Category Archives: 1 & 2 Peter

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What does it mean for the younger to submit to the older in 1 Peter 5:5?

After calling on fellow “elders” to look out for the needs of other believers in 1 Pet 5:1-4, Peter calls on the younger to submit to their elders in 5:5, “in the same way” (Gr. homoiôs).

This is not the first time that Peter has called on people to submit, or the first time that he has enjoined a level of mutual concern. In 2:13, he offers a general invitation to “submit” to human authorities in general, going on to illustrate this with submission to kings, governors, and finally, again, kings (2:13-17). He invites slaves to “submit” to slaveholders (2:18). He recognizes that these are human structures (2:13) and that they can be abusive and unjust (2:18-20).

Most ancient household codes didn’t address slaves directly; these were usually written to elites who ruled slaves rather than served slaveholders. But in the unjust setting that slaves could not easily escape their holders’ social control, Peter empowers slaves by affirming their own moral volition and identifying them with Christ (2:21-25). (This resembles some Stoic arguments as well.) Unlike some other NT letters, 1 Peter does not address slaveholders, probably because he expects few Christian slaveholders in the communities that it addresses.

Peter goes on to urge wives of nonbelieving husbands “in the same way” (Gr. homoiôs) to “submit” to their husbands according to the expectations of their culture so as to win their husbands to Christ (3:1). That is, submission becomes an expression of mission, of evangelism, in a setting in which verbal evangelism became impossible. Most husbands expected their wives to submit to the husbands’ religion. Here Peter invites believers to choose our battles: give way in what we can so as to reduce the hostility we face where we cannot compromise. (Peter is not speaking to physically abusive relationships here, in contrast to his explicit advice to slaves. Slaves could get free only by earning money on the side and buying their freedom, or by their holders’ choice. In the Greco-Roman world, nothing legally prevented wives from leaving abusive husbands, despite the uncomfortable situations that such an action could create.) Peter then addresses believing husbands “in the same way” (Gr. homoiôs) to value their believing wives as sharers in the things of Christ (3:7).

Ancient society expected younger persons to respect their elders and defer to them wherever possible. They should offer them better seats, greet them respectfully, and, when feasible, heed (and at least respect) their counsel. In general, even today we recognize that age often offers a greater breadth of life experience from which we can draw wise lessons. (And as someone in my late 50s, I now appreciate better seats, in that I can no longer sit on the ground as easily as I could in my teens and twenties!) So there is some general wisdom here, even though many of our cultures today do not revere age as did those in antiquity. (They also valued the vigor of youth, as we do, but were often more explicit about the reasons for which they valued different age groups; cf. 1 John 2:12-14.)

Yet after this brief exhortation to the younger to submit to the elder (1 Pet 5:5a), Peter goes on to urge all believers to clothe ourselves with humility toward each other (5:5b). He has already instructed his fellow elders to look out for the younger (5:1-4). In many synagogues, as in ancient Israelite villages, “elders” ruled. In Christian circles, too, elders could be appointed to lead (Acts 14:23), so named because they were normally chosen from among older members with more life experience (cf. the connection in 1 Tim 5:1-2, 17; but exceptions existed for those otherwise qualified, as in 1 Tim 4:12).

Now, having exhorted both the older and the younger, he urges all to clothe ourselves with humility. Most people in antiquity appreciated gentle and merciful rulers. Jewish tradition further valued leaders who humbled themselves to serve their parents or fellow leaders. But the mutual humility for all believers here reminds even leaders that we are to be servants. Leadership is one way of expressing our service, but rather than lording it over others, we are to be examples for them (5:3). If we do this, we will be rewarded by the chief shepherd who is our own example (5:2a, 4), who sacrificially served all of us (2:21-25).

–Craig is working on a 1 Peter commentary tentatively planned for Baker Academic.

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Lifestyle Apologetics and 1 Peter 3:15

People often quote part of 1 Pet 3:15 to support the need for apologetics: always be ready to offer a defense (Greek apologia) to whoever asks you for an account of the hope among you.”

The context may suggest that the asking involves unbelievers questioning a movement of which they are suspicious; being a Christian was certainly an object of slander (2:12), and may have already been subject at times to prosecution (cf. 4:15-16). Being able to offer a defense meant being able to show that the charges against Christians (or at least against the Christian movement as a whole) were untrue.

First Peter 3:15 does apply to an apologetic, or defense, and it is certainly not alone. The final quarter of Acts, for example, probably functions as Luke’s apologetic (based on sound information, I would argue) for the innocence of the leading figure behind the gentile mission. But what kind of apologetic is it? Certainly early Christians did appeal to evidence, such as the eyewitness testimony of the apostles and continuing miracles. But the appeal here also appeals to something else.

The context of 1 Pet 3:15 is slanders against believers as wrongdoers (2:12: “they speak against you as wrongdoers”; 3:16: “those who speak against you and abuse you”). When the arguments against the Christian message are the alleged behavior of Christians, Christians need to work all the harder to live an apologetic that undermines the charges. Of course, in a culture where there is less social cost to being a Christian, lots of people claim to be Christians without living a Christian life. This undermines Christian witness.

