’s so, it might be another case in which men might be the stronger, if you want to call it stronger, and women the weaker, because the man can do a little more emotional bullying and she’ll get sad quicker. Keep those kinds of things in mind when you’re thinking about, as a husband, how you’re going to do what’s good and right and protect your wife.

Now, in fairness, it should be observed that women live longer than men, so evidently they’re either—well, I won’t say—either they’re tougher or men are easier to live with. There may be other options out there. We joke about these things, but it’s just the fact that on average women outlive men, and whether that’s due to their stronger constitution in some ways, even though their ability to lift weights might be a little less, or because we men are so easy to live with that they just go on and on—you take your pick of what you think is correct there.

But the overall role, if you’re a man, is that you ought to be standing up for your woman and defending her and protecting her rather than using your own strength against her.

The apostle Paul, when he writes in Ephesians 5, says, what kind of man wouldn’t look after his own body? He says you and your wife are one. What kind of man doesn’t feed and care for his own body? What kind of idiot wouldn’t take care of his wife?

Then Peter goes on to say, now respect her. Honor her as your eternal equal, because she is. She’s an heir with you of the gracious gift of life. God gives her the gift of eternal life through faith in Jesus Christ, and this is a person who—if you could see her someday, if you could see her now as she will be someday—you’d probably be tempted to fall down and worship her because she’s going to be seated on one of those thrones with Christ and enthroned with him. She’s going to be a princess or queen in God’s kingdom.

And what are you treating her like? Are you treating her like royalty? Is she your queen? Honor her as your eternal equal, because she is. God created her in his image just as much as you. Christ died for her and shed his blood for her just as much as he died for any man. The Holy Spirit indwells her just as much as he indwells a man.

So because you’re eternally equal and you have this tremendous destiny, both of you should start treating each other as royalty right now. You’re not even going to get into tussles over who has to submit to whom if you take Paul’s language from Ephesians 5. He uses the language of submission for the wife and the language of sacrifice for the husbands. “Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her” (Ephesians 5:25).

So, a husband, if he wants to be the leader in the home and say, “I’ve got to take the lead and she’s got to be submissive,” then you take the lead in sacrificing, in laying down your life, in paying whatever price it takes to do what’s best for your wife. If you do that, she might find you kind of easy to submit to.

And if you have fights—I’ve mentioned before how to have a good, fair Christian fight—you’ve heard it before. I’ll just remind you again that if you get into a fight as husband and wife, then the fight goes something like this: “Okay, the Bible tells me to submit to you, so we’re going to do it your way.” “No, the Bible says that I’m to sacrifice for you, honey, so we’re going to do it your way.” “No, it says I submit to you, so we do it your way.” “No, I sacrifice for you, and I’m the head of this relationship, and that’s how it’s going to be.”

That is a good Christian fight. And if your fight is just, “I want to have my own way and I’m going to try to get my way,” then you’ve already lost. That’s how you honor one another. That’s how you have a Christian fight.

The apostle also adds something else. He says, “So that nothing will hinder your prayers” (1 Peter 3:7). That’s worth thinking about. If you’re a husband, consider this thought: God listens to me about as much as I listen to my wife, and God does for me about as much as I do for my wife. Is that the ground rule you want to play by? Those are the ground rules, okay? That’s what it means.

It says, if you live in knowledge with your wife and you’re paying attention to her and doing what’s best for her, then the prayers are going to go well. If you don’t listen to her, do you think God’s going to listen to you? Do you think he should? Is there a bigger gap between you and your wife or between you and God? Well, actually, there’s no gap between you and your wife because you’re on the same level. There’s a big gap between you and God, and if you think you’re too important to listen to your wife, well, God’s way too important to listen to you. So listen as God listens.

Think again about this: Jesus died for your wife. That’s what he did. How do you think he’ll like it if you don’t treat her well? He gave his blood. What have you done lately? If you’re loving her the way you ought, then you can expect your prayers to get through. If not, God’s going to withhold his favor and his answers to your prayers until you get with the program.

There are times in the Bible when it’s time not to pray—time to stop asking God for things and say, “I’d better get right with him and right with some people around me before I head back into the prayer room,” because he’s not going to listen to my prayers if I keep on behaving this way toward the person I am meant to cherish more than anybody else.

Those are God’s instructions for being an attractive wife and an attentive husband. Your overall design as Christian spouses isn’t just that you live in uninterrupted bliss—though I hope you have lots of bliss and it doesn’t get interrupted too often. Overall, your life is also meant to convey things about God. When you live as male and female, you’re honoring the differences God created between men and women rather than trying to pretend those creative differences don’t matter or don’t count. You’re displaying the Creator’s design in your marriage.

You’re showing the love of Jesus when one of you is submitting and serving and the other is sacrificing and serving. Remember Jesus with the towel—Jesus washing people’s feet, Jesus giving his life. When you treat each other that way, you’re showing something of Jesus. When you have the beauty of a gentle and quiet spirit, the beauty of the inner self, then you are showing that the Holy Spirit of God lives inside you. Therefore it’s not just a woman thing to have a gentle and quiet spirit or a beautiful inner self. It’s a man thing too, because the Holy Spirit comes into you to produce the Spirit of love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control.

