1 Peter 3:18-21
For Christ also suffered once for sins, the just for the unjust, that He might bring us to God…[as] in the days of Noah, while the ark was being prepared,…eight souls were saved through water. There is also an antitype which now saves us—baptism— through the resurrection of Jesus Christ.
This is certainly a difficult passage. Perhaps this is what it means:
1. Christ suffered and died once for sins, the sins of the whole world.
2. We are saved by the grace of God, through the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. This salvation is given to us in baptism, which is an antitype. Noah was saved out of the waters of the flood. The ark was God’s means of grace. We are saved in the waters of baptism, which is for us a means of grace.