I experienced this firsthand because, when I was an atheist a few decades ago, I was more hostile toward Christianity than toward other religions, because it seemed to me that most “Christians” didn’t live like Christ made a difference for them. Still, there were some committed Christians (such as my Dad’s sister’s family) who didn’t fit my skeptical paradigm, Christians that I had to respect despite my dismissal of Christians as a whole. That enigma wasn’t enough to change my paradigm, but if more of the “real” Christians had openly self-identified as Christians, perhaps I would have noticed a different pattern. (Yet even after conversion I discovered that even “real” Christians aren’t perfect, and could certainly profit from Peter’s advice.)

Their apologetic responds to charges that Christians are subversive against the empire. (What would you expect for a movement begun by someone executed on a cross for high treason against the majesty of the emperor, by pretending to be a king?) Thus, for the sake of the gospel, believers should, under ordinary circumstances, submit to every “human institution” (2:13). An emperor (2:13), slavery (2:18), and husbandly rule over wives (3:1; calling him “lord” in 3:6!) are human institutions and not part of every culture. But by submitting to social demands where possible (Christians often had no alternative except to be in those situations), Christians, who were a tiny and misunderstood minority, could silence such misinformed claims (2:15) and even win over some nonbelievers (3:1-2). They could challenge the charges of subversion leveled against them.

There are certainly intellectual apologetic issues worth discussing today. But some of the turnoffs to Christianity are the public personae of Christians. Sometimes this stems from misrepresentation. Sometimes it stems from public fixation on scandal, which allows the worst representatives of Christianity the most airtime. At least we don’t have people accusing our movement of cannibalism, as some of earliest Christianity’s critics did (misunderstanding what Christians meant by eating the body of their Lord).

But like Peter’s original audience, we live in a world where people often challenge Christianity because of how they think Christians live. Peter can’t tell us how to change what we can’t control. But he does advise us about what we can control: live in such a way that refutes such accusations, at least among those who know you personally. As Peter advised Christians who were subordinate on other fronts, choose your battles. We don’t have to fight and quibble about every situation or every social stance held by others, even if these are not the values that we live by. But we do need to live in such a way that people can see a difference.

A year or two before my conversion, I heard one of my cousins singing in a youth choir. They sang, “They will know we are Christians by our love.” That was a kind of Christianity I didn’t feel the need to despise. This group also seemed genuinely committed to Christ. I despised the intellectual dishonesty of people who claimed to believe that a God created them yet didn’t live like he was the most important thing in the world. I could respect those who at least lived consistently with what they believed. That didn’t stop me from making fun of Christians generally, but it did plant a seed that later bore fruit when I was confronted with the gospel.

The sentence doesn’t stop with “offer a defense to everyone who asks you.” It elaborates on the attitude with which this defense is given, one that does not match some apologetic broadsides available on YouTube or elsewhere. (Blasting atheists by calling them names, for example, is not a very good way to communicate Christ’s love to them.) Peter says to give an answer, but (and here he uses the stronger Greek word for “but”): do it with gentleness and respect.

Part of our defense of the faith is thus how we live the values of Christ, the example to whom Peter appeals (2:21; 3:18). As Christ went to the cross, he did not respond to insult with insult; he left his honor in the Father’s hands (2:23). Our natural, fight-or-flight instinct is to defend ourselves. It is difficult to do otherwise. As we retrain ourselves to follow Christ’s example, however, we want to show grace even to those who are hostile to us, so they can see more of the heart of the one who died for his enemies—even for us, when we were his enemies. May the Lord help us to defend the faith—and especially with gentleness and respect.

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Should wives call their husbands “lord”?—1 Peter 3:6

When Peter calls on slaves to submit even to harsh treatment (2:18), even beatings (2:20), is he endorsing slavery? Is he at least suggesting that we should embrace harsh treatment even when we can avoid it?

When we look at Peter’s sections addressed to slaves (2:18-25) and wives (3:1-6), we should consider what setting Peter was addressing. He was not addressing a setting of voluntary employees who could simply resign from work if they were being mistreated. He was not addressing women who might readily find different husbands who did not expect unilateral submission.

Peter’s advice to both slaves and wives belongs to his larger section of what are often called household codes, which ancients in turn often discussed in the context of civic management (2:13—3:12). Ancient writers often used such codes to express conventional expectations. For the sake of honoring the Lord (2:12-13), Peter urges compliance when possible with “every human institution” (2:13). This exhortation not endorse all these human institutions, such as slavery (2:18-25), monarchy (2:13, 18), or wives calling their husbands “lord” (3:6), as universal and eternal. It is not claiming that all these human institutions are permanent divine institutions. It is just calling on those in these settings to make the best of their circumstances.

