3690 — The Spirits in Prison
By Editor
"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; by which also He went and preached unto the spirits in prison; which sometime were disobedient, when once the long-suffering of God waited in the days of Noah, while the ark was a preparing, wherein few, that is, eight souls were saved by water." It seems to us there can be no question over the 17th and 18th verses. They are a very clear statement of what they mean. It is better to suffer for doing well than for doing evil. Christ also has given us an example in suffering for us: He was put to death in the flesh while He was here upon the earth; He was made alive by the Spirit, or quickened by it—that same Spirit by which He went and preached to the spirits in prison. "Spirits in prison" refers to those who are shut up in the prison-house of sin. Part of our Lord's mission, of course, was to open "the prison to them that are bound." Isa. 61:1; Luke 4:18. Jesus came to deliver the captives. But this was not a work which He did while here upon the earth alone, but at all times. He is "Jesus Christ the same yesterday, and to-day, and forever." Heb. 13:8. 2. "He went and preached." When? The text itself tells us: "When once the long-suffering of God waited in the days of Noah." That was just before the Flood; and the next clause also tells us—"while the ark was a preparing." Here are two adverbial phrases that tell us when it was our Lord preached. He preached when these souls were disobedient, suffering by their disobedience, in the days of Noah, while the ark was in preparation. 3. How He preached is told in the 19th verse—"by which" (by the Spirit). Noah was a prophet of God, and a servant of God; and Peter has already told us in the same epistle, verses 10, 11 of the first chapter: "Of which salvation the prophets have enquired, . . . searching what, or what manner of time the Spirit of Christ which was in them did signify, when it testified beforehand the sufferings of Christ, and the glory that should follow." It was Christ's Spirit testifying through Noah God's message to those who were disobedient at that time. Thus understood there is no contradiction with other scriptures.