“…he went and proclaimed to the spirits in prison…”
Why do those supermarket tabloids always grab our attention? We easily see through their outrageous headlines and pasted-together photos… yet we still want to see what’s inside.
We can be just as easily drawn to spiritual nonsense, too, and this passage has more than it’s share of proponents for wild explanations and sensational revelations. How can you keep from being taken in? A good rule of thumb is to look at the context, both in the same paragraph and from the greater context of the entire Bible.
What is the context here? It’s something we see scattered throughout Scripture. God has been continually at work for the salvation of human souls. Peter brings it up here since he has been speaking of the suffering we encounter in our lives. He wants to emphasize that Jesus suffered as well, but for a far greater purpose. His suffering was for our sins that he might bring us to God.
It doesn’t help that the language here is somewhat less than crystal clear. We must be careful not to make inferences that cannot be supported by the clear teaching found elsewhere in the Bible. The best explanations I’ve read about this passage are also the least sensational and appealing to our thirst for “secret” knowledge. In the days of Noah, Jesus, being part of the Godhead with the Father and the Spirit, preached to the people through Noah. Those people are now dead, or imprisoned, since they did not heed the message.
The main takeaway is that the eight people who trusted God were brought safely through the water. The obvious comparison is to baptism. It’s not about soap and water and scrubbing behind your ears, but about dying to sin and being raised to newness of life. Jesus was resurrected from the dead and is now in heaven, where all angels, authorities and powers are subjected to him. And nothing can stop Him from bringing us along.
For more details, see 1 Peter 3:18-22. No UFO’s. I promise.
Copyright 2019 David J. Cooley