Unless they earned enough money on the side to buy their freedom, slaves did not have much say concerning their slave status. Slaveholders often did eventually free slaves (though sometimes to preclude having to support them in their old age). A minority of slaves in the Roman empire achieved status and even wealth—even as slaves. But the legal authority to emancipate slaves lay solely with the slaveholders. Peter thus provides advice for how to bear up under a difficult situation that his addressees could not control, not how to address a situation that they could not control. This is the same approach taken by many ancient moral teachers, such as Stoic philosophers, who focused on what is in our power to control, rather than on what is not.

His comments to wives follow along a similar line. (The first word in Greek in 1 Peter 3:1 is homoiôs, which the NRSV translates, “in the same way.” It explicitly links the case of wives in 3:1-6 with the case of slaves in 2:18-25.) Addressing wives married to nonbelieving husbands (3:1), Peter urges them to win over their husbands by gentle and pure behavior. Illustrating such behavior, he uses the example of matriarchs such as Sarah who, functioning within the conventional expectations of her culture, obeyed Abraham. Sarah calls her husband “my lord” (Gen 18:12), fitting convention (though not always translated this way from Hebrew), just as others could so address various respected figures (Gen 18:3; 23:6, 11), including fathers (31:35) and brothers (32:4-5, 18; 33:13-14).

Yet just as Sarah may have done what Abraham said, so also Abraham did what Sarah said (Gen 16:2), once with God’s direct backing (21:12)! So why does Peter offer only the example of Sarah? Only Sarah’s example is relevant for these wives, because they cannot control what their husbands will do. Although the degree of power varied, in virtually all cultures Peter addressed, husbands governed their wives.

Yet we need not infer from this an endorsement of universal husbandly rule or lordship any more than we infer an endorsement of a universal practice of slavery in 1 Pet 2:18-25. Husbands ruling their wives is common through history, and we might expect as much from the effects of the curse (Gen 3:16). Yet we are not called to enforce the effects of the curse (e.g., requiring men to sweat when they work, or proliferating sin and death as much as possible).

Although Peter is mainly addressing those in subordinate positions in society (1 Pet 2:13), and ancient evidence suggests that women probably outnumbered men in the churches, Peter addresses husbands here as well. He summons them to care for and honor their wives (1 Pet 3:7).

In the case of wives, Peter is addressing the norm in his day, not the question direct physical abuse that he addressed with slaves (2:20). Unlike slaves, wives were not usually objects of beating in the regions that Peter addresses (1 Pet 1:1). Also unlike slaves, wives had options to safely remove themselves from such situations, if they arose; no laws compelled them to stay. Even Judean Pharisees, who normally recognized only the husband’s right to divorce, approved of intervening and making an abusive husband grant a divorce, thus freeing his wife to remarry. In other words, Peter is not advising against escaping such abuse for those with the freedom to do it.

Is it ethical to flee abuse? Scripture provides numerous examples. David fled from Saul, and Jesus’s family fled to Egypt to escape Herod. Even in cases of persecution for the name of Christ, Jesus allows fleeing (Matt 10:23), and his disciples normally did so when possible (Acts 14:6).

Let us be careful to use these passages the way they were meant to be used: to encourage one another’s faith in the face of difficult situations, not to make those difficult situations harder!

(This brief study addresses one subject only, not all the nuances of ancient slavery, the Bible and gender, etc. I originally wrote this as part of my preliminary contribution to an Anglican study group on 1 Peter at Lambeth Palace in London. The group’s final version will probably look different, so they should not be blamed for any oversights in my own!)  

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When prophecies don’t happen

For various reasons, prophecies sometimes don’t happen. Sometimes (perhaps often, especially from untested prophets) they’re false; sometimes (perhaps usually, at least in the Bible) they’re conditional; sometimes (also perhaps usually, and often in the Bible) we misunderstood them because they’re almost always partial; and sometimes (probably often in the Bible) their time remains partly or fully future.

Now, the above paragraph addresses readers who, like me, believe that God continues to provide prophetic direction to his people today (for our lives as individuals or communities, not for new doctrine). But the rest of this post addresses instead why some biblical prophecies haven’t happened. After all, these prophecies were given a long time ago! All the same reasons can be given for biblical prophecy anomalies as for the contemporary ones addressed above (the Bible even records false prophecies, albeit without endorsing them; e.g., Jer 28:11).

The Nature of Prophecy

Most fundamental to the question is the nature of prophecy as it’s presented in the Bible. Prophecies are usually linked by kind of event, not arranged by a chronological timeline. Thus in Joel 1—2 a locust invasion is depicted with the imagery of an invading army, foreshadowing the ultimate day of the Lord (Joel 1:15; 2:1-2, 11, 31). The next chapter, however, goes on to depict a real invasion in an ultimate day of God’s judgment (3:9-17, esp. v. 14).

Likewise, on Mount Horeb the LORD instructs Elijah to carry out three special missions: anoint Hazael as Aram’s king; anoint Jehu son of Nimshi as Israel’s king; and anoint Elisha as Elijah’s prophetic successor (1 Kgs 19:15-16). Elijah does in fact call his successor Elisha (19:19-21), but Elisha appoints Hazael (2 Kgs 8:12-15) and delegates another prophet to anoint Jehu (2 Kgs 9:1-10). The missions were carried out, but Elijah’s role in two of the three cases was indirect.

