Good behavior is part of our ready defense.

1 Peter 3.15-18.

As I said in my previous piece on 1 Peter 3.15, Christian apologists love this verse because they figure it justifies everything they do to “defend” Christianity by arguing in its favor. Nevermind the fact argumentativeness is a work of the flesh; they’re doing it for Jesus, so that makes it righteous.

But when we keep reading 1 Peter 3, you’ll notice it’s not to be done argumentatively. We’re to keep things civil. Respectful. Gentle—with our emotions in check, because it’s a proper fruit of the Spirit, and actually righteous.

We’re not to resort to the misbehavior of fleshly Christians and pagans, who care far more about winning than behaving themselves and being truthful. They’re gonna violate their consciences, ’cause they’re willing to do what they know is the wrong thing—manipulate and cherry-pick data, try to get one’s emotions to override facts, insist their opponents listen to them instead of listening to the Spirit. Roman rhetoricians did all that stuff when they debated, because they sought to win no matter what. But it does matter how we defend ourselves. Still gotta avoid fraud, untruth, anger, and sin.

And if we’ve done that, our opponents can’t point to our misbehavior and use it to justify dismissing us. See?—goodness has its advantages. As Simon Peter pointed out.

1 Peter 3.15-18 KWL

15Sanctify Christ the Lord in your² minds,

always ready with a defense

for everyone who asks you² for a word

about the hope in you.

16But do it with gentleness and respect,

having a good conscience,

so when you’re² spoken about,

those who verbally abuse your² good lifestyle

might be disgraced.

17For, God willing, doing good is better

than to suffer for evildoing,

18because Christ Jesus once also suffered for sins—

the just for the unjust—

so that he could bring us to God,

putting us to death in the flesh

and making us alive in the Spirit.

Sharing Jesus kindly.

Verse 15 is a bit different in the the King James Version and Textus Receptus. First of all, it says “Sanctify the Lord God in your hearts”—it pulled Christ out of the verse and replaced him with God. Which isn’t a huge replacement; he is God. But more of the early 1 Peter copies and quotes have Χριστὸν/Hristón, “Christ,” not Θεὸν/Theón, “God.”

Why’s it important? Well, ancient Romans weren’t gonna take issue with anyone’s belief in the One God. Jews and Zoroastrians had been around for a good long while, pushing the idea of monotheism, so it wasn’t a wholly unfamiliar concept to Greco-Roman pagans. They could wholly agree with monotheists that there’s a higher power who oughta be worshiped. They simply had a bunch more of those higher powers.

But the point of difficulty for a Greco-Roman pagan would’ve been Christ Jesus. Because Jesus of Nazareth had been crucified. To their superstitious minds, someone who suffered that horrifying form of death must’ve had some really bad karma; must’ve really outraged the gods. And Christians worshiped him. And called him Lord and God. Jn 20.28 So they thought Christians were nuts: You guys worship a crucified god? You sure he’s almighty?

Yeah, he is. Voluntarily went to the cross too. Did it ’cause the sins of humanity are so bad, they deserve crucifying. So they were—but the One who took ’em down to the grave with him, came out of the grave without them, and freed us, and he lives forever. Your gods never did anything remotely self-sacrificial like that. Jesus truly is worthy of our worship.

Now, when you explain Jesus to people, and give that “ready defense,” as Christian apologists put it, for why we follow Jesus—don’t forget we gotta do it with gentleness and respect. The KJV translates this “with meekness and fear,” both of which are valid translations of πραΰτητος/pra’ýtitos, “emotional self-control,” and φόβου/fóvu, “cautious anxiety.” We mustn’t be jerks to people who don’t know any better; we mustn’t be arrogant just because our Lord’s a real person and their lords are (to them, anyway) pleasant ideas. We’re here to point them to Jesus, not force him down their throats.

Greek New Testaments nowadays stick the gentleness and respect part in verse 16, rather than keep it with verse 15 like the Textus and KJV. Why’d the words switch verses? Because the Textus left out the word ἀλλὰ/allá, “but,” which—again—you’ll find in the best early copies and quotes of 1 Peter. When you stick allá where it goes, it means you can either translate verses 15-16 as a big run-on sentence—which wouldn’t be wrong; 1 Peter reads like Peter is dictating the letter to a scribe who’s writing everything down—or as two sentences. But if you’re gonna split the sentence up by verses, the verse should be split at the conjunction allá. So the Westcott-Hort Greek NT moved it over, and every Greek NT since has likewise moved it over. Today’s bible translations have followed suit.

