Christ Preaching to the Spirits in Prison.

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"Now that he ascended, what is it but that he also descended first into the lower parts of the earth? He that descended is the same also that ascended up far above all heavens, that he might fill all things." (Eph. 4:9, 109(Now that he ascended, what is it but that he also descended first into the lower parts of the earth? 10He that descended is the same also that ascended up far above all heavens, that he might fill all things.) (Ephesians 4:9‑10).)
"BY which also he went and preached unto the spirits in prison; which sometime were disobedient, when once the longsuffering of God waited in the days of Noah, while the ark was a preparing, wherein few, that is, eight souls were saved by water. The like figure [or antitype] whereunto even baptism doth also now save us (not the putting away of the filth of the flesh, but the answer of a good conscience toward God) by the resurrection of Jesus Christ: who is gone into heaven, and is on the right hand of God; angels and authorities and powers being made subject unto him." (1 Peter 3:19-2219By which also he went and preached unto the spirits in prison; 20Which sometime were disobedient, when once the longsuffering of God waited in the days of Noah, while the ark was a preparing, wherein few, that is, eight souls were saved by water. 21The like figure whereunto even baptism doth also now save us (not the putting away of the filth of the flesh, but the answer of a good conscience toward God,) by the resurrection of Jesus Christ: 22Who is gone into heaven, and is on the right hand of God; angels and authorities and powers being made subject unto him. (1 Peter 3:19‑22).)
The above passage cannot be well, if at all, understood, unless it is seen, and borne in mind, that it is a digression from the subject of which the apostle is treating in this, and in the following chapter. The object of this digression, as we shall presently see, is to magnify the grace of God toward some in the earlier ages of the world, who, though they were the people of God, it is true, were, like many Christians at present, unfaithful to Him—unfaithful in no ordinary way—and so were especially fitted to be held up as trophies of that grace which had redeemed them from evil.
Before entering however on the above subject, we must first consider what the apostle says in the foregoing and following verses; then we shall have the clue to the sense of the passage, namely, the digression above named. And now let us look at these verses, which I here quote, leaving out the digression, marking at the same time the place where it occurs with three asterisks. It is as follows:
“If ye suffer for righteousness' sake, happy are ye: and be not afraid of their terror, neither be troubled; but sanctify the Lord God in your hearts: and be ready always to give an answer to every man that asketh you a reason of the hope that is in you with meekness and fear: having a good conscience; that, whereas they speak evil of you, as of evildoers, they may be ashamed that falsely accuse your good conversation in Christ. For it is better, if the will of God be so, that ye suffer for well doing, than for evil doing. For Christ also hath once suffered for sins, the just for the unjust, that he might bring us to God, being put to death in the flesh, but quickened by the Spirit (=============================). Forasmuch then as Christ hath suffered for us in the flesh, arm yourselves likewise with the same mind: for he that hath suffered in the flesh hath ceased from sin; that he no longer should live the rest of his time to the lusts of men, but to the will of God. For the time past of our life may suffice us to have wrought the will of the Gentiles, when we walked in lasciviousness, lusts, excess of wine, revelries, banquets, and abominable idolatries: wherein they think it strange that ye run not with them to the same excess of riot, speaking evil of you: who shall give account to him that is ready to judge the quick and the dead. For for this cause was the gospel preached also to them that are dead, that they might be judged according to men in the flesh, but live according to God in the spirit.”
