Since Jesus Christ has gained the victory, Peter urged his readers to rededicate themselves to God's will as long as they might live. He wanted to strengthen their resolve to continue to persevere. He resumed here the exhortation that he broke off in 3:17. Generally speaking, verses 1-3 focus on Christian behavior and verses 4-6 on pagan response.
4:1 Peter's present appeal grew out of what he had just said about Christ's victory (3:18, 21c, 22). In view of His example of committing Himself to accomplishing God's will, Peter called his readers to commit themselves to the same purpose (cf. 3:15). Jesus suffered to the extent of dying, and Christians should be willing to suffer to the same extent.
In the second part of the verse, Peter probably meant that his readers had identified themselves with Christ's suffering and death (in water baptism). They should, therefore, put sin behind them and live a clean life (cf. Rom. 6:1-11).154Roman Catholic interpreters have seen this verse as support for their doctrine of purgatory. They believe that Peter meant that suffering purifies the life. The aorist participle (Gr. pathon, "has suffered") normally is antecedent in time to the main verb, which here is in the perfect tense (pepantai, "has ceased"). Suffering precedes ceasing, but Peter apparently meant that suffering with Christ should lead to a more holy life (cf. v. 2).
4:2 Peter clarified commitment to God's will in this verse. "Flesh"refers to one's mortal lifetime on earth, not to carnal living (cf. 3:18; 4:6).
". . . the flesh' is not used here or anywhere else in 1 Peter (it is used seven times; all but one of them are in 3:18-4:6) in the Pauline sense of the sinful nature in human beings (as, e.g., in Rom. 7-8), but in the normal Jewish sense of human existence as weak, fallen, and therefore subject to pain and death."155
"We may not always understand what He is doing, but we know that He is doing what is best for us. We do not live on explanations; we live on promises."156
4:3 Peter's readers had already spent too much time living for self in typically unsaved Gentile practices. Note the prominence of sexual and alcohol related activities here (as in Rom. 13:13-14; Gal. 5:19-21). This verse along with others (e.g., 1:14; 2:10) suggests that Peter was writing to a predominantly Gentile audience.
4:4 Some of the persecution Peter's readers were experiencing was due to their unwillingness to continue in their old lifestyle with their unsaved friends. This continues to be a common source of persecution for Christians today.
"Unsaved people do not understand the radical change that their friends experience when they trust Christ and become children of God. They do not think it strange when people wreck their bodies, destroy their homes, and ruin their lives by running from one sin to another! But let a drunkard become sober, or an immoral person pure, and the family thinks he has lost his mind!"157
4:5 Peter reminded his readers that God would condemn their unsaved friends' behavior. Consequently they should not return to it. The Judge was already "ready"to judge (cf. Dan. 3:15 [LXX]; Acts 21:13; 2 Cor. 12:14). Peter viewed those who slander Christians for their lifestyles as really slandering God who called us out of darkness into the light.
4:6 Because everyone will give account of his life to God (v. 5) Christians preach the gospel. We do so to enable people to give that account joyfully rather than sorrowfully. In Peter's day Christians had preached it to other Christians who had already died. Even though these brethren had experienced judgment for their sins by dying physically, they lived on in a new spiritual sphere of life since they were believers (cf. 3:18). Physical death is sin's last effect on believers during their earthly lives.
Some people have incorrectly understood this verse as teaching that after a person dies he or she will have a second chance to believe the gospel.158This interpretation clearly contradicts the revelation of Scripture elsewhere that there is no second chance after death (Heb. 9:27).
"Peter does not say that the gospel is being preached even to the dead but was preached.
"These are not all of the dead who shall face the Judge at the last day but those to whom the gospel was preached prior to Peter's writing (by the gospel preachers mentioned in v. 1, 12), who at this writing were already dead [cf. 3:19-20]."159
The verses in this pericope are a strong encouragement to endure suffering. Christ has assured our ultimate victory, and to turn back is to incur God's punishment.