Yeah, all these differences enrage people who worship the KJV, who claim that translation and the Textus are infallible bibles, and have all sorts of wacky reasons why they believe this. Ignore their wack. Their rage should tip you off about how there’s something amiss about them.

Same as our rage, whenever we forget we’re meant to share Jesus kindly. With meekness and fear, with gentleness and respect, or however other bibles put it. When we refuse to argumentatively go to battle for Jesus, and rip apart our opponents, they have no reason to oppose us with that same argumentative rage. Like Peter put it, “those who verbally abuse your good lifestyle might be disgraced.” Every onlooker will immediately realize, “Wow, are they disproportionally angry. What’s their problem?” Usually a guilty conscience, and their self-preservation instinct kicked in to defend it, and is fighting to the death against something that’s not threatening death—it’s offering life! Now, if you’re not sharing Jesus kindly—if instead you’re threatening doom and hellfire—onlookers will figure they’re entirely justified in pushing back hard. So don’t give them that kind of ammunition! Share good news. Nothing else.

Stick to good news.

You notice in his letter, Peter never misses an opportunity to remind his readers of how awesome God is, and what Jesus has done for us. In verses 17-18 he does it again. Don’t do evil; do good; God doesn’t want us to suffer. Jesus came to earth to take our suffering upon himself, and make us alive in the Holy Spirit.

So when we’re sharing Jesus, when we’re answering pagans’ questions about why we believe, why we hope, what Jesus means to us, who is this Jesus person anyway: Don’t make ’em suffer! Don’t agitate them. Don’t enrage them.

Well, don’t do it if you can help it. Back in Acts, Peter himself kinda did it unwittingly. Give him a break; he was a really excitable young man back then.

Acts 5.24-33 NET

24Now when the commander of the temple guard and the chief priests heard this report, they were greatly puzzled concerning it, wondering what this could be. 25But someone came and reported to them, “Look! The men you put in prison are standing in the temple courts and teaching the people!” 26Then the commander of the temple guard went with the officers and brought the apostles without the use of force (for they were afraid of being stoned by the people).

27When they had brought them, they stood them before the council, and the high priest questioned them, 28saying, “We gave you strict orders not to teach in this name. Look, you have filled Jerusalem with your teaching, and you intend to bring this man’s blood on us!” 29But Peter and the apostles replied, “We must obey God rather than people. 30The God of our forefathers raised up Jesus, whom you seized and killed by hanging him on a tree. 31God exalted him to his right hand as Leader and Savior, to give repentance to Israel and forgiveness of sins. 32And we are witnesses of these events, and so is the Holy Spirit whom God has given to those who obey him.”

33Now when they heard this, they became furious and wanted to execute them.

I mean, the Judean leadership was responsible for sentencing Jesus to death, and handing him over to the Romans to execute. Including these facts in the gospel isn’t slander. But it agitated the head priest and Judean senate because frankly, rejecting and killing your Messiah really looks bad, whether you believe he’s Messiah or not. And getting on the head priest’s bad side did not help the apostles in the long run. He was more likely to get ’em persecuted, to encourage the Romans and their procurators and puppet kings to hassle them. Had the apostles been more thoughtful, they could’ve avoided a lot of the animosity the Judean leaders had for them. Peter knew this from personal experience.

Too often, Christians come thundering into a community, dead set on doing some evangelism. And it doesn’t matter at all to them what anybody in leadership thinks. They don’t care about the mayor of the village; they don’t care about the other Christian leaders in the community; they don’t care that their sound system is too loud; they don’t care. They’re not kind people anyway. Too much zeal, not enough fruit. They might evangelize a lot of people regardless… but they could’ve reached way more people had they actually behaved like Jesus.

So here’s your reminder: Feel free to explain your faith. Feel free to share our Lord with everybody. But do it right. Do it like Jesus would.