1 Peter 3:18

Verse 18. For Christ also hath once suffered for sins.

Our great example (Christ) suffered. Once, however, and no more. It is, therefore, no proof that our cause is bad because we suffer. He suffered on the cross for sins not his own. He was just, and he suffered for the unjust. The object of his suffering was that he might thereby bring us to God.

Put to death in the flesh.

Nails were driven through his hands and feet. His side was pierced. All these wounds were inflicted on his flesh his body suspended. He was upon the cross, the Roman method of capital punishment, and there his earth-life was terminated.

But quickened by the Spirit.

That is, made alive by the Spirit. The idea that Christ did not die, that some entertain, I regard as infidelity; bold, bald infidelity, and nothing else. The idea I here and now unhesitatingly repudiate. Let the Word of the living God speak. Paul to the Corinthians asserts clearly and plainly as a part of the gospel that he there preached the fact of his death. "How that Christ died" (1 Corinthians 15:3). This I believe, and here I stand and leave all consequences in the hands of a merciful and loving Father. That Christ had life in himself I do not question. That he had power to lay down his life and power to take it again he affirms, and I believe I see no difficulties here to the humble believer. The veiled things are not for our mental vision. In God's own good time they may be made plain. It is enough for me to know that he was made alive by the Spirit, and that he arose from the dead. This much God desires me to know, for he revealed just this much, and with it I am content.