It’s not that these sorts of anomalies escaped ancient Israelites’ notice; they simply were accustomed to the ambiguous and unusual nature of prophecy. Ancient Israelites knew that prophets tended to be strange (see e.g., 2 Kgs 9:11; Jer 29:26; Hos 9:7; cf. Acts 2:13; 1 Cor 14:23), and everyone knew that inspiration or even divine command could lead to unusual behavior (1 Sam 10:5-6, 10; 1 Kgs 20:35-27; Isa 20:3; Jer 13:4, 7; Ezek 36:1; Hos 1:2). Sometimes a prophet would be confronted and have to wait until God gave yhe answer to speak it (Jer 28:11-12).

Sometimes God could even command someone to do something and expect them rightly to resist (Jer 35:5-8, 14). Sometimes God could raise someone up yet know in advance how the person would fail and plan for a successor once that successor was mature (1 Sam 8:7-18; 10:24; 15:28-29; 16:13-14).

Inexact and conditional prophecies

Prophecies didn’t have to be exact. Agabus’s prophecy in Acts 21:11 is not precisely how things played out, but it communicated the basic expectation. Contrary to what some people say, prophecies had that flexibility in the OT, too (e.g., Isa 37:29, 36). In fact, before the exile, most books of prophecies were in poetry; Hebrew poetry reveled in metaphor and symbolic imagery. Sometimes prophets used diverse images for judgment when the basic thrust was simply that judgment is coming. Sometimes they used poetic imagery to prophesy glory when ultimately God planned even greater glory than the original imagery could contain (compare Ezek 40—48 with Rev 21:1—22:5, esp. 21:22). At other times, of course, prophecies could prove very precise in matters of detail (e.g., 1 Sam 10:2-5). (I could give examples of this happening today, including in my own and my wife’s lives.)

As prophets sometimes pointed out, prophecies themselves are normally conditional, whether or not this is stated; sometimes, then, they will not come to pass if people turn from their current ways (Jer 18:7-11; cf. also Ezek 18:21-32). That’s why Jonah was so upset when God relented of his warning to judge Nineveh (Jon 3:9—4:2). Nations could escape promised judgments, or could lose promised blessings, by turning from their behavior. In the same way, individuals’ repentance could cause promises of judgment to be deferred (1 Kgs 21:29; 2 Kgs 22:19-20).

Some of the ambiguity has to do with the unusual ways that God, though foreknowing the future, intersected with the free choices of time-bound mortals on their level. Some today argue that the future is “open” and thus God foreknows only what he specifically ordains; others, that God knows the infinite number of possible futures and charts out the most important outcomes accordingly; others, including (I think) myself, that God foreknows the future, but works with humans on their level (divine “accommodation,” some church fathers called it; cf. e.g., 1 Sam 8:7). Theologians also debate the degree to which God directly causes things—from activating creation and then “intervening” only occasionally to micromanaging subatomic particles. (Most stop short of deism, on the one hand, with no intervention, and God directly causing evil actions, on the other. Some would affirm that God knows every sparrow that falls yet protest that he is not shooting them down with a BB gun.) This is not the place to try resolve these questions, but simply to note that there are a variety of options to consider when addressing what we tend to envision as unfulfilled prophecy.

Limited insights, misinterpretations

The gift of prophecy itself was also fallible in its execution, not because God errs in speaking but because prophets may err in hearing. Happily the Bible is time-tested; of the prophets of Jeremiah’s generation, for example, only Jeremiah’s prophecies proved true and made it into the Bible.

That God would guard his Word for subsequent generations, however, didn’t prevent the actual experience of distinguishing true from false prophets from sometimes being messy on the ground. Jeremiah appealed to the succession of prophetic voices and warned that the burden of proof is on the prophet of peace (Jer 28:8-9). But Jeremiah stood virtually alone against a majority of supposed prophets (e.g., Jer 5:13, 31; 6:14; 8:11; 14:13-15; 23:9, 15-16, 21, 26, 30-31; 27:9, 14-18; 29:8), who affirmed the people’s theologically-grounded conviction that, since they were God’s people and godlier than their enemies, God would surely protect them (e.g., Jer 7:4). Prophesying against God’s temple or people sounded to them like blasphemy (e.g., 20:2; 26:8-9)! In some parts of the world, many erroneous prophets today likewise promise God’s people blessings and a blissful future in this world instead of warning of the corruption and folly among God’s people that itself merits divine discipline.

Moreover, even genuine prophets could make wrong assumptions or misinterpret what the Lord was saying; Nathan had to backtrack on an assurance once the word of the Lord actually came to him (2 Sam 7:3-5). This was true because prophets “prophesy in part,” just as teachers “know in part” (1 Cor 13:9); our knowledge in this age is limited (13:9-12). That’s why John the Baptist heard of Jesus’s works and then questioned who Jesus was (Matt 11:2-3//Luke 7:18-20); John had rightly heard from God that the coming one would baptize in the Spirit and in fire (Matt 3:11//Luke 3:16), but he had not heard from God about there being two comings. What John heard from God was right, but John’s inference was wrong because he, like all prophets, had only a piece of the larger picture.

