Reading Scripture: 1 Peter 3:18-22

 

Norman Adams RA: "The Flood" (1961)

There are surely few passages in scripture as sweeping as 1 Peter 3:18-22, which punctuates an extended discussion of priesthood, suffering, and sanctification with a series of images interwoven to drive home the point that sanctification, unlike justification, is a matter of transformation that involves suffering—our suffering:

For Christ also suffered once for sins, the righteous for the unrighteous, that he might bring us to God, being put to death in the flesh but made alive in the spirit, in which he went and proclaimed to the spirits in [Tartarus], because they formerly did not obey, when God’s patience waited in the days of Noah, while the ark was being prepared, in which a few, that is, eight persons, were brought safely through water. Baptism, which corresponds to this, now saves you, not as a removal of dirt from the body but vas an appeal to God for a good conscience, through the resurrection of Jesus Christ, who has gone into heaven and is at the right hand of God, with angels, authorities, and powers having been subjected to him.

Here's a loose paraphrase that might help:

Christ our Lord put our sin to death in his body on the Cross, after which he descended to Tartarus to proclaim his authority over the unclean spirits of corrupt origin who were purged from humanity by the Flood, from which God spared a remnant of humanity who entered into the Ark, the germ of a new humanity, which corresponds to baptism whose waters are the outward confirmation of a circumcised heart and rebirth as a new person incorporated into Jesus Christ who has ascended into Heaven as Lord of all creation, both visible and invisible.

The first half of the passage reminds us that our Lord has redeemed us from lawlessness by taking us along with our sins unto himself, and expiating these assumed debts once and for all on the cross by his death, thereby purging those in him of sin just as completely as the Flood purged humanity of the corruption resulting from the intercourse of spiritual beings and humans. The second half of the passage highlights the image of the ark floating over the waters of the flood, which recalls the image of the Spirit hovering over the waters at Creation, that represents the promise of new creation, which corresponds to the reborn spirit of the believer buried with Christ in the waters of baptism, which symbolize death followed by resurrection in glory.

The passage thus drives home the larger argument, which Peter has slowly developed over the previous chapters, that our purpose in this fallen world is to sanctify ourselves as priests so that we may minister the grace of God to this world that is perishing. This sanctification requires suffering because only through suffering can we learn trust in God and empathy for others, precisely the qualities that underlie the two great commandments. Someday we will understand how everything fits together.