Observe, the subject of which the apostle here treats (and from which, in verses 19-22, he digresses,) suffering for righteousness' sake. Writing to saints under the pressure of trial and persecution, he seeks to encourage their hearts, to strengthen their confidence; and in so doing, observe, he sets Christ before them as their example in suffering. The blessed Lord, as he shows them, had suffered for them: the least, therefore; they could do was to arm themselves with the same mind, to be willing to suffer like Him and for Him; in order that, as He had been quickened by the Spirit, so they, by the power of the same blessed Spirit, might practically cease from sin, no longer living in the flesh to the lusts of men, but to the will of God. The ungodly world, he gives them to know, will wonder at this, speaking evil of those who break loose from its trammels. But while it thus judges, it has itself to give in its account to. Him who is ready to judge the quick and the dead, namely, those alive in the spirit, and those dead in sin; in a word, the righteous and the unrighteous, to bless the former, to punish the latter. And now mark how he concludes this encouraging passage; "For, for this cause," he says, "was the gospel preached also to them that are" dead, that they might be judged according to men, in “the flesh, but live according to God, in the spirit." Here observe, he puts before them the fact that in these sufferings of theirs God's purpose had been answered. For this cause, he tells them, the gospel had been preached to them, and to others, dead in sin, as they had previously been, that is, before the message of mercy had reached them, in order that they might, on the one hand, be judged in the flesh, that is, suffer in the flesh, according to man, or at man's hand; but, according to God, that they might live in the spirit, that is, that the life of God in their souls, through these very trials might be nourished and strengthened, that Christ in them 'night be more fully developed. Such I believe to be the meaning of a passage, which is in reality simple, but which may have seemed difficult owing to our not having sufficiently connected it with the context.
And here, before leaving this subject, let me in passing say one thing more as to the passage. It is this. “For for this cause was the gospel preached also to "them that are dead." (1 Peter 4:66For for this cause was the gospel preached also to them that are dead, that they might be judged according to men in the flesh, but live according to God in the spirit. (1 Peter 4:6).) What, we ask, does the word "also" here mean? This query we shall endeavor to answer at a further stage of our inquiry; but, as we believe it to be connected with the digression especially, on which we have not entered as yet, our observations thereon must be for the present suspended. (See page 25.)
And now for the passage at the head of this paper, the digression, as it evidently is, from the subject which I have just been explaining. This, I have begun by stating, exhibits God's grace to some in past ages, who, though the people of God, as I have said, were signally guilty; even to some of those who, in the days of Noah, while he was building the ark, were led away by evil example, were disobedient in not giving heed to his testimony, who went on with the world around them, and so were cut off by the flood. The prevailing opinion, I know, is, that there was no salvation outside the ark-that all who were drowned in the flood were eternally lost. But, I ask, is this in any way consistent with God, with His ways or His character, either before or after this period? Is there any other era in this world's history, when one, and only one, family, out of the thousands that people this earth, are thought to have escaped the eternal judgment of God? Will it be so put before the Lord's coming, when the willful king is in power, when the iniquity of man is developed, as it will be in that day, in such fearful enormity? If we consider the case, such will be seen to be quite an anomaly. With such love in His heart to poor sinners, with such a remedy at hand, with His eye on that Lamb which He had set apart in His counsels to take away the sin of the World,' is it likely that then, more than 'taw, the Lord would have suffered the whole world to perish eternally, all saving the little band in the ark? Assuredly not: it is quite a mistake, arising from the fact of its not being seen that the wide-spreading judgment of the world of that day, with the deliverance of Noah and his house in the ark, were both of them temporal;—that it was the body, not the spirit, that suffered in that general ruin. And now let us consider the case as it was with Lot, who, notwithstanding the sad disgrace which he brought on the name of the Lord, is termed "just Lot" by the apostle; and as it is, we may add, alas! with thousands at present, in this day of sad inconsistency among the people of God; there were those of that generation, who, though they had divine life in their souls—had faith in Him who was to come, even the promised seed of the woman—were nevertheless mixed up, as to their principles and ways, with the wicked. Carried down the stream of ungodliness with those of that corrupt generation, they refused to listen to the preaching of Noah, forewarning them of the flood; and they, the people of God, as they were, were involved in the general ruin. They sinned in company with the wicked, and they suffered together with them. But still, all the while, they being among the elect, this was but temporal punishment; their souls, being quickened, were beyond the reach of the destroyer. To these then it was that, during either the whole or a part of the interval between His being put to death in the flesh and His being quickened by the Spirit, that is, during the three days and three nights of His lying asleep in the sepulcher, Christ went to preach. He could not be inactive even in death: His blessed lips might be closed, His body might slumber, but not so His spirit. This, by the power of that Spirit by which He was afterward quickened and raised, was speaking to those whom He loved, to those who—notwithstanding their disobedience and blindness as to the especial testimony of that day, even the warning of Noah as to the flood—had faith, however feeble and halting, in the earliest notice after the fall of the birth of the promised seed, 44 THE SEED OF THE WOMAN," who was to destroy the works of the devil, to bruise the head of the serpent; that blessed One who in after times was revealed as the Lord, the Messiah of Israel. Their souls were in hades; and to hades He had come to show them the meaning, the value, of that which they had slighted, which they did not understand, in the days of their flesh. THE ARK WAS A MYSTERY, A SYMBOL, A TYPE OF ETERNAL SALVATION; and this the Lord, in His wonderful grace, made known to them now. And not only so, but they, receiving His testimony, were fully delivered from that state of spiritual bondage and darkness in which they had hitherto been held. And here let me say that it is quite a mistake to apply the word "prison" in this passage to a condition of punishment, or anything like it. Neither has it merely to do with locality. It also, and mainly, I believe, refers to a state or condition of soul. All the Old-Testament saints were "shut up unto the faith which should afterward be revealed;" they through fear of death were all their lifetime subject to bondage; and so they, as well as those of whom we are speaking—the elect, but disobedient ones in the days of the flood—were in prison. In fact, to say that they were so, is equivalent to saying that they belonged to the old dispensation; which was not one of liberty and light, like the present, but one of thralldom and darkness, from which none were emancipated till redemption was finished, till the blessed Surety had died, and risen again from the dead.