In a similar way, prophets revealed to Elisha, “Do you know that your master is going to be taken from you today?” “I know,” he replied, “be quiet.” This happened in a couple different towns, but Elisha, more mature as a prophet, held his peace until Elijah broached the subject with him. After a chariot of fire swept Elijah to heaven, the prophets thought that God’s Spirit had deposited Elijah’s body somewhere and wanted to go looking for him. They had some revelation but were much less mature and complete in their knowledge (2 Kgs 2:3-6, 16-18).

Likewise, people prophesied to Paul in every city what awaited him in Jerusalem (Acts 20:23), but he knew (also by the Spirit) that his mission was clear (20:22). Some said to him “through the Spirit,” i.e., prophetically, that he shouldn’t go to Jerusalem (21:4). After another prophecy of what awaited him (21:11), all his friends present—probably including Agabus the prophet and Philip’s four prophetic daughters—urged Paul not to continue on this road. Paul maintained his mission, however, until his friends desisted and conceded, “Let God’s will be done” (21:12-14).

How could the detractors warn Paul not to go “through the Spirit,” yet it was God’s will for Paul to go? Surely God the Father and the Spirit are better coordinated than that (Rom 8:27)? But prophetic knowledge is partial; the believers’ partial knowledge through the Spirit of what Paul would face (cf. Acts 20:23) and their love, also from the Spirit, motivated them to urge Paul not to go (21:4). Given their limited knowledge, it was even right for them to urge Paul not to go. But Paul had a higher level of prophetic knowledge concerning his own mission and nothing would stop him from fulfilling it. We know from his letters that Paul sometimes had to correct prophets, reminding them not to abuse their inspiration, to control it in the right way, and to recognize a higher level of order (1 Cor 14:30-33, 37-38). Paul worked on a higher level of inspiration and from a more mature perspective than typical local prophets (1 Cor 14:37-38).

The Lord’s return

I won’t survey here the history of failed predictions by prophecy teachers who use what I call “newspaper hermeneutics” to interpret biblical prophecies. Their approach to the text is almost completely wrong-headed, so we should not be surprised by their high proportion of failed guesses (for details, see my Revelation commentary [Zondervan, 2000], pages 23-26, 61-65; such debacles are also chronicled in, e.g., Dwight Wilson, Armageddon Now! [Baker, 1977] and Richard G. Kyle, The Last Days are Here Again [Baker, 1998]). In these cases, it’s not biblical prophecies that have failed, but modern interpreters working in almost complete isolation from ancient context.

But, in Scripture itself, what about Jesus’s apparent promise to return within a generation? Or, to use common scholarly language, the “delay of the parousia”? I cannot address this at length here, and address it in my commentaries on Matthew (Eerdmans, 2009) and Revelation (already noted). Particularly helpful here is Ben Witherington’s book Jesus, Paul, and the End of the World (InterVarsity, 1992).

Scholars approach this question from a variety of angles. N. T. Wright, for example, construes all of Mark 13 with reference to the temple’s destruction in A.D. 70; Jesus comes figuratively in judgment on the temple. My understanding is different, related to what I have already noted about prophecy usually viewing events according to their kind rather than their chronology (remember Joel’s day-of-the-Lord-portending locust plague). I believe that the temple’s destruction provided a foreshadowing of greater judgment to come, but did not complete it.

Again, prophetic blending of events by kind is not unusual in the Bible. For example, the geographically diverse origins of Jewish believers on Pentecost, the conversion of an African official from the southern ends of the earth, and the gospel reaching Rome all foreshadow in Acts the greater fulfillment of the gospel reaching the ends of the earth, announced in Acts 1:8. Likewise, Matthew incorporates end-time material from Mark 13 to turn the mission instructions for the Twelve (Matt 10) into a model for mission relevant until the end of the age (cf. 10:23), albeit with a few subsequent adjustments (28:19). One of the proposed theological solutions to the final sequence of events in Dan 11—12, which seems to leap from a very exact depiction of the Maccabean era to the resurrection of the dead, is to think in terms of deferred eschatology, possibly by coalescing the image of different abominations.

Unlike N. T. Wright, whom I do greatly esteem, I do see Jesus’s future return addressed in Jesus’s eschatological discourse, especially clearly in Matthew’s Gospel. In the context of Matthew 25 (and also the reuse of the same imagery in 1 Thess 4:13—5:9), Matthew apparently does envision Jesus’s still-future coming in Matt 24:27-31, 36-51 (a section largely parallel to Mark 13). But Matthew, who may be writing after the temple’s destruction in 70, offers clearer guidance than Mark for distinguishing between the devastation of 70 and the ultimate day of judgment that it portends. In Matt 24:3, the disciples ask two distinct questions: “When will these things be?” (i.e., the temple’s destruction, 24:1-2), and, “What will be the sign of your coming and of the age’s end?”

