Returning to an exposition of 1 Peter after several weeks' break, the sermon opened the new year with 1 Peter 3:18-22, a passage the preacher called especially relevant for facing whatever the coming year holds. The text follows directly from verse 17 — "it is better to suffer for doing good, if that should be God's will, than for doing evil" — establishing that God sometimes permits His children to suffer for righteousness' sake, whether through gospel witness, costly love for the hard-to-love, outright persecution, or simply the ordinary afflictions common to a fallen world. The congregation was reminded that comfortable, first-world Christianity in Melbourne is not the global norm: Voice of Martyrs estimates some 300 million Christians face persecution across more than 60 countries, and even closer to home, ethnic Sundanese believers in West Java forfeit family standing and pribumi privileges for their faith. Peter's aim in this passage, though some of its details (verses 19-20 in particular) remain notoriously difficult, is unmistakable: to arm believers with a settled way of thinking that equips them to suffer for Christ, a call picked up again in 4:1 — "since therefore Christ suffered in the flesh, arm yourselves with the same way of thinking."

The sermon traced three of Peter's five strengthening truths from this passage (the remaining two reserved for the following week). First, believers are strengthened by remembering that Christ Himself suffered and died (v.18a) — Jesus warned His disciples that the world hated Him before it hated them, that following Him means denying oneself and taking up the cross, and that He sends His disciples out "as sheep among wolves." Suffering for righteousness is therefore not strange but confirms union with Christ; those who suffer for His name are, as Jesus said, blessed, standing in the company of the prophets who suffered before them. Second, Christ's suffering was substitutionary and victorious, bringing believers to God (v.18b): "the righteous for the unrighteous, that he might bring us to God." Sin is humanity's deepest problem, separating us from God in both physical and eternal death, but Christ — the sinless One in whom the Father was perfectly well pleased — died in the place of the unrighteous, a death described as "once for all" (hapax), permanent, final, and binding, satisfying God's justice (Romans 3) in a way that mere forgiveness without atonement never could. This is illustrated in God's patient dealings with a rebellious Israel in the Exodus and in David's forgiveness after his sin with Bathsheba and Uriah — grace that could only be righteously extended because Christ would one day bear the cost. Because Christ's death brings believers to God, suffering is never proof that God has abandoned or stopped loving us. Third, believers are comforted by Christ's resurrection and present reign (v.21c-22): raised and now seated at God's right hand, with angels, authorities, and powers subject to Him, Christ reigns sovereign over every force that might afflict His people. Drawing on 1 Peter 5:8-9 ("your adversary the devil prowls around like a roaring lion") and the image from Pilgrim's Progress of the chained lions guarding the gate — fearsome in appearance but limited in reach — the sermon argued that Satan can do nothing to God's children without Christ's permission, just as with Job, whose suffering was real and severe yet bounded by God's sovereign hand and worked ultimately for his good and God's glory. The sermon closed by urging the church into the new year with settled faith, expecting trials as normal rather than strange (1 Peter 4:12) for those who live to do God's will, resting in the certainty that the sovereign, reigning Christ who died for them will not fail to comfort, strengthen, and lead them through whatever suffering the year may bring.

Bible verses used

• 1 Peter 3:18-22 — the sermon's central text: Christ's substitutionary, once-for-all death, His resurrection, and His present reign over angels, authorities, and powers, presented as grounds for Christian endurance in suffering.

• 1 Peter 3:17 — "it is better to suffer for doing good... than for doing evil," the immediate context Peter's "for" (v.18) builds on.

• 1 Peter 4:1 — "since Christ suffered in the flesh, arm yourselves with the same way of thinking," linked forward to show the passage's ongoing argument about suffering.

• 1 Peter 4:12 — not to think it strange when suffering comes, cited to frame trials as the expected experience of those who do God's will.

• 1 Peter 5:8-9 — the devil prowling "like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour... resist him, firm in your faith," paired with the Pilgrim's Progress image of the chained lions to show Satan's limited, permitted scope of action.

• Romans 3 (referenced) — Paul's argument that Christ's death demonstrates God's justice in forgiving sinners, addressing how a just God can pardon sin without compromise.

• Job (referenced, narrative) — Job's suffering at Satan's hand yet under God's sovereign limits, illustrating that no affliction touches a believer without divine permission and purpose.