It is Easter Saturday.

The disciples spent Easter Saturday confronting their own failure, scared of those around them, with no hope left at all. The closest description we get is from the next recorded moment, in John 20:19:

the doors being locked where the disciples were for fear of the Jews

But Easter Saturday was anything but failure, and it is anything but irrelevant to the Christian life today.

The Apostle Peter, in 1 Peter 3:18-20, uses the time between 3pm Friday and his resurrection on Sunday as an encouragement for us as we face our everyday normal discouragements and sufferings in life—especially where we are suffering unjustly.

For 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 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.

This is clearly the time after Jesus’ death, but before his physical resurrection because he has been “put to death in the flesh but made alive in the spirit.”

Jesus is not himself being punished—as though the cross were unfinished (he literally said “it is finished” just before dying—John 19:30).

Jesus is not passive in the grave—Peter says he’s proclaiming.

And Jesus is not proclaiming the Law—because the context shows clearly he is proclaiming his victory: Peter has called us ordinary Christians to endure suffering and yet “Do not repay evil for evil or reviling for reviling” (3:9). This is to follow Jesus’ own example “When he was reviled, he did not revile in return; when he suffered, he did not threaten, but continued entrusting himself to him who judges justly.” (2:23). So, now, in the place of the dead talking to spirits who formerly did not obey, Jesus himself is not repaying evil for evil, but telling them about his victory on the cross. This is “the reason for the hope that is in” all Christians (3:15) that Peter has just encouraged us to talk about.

Peter recognises the reality all of us face in life that “But even if you should suffer for righteousness’ sake, you will be blessed. Have no fear of them, nor be troubled,” (3:14). And he explicitly talks about Christians being “slandered” (3:16).

This is the Christian life. And take comfort that it is normal: unjust suffering, reputational damage, gossip, slander, pressure from others, and all sorts of earthly problems that create a strong temptation to fear.

Just look at the disciples locked away (isolating themselves) in fear (overwhelmed by the majority) before they saw the risen Christ: this is the experience of many Christians.

But what was happening? Not nothing.

Here’s Peter’s point: Jesus was already proclaiming his victory. He went to the spirits in prison and said “He proclaimed that his suffering was not defeat, but victory—that sin, death, and all opposition to God had been overcome. They can’t touch my people. In the world above, they’re enduring silently… because they’re only enduring temporarily.”

Whoever you are reading this: you are almost certainly facing some unjust suffering of some kind. It is painful. It is hard. It is emotionally overwhelming and exhausting. Jesus knows and understands. But he doesn’t just empathise. He has definitively resolved this issue for you. One day he will reveal to the world that all those who are in him were declared righteous in AD 33.

To know and have this assurance, Peter says it comes to us simply through hearing this same living Word (1:23):

you have been born again, not of perishable seed but of imperishable, through the living and abiding word of God

Even those of us who are dead in our suspicion of God and his good motives are brought to life again like this simply as we hear this Gospel (4:6).

God is in a good mood with you. It is not because of you. It is because of Jesus. He has forgiven your sin in him. Immediately after securing this victory, through submitting to defeat, Jesus began preaching it even to the spirits in prison. And through this incredible Word he brings us up with him as captives from the grave.

Come along to Manchester Lutheran Church any Sunday, or join the Confessional Lutheran Church online any Wednesday, to hear this Gospel, through which God gives us this assurance.

He loves you. You may be suffering. It may seem God is silent. He isn’t. Jesus is constantly declaring his victory—won for you.