In light of this introduction, Jesus’s discourse addresses both topics, while moving back and forth between them. Clearly the sacrilege in the holy place that will produce desolation involves the events leading up to 70 (24:15-20). As for signs of the end, Jesus specifically disavows as signs of the end the sorts of regular historical events that his contemporaries often cited as signs of the end (24:6-8), while including as a prerequisite for the end proclaiming the good news of God’s reign among all peoples (24:14). For anyone waiting to repent until a “sign” comes, however, they will wait too late: when the Son of Man’s sign appears in heaven, Jesus is returning (24:30).

The temple’s destruction was part of “these things” to be fulfilled within a generation (24:34); Jesus’s return would happen at an hour known to no one but the Father—not even the Son (24:36). Jesus explicitly reveals that he himself does not know (at least at the time he was speaking) the schedule of his return. Yet the fulfilled destruction of the temple within a generation (found not only in Mark but implied in probably even earlier “Q” material in Matt 23:38//Luke 13:35) assures us that the promise of Jesus’s coming, also, will ultimately be fulfilled.

This depiction, then, comports well with the larger New Testament tension of the already/not yet, which is the ultimate example of having to distinguish blended prophetic events. Jesus fulfilled more prophecies than his contemporaries expected for a Messiah—God’s own coming, David’s Lord, the ultimate suffering servant, and the like. Yet he did not liberate Israel from the nations, as they expected, because they read a wrong chronology into biblical promises.

He would begin the restoration with a foretaste, such as healing and deliverance from demons, and establish his cosmic rule spiritually, but then he would remain at the Father’s right hand until the Father subordinated his enemies under his feet (Ps 110:1). There would thus be two comings. Likewise, the time of the witness to the nations predicted in Isaiah would happen between the comings, not as a result of the Messiah’s coming, which would judge the nations. Prior prophecy did not provide all the details, and especially a timeline; some features would be understood fully only once the prophecies came to pass and filled in the lacunae in our knowledge (especially, again, of timelines).

Reasons for long delay?

Still, no one anticipated such a long interim period. Those of us who have been converted since the first century (I assume that none of my readers is more than 1915 years old) can be grateful for this delay, in God’s providence, but God has presumably also been taking into account an important factor that he specified in advanced. Jesus said that the good news must be preached among all nations before his return (Matt 24:14). Despite the Great Commission of 28:18-20, however, Jesus’s followers have never completely fulfilled this mission. Some generations were quite committed and effective; for many other generations of church history, however, we may thank God for sovereignly keeping the church from killing itself off. That is, a key condition has not yet been met.

Moreover, based on Old Testament prophecies about Israel turning to the Lord, early believers in Jesus expected God to bring about the consummation once the Jewish people recognized Jesus as their Messiah (Acts 3:19-21; cf. Matt 23:39; possibly Rev 11:13), although the time remained unknown (Acts 1:6-7). But in Romans 11 Paul suggests that God had sovereignly allowed Israel’s hardness to delay that time, to give Gentiles time to repent. (When I speak of Israel’s hardness, this does not mean that God did not welcome a significant remnant; the contrast is with “Israel as a whole” [Rom 11:26], and Paul undoubtedly wanted his own ministry among the Gentiles to provoke his people to repentance.)

Once the full measure of the Gentiles had come in, the Jewish people as a whole would be saved (11:25-26). (I translate “Israel as a whole” because this is how Jewish people in Paul’s era employed Paul’s phrase that is often translated “all Israel”; it didn’t necessarily mean every individual Jewish person.) From the rest of the context of Romans, it is clear that this salvation would come through turning to Christ (e.g., 3:9-26). My understanding of Rom 11 is that Paul believed that when the Jewish people saw the promised biblical influx of Gentiles worshiping Israel’s God and observing biblical morality, they would recognize that God was fulfilling his promises through Jesus and would embrace Jesus.

Unfortunately, despite billions of Gentiles who have now professed faith in Israel’s God, Paul’s solution never succeeded—because it was never really tried. Paul warned Gentile Christians not to boast against the Jewish branches (11:18)—precisely what much of Gentile Christendom did during the subsequent history of Christian anti-Semitism (e.g., the Inquisition of Jewish converts, the drowning of converts in baptism to prevent recanting, etc.) The situation has been changing in the past generation, and many believers hope that God is finally bringing about some of these biblical expectations.

But rather than complaining about the Lord’s return being delayed, we should be participating in God’s end-time plan needed to bring it about. The good news going to all the nations is a key biblical prerequisite for the end (Matt 24:14; 28:19-20; Acts 1:8; Rom 11:25-26; cf. Rev 5:9; 7:9). That is likely why 2 Peter urges us to be “looking for and hastening the day of God” (2 Pet 3:12)—God wants everyone to have opportunity for repentance (cf. 2 Pet 3:9).

Fulfilled prophecies: the bigger picture

When exploring prophecies that did not happen the way we expected, it is important not to miss the larger picture. The Bible includes some unambiguous prophecies that clearly precede their fulfillment, would have been unimaginable in their day, and yet have been dramatically fulfilled, some within our own living memory. While we may debate about some fulfillments, other fulfillments are absolutely clear, clear enough to invite solid faith in a faithful God.