And now as to the character of the preaching of Christ to these souls; the burden thereof is found in the following passage: " The like figure [Or rather the antitype]
“whereunto even baptism doth also now save us (not the putting away of the filth of the flesh, but the answer of a good conscience toward God,) by the resurrection of Jesus Christ: who is gone into heaven, and is on the right hand of God; angels and authorities and powers being made subject unto him."
Here the ARK, together with the deliverance effected thereby, the salvation by water, is shown to be a type, the antitype of which is said to be BAPTISM. This, we believe, does not refer to the outward ordinance appointed by Christ; neither does it show that to which the ordinance points, namely, the baptism of the Holy Ghost; but it signifies that baptism wherewith, Christ was baptized, when He passed through the deep waters of suffering, when He bore the wrath of God on the tree. In a word, the atonement, redemption through Christ, is here meant. HIS DEATH it is which saves us, not by putting away the filth of the flesh, but by putting away sin, by cleansing the soul, by opening the lips of the believer with the answer of a good conscience toward God; which good conscience, observe, results not merely from the death of the Surety, but also from His resurrection, and still farther from the fact of His being now seated in heaven at the right hand of God, angels and authorities being made subject unto him. This is the truth which is now preached to these spirits in hades; what they disregarded, what they did not understand as expressed by the type of the ark in the days of the patriarch Noah, was made clear to them now by the Lord; and they, believing His testimony, were not quickened, not converted, it is true, because this they had been before they were lost in the flood; but they were delivered from thralldom; the darkness of their own dispensation all passed away; and so, when Christ ascended to heaven, they—their spirits I mean—ascended together with Him. Thus herein we have a marvelous proof of the blessed effects of the cross, of the efficacy of the blood of Christ to put away sin. The apostle having spoken of Christ having suffered, the just for the unjust,, he at once turns aside, he digresses in order to show how, ages before, His blood had washed away sin, even the sin of those who were so signally guilty, that their rebellion, in conjunction with that of those who were eternally lost, called for nothing less than the death of well nigh the whole human race. To them, even to them, willful and disobedient as they had been, the atonement had reached; and therefore, as soon as ever the blessed Sufferer had laid down His life, He at once went to tell these elect ones of that which He had done, of the blood which He had shed, and of their eternal interest therein.
And now for my promised explanation of the word "also." (1 Peter 4:66For for this cause was the gospel preached also to them that are dead, that they might be judged according to men in the flesh, but live according to God in the spirit. (1 Peter 4:6).) "For for this cause was the "gospel preached also to them that are dead," &e. Here the apostle evidently glances at something spoken of before; and so in the previous chapter (1 Peter 3:1919By which also he went and preached unto the spirits in prison; (1 Peter 3:19)) we read of Christ preaching, but to whom? Not to the dead, as at present, but to those who, disobedient as they had been when on earth, had nevertheless all the while the life of God in their souls. To the living in this case the gospel was preached; and having done its work as to them, having brought them forth from the prison, the, gospel is now preached to the dead, to a world of sinners, in order that they, being brought to believe in the testimony, might be judged according to men in the flesh, but live according to God in the spirit. In one case, observe, the object was to bring living souls out of bondage; in the other it is to bring the wicked to God, to redeem them from eternal perdition.
