1PETER CHAPTER 3 - CONTEMPORARY ALIGNED VERSION (SPIRITCODE)

1. These same attitudes apply to you who are wives. Give all due honor and respect to your husbands so that if they are not drawn to God through any response to his word, they will be drawn by responding to your godly lifestyle.

2. They will be impressed by your modesty and integrity and the awesome respect you show towards God.

3. Don’t let the beauty of who you are be dependent on how stunning and fashionable your hairstyle and clothes and accessories are,

4. But let your beauty be that inner beauty of the heart, which never fades or loses color and impact. That beauty is seen in the dignity of a gentle and kind spirit, something that God values as priceless.

5. This is how in times past those special godly women who trusted in God showed an inner beauty in the way they respected their husbands.

6. Sara showed honor and respect to Abraham and was proud to call him her husband. You rank with her when you go about all that you do with virtue and poise and calm.

7. The same goes for you husbands. Learn to treat your wives the right way. Give her honor and respect, as someone under your protection, knowing that you share together equally in everything that God has given us. Otherwise your prayers will lose their power.

8. So aim at finding agreement with each other, and being kind to each other, loving one another as family, and feeling for one another as close friends.

9. Don’t try to settle old scores with reprisals, or retaliate with anger. You are here to bless one another, so realize that this is what your new life is all about. That way God will see to it that you live in his blessing.

10. If you want to really enjoy life and look forward to better days, then don’t say hurtful or deceitful things to anybody or about anybody.

11. Keep away from evil and keep on doing good. Find the pathway of peace, and walk in it.

12. God is always watching over those who live in harmony with him, and he is listening to their prayers, but he does not look with favor upon those who do harm.

13. So who can really do you harm if you have set your heart on doing what is right and good.

14. If someone does mistreat you for doing good then see yourself as being better off for it, and don’t become alarmed or distressed by fear tactics

15. Stay close to the Lord in your hearts, and you will be able to explain in simple and humble terms why you have such an expectation of God’s goodness towards you.

16. Keep your conscience clear so that if anyone falsely accuses you of doing something morally or ethically wrong they will be seen as being the one in the wrong because your behavior actually reflects the integrity of Jesus himself.

17. It is better to be mistreated for doing what is right than it is for doing wrong.

18. Jesus took upon himself a one-time suffering for all sin, the one just man for all unjust men, to bring us into God. They put his body to death but the Spirit brought him back to life.

19. And in the Spirit he went and proclaimed the truth of God’s plan to the spirits of those imprisoned by death.

20. These included the ones who would not listen to that message when God gave them ample time to hear it, as Noah prepared the ark, which finally saved only eight people from the waters

21. Water also figures symbolically in the picture of our salvation as we are baptized into the resurrection of Jesus Christ (the water of baptism not being for the cleansing of our bodies, but as the symbol of our faith response to God’s message).

22. Jesus has gone to Heaven and is seated at God’s right hand, with all angels and powers and authorities under his power and authority.