On the usual date of Deuteronomy and Jeremiah, both predicted in advance the regathering of Judah after exile. No one had historical reasons to expect a large-scale regathering after such large-scale exiles as the Assyrians or Babylonians conducted. Yet the Medo-Persian king Cyrus instituted a new policy, also attested archaeologically in the Cyrus Cylinder, of sending peoples back to their locations of origin. This was a dramatic vindication of the true biblical prophets’ message.

Compare also the humanly unexpected survival of the Jewish people as a distinct people in contrast to the fate of surrounding peoples such as Philistines, Moabites, Ammonites, Amalekites, and so forth. This is not a minor detail or a conditional prophecy, but suggests a surprising connection with the people through whom God introduced long-term monotheism into the world. Today over half the world’s population is at least officially monotheistic (largely Christians and Muslims).

I could talk further about fulfillment in Christ’s coming and what we can say on even purely historical grounds about that, but this post is already inordinately lengthy and I have addressed this question elsewhere (particularly the latter point in my Historical Jesus of the Gospels [Eerdmans, 2009]).

In the first century, the tiny church of God might have seemed destined to vanish like so many other religious sects of the day, especially when it became an object of official persecution in Rome under Nero (and in a more widespread way in some subsequent centuries). How is it that John envisions members from every people group before God’s throne (Rev 7:9)? Think also of the other Jewish messianic sects in Judea and Galilee. It seems more than coincidence that:
• This is the only one in this period that outlived the death of its founder, and the only one period that persists to this day
• Only Jesus’s movement claimed that he rose from the dead, with witnesses prepared to die for that claim
• Only Jesus’s movement claimed that they experienced the promised Spirit, on a scale exceeding even that of the Old Tesyament prophets
• Only Jesus’s movement claimed that he had sent them to the Gentiles
• Not only did they go to the Gentiles, but they had great success

Sometimes the church has spread to new regions even as it was dying or being suppressed in others. Over the course of the last century, we have witnessed the greatest shift in the Christian population in history. As Daniel Carroll Rodas and I noted in the introduction to Global Voices (Hendrickson, 2013, p. 1) “Many estimate that in 1900 … 16.7 percent of Christians lived in Africa, Asia, and Latin America. By 2010 it was 63.2 percent, and by 2025 it will be nearly 70 percent.” In the past half-century, evangelicals on these continents have multiplied roughly twelve times over, and already represent more than 80 percent of evangelicals in the world, far outnumbering those in the West.

Who would have believed it when a Jewish Christian prophet exiled to the island of Patmos had the audacity to prophesy the ultimate downfall of the empire who had banished him there? Who would have believed his vision of believers from every nation and language and tribe (Rev 5:9; 7:9)? Who could have imagined the good news being proclaimed among all peoples (Matt 24:14)? People in the Roman empire knew of India, China, of Africa at least as far south as Tanzania, and other far-flung locations, yet at the time they probably constituted far less than one-tenth of one-percent of the Roman empire.

Believers in the first century could look back on fulfilled promises of judgment against the great empires of Assyria and Babylon; the tiny people of God nevertheless remained. Today, as well, we can see God’s faithfulness in history, despite the frequent unfaithfulness of God’s people. Certainly Rome fell, but the faith some of its rulers tried to crush has spread among more peoples than ever before.

The prerequisite of spreading the good news has continued to advance, especially thanks to missions movements in Asia and elsewhere. (Proportionately speaking, Western Christians of the present generation are lagging behind, although that was untrue in many recent generations.) If we are eager to witness the consummation of God’s promises, we are invited to participate in their fulfillment. We may do so—provided our vision is not for our own comfort, but for meeting the world’s need and fulfilling our Lord’s honor.

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Should Christian wives submit to their husbands? — 1 Peter 3:1-7

Although Peter upholds societal norms for the purpose of the church’s wit­ness in society, his sympathy here in 1 Peter 3:1-7  is clearly with the woman,  as it was with the slaves in 2:18-25. He continues to advocate sub­mission to authority for the sake of witness and silencing charges that Christianity is subversive; husbands were always in the position of author­ity in that culture.

3:1.   “In the same way” refers back to the  passage on slaves  (2:18-25). Like Judaism and other  non-Roman reli­gions, Christianity spread  faster among wives than husbands; husbands had more to lose socially from conver­sion to an unpopular minority religion. But wives were expected to obey their husbands in Greco-Roman antiquity, and this obedience included allegiance to their husbands’ religions. Cults that forbade  their participation in Roman religious rites,  including prohibiting worship of a family’s household gods, were viewed with disdain, and Jewish or Christian women who refused to worship these gods could be charged with atheism. Thus by his advice Peter seeks to reduce marital  tensions and causes of hostility toward Christianity and Christians. Silence was considered a great virtue for women in antiquity.  “Chaste  and  respectful” (NASB) is the behavior that was most approved for women throughout antiquity.