And now, if it be asked, how and when was the ark a figure of Christ in His sufferings? I reply, that I do not believe that it was so at the time when it was riding triumphantly over the face of the waters with its living burden therein, but previous to that, even at that awful and critical juncture-those forty days during which the deluge was rising. It is, I believe, a common thought with regard to the ark, that it was gently dislodged from its moorings, quietly lifted up from the earth; and that it floated away over the wide world of waters without causing either alarm or confusion to the eight souls within it. But this is assuredly wrong. The windows of heaven being opened, the fountains of the great deep broken up, the dismay and confusion of that hour must have been terrible; so much so indeed, that it called for no little faith on the part of Noah and his family to be assured that they would ever pass through the horrors of that moment; to know that shipwreck did not await them; not to fear, as they listened from within to the mighty conflux of waters above, beneath, and around them, lest they, together with the rest of the world, might perish: and perish they assuredly would have done, had there been the slightest leak or flaw in the ark. But there was none. It was perfectly sound, seaworthy, as we say; and hence they were safe; those very waters which drowned the men of that generation were the means of deliverance to them: they were "saved by water," as we read. Here then, I believe, was the time when the sufferings of Christ were foreshown. The baptism of the ark in the flood was a type of His baptism on Calvary. And what a lively image it is With the water in torrents pouring down from above, with the surging tides from beneath, eddying, swelling, raging, and foaming around it, the ark at that moment was surely a figure of Him whom all the billows, the waves of God's infinite anger, went furiously over, when He laid down His life on the tree, when He suffered for sinners. And may we not say, that as it was with the ark, so it was also with Christ? There was no flaw, no leak in the one; neither was there failure or imperfection in the other. Had it been otherwise—had there been in Him anything short of perfection, either as to Himself or His work—there would have been no salvation for us. We all must have perished. But this could not be. In Him the eye of the Father saw nothing but that in which he took unhindered delight. All was perfect, divinely, infinitely perfect, in Him. And hence, those who trust in His name are everlastingly safe, have passed beyond the reach of the destroyer, like those who after the flood had fairly set in, and the mighty life-boat in which they had taken refuge was moving unharmed, in the power of resurrection, as it were, over the wide spreading deep, with death and destruction beneath and around them, felt no fears as to the issue, well knowing that neither the ark nor those in it could possibly perish.
Then there is another point. I have said that I do not believe that the term "prison" has to do merely with locality; which shows that I do not leave the thought of locality altogether out of the question. It is then as to this that I would now say a word. Man, when he originally sprang from God's hand, was surely not made for heaven. Formed out of the dust of the earth, this earth was his birthplace, his portion, his home; and hence, had he not fallen, both Adam and all his posterity, I apprehend, would have everlastingly dwelt upon earth. But sin and death—and more than that, redemption through Christ coming in—changed the whole order of things as to man. Now a sphere altogether above and beyond this earth is opened to him. The death and resurrection of Christ have made a path for him into heaven. It was not, I believe, till after Christ had been actually slain, till he had ascended to heaven, that the way thither was opened to the people of God. Before that, with the exception of two whose eases were altogether peculiar, and who, observe, were translated without passing through death, namely, Enoch and Elijah, none went to heaven. "Dust thou art, and unto dust shalt thou return," was the solemn sentence pronounced upon man after he had transgressed. This, it is true, applied to the body; but the same thing, I believe, in a sense, was true as to the soul. It did not ascend, as it now does in the case of God's people. It went down, I believe, there to wait till the blessed forerunner should die, rise again, and ascend, so as to make a way out of their prison, even hades, into the regions of light and of love, where they now are who have departed, and, as the apostle has told us, are "WITH CHRIST." By this, observe, I do not imply that their previous condition was one of suffering or punishment, or even of sadness and gloom, as the term prison might lead to fancy. They, as God's people, were assuredly happy wherever they were, though not brought forth into the liberty that they afterward were. And here something strikes me, which I will mention. It is this: That I cannot but think that the thoughts of the heathen,, their mythological fancies as to the unseen world and the shades of the departed, had their foundation in truth, and that Tartarus and Elysium, one a place of torment and gloom, the other of dreamy enjoyment, faintly shadowed forth what, with regard to this subject, we dimly gather from Scripture: and these, observe, were not above, but beneath, so that those who visited hades, as in the case of Orpheus, that fabulous person, when he went to rescue Euridice from the dark realms of Pluto, had to descend. And here let me say, if what I have said be objected to, how was it with Samuel when brought up by the witch of Endor at the bidding of Saul? Is he seen descending from heaven? Does he not rather come from beneath? If not, what means the terrified cry of the witch, who, evidently taken by surprise, exclaims when she sees him, "I saw gods ASCENDING OUT OF THE EARTH?" And again, when asked by the king, "What form is he of?" she replies, "An old man COMETH UP." And lastly, when Samuel himself speaks, he says, "Why halt thou disquieted me to BRING ME UP?" This then may, in a measure, help us to understand where the souls even of the saints were when separate from the body, before life and immortality were brought to light by the gospel, to see that not only morally, but locally also, they were "in prison.”
