In his first epistle, Peter writes to Jewish Christians in Asia Minor (1:1), people who may be both literally and spiritually "sojourners and exiles" (2:11). He counsels them to be willing to suffer for the sake of the Gospel, following in the footsteps of Jesus.
One group that Peter addresses consists of wives whose husbands "do not obey the word" (3:1). If they live righteous lives, he says, they may win over their husbands.
He says that a beautiful character is a better adornment than beautiful clothes or jewelry, and he instructs these women to follow the example of Abraham's wife Sarah. Sarah, Peter states, "obeyed Abraham, calling him lord. And you are her children, if you do good and do not fear anything that is frightening" (3:6).
In saying that Sarah called Abraham "lord," Peter is referring to Genesis 18:12, which gives Sarah's reaction when she hears that she will be giving birth to a son in a year. At that point Sarah laughs and says, "After I am worn out, and my lord is old, shall I have pleasure?" This verse gives an indication of Sarah's respect for Abraham, since she referred to him as "my lord."
Genesis 18 does not give much in the way of examples of Sarah's obedience to Abraham. (We're not told, for example, what happened with the bread Abraham told her to make in verse 6.) So what might Peter have had in mind when he wrote of her obedience?
New Testament scholar Troy Martin noted in a 1999 paper that the Testament of Abraham, a Jewish work from either the first century BC or the first century AD, pictures Sarah addressing Abraham as "my lord Abraham" several times. So apparently by the Second Temple Period, the brief reference in Genesis 18:12 had grown into a tradition about Sarah's respect for Abraham.
Scholar Mark Kiley has argued, in a 1987 paper in the Journal of Biblical Literature, that some relevant examples of Sarah's obedience are to be found in Genesis 12 and 20, where Sarah obeyed Abraham's request that she not reveal she was his wife.
In those situations in Egypt and Gerar, Abraham and Sarah were "sojourners and exiles," people in a vulnerable situation away from home. Abraham in those cases was, like the husbands in 1 Peter 3:1, "not obeying the word." But Sarah chose to honor her husband's misguided request, placing her future in God's hands when she was abducted by foreign rulers. Those were frightening situations for Sarah, and she needed to trust God to get through them..
1 Peter 3:1-6 has been misapplied by some who have unbalanced views about submission of wives to husbands. We should remember that the Bible teaches mutual submission among Christians (Eph 5:21). Peter goes on in verse 7 to address husbands:
"Likewise husbands, live with your wives in an understanding way, showing honor to the woman as the weaker vessel, since they are heirs with you of the grace of life, so that your prayers may not be hindered."
Here Peter instructs husbands to honor their wives, and he places men and women on an equal footing, "joint heirs" of eternal life. In the case of Abraham and Sarah, we know that Abraham often honored Sarah's wishes, as in the case of their parting ways with Hagar and Ishmael (Ge 21:8-14). Since Abraham loved Hagar and Ishmael, this was not an easy thing for him to do. We note that Abraham's prayers in Genesis 20 were "not hindered."
In his epistle, Peter teaches a way of sacrificial love in imitation of Jesus, for men and women in all circumstances in life.
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