Biblion Bible Commentary
Read the introduction to 1 Peter · About this commentary
Ready to Give an Answer
1 Peter 3:13-15
13 Now who will harm you if you become imitators of that which is good? · WEB
A prophet's words to a nation afraid of a conspiracy are applied to a frightened minority, and the reply they are told to prepare is about hope rather than doctrine.
Verse 13 asks a question that experience appears to contradict — who will harm you if you are zealous for good? — and verse 14 concedes the exception immediately: but even if you should suffer. The letter does not promise that goodness protects anyone. It says that when it does not, the sufferer is blessed.
The quotation that follows was first spoken to a nation panicking about an alliance forming against it Isaiah 8:12–13. Do not fear what they fear. The prophet's answer was not that the danger was imaginary but that the wrong thing was being feared, and the antidote he gave was to treat God himself as the one to be held holy and feared. That is exactly what verse 15 does with it — sanctify Christ as Lord in your hearts — and it is the second time this letter has drawn on Isaiah 8 1 Peter 2:8.
Then the instruction most quoted from this letter, and it is worth reading for what it actually asks. Always ready to give an answer to anyone who asks — for a reason concerning the hope that is in you. The subject is not the whole faith and not a defense of doctrine; it is why these people are still hopeful, which is the question their neighbors would actually have.
And the manner is fixed with two words: gentleness and fear. An answer given any other way is not the answer asked for.
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