And now as to the blessed Jesus Himself, we ask, Whither did He go after He had given up the ghost? If it be answered, to heaven; we reply, that' we believe that it may have been so, seeing that the whole range of the universe was freely open to Him as Lord of it all. But then, did He go only to heaven? If so, what means Eph. 4:9, 109(Now that he ascended, what is it but that he also descended first into the lower parts of the earth? 10He that descended is the same also that ascended up far above all heavens, that he might fill all things.) (Ephesians 4:9‑10), where it is so stated expressly, that "he descended first into THE LOWER PARTS OF THE EARTH?" This surely does not refer to His burial. Such terms as these, "the lower parts of the earth," can scarcely mean the tomb, where He lay for the three days and three nights that He slept, which being cut out of a rock was either on a level with the surface of the earth, or at all events only a few feet below it. We therefore feel warranted in connecting with it the passage in 1 Peter 3:19-2219By which also he went and preached unto the spirits in prison; 20Which sometime were disobedient, when once the longsuffering of God waited in the days of Noah, while the ark was a preparing, wherein few, that is, eight souls were saved by water. 21The like figure whereunto even baptism doth also now save us (not the putting away of the filth of the flesh, but the answer of a good conscience toward God,) by the resurrection of Jesus Christ: 22Who is gone into heaven, and is on the right hand of God; angels and authorities and powers being made subject unto him. (1 Peter 3:19‑22), believing it to refer to the Lord's going to preach to the spirits in prison, which occupied, if not the whole, at least part of the time while His body lay in the sepulcher.
And now, before I conclude, I would say a word as to the ordinary view of this passage; though let me premise that my object is not controversial, but without wishing or seeking to come into collision with those who view it in a different light, to say what appears to me to be the simple and natural 'interpretation thereof.
The common thought then with regard to this passage is this: That it relates to the preaching of Noah, and not of Christ personally at all; that is, that it tells us of Christ speaking through Noah, and by the lips of the patriarch, in spirit, appealing to those who, because of their disobedience in rejecting that testimony, are at present in prison. But how, I ask, if the apostle meant this, could he with any propriety say, He went and preached to the spirits in prison? Would he not rather have said in this case, that he came—came from above to this earth, not that "He went," a term which implies, his going hence, and not coming hither?