3:3.   Hair was braided in elaborate man­ners, and well-to-do women strove  to keep up with the latest expensive fashions. The gaudy adornments of women of wealth, meant to draw attention to them­selves, were repeatedly condemned in ancient literature  and  speeches, and Peter’s readers would  assume that  his point  was  meant  in the same way.

3:4.   Ancients  considered  a meek and quiet spirit a prime virtue  for women, and many moralists advised this attitude instead of dressing in the latest fashions to attract men’s attention, a vice com­monly attributed to aristocratic women but imitated  by those who could afford to do so.

3:5.   Moralists  normally  added  exam­ples of such quietness to their exhorta­tions; they especially liked to appeal to matrons of the distant past, who were universally respected for their chaste behavior in contrast to many of the cur­rent models in Roman high society. Jew­ish readers would think especially of the great matriarchs, extolled for their piety in Jewish tradition: Sarah, Rebekah, Rachel and Leah, Sarah being most prominent.  The readers may think interms of head coverings that were prom­inent in much of the East, meant to ren­der the married woman inconspicuous.

3:6. Although Peter explicitly advocates only “submission” (v.1), he cites Sarah as an example even of “obedience,” which was what Roman male society demanded of their wives. That Abraham also “obeyed” Sarah is clear in Genesis (the term usually translated “listen to” in 16:2 and 21:12 also means “obey,” and in both passages Abraham submits to Sarah), but this point is not relevant to Peter’s exam­ple for wives with husbands disobedient to the word.

One should not read too much into Sarah’s calling her husband “lord”  here. The  direct  address  “lord” may  have  been used in  Hebrew  to address husbands  respectfully as  “sir,” e.g., Gen 18:12; Hos  2:16, though  it  is especially in later Jewish traditions such as the Testament of Abraham that Sarah addresses Abraham in this manner. Even in the Testament of Abraham, Isaac also addresses his mother with a similarly respectful title and Abraham so addresses a visitor, unaware that he is an angel. In another Jewish tale, Asenath calls her father “lord” yet answers him boastfully and angrily, although Peter certainly does not  suggest  such  behavior  here. In the patriarchal period, it was a polite way to address  someone of higher authority  or one to whose status one wished to defer, e.g., Jacob to Esau in Gen 33:13-14.) Jew­ish people were considered “children” of Abraham and Sarah; on Christians’  ful­ filling such a role, d. 2:9-10.

Peter’s advice is practical, not harsh as it might sound  in our culture. Although philosophers’ household codes often stressed  that the wife should “fear” her husband  as well as submit to him, Peter disagrees  (v. 6; d. 3:13-14). Husbands could legally “throw out” babies, resort to  prostitutes and  make  life miserable for their wives, although sleeping with other women of the aristocratic class or beating their wives was prohibited. (In a mid-second-century account, a Christian divorced her husband for his repeated infidelity, so he betrayed  her to the authorities  as a Christian.) Christian wives were limited in their options, but Peter wants them to pursue  peace with­ out being intimidated.

3:7.   Although  his  point  is  to address the many converted  wives with uncon­verted  husbands (3:1-6), he includes a brief word for converted husbands as well. Many philosophers, moralists and Jewish’ teachers complained about  the moral and intellectual weakness of women;  some referred  to  the  weak­ness of their bodies. Women’s delicacy was considered an object of desire, but also of distrust; even the traditional Roman legal system simply assumed their weakness and inability to make sound decisions on their own. Much of this was due to the influence of
Aris­totle, who argued that women were by nature inferior to men in every way except sexually.

Yet this weakness (Peter  may apply it only to social position) was often cit­ed as a reason to show them more con­sideration,  and Peter attaches no sig­nificance to this common term except that requirement; the rest of the verse declares women to be equal  before God, which ruined  any arguments of their  inferiority  “by  nature.” A hus­band who failed to recognize his wife’s spiritual equality jeopardized his own prayers, for the reason Peter gives in 3:12.

(Adapted from The IVP Bible Background Commentary: New Testament. Buy the book here.)

 

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Resist the devil — James 4:7 and other verses

James contrasts the peaceful wisdom which is from God (3:13, 17-18; “from above” was a typical Jewish way of saying, “from God”) with the contentious wisdom which is from the devil (3:14-15). Then he warns his audience not to try to hold both perspectives as if they were compatible. Those who try to follow both God’s and the world’s wisdom at the same time are spiritual adulteresses (4:4).

Submitting to God and resisting the devil (4:7), then, is rejecting the world’s evil way of treating one another and preferring the gentle approach that comes from God. To adopt this new way of treating others requires repentance (4:8-10).

1 Peter refers to a situation in which Christians are being persecuted (1 Pet 4:12-16); in 1 Peter 5:8-9, the devil apparently seeks to crush believers by seeking to turn them from the faith. Resisting him therefore means withstanding the persecution.

In the context of Ephesians 4:27, one resists the devil by refusing to deceive or stay angry with one’s fellow-believers (4:25-26); in the whole context of Ephesians, this is part of “spiritual warfare” (6:11-14, 18).