Complementarian is a strange word. I never heard my parents or my pastor use it as I was growing up. I can’t recall the first time I heard it — though it was likely sometime in the early 2000s, as a young married woman, sitting under the teaching of John Piper.

However, long before I heard the strange word, I had seen the concept. I saw it when my dad’s heart to be generous and hospitable was taken up by my mom and transposed into a welcoming home that operated like a bed-and-breakfast for family, friends, and strangers. I saw it when my dad would take the initiative to warm the car and pull it up to the curb, always hopping out to open the door for my mom — my fearless mom, who wielded chainsaws and rode young green horses, yet gladly welcomed this kindness from her husband. I saw it when my mom helped shoulder my dad’s call to be a physician, making the best of a constantly changing schedule. I saw it in my dad’s hard work and provision for us and in my mom’s labor in the home to turn that provision into something truly wonderful. And I saw it when my dad led us in prayer and gratitude to God for everything, especially God’s Son.

Woven Through All of God’s Word

Yet there was another place I’d seen complementarity: the Scriptures. From the opening pages — the genesis of Adam and Eve — to the final chapters revealing the marriage supper of the Lamb, this concept of part and counterpart; of the distinctiveness of man and woman (in Hebrew, ish and ishah); of the design and order of husband and wife, lord and lady, bridegroom and bride, was everywhere. From Sarah’s willingness to obey Abraham to Boaz’s noble protection of Ruth, the stories of Scripture show us both the beauty of complementarity and the consequences of rejecting God’s design for men and women — as when Adam submitted to Eve rather than to God in the garden.

“The husband is head, and the wife is glory — just as Christ is head, and the church is body.”

Even the gospel itself is intertwined with this foundational reality of creation: the husband is head, and the wife is glory — just as Christ is head, and the church is body (1 Corinthians 11:3; Ephesians 5:22–33). The husband loves his wife, and the wife respects her husband — just as Christ lovingly sacrifices, and the church gladly submits and receives (Ephesians 5:22–33; Colossians 3:18–19). I had observed, too, how the Epistles reiterate the distinctions between men and women as they give separate and particular instructions for older women, younger women, older men, younger men, wives, husbands, and widows (Titus 2:1–6; 1 Timothy 2:8–15; 1 Peter 3:1–7).

By the time the strange word complementarian became part of my vocabulary, with its accompanying pushback against the idea that men and women are interchangeable, I didn’t need to be convinced it was true or scriptural. I’d seen it — both in print and in life.

Speed Bumps Along the Way

Of course, seeing a reality and living a reality are two different experiences. I could see the reality of complementarity. I could see the beauty of God’s intent for men and women. But stepping into that reality as a young woman and trying it on was more difficult. From the time I was little, the word equality was a good word. Especially as an American, I was proud to consider everyone equal. I’d heard that egalitarianism was simply that: equality between men and women. Who could be opposed to equality?

Thankfully, a complementarian position was able to account for both the equalities and the inequalities of men and women. To embrace the Bible’s teaching on men and women is to acknowledge an equality of value alongside physical and positional differences.

“What a gift to be a woman! What a gift to be endowed with a woman’s body and to have a woman’s mind and instincts!”

I found over time that, rather than bristling at this reality, there was great relief in stating the obvious. I came to acknowledge that treating men and women as the same was actually an affront to God — and at the same time, I became free to acknowledge that how he designed men and women was truly good and beautiful. Many women are indoctrinated by the world to believe that we will lose something essential in ourselves if we admit that we are physically weaker or inherently different than men. When we acknowledge that we don’t choose what we are but are created to be what we are — man or woman — the world teaches us to shudder and rebel, but God teaches us to say thank you for his good gift. What a gift to be a woman! What a gift to be endowed with a woman’s body and to have a woman’s mind and instincts!

Two Precious Tutors

Two books were especially helpful to me as I began to really practice the complementarity I saw in Scripture, both in my marriage and in how I conceived of myself as a Christian woman in the world. The first was Matthew Henry’s The Quest for Meekness and Quietness of Spirit, and the second was Jim Wilson’s How to Be Free from Bitterness. Neither book mentions complementarianism, neither is about the differences between men and women, and neither is written particularly for women. But both books helped me gain a frame of mind and heart and soul that served my submission to God and his ways — and helped me flourish as a result.