Besides which, it is of Him who had suffered for sins and risen again from the dead, of whom the apostle is speaking. "CHRIST," in this sense of the term, the Son of man, is the antecedent to the pronoun "HE" in this passage. “For CHRIST also hath once suffered for sins, "the just for the unjust, that he might bring us to God," being put to death in the flesh, but quickened by the "Spirit; by which also HE went and preached unto the spirits in prison," &c. We thus quote the passage, in-treating the reader to consider it well, and to ask himself whether the ordinary interpretation is a simple, natural, satisfactory one; whether it is such an one as would occur to him if he had never read the passage before unbiased by the opinions of others? What, we ask, do we here find? What, but that He, even Christ, led by the Spirit, which had raised Him again from the dead, went and preached to these spirits? Why speak of this as the PREACHING OF NOAH, just because the longsuffering of God in the days of Noah comes in the following verse? This surely is not the simple and obvious interpretation thereof. How, we ask, could such language as this be applied to the eternal Son before He became the seed of the woman? Was it not after He took flesh, not before, that He did things "by the Spirit?" Surely it was the Holy Ghost, rather than Christ Himself, as an individual, a person, as He is spoken of here, who was appealing through Noah to the men of that generation. "My spirit shall not" always strive with man, for that he also is flesh: yet "his days shall be an hundred and twenty years" (Gen. 6:33And the Lord said, My spirit shall not always strive with man, for that he also is flesh: yet his days shall be an hundred and twenty years. (Genesis 6:3)), is a passage which we believe to be our warrant for concluding that such was the case.
Then, as to His preaching to spirits. What should we say, if one told us that he had been preaching to a spirit, and then explained himself by saying that the individual in question was dead; that he had preached to him in his lifetime, but that now he was in a separate state, a spirit apart from the body? Who would receive such a statement as this, as to any ordinary case of the kind, or find any agreement between the fact and the explanation thereof? If this then be so, may we not say that this passage, when simply considered, we think, ought to be viewed as meaning that they who were thus preached to, at the time that the testimony reached them, were not in the flesh; that they were spirits, disembodied, unclothed, and not living men upon earth, as they were at the time that Noah addressed them? And not only so, but that they also were in prison? To say that he preached to those who then were at large, but now are in prison, is surely introducing into the passage ideas which to the simple reader it by no means conveys. To my mind, it is forcing the meaning, distorting the passage, from the desire, I apprehend, to get rid of the difficulty. What, I ask, would you say, if you were told that a certain individual went to visit another in prison? Would you thereby understand that the person thus visited then was at large, but now was in prison? And if explained to you thus, would you not at once say that the mode of stating the fact was quite incorrect?
Such then are my views of this subject. If it be objected that therein I am indulging in vain speculations, treating of a passage which, because of its peculiarity, its being so little understood, so beyond the ordinary reach of our thoughts, had better be left unexplained; I answer, that if it be, as I have said, that its object is to magnify the grace of God to the guilty, to those who were especially so, to show what the cross of Christ has effected, into what amazing depths the Son of God has descended in order to rescue His people (and this I trust I have succeeded in doing), it must be a passage of deep interest to our hearts; and we ought not to shrink from it because of its marvelous character, seeing that the whole of God's word is in every line of it a marvel, a mystery, from beginning to end, utterly beyond the reach of the natural man. If we take it, or any other passage in scripture, in a mere speculative way, it must be unprofitable; but if we remember that this is found in a most blessedly practical epistle addressed to us all, and treat it accordingly, as surely it claims to be treated, namely, as intended to illustrate the infinite depths of God's grace to His people, looking to the Holy Ghost to lead us into the truth, it cannot be hurtful; on the contrary, it must be instructive. May the Lord, in His mercy, give us more and more to apprehend what a Savior we have; to see that the reach of His mercy is infinite; that He has not only ascended up far above all heavens, but that He has also descended, descended into the lower parts of the earth, from thence to rescue His people from bondage! This we believe to be taught in the passage before us, namely, 1 Peter 3:19-2219By which also he went and preached unto the spirits in prison; 20Which sometime were disobedient, when once the longsuffering of God waited in the days of Noah, while the ark was a preparing, wherein few, that is, eight souls were saved by water. 21The like figure whereunto even baptism doth also now save us (not the putting away of the filth of the flesh, but the answer of a good conscience toward God,) by the resurrection of Jesus Christ: 22Who is gone into heaven, and is on the right hand of God; angels and authorities and powers being made subject unto him. (1 Peter 3:19‑22), as well as in Eph. 4:9, 109(Now that he ascended, what is it but that he also descended first into the lower parts of the earth? 10He that descended is the same also that ascended up far above all heavens, that he might fill all things.) (Ephesians 4:9‑10). It begins by presenting Christ as going down, in order to visit and preach to the spirits in prison; and at its close it speaks of Him as ascended and seated at the right hand of God, angels and authorities and powers being made subject to Him.