As husband and wife, as Christian spouses, you’re displaying God. In the context, Peter is telling mainly a wife how to display Jesus to a husband to win him over, but he also has advice for Christian husbands. Overall he’s saying that Christian spouses are meant to be displays of the reality of Jesus, out of the truth of the gospel, by the way they relate in their marriage. That’s a sobering message. If people get their impression of Jesus from the way you regard each other and treat each other as Christian spouses, what do they think of him? Is it a good message or a bad one?

We’re to live as Christian spouses to attract others to God. If you’re a Christian wife and your husband isn’t, attract him to God. If there are friends whom you know, and your marriage is flourishing in the Holy Spirit and in the love of Jesus and in the creative goodness of God the Father, then your marriage is going to make a relationship with God more attractive to other people.

A word about children. Peter doesn’t say anything here about bringing up children the way some of the other epistles do, but I will say this: Peter already told you the most important thing about bringing up your children and leading them to the Lord—love your spouse. If you do that, that’s the single best piece of child-rearing advice that exists. Love your spouse. Have a stable marriage that flourishes, and you’ll be winning your kids over without words a great deal of the time. If there’s constant tension, if there’s a butting of heads and selfishness between husband and wife, that tends more to push kids away from God rather than to win them toward him.

That doesn’t mean that if you have a child who’s wandered you should right away say, “Oh, it was our bad marriage that did all that.” Be careful about drawing simple lines. But it’s here: if you want to attract people to God as a Christian spouse, you can win a spouse toward him, and your marriage—if you’re both united in the Lord—is going to attract your children to Jesus. It’s going to attract your associates and friends to Jesus, your neighbors who know you. Your life together is going to be one of the best or worst ways of conveying what faith in Jesus is really worth.

So I encourage you again today to take to heart God’s message. Wives, win your husbands over without words by the purity and reverence of your lives, and focus on the beauty of the inner self (1 Peter 3:1-4). Husbands, be ready to give anything for your wife, to defend her as the weaker partner, and let your strength build her up and do all you can to help her flourish (1 Peter 3:7). Then you’ll be a witness for Christ. And remember the overall section: “Dear friends, I urge you, as aliens and strangers in the world, to abstain from sinful desires, which war against your soul. Live such good lives among the pagans that, though they accuse you of doing wrong, they may see your good deeds and glorify God on the day he visits us” (1 Peter 2:11-12).

That’s been the overall command for which all these other commands were designed—how you deal with the government, how you deal with employment and work, how you deal with marriage. It’s all intended so that the way you live in a pagan world shines and that many more are drawn to Christ and glorify him on the day when he comes again. So may God give us the grace to do just that.

Prayer

We thank you, Father, for the blessing of marriage. We thank you for the way you designed it and how you’ve intervened in your redemption to restore and renew marriage again. We pray, Lord, that our lives and our marriages will be emblems of your truth and of your reality and your love. Forgive us, Lord, when they’re less than that. Forgive us, Lord, when they’re far short of that, and where some of us, Lord, need your change, your transformation, repentance, and healing, bring that about. And Lord, help all of us. Many of us, Lord, are not married. Some are younger and maybe look forward to marriage. Help them to be instructed by these words. Some, Lord, are living as adult singles and have wonderful purposes in your communion. Help us, Lord, as a larger community to encourage one another—where married folks encourage the singles, and singles build up and encourage those who are married and strengthen their family lives. May all of us together, Lord, flourish as a community and shine, so that those who are far from you will be drawn to the light of Christ. We pray in his name. Amen.

Christian Spouses (1 Peter 3:1-7)
By David Feddes
Slide Contents

Living under the system

• Political system (2:13-17)

• Work system (2:18-25)

• Family system (3:1-7)

^3:1 Wives, in the same way be submissive to your husbands so that, if any of them do not believe the word, they may be won over without words by the behavior of their wives, ² when they see the purity and reverence of your lives.

³ Your beauty should not come from outward adornment, such as braided hair and the wearing of gold jewelry and fine clothes. ⁴ Instead, it should be that of your inner self, the unfading beauty of a gentle and quiet spirit, which is of great worth in God's sight.

⁵ For this is the way the holy women of the past who put their hope in God used to make themselves beautiful. They were submissive to their own husbands, ⁶ like Sarah, who obeyed Abraham and called him her master. You are her daughters if you do what is right and do not give way to fear.

⁷ Husbands, in the same way be considerate as you live with your wives, and treat them with respect as the weaker partner and as heirs with you of the gracious gift of life, so that nothing will hinder your prayers.

Better than Bible?

• Marriage can be same-sex.

• Even if you are male and female, act like you’re interchangeable.

• Don’t try to win a faithless spouse.

• Focus on clothes and cosmetics.

• Women, be pushy. Men, be wimpy. The wife is the stronger partner.

Attractive wife

• Win without words

• Dress for success

• Respect as royalty

Attentive husband

• Dwell with knowledge.

• Protect weaker partner.

• Honor eternal equal.

• Listen like God listens.

Christian spouses

• Display Creator’s design

• Show Savior’s love

• Produce Spirit’s fruit

• Attract others to God