Leithart
1 Peter 3:7: You husbands likewise, live with your wives in an understanding way, as with a weaker vessel.
As Toby has pointed out in the sermon, Paul describes the wife as a “vessel” that a husbands is to treat with honor. This is, as Toby pointed out, a priestly image, since the word Paul uses refers in the Old Testament to the “vessels” of temple worship – the plates and bowls and cups and forks and snuffers. These are sanctified things that belong to Yahweh, and therefore must be treated with reverence.
Wives are holy vessels because they are fellow heirs of the grace of life. They are holy because they belong to God and are sanctified by the Spirit. Therefore, men must treat their wives with the same reverence the Aaronic priests showed to the furnishings of the temple.
There’s another aspect to this as well. The same word for “vessel” is used in the Old Testament for weapons. The “gear” of a soldier – his armor, sword, shield, spear – is his set of “vessels.” The connection of liturgical and military vessels is explicit in some passages. Moses sent Phinehas to the battle against the Midianites armed with the holy vessels of the tabernacle, and later the priests blew the ram’s horn trumpets, which were among the “vessels” of the tabernacle, to bring down the walls of Jericho.
God’s chief holy things in the New Covenant are people. We the saints are the sanctified vessels of the Lord and as His holy things, we are also the weapons of His warfare.
This throws light back on 1 Peter 3. Husbands are to regard their wives as “holy things,” since they belong to Jesus and are sanctified by the Spirit. But husbands should also regard their wives as weapons of their warfare. As the people of the Last Adam, we are called, men and women together, to rule the earth, to fill and subdue it. Men can’t do this alone; women are partners in that conquest and that rule, warrior queens conquering alongside their warrior kings.
This also highlights what we do in worship, and here at this table. We are the holy ones, and God puts these “vessels” in our hands as the weapons of our warfare – this book, this bread, this wine, this water, these hymns, these prayers. This is the gear that our Commander, Jesus, has issued to us so we can go about tearing down strongholds and taking every thought to the obedience of Christ.
When we assemble for worship around Word and Table, we are assembling as God’s hosts, His conquering armies. We assemble here as the Lord’s vessels, so that Jesus, our great husband, can deploy us as His warrior bride.
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