The books gave me a window into the inner workings of a heart that truly trusts and obeys God. And it just so happens that the kind of heart that trusts and obeys God is the same kind of heart that does not rebel against God-ordained relationships of authority and submission. Whether submitting to the elders of my church or the authorities who make our traffic laws or my own husband as he leads us on a new adventure, my frame of heart and mind must be wholly trusting God. I need a stability of soul born of meekness and a faith-filled heart that is free from bitterness.

Henry and Wilson fanned the flames of my happiness in day-to-day life as they helped me turn from sins of grasping, bitterness, and inward strife and replace them with simple gratitude, peace, and joy in Christ. I commend them to you. My happiness in complementarity was directly tied to my own sanctification and my willingness to bow my knee in submission to King Jesus, no matter what the world or anyone else thought.

To agree with God’s word that a wife ought to submit to her husband (Ephesians 5:22), or that woman is the glory of man and man is the glory of Christ (1 Corinthians 11:3), or that God himself ordains who is a man and who is a woman — these positions won’t earn you accolades or applause in many circles. But agreeing with God — even more, loving what God has said and done — will bring you peace and hope and joy, both now and in the age to come. Complementarian is a strange word, but that’s alright. Christians have often been strange to the world.

http://rss.desiringgod.org/link/10732/14749309/individualism-and-solidarity-in-the-church

Audio Transcript

Do unbelievers get a second chance at salvation after death? This is a common question in the inbox. It’s an important question. It’s so important that two people asked the same question, at the same time, inspired by the same biblical text. “Hello, Pastor John, my name is Florin. I’m Romanian but live in London. I have asked a few different pastors, but they could not give me an answer. Can you explain 1 Peter 3:19–20 and 1 Peter 4:6, this idea that the gospel was preached to the dead? Thank you!” And the question also recently came from a listener named Jason. “Pastor John, could you please explain 1 Peter 3:19 to me? I’ve heard so many explanations for what Jesus was doing and why he was there. Some go so far as to imply a second-chance salvation. Is there one?”

I’ve returned to 1 Peter 3:19 over and over in the last fifty years, and I have to admit that I don’t have complete confidence that I know for sure what Peter is referring to when he says that Christ in the spirit preached to those who are now in prison. Here’s what that verse says so everybody can be up to speed with us.

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 [that is, in that spirit] he went and proclaimed to the spirits in prison, 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 as 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. (1 Peter 3:18–22)

Now, I read the whole thing because the context is going to make a difference in the various interpretations that are put forward.

Three Main Interpretations

Here’s what Martin Luther said about this text: “A wonderful text is this, and a more obscure passage perhaps than any other in the New Testament, so that I do not know for a certainty just what Peter means.” That’s Martin Luther. That’s pretty much the way I feel as well. I don’t know for certain. So I’m going to mention the three main interpretations, tell you the one I lean toward and why, and then step back and say a word about handling texts where you’re not sure all that it means.

Hope for the Dead

So here’s the first one. One interpretation is that, between Good Friday and Easter, those days, Christ in the spirit, in his spirit, went to the place of the dead and preached. This is linked then to Ephesians 4:8, where it says that “when he ascended . . . he led a host of captives” (Ephesians 4:8; cf. Psalm 68:18). So he led Old Testament saints out of the temporary place of the dead with him into heaven.

Now this may well be the right interpretation, but it does seem odd to me that the focus of Jesus’s preaching would seem to be limited to those who did not obey in the days of Noah. If the reference is to all the Old Testament saints — and the fact that they disobeyed is an odd way of referring to them as well — then I’m still puzzled. That may be right. I’ve got good friends who hold that view. It’s a pretty traditional view.

Victory over Imprisoned Angels

Here’s the second one. Another interpretation argues that the preaching of Jesus after the crucifixion refers to his ascended proclamation of victory over those angelic forces referred to at the end of the passage: “with angels, authorities, and powers having been subjected to him” (1 Peter 3:22). This view says that the spirits in prison are the evil angels in prison for their disobedience, and Jesus is simply announcing after the resurrection his victory over them.

And again, that may be right. I’ve got a good friend who wrote a commentary who thinks that’s the right interpretation. But I have a hard time following Peter’s thought from the days of Noah to that conclusion.

Preaching Through the Prophets

Here’s the third view, and it’s the one I have leaned toward. I’ve circled back to it again and again. The view that I keep coming back to seems attractive to me because the strangeness of this text has already been set up for us by the strangeness of another text back in 1 Peter 1. Here’s what 1 Peter 1:10–11 says: “Concerning this salvation, the prophets who prophesied about the grace that was to be yours searched and inquired carefully, inquiring what person or time the Spirit of Christ in them was indicating.” That’s amazing. He’s talking about what the Spirit of Christ in them — in the prophets like Noah, perhaps — “was indicating when he predicted the sufferings of Christ and the subsequent glories.”

So Peter has already prepared us for thinking that, during the Old Testament, Christ in his Spirit went and preached through the prophets. First Peter 3:19 can very legitimately be translated to say that Jesus, “In the Spirit, having gone to the spirits who are now in prison, proclaimed to them in the days of Noah . . .”

“The very Spirit that raised Jesus from the dead was the Spirit in which he had gone and preached through Noah.”

On this interpretation, there’s no preaching to the dead between Good Friday and Easter. Whether that happened or not, I’m saying that’s not what this text is about. Instead, there’s a reference to the fact that the very Spirit that raised Jesus from the dead was the Spirit in which he had gone and preached through Noah to the world of Noah’s day. Most people were disobedient, and they’re now in prison, awaiting their final judgment.

Now, it seems to me that this interpretation has the advantage of making good sense out of why there is a focus on Noah and the people of his day. Why did Noah even come to Peter’s mind at this point in the argument? What brought him to mind as he was writing this text?

Noah’s Day and Peter’s Day

Now, I said that I would try to explain how I think about handling texts where I’m not clear on some things. Well, in this case, what I do is step back and look at the larger flow of Peter’s thought and ask, “What’s he trying to do in 1 Peter 3:18–22? Why did the issue of Noah, and the disobedience of so many people, and the salvation of so few in the ark — namely, eight — why did that even come to his mind?”

And I think the answer is that the churches that Peter was writing to were very small and insignificant in comparison to this gigantic Roman Empire. Most in that empire were being disobedient to the gospel in Peter’s day. The salvation of such a few people in this huge Roman empire caused Peter to think of the days of Noah, when only eight people came safely through the waters of judgment. And Peter says over in chapter 4 that, in his day, it’s time for judgment to begin with the household of God, similar to the days of judgment in Noah’s day (1 Peter 4:17).

“The whole world may laugh as in the days of Noah, but by faith we come safely through the judgment.”

And as he ponders this parallel between the salvation of a few in Noah’s day and the salvation of a few through baptism in his own day, it strikes him, perhaps — as he thinks back on 1 Peter 1:10–11, where Christ was preaching through the prophets in the Old Testament — that it might be helpful to mention that the analogy between Noah’s day and his own day is even fuller and deeper than the people might think. In other words, the analogy is not just that vast numbers of people were unbelieving and disobedient in Noah’s day, just like they are in Peter’s day, and only a few were saved through the ark, just like only a few were being saved through the waters of baptism. The analogy also extends to the fact that Jesus himself — by the Spirit, through Noah — was preaching in the days of Noah, and Jesus is preaching by the Spirit through the apostles in Peter’s day.

Saved Through the Waters

So even if I’m wrong about my understanding of the details of Christ preaching through Noah to the world of his day, I think this bigger picture is right. That’s what I meant when I described trying to understand what you do with the text if you don’t understand all the details. What’s the bigger picture that you can see clearly? I think it’s right and has a huge significance for that day and for ours.

Noah came to Peter’s mind because only a few were saved in the ark under God’s judgment. And now salvation through faith, through baptism, is like that. Through water, God saves his people, whether few or many, at any given time and place. And we should rejoice that Christ died to bring us to God through his judgment. The whole world may laugh, as in the days of Noah, but by faith we come